It is 2016, and at least one religious institution hasn’t let go of the idea that Pokémon is somehow sinful. What a time to be alive.


Late last week, a certain Pokémon started making headlines...


For the two of you that don’t play Pokémon Go, what this picture is relaying is that Westboro Baptist Church is marked as a “gym” in Pokémon Go. This in turn means that players can park their Pokémon at that location IRL to defend a digital title. In this case, someone thought it would be funny to put in a fairy type Pokémon as the defender of a place known for being very hateful and intolerant.

Since then, it is unclear on whether or not the Clefairy has remained in the Westboro Baptist Church gym—the initial “combat power” was low enough that anyone could easily knock it out. Regardless, it seems that the trolling news has reached Westboro itself, and they’ve taken to social media to issue a response:



And here’s the Vine embedded in the Tweet:


Incredible. I want to say that they couldn’t have come up with this without having a fan in-house, because Jigglypuff’s jingle is from the anime, which isn’t as popular anymore...but then, they’ve also said that Clefairy, a digital creature that does not actually exist, is somehow a “sodomite.” Okay then.

Actually, WBC has been on a bit of a Pokémon bender this morning, with disgusting posts like:


I feel like I’ve been transported to 1996. I don’t know what WBC’s problem is here, either: in a twist, Pokémon Go is sending everyone to church already.