Students stage protest against demonstrators

Faye Murman/Courier-Post

By JANE ROH
Courier-Post Staff

Six members of the Topeka-based Westboro Baptist Church faced off with about 100 students and parents at Cherry Hill East High School before the start of the school Monday.

"We got here probably around 7:10," said Forest Steinberg, a 17-year-old at Moorestown High. About 15 of her classmates got notes from their parents to skip first and second periods to join their Cherry Hill East counterparts.

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Photo gallery of this morning’s protests

Faye Murman/Courier-Post

Click here to read more about this morning's protests outside of Cherry Hill High School East.

View the Courier-Post photo gallery with over 20 photos of the protests at: Protests in Cherry Hill | courierpostonline.com | Burlington, Camden and Gloucester Counties South Jersey News | Courier-Post.

Counter-protest dwarfs anti-gay, anti-Semitic church group in Cherry Hill

Faye Murman/Courier-Post

About 100 students and parents greeted a roving group of anti-gay, anti-Semitic protesters this morning at Cherry Hill East High School.

The six members of the Topeka-based Westboro Baptist Church, which is led by Fred Phelps and composed almost entirely of his relatives, were confined to public property across the street from the high school. Placard-waving protesters on both sides chanted and traded taunts for a little more than a half-hour starting at 7:30 a.m.

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Planned protests in Cherry Hill spark outrage

Gannett News Service

By JANE ROH
Courier-Post Staff

The group of Kansans who will be in town next week protesting Jews, gays, and high school students belong to the Westboro Baptist Church, a group that religious leaders, social activists and political leaders call a fringe group that specializes in hate speech.

"There are a lot of promises from God, and these kids run from those that would serve Him and run to those that would not. God's promise that he would destroy this nation -- they are all faithful, precious promises," said Shirley Lynn Phelps-Roper, daughter of Westboro Baptist's leader, Fred Phelps. "When He's ready to destroy a people you start seeing evidence of the curse of God on them."

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Cherry Hill Schools: ‘Anti-Semitic, anti-gay extremist group’ should be ignored

Cherry Hill Public Schools is asking students, staff and parents to resist engaging members of the controversial Westboro Baptist Church when the group demonstrates near the school Monday morning.

"We expect that a small group of picketers will stand on public property for approximately 30 minutes displaying disturbing signs in an effort to provoke a response," Superintendent David Campbell and Cherry Hill High School East Principal John O’Breza said in the written statement.

"The most effective message we can send is to ignore the picketers and go about our day."

Read the letter after the jump...

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Residents respond to church’s planned protest

Joe McLaughlin/Gannett New Jersey

Yesterday, I posted "Controversial church to protest in township" about the planned protests by Westboro Baptist Church in Cherry Hill on Monday, Dec. 7.

Members of the church, which is based in Kansas, have received criticism in recent years for setting up picket lines at soldiers' funerals to present the church's message that the soldiers' deaths are God's punishment for Americans' tolerance of homosexuality.

The church has announced that it plans to picket from 7:30 to 8 a.m. Monday at Cherry Hill High School East, and Sunday (3 p.m.) and Monday (8:30 a.m.) against the USCJ 2009 Biennial Convention at Crowne Plaza Hotel on Route 70.

Cherry Hill InJersey has received a lot of feedback from readers about the planned protests.

Read more after the jump...

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Controversial church to protest in township

JOE MCLAUGHLIN/Gannett New Jersey)

Members of the controversial Westboro Baptist Church, based in in Topeka, Kan., plan to protest at Cherry Hill High School East and the USCJ 2009 Biennial Convention on Monday, December 7.

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