Mike Johnson invited an anti-LGBTQ+ hate preacher to give opening prayer in Congress

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) invited anti-LGBTQ+ extremist pastor Jack Hibbs of Calvary Chapel in Chino Hills, California, to deliver the opening prayer in the House of Representatives on Tuesday.

LGBTQ Nation reported yesterday on Hibbs’s appearance in the House. The House Office of the Chaplain has now disclosed that Johnson was the member of Congress who invited Hibbs to give the prayer.

Related:

Mike Johnson says God told him he’s Moses while getting award at hate-filled gala

Other speakers at the gala compared homosexuality to pedophilia.

Hibbs has marched on Sacramento to stop a bill that would have labeled conversion therapy a form of consumer fraud, rallying with the self-proclaimed ex-LGBTQ+ group “Changed.” He said that teachers should out LGBTQ+ students to their parents in order to fight the “demonic and dark satanic powers” in public schools that are “sexualizing” and “mentally abusing” children. He said that “Satan himself” planned the “transgender agenda.”

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“When two people of the same sex get together, it’s out of sheer wanton lust and pleasure only for self,” Hibbs preached in 2021. “Nothing comes of it. No life can come from it. No family can come from it.”

“Homosexuality—L-B-G-T-Q actions—prove the existence of God, because God’s word says this would be some of the outcome and actions of the Last Days.”

Media Matters also notes that Hibbs has also made antisemitic and islamophobic comments in the past.

Johnson has not said why he invited Hibbs to be a guest chaplain in the House of Representatives, but Johnson shares many of Hibbs’s views when it comes to LGBTQ+ people.

Johnson is on the board of a conservative Christian publishing company that says MPOX is the “appropriate penalty” for being gay. His wife, Kelly, runs a Christian counseling service that compared LGBTQ+ identities to bestiality on its website. In an October 3 call with the World Prayer Network, Johnson said that America is “dark and depraved” because there are too many LGBTQ+ people.

Mike and Kelly Johnson have complained about the non-existent “lesbian toys” in Disney’s Toy Story 4, criticized “woke corporations” like Bud Light and “satanic” Disney, and praised anti-transgender broadcaster Matt Walsh during Pride Month on their podcast this year.

Johnson has previously said that same-sex marriage will lead to “chaos and sexual anarchy” and “place our entire democratic system in jeopardy by eroding its foundation.” He claimed legalizing same-sex marriage would lead to “pedophiles” seeking legal protections for having sex with kids and people trying to marry their pets. He has also said, “Homosexual relationships are inherently unnatural… ultimately harmful and costly for everyone.”

He has sought to criminalize private gay sex between consenting adults, called gay marriage the “harbinger of chaos,” and said gay people should not be a protected class because they “are capable of changing their abnormal lifestyles.” He also believed the fall of ancient Rome was caused by “rampant homosexual behavior.” 

Johnson previously served as a senior attorney and national spokesman for the anti-LGBTQ+ hate group Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), filing lawsuits against same-sex marriage, same-sex adoption, and same-sex marital benefits. When recently asked about his numerous anti-LGBTQ positions, Johnson told a Fox News interviewer that he didn’t remember some of them.

In 2022 he endorsed a book full of conspiracy theories that called out Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg a “queer choice” for the Cabinet, accusing Buttigieg of having “queer sanctimony,” and calling him “openly, and obnoxiously, gay.” The book calls him “Gay Mayor Pete Buttigieg.”