Surrounding a tweet Christian activist Holly Fisher posted that was deemed offensive by some, Rev. Chuck Currie wanted to apologise for Christian hate.
"As a Christian minister, I apologize for @HollyRFisher and all those who use Jesus' teachings to promote violence," the pastor posted on his own Twitter account @RevChuckCurrie.
The United Church of Christ minister sent this out on social media as a response to Fisher's tweet that said:
"Apparently I was on TV in France...and judging by the vast amount of hateful tweets, they don't like me. *shrugs* I could protect them..."
Fisher posted this a day after the Paris-based office of magazine Charlie Hebdo was attacked by Islamic radicals. The social media activist is a young conservative American who has almost 60,000 followers on Twitter and calls herself a Christian and "100 % pro-life".
Rev. Currie who writes a blog about his personal take on religion and social issues for The Huffington Post described her in a blog post as a "provocative voice who doesn't like liberals, college graduates, President Obama, Speaker Boehner, and certainly not Islam which she states is more evil and violent then fascism and Hitler's holocaust. And she posts provocative images on Twitter."
The minister noted in his Huffington blog post that religious leaders of other religions, such as Islam and Judaism, typically apologize for deeds that radicals of the same faith accomplished.
"What if Christians were held accountable for their words and acts in the United States? What if every time Pat Robertson uttered another nonsensical comment about gays causing hurricanes the National Council of Churches, the National Association of Evangelicals and the U.S. Conference of Roman Catholic Bishops were forced to parade in front of the cameras and issue apologetic statements because a Christian pastor had once again dehumanized children of God, who are still victims of hate crimes in this nation?" Rev. Currie wrote.
After the pastor apologised for Fisher on Twitter, her many followers defended her and criticized Rev. Currie. One of the Fisher defenders posted, "As a Christian I apologize for Christian ministers who see a picture of a gun & think it represents violence."
Last year's Fourth of July, Fisher posted a photo of herself on Twitter holding a Bible and a large gun while she stood in front of an American flag. The image received plenty of criticisms from liberals and praise from conservatives.
Rev. Currie, who is active working on housing and health care for the homeless, said he will not take back the apology:
"Still, I stand by my apology. I don't want anyone to ever believe that just because this individual has access to a Twitter account it means that she is a spokesperson for the Christian faith. We have enough institutional spokespeople using faith to divide us along religious lines already. I'm sorry about that and hope that we can do more to bring people together. We clearly have more work to do."