Controversial evangelist
faces human rights tribunal
Campbell willing to go to jail for his principles

David F. Dawes
Special to CW

VANCOUVER, BC–Self-styled "confrontational evangelist" Ken Campbell will have to wait a few more weeks to learn the nature of his fate for opposing a court ruling involving sexual orientation and discrimination.

Campbell appeared before the BC Human Rights Tribunal October 15 in response to a complaint brought against him concerning a full-page ad he placed in the Globe and Mail in 1998. The ad decried the Supreme Court of Canada decision in the Vriend vs. Alberta case, maintaining that the court was undermining the biblical view of homosexuality when it ruled that the Alberta government must add sexual orientation to race, gender and other categories where discrimination is prohibited.

The Vancouver hearing was adjourned until November 8 to give the hearing officer time to consider issues raised by Campbell. A similar case brought against Campbell by the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal was dismissed some time ago.

From his home in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., Campbell says he still stands behind the original ad, which he has describes as a "message of the Lord to the nation." He declares that he is willing to go to jail for his principles.

"While an appeal process through the courts is a possibility, my present inclination, under God, is simply to submit to the inevitable incarceration which will result from the Christian civil disobedience of my refusal to comply with the ‘remedies' the complainant seeks–and is likely to be granted by the tribunal," he says.

"At the same time, there are evidences that the destructive injustices which have characterized tribunal decisions may have run their course to such extremes that there may now be a turning of the tide."

Campbell acknowledges that some Christians have expressed strong disapproval of his form of aggressive activism. "My main regret," he says, "is that I've failed to overcome the reluctance of evangelicalism to provide at least the prayerful support for such front-line, cutting-edge witnessing."

He asserts that he models his approach on what he terms the "counter-culture witnessing" of the early church depicted in the Book of Acts.

"In bringing the same witnessing strategies to our hostile, post-Christian, secular society, I've come to accept rejection by ‘comfort-zone evangelicalism' to be as inevitable as the hostility of the militant wicked. I understand a little of Paul's dismay, which caused him to ask believers in Galatia: ‘Am I, therefore, become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?'"

Campbell insists that, while he is adamantly opposed to what he sees as a movement toward making homosexuality acceptable, his ultimate mission is to communicate the love of Jesus to gays and lesbians.

"While I'm a fumbling follower of Christ at best, God knows that I've pursued his purposes in ministering to homosexual sufferers…and homosexual militants, with the compassion and fervour of our Saviour."