videogamer
Banned
LAS VEGAS The preacher with a hole in the knee of his jeans and a pocketful of prayer cards waded through the late-night crowd young men with hats on sideways, women in saucy dresses, hired hands passing out fliers for escort services. Tom Griner turned a raised palm toward Robert Jones, a 21-year-old visiting from Illinois.
"Jesus saves!" Griner shouted.
"Maybe," said Jones, not stopping to chat. "But he didn't win me $500 last night."
The way the American Civil Liberties Union sees it, the 1st Amendment was made for nights like this. The organization in recent months has turned a small band of street preachers into unlikely symbols of free speech fighting, sometimes in noisy confrontations with police and casinos, for the preachers' right to spread the gospel on the Las Vegas Strip.
The alliance is an awkward one.
The preachers openly despise the ACLU, which they view as an insufferably liberal institution, albeit one that had lately seemed like their only friend in town.
The ACLU doesn't think much of the preachers' condemnations of, well, a lot of people, including "fornicators," Democrats, women who seek abortions and people who have not accepted Christ as their savior.
And the Las Vegas establishment doesn't think much of the whole issue; evangelical preachers bellowing about "homos," "porno freaks" and the devil don't exactly fit with the anything-goes marketing scheme that has served this city well.
But the ACLU forged ahead because, the organization said, a long-percolating dispute between the casinos and the preachers threatened the sanctity of the quintessential American venue for free expression: the sidewalk.
This fall, the group's campaign resulted in a tenuous agreement among casinos, police and city leaders that allows the preachers to stay. If the agreement holds, it could mark the end of a decade-long fight to give control over the sidewalks back to the public. It was a fight that had been taken up, at one time or another, by a motley collection of people who want to express their opinion in public, including advocates for the homeless, animal rights activists, war protesters and hawkers for erotic dance clubs.
"What the court said, basically, is that if it looks like a sidewalk, smells like a sidewalk and functions like a sidewalk, then by golly it's a public sidewalk," said Gary Peck, executive director of the Nevada ACLU.
Early this year, however, it became clear that casinos, private security firms and some police officers weren't aware of the ruling or were choosing to ignore it. Casino security repeatedly told the preachers that they were on private property and needed to leave. Police officers insisted that the preachers move even after the preachers produced copies of the court opinion. Griner was even cited with obstruction, a misdemeanor, for blocking the sidewalk.
Griner and fellow preacher Jim Webber began videotaping their encounters with security personnel and police officers. Peck and Allen Lichtenstein, Nevada ACLU's general counsel, became a free-speech SWAT team, descending on the Strip on a moment's notice to make impassioned, impromptu arguments that the preachers could stay confrontations that drew crowds of curious tourists.
Griner and his wife, Kathie the church's office manager have been married for 25 years. They have three daughters, ages 19 to 23. They are avowed virgins who preach abstinence to teenagers. Griner says he believes that Democrats, as a rule, are hostile toward religion. He donates money frequently to conservative candidates and to the state and national Republican parties.
"Preaching" is something of a misnomer; Griner speaks sparingly and spends most of his energy trying to press prayer cards into the hands of pedestrians.
When someone stops to engage him, he is happy to oblige. He preaches that homosexuality is "against nature," adding: "We're not here for them." He preaches that abortion should be illegal in all cases, including instances of rape, incest or when a woman's life is in danger.
The preachers have been taunted and cursed by passersby, and concede readily that, to some degree, they ask for it. Griner sees their crusade as a calling. He believes he is a "messenger from God," that Christians have become caught up in political correctness and in trying to "make friends." And he believes the church should return to the days of fire and brimstone.
"We are disturbing the atmosphere out here, but doing it in a positive way," Griner said. "People are out here to sightsee and people are out here to party. But you never know when someone is going to walk by and be ripe for this conversation."
On this night, as on many others, no one was. The Griners, joined by one member of their congregation, stood on the sidewalk in front of the Bellagio for nearly three hours. There were no dramatic conversions. There was only one substantive conversation and that was with a devout Christian who scolded Griner for scaring people away from their religion.
Another woman who walked by with friends took a look at Griner's sign and shouted: "I am a sinner and I am going straight to hell!"
The crowd cheered.
"It doesn't have to be that way," Kathie Griner called after her.
"I want it that way!" the woman yelled back.
For the most part, however, the Griners were simply ignored. After their lengthy struggle to be there at all, they made clear that they were satisfied with that. And some onlookers were impressed with their fortitude, given the surroundings.
"If you believe in it, you should push it," said Garrett Midkiff, a 24-year-old student visiting from Arizona. "Don't get me wrong, I'm still going to go gamble and drink some more. But I look up to them for doing this. And what better place to do it than the city of sin?"
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-na-preach10nov10,1,1704199.story