Kanye has some explaining to do.
Since abandoning secular music in favor of saving souls and rapping about Chick-fil-A, his crusade for Christ has garnered praise and acclaim from pastors like Adam Tyson to profiteers like Joel Osteen. And while he’s made plenty of new friends and bad music along the way, it appears that those associations have officially veered into problematic territory.
In what’s being billed as the “first epic evangelical stadium event of the decade,” the Chicago native will headline Awaken 2020, a massive prayer rally this weekend in Tempe, Ariz., according to the Daily News. But before you throw on your church clothes and prepare to slap the shit out of your favorite tambourine, you might wanna check out the highly questionable lineup that will be joining Yeezus Christ on stage.
From Complex:
The Christian gathering features a lineup of controversial religious leaders who’ve expressed anti-gay views. These figures include Cindy Jacobs, a self-proclaimed prophet who encouraged Christians to “rise up” and stop the Equality Act; Guillermo Maldonado, a Miami-based pastor who believes homosexuality is a result of “a generational curse, or even a demonic attack while in the womb”; Ché Ahn, the president of Harvest International Ministry who once compared gay rights to racist laws: “just because it’s legal does not mean that it’s right, at one time we had a law saying blacks were not citizens, that didn’t make that right”; and Lou Engle, a senior leader of the International House of Prayer who was a vocal proponent of Uganda’s “Kill the Gays” bill, and who once claimed Nazism was fueled by homosexuality.
Damn, Kanye. Is this what Jesus would do?
As to be expected, fans of the “Good Life” rapper are less than pleased with his latest affiliation.
“I can give him the benefit of the doubt, but I think it is disappointing (West) is going to associate himself with people like Lou Engle,” John Gimenez, a gay student at Arizona State University, told the Arizona Republic. “As someone who grew up listening to Kanye, only to see him embrace people who, if they had their way, would see people like me marginalized, is a very bitter feeling.”
Kanye has yet to address his decision to align with such controversial figures, but considering we’re talking about the same guy who exchanged friendship bracelets with Donald Trump, is anyone really surprised?