Planting Peace

The timing couldn't have been better for the shenanigans local activist Aaron Jackson and his non-profit, Planting Peace, pulled off in Topeka, Kansas yesterday.

If you managed to avoid social media or the internet in general over the last 24 hours, the Destin-based activist, along with friends and partners involved in his organization, converted an average-looking two-bedroom house, located across the street from the Westboro Baptist Church, into a symbol of gay pride. This rainbow-colored "Equality House," which will serve as a base of operations for Planting Peace's antibullying intiative, now sits as a direct and visible challenge to the infamous compound's hate and bigotry.

The "God Hates Fags" clan will have to look at it every. single. day.

Jackson, who purchased the house about a year ago through Planting Peace and had been keeping the plan under wraps, knew the response would be swift and sizable. But he didn't expect it to be so massive that he'd hear from international media outlets within the first few hours.

"A lot of papers I've never heard of called," Jackson said Tuesday night.

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-Activist Painting House Like a Gay Rainbow, Across Street From Westboro Baptist Church

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Planting Peace

The painting is under way.

Last May, the Huffington Post published a photo of a 9-year-old named Josef Miles counter-protesting the Westboro Baptist Church -- a small but infamous group known for protesting soldiers' funerals with signs that declare "God Hates Fags." Miles held a small pencil-drawn sign that said, "God Hates No One."

Seeing Miles stand up to hate, Aaron Jackson got inspired. Jackson is a Florida activist who founded a charity called Planting Peace and who, after being featured in New Times for his work helping children in Haiti when he was just 23, went on to win a CNN Heroes award.

Sitting at a computer at his family home in Destin, Florida, Jackson loaded Google Earth and started poking around the hate group's neighborhood. He located the church's Kansas headquarters in a quiet residential area a few miles outside of Topeka's downtown and zoomed in and panned around.

A hundred and 80 degrees later, he saw it: a for-sale sign directly across the street from the church's entrance.

"I knew right away what I wanted to do with the house," Jackson said Monday from Planting Peace's new Topeka address, where the organization is kickstarting a new antibullying initiative.

"Paint it the colors of the pride flag."

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Jesten Peters: PRAYER WARRIOR.

With the Republican National Convention all ready to kick off at the beginning of this week, many feared Tropical Storm Isaac would come and ruin all the fun, festivities, and chances to make old people scared of the black man, who may or may not be a Muslim and may or may not even be American, in the White House.

But thanks to Lake City, Florida,-based Keys of Authority Ministries, the RNC is going to be just fine, because they prayed that Isaac would go away. And it did.

Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) correspondent Paul Strand spoke to Keys of Authority Pastor Jesten Peters, who told him her ministry's prayers, and not a common high-pressure ridge and southeastern trough, pushed Isaac away and saved Tampa and the RNC.

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