Albuquerque church increases security after controversial book ban protest

By Alyssa Munoz

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    ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (KOAT) — The Church of the Good Shepherd is increasing its security after getting online threats.

Sarah TevisTownes, a pastor, spoke out on Wednesday in favor of keeping LGBTQ+ books in schools. Also at the meeting was John Amanchukwu, a pastor and preacher who has been traveling to school board meetings to ban books he said support LGBTQ+ communities. TevisTownes said the threats started after the meeting.

“A lot of them came through social media. Some to me directly and some of pastor Amanchukwu’s Instagram page. I reported most of them; most got taken down, but I was identified directly in his post so we were a little worried we would be targeted, and I take those threats pretty seriously,” TevisTownes said.

She said they have added both visible and hidden security measures to the church.

“With this rhetoric that’s been preached, we just have to be safe. We have families with kids here. We have a lot of vulnerable folks, a lot of people are vulnerable, so our plans have changed,” said TevisTownes.

Matthew Baugh is a part of the church. He said it was important to speak out about this.

“I think we have to be cautious. I think we have to take this very seriously,” Baugh said. “It motivated me to stand up and say something and do something, do as much as I can to fight for compassion and tolerance and acceptance of all people.”

Grace Robinson said people outside of their church came out to support them Sunday.

“I expected maybe 10, 20 people to show up, but to see so many people show up, it really heartened me. It gives me hope that people are going to stand up for marginalized communities, and hopefully we can continue that energy,” Robinson said.

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