Editor’s note: This article contains language that some might find disturbing. The purpose of this article on Stedfast Baptist Church is to report news that the ChurchLeaders editors believe is important for the church to know. This article is not an endorsement of the perspectives being reported.
A letter claiming to be from members of a Texas church notorious for saying that gay people should be executed was reportedly sent to a TikTok influencer who identifies as LGBTQ+ and said that the letter was supposedly from new neighbors.
Among several key beliefs stated in the letter were “that Jewish people and Muslim people are pedophiles” and that “LGBTQ people are groomers and unclean and should be lined against a wall and shot in the back of the head.” The influencer, who was unnerved by the letter, asked followers for “suggested actions.”
“Not your usual content here,” said the TikTok influencer, who goes by the handle @enbyofcrows and whose name appears on the platform as “Crow.” Crow showed viewers a typed letter Crow said had been taped back together after the influencer’s wife ripped it apart in anger. Crow read the repaired letter aloud in a TikTok video, saying it was from neighbors who had moved in recently and lived directly across the street.
“As devout Christians, we feel it is our duty to reach out to you and spread our faith. We are longtime members of Stedfast Baptist Church,” the letter began, explaining that “our church is one of a growing number of New Independent Fundamentalist Baptist churches spreading across this country.”
Stedfast Baptist Church Denies Sending Letter
Stedfast Baptist Church is a church that has made headlines in recent years for a number of incendiary statements. The church was evicted in February 2022 from a building it was renting in Hurst, Texas, after Pastor Jonathan Shelley said that gay people are “worthy of death.” The congregation then moved to Watauga, Texas. Stedfast was again evicted later that year, and the church subsequently purchased a building in Cedar Hill, Texas.
While in Watauga, church leader Dillon Awes said during a sermon that gay people “should be sentenced with death, they should be lined up against the wall and shot in the back of the head! That’s what God teaches.”
Shelley has repeatedly used homophobic slurs, said that Jewish people “want to destroy everything that’s holy and everything that’s righteous,” and has said that women don’t earn as much as men because “they’re not as good at working.”
Crow first posted about the letter at the end of August and posted additional updates in the weeks that followed. The first of “five main points of belief” stated in the letter is “the King James Bible is the one true version, the inherent Word of God. All other versions are blasphemous. We believe this so strongly that we have Bible burnings as least once a year where we will burn all other versions of the Bible.”
“So far, not overly concerning,” said Crow. “Freedom of speech—get it.”
On Oct. 7, polemical news site Protestia posted a video purporting to show Shelley leading Stedfast members, including children, in burning copies of the Bible when the church was still in Watauga. In a statement to ChurchLeaders, Stedfast said the video actually showed Pure Words Baptist Church in Houston.
The letter went on to say, “We believe that Jewish people and Muslim people are pedophiles and should be cast into the fire,” and, “We believe LGBTQ people are groomers and unclean and should be lined against a wall and shot in the back of the head.”