Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Grist for Roseanne's Mill
Posted By Jerre Wroble on March 23, 2010, 8:01 PM
The wheels of Roseanne World grind loudly, but they grind exceedingly fine.
Mormonism, in particular, has a special place in the ever-controversial Roseanne Barr's heart. Her amped-up vitriol for the LDS faith might have something to do with her having been a church member during her formative years, ages 6 to 16, right here in Salt Lake City.
So a lot of it is personal. ---
In early March, Barr's blog rather cruelly took Marie Osmond to task for blaming the suicide of Osmond's son, Michael Bryan, on depression:
marie osmonds poor gay son killed himself
Barr later retracted her statement when Michael Bryan's friends and family argued the young man was not gay.
Barr, admitting she can be an "insensitive asshole," has since apologized for her comments and even prayed for Marie Osmond on her blog. But the upset triggered follow-up posts by Barr about the rising number of gay Mormon suicides, the treatment of young gays within the Mormon faith, and basic Mormon beliefs.
Beyond the Osmond posts, though, Mormons behaving badly continue to provide Barr with plenty of material. There are the hot-tubbing, drunken-driving antics of lawmaker Kevin Garn, for example. And then, from Portland, the lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America and the LDS Church stemming from the sexual abuses committed by assistant Scoutmaster Timur Dykes.
But today's latter-day fall from grace has yet to make it to Roseanne's blog: Village of Hope co-founder Lon Harvey Kennard Sr., a 68-year-old charity worker from Heber, is accused of sexually abusing two of his adoptive daughters from Ethiopia (and there may be more charges to come).
Meridian Magazine highlights the Kennard's spiritual journey that led him and his wife to adopt six children from Africa after raising six biological children.
The Trib also had published a rather glowing article about Kennard that included the video below, where Kennard can be seen hugging and kissing village children. "Women are terrifically abused and taken advantage of, exploited in Ethiopia, so we try to provide them with refuge, as a place to get away from it," Kennard says on the video. "We, of course, feed them, we house them, we provide them with medical care, we provide them with an education, we hope we provide them with love." If the allegations against him prove to be true, it's stuff to make your skin crawl.
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