By Bud Kennedy
bud@star-telegram.com
Even for North Texas' most obnoxious street preacher, it was a first.
"I was in jail with drug dealers, thieves and burglars," Joey Faust said, describing what happened last weekend when he tried to preach his way through the crowd after the annual gay and lesbian Pride Parade.
For more than 10 years, Faust and a few worshippers from Kingdom Baptist Church in rural Johnson County have protested wherever they might get attention -- theaters, bars, company headquarters.
He had never gone to jail.
Until Saturday.
Tailing the 32nd annual Pride Parade with his church's message of fire and brimstone, he found police blocking a Main Street sidewalk.
"One officer said, 'If you take a step across the line, I'll arrest you,'" Faust said by phone Thursday.
"So I took a step across the line."
Police arrested Faust, 46, and Ramon Marroquin, 33, both of rural Johnson County.
Both face up to six months in jail and a $2,000 fine on a possible Class B misdemeanor charge of "interfering" with public duties, which includes wasting officers' time.
Faust spent 20 hours in the Mansfield Jail, he said.
He complained that police arrested him "just for preaching." But he and police have carefully gone over the noise and nuisance laws regulating his church's weekly preaching appearances near the Sundance Square bars.
Nowhere in the Constitution does it say you get to horn in on somebody else's parade.
Last year, a church member was arrested and faced a disorderly conduct charge after a paradegoer thought he heard an obscenity over the hand-held PA system. That charge was dropped, Faust said.
Kingdom Baptist has only a handful of members. Faust calls it an Independent Fundamental Baptist Church.
On the website, Faust fears "The Occultic Conspiracy To Replace The King James Bible."
He preaches against all manner of Satanic influences, including Catholicism, Mormonism, ecumenicalism -- yes, even Glenn Beck.
In 2001, church members picketed
Harry Potter.
"Magic is evil," Faust was quoted then. "Witchcraft is of the devil. Who would have imagined it would become OK to have kids reading books about witchcraft and spells and alchemy?"
The 21st century has not yet reached his corner of Johnson County.
Bud Kennedy's column appears Sundays, Wednesdays and Fridays. 817-390-7538Twitter: @budkennedy
Looking for comments?
