‘Symbol Of Spiritual Darkness’: Anti-Gay Bigot Blames Satan For Solar Eclipse

Anti-gay extremist Bryan Fischer has a theory about the eclipse: It’s the work of the devil.

On Friday, Fischerthe same man who believes that homosexuals were behind the Holocaustposted a conspiracy theory on Facebook in which he claimed that the solar event is a “symbol of spiritual darkness.”

“The path of this total eclipse of the sun is remarkable, in that it crosses over the entire continental United States, almost perfectly bisecting America from the Northwest to the Southeast,” wrote Fischer, a former spokesperson for the anti-gay American Family Association. “And in that path, the sun will be perfectly blotted out, by the ruler of the night, plunging all of America in its path into virtual total darkness.”

“This is a metaphor, or a sign, of the work of the Prince of Darkness in obscuring the light of God’s truth,” he added. “Satan, and those who unwittingly serve as his accomplices by resisting the public acknowledgment of God and seeking to repress the expression of Christian faith in our land, are bringing on us a dark night of the national soul.”

Fischer quoted Bible verse John 3:16 in his defense: “This is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.”

This shouldn’t need to be said, but the solar eclipse is a perfectly natural phenomenon. When the moon passes between the Earth and the Sun, it occasionally blocks the Sun. Every year there are at least four smaller eclipses, but humans rarely see them. Americans haven’t been treated to a coast-to-coast eclipse of this magnitude since 1918when the solar event last traversed the continental United States.

Blaming the eclipse on satanic forces might seem absurd and unbelievable, but for Fischer, it’s just another day at the office.

The right-wing zealot and radio host has infamously claimed that the Third Reich began as a “homosexual movement,” blaming LGBTQ people for the deaths of millions of Jews. Calling the LGBTQ rights movement “the greatest threat to liberty” in America’s history, Fischer has compared homosexuality to bestiality, necrophilia, child abuse, and incest.

The anti-gay pundit last made headlines in May, when he compared being “forced” to serve same-sex couples to “slavery” in a blog post for the AFA.