Homophobic pastor who blamed Hurricane Katrina on LGBT+ Pride tests positive for COVID-19. He’s 80
Texas megachurch pastor John Hagee
John Hagee, an 80-year-old megachurch pastor who claimed that God is preparing to wreak vengeance on gay people, has tested positive for COVID-19.
Hagee is a pastor at Cornerstone Church in San Antonio, Texas, is best known for his 2005 pronouncement that God sent Hurricane Katrina, which devastated several east coast states, because of Pride celebrations in New Orleans.
He tested positive for coronavirus last week, his son announced at a service on Sunday (October 4).
Matt Hagee said: “Pastor Hagee has been diligent throughout this entire COVID pandemic to monitor his health. And this past Friday, he was informed by his doctors that he did test positive for COVID.
“It was one, discovered very early, and two, his medical team has him under watchful care and three, he’s feeling well enough to be frustrated by anyone in a white coat with a stethoscope.”
In 2005 Hagee sparked widespread condemnation when he said: “Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans.
“New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God. There was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came.”
In 2013, Hagee again claimed that God would wreak vengeance upon gay people and those who support them, describing the Biblical destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah as “God’s pilot study for his response to the homosexual society”.
Texas megachurch pastor John Hagee
When same-sex marriage was legalised in all 50 states in 2015, he again warned: “This Supreme Court has made America the new Sodom and Gomorrah.
“God will have to judge America, or he’s going to have to apologise to Sodom and Gomorrah. We are at that place where God is asking the church, who is on the Lord’s side?”
John Hagee claimed that coronavirus was being exaggerated to harm Donald Trump.
Hagee has also made controversial comments about coronavirus, prior to getting infected himself.
In June, Hagee likened the coronavirus lockdown to “the Antichrist coming to power” and claimed that the First Amendment gave churches the right to defy restrictions.
He repeatedly sought to play down the crisis in his sermons, claiming at the time that doctors were being “pressured to record deaths incorrectly” to inflate the scale of COVID-19 and “extend this crisis all the way to the November presidential election if possible”.
