Josh Duggar: I love gays, which is why I'm fighting against their rights
Josh Duggar (Screen capture)

Josh Duggar -- son of "Quiverfull" parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar -- said that his and his family's efforts to overturn a nondiscrimination law in Fayetteville, Arkansas were an act of love toward the LGBT community.


Right Wing Watch reported that Duggar -- who is now a policy director at the Family Research Council (FRC) -- guest-hosted the FRC's Washington Watch radio show on Monday. He and his guest, Southern Baptist pastor Richard Land, said that gays and lesbians should be thankful that Christians are trying to free them from their "sad, lonely lifestyle."

“It’s such a sad, lonely lifestyle,” said Land. “It just seemed to me that one of the cruelest jokes the devil has ever played is to have that lifestyle described as ‘gay.’”

In another part of the interview, Duggar explained that his and his family's efforts to repeal the LGBT nondiscrimination law in Fayetteville were a favor to the gay community.

LGBT activists, he said, are "very vocal about their side," but as Christians, "We have got to stand up in love and say, 'We're gonna stand up for what's right and we believe in this.'"

Duggar cited his time selling cars, saying that he had to do his job and sell cars to people "who didn't have the same opinions and beliefs as I did and that never became an issue."

The problem, he said, is when LGBT activists try to force people to agree with them.

"The radical gay groups," said Land, "their goal is very clear. Their goal is to use the power of the state to force everyone to accept and affirm their lifestyle and to marginalize anyone who disagrees with it."

Duggar said that it is a falsehood that for you to love someone, you have to accept their "lifestyle" and agree with them on everything. Christians, he said, have a right to stand up for what they believe.

"You know what?" he said. "We still love everyone as Christ commands, we still have compassion, we still have those kinds of feelings, but we also have our convictions. We have our beliefs."

"If you really love somebody, you're going to tell them the truth," said Land. "The Bible's not neutral about lifestyles. The Bible blesses and approves of some and not others."

Listen to the radio broadcast, embedded below in two parts via Right Wing Watch:

Part One

Part Two