WATCH: Ariz. Anchor Challenges 'Hatemonger' Pastor on Antigay Views

An Arizona news anchor interviewing antigay pastor Steven Anderson, who recently called for death for all LGBT people, and said they are “basically rapists,” challenges him on his views, but Anderson holds firm, equating gay people with ax murderers and Adolf Hitler.

“When I heard your sermon, it sounded like the rantings of someone who was either a hatemonger or a religious zealot, and I’m wondering, which are you?” Phoenix TV station KPNX anchor Mark Curtis asks Anderson, pastor of the Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe.

Anderson readily admits to being a religious zealot, and he cites the verse in Leviticus calling gay sex an abomination and saying those who engage in it should be put to death. “According to the Bible, homosexuality is a capital crime,” he says.

Curtis also asks Anderson how he would react if he had a gay child — would he want them dead? For one thing, Anderson says, he wouldn’t have a gay son or daughter. “That’s just a fallacy that it just turns out that some people are gay,” he says, claiming that people become gay when they reject God.

But if he did have a gay son or daughter, he would have nothing to do with them, he adds. “That’s like saying, what if your daughter, you know, grew up to be an ax murderer?” he says. “What if your son grew up to be like Adolf Hitler?”

Watch the interview below. Meanwhile, Planting Peace, a progressive organization that has its headquarters just across the street from the hateful Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., is using Pastor Anderson’s hate to benefit a good cause.

Planting Peace is raising funds on Crowdrise to benefit people with HIV or AIDS, and for every donation it receives, it will send Anderson a lump of coal. It will place the coal “in a festive package tied with a bow that will be delivered on Christmas Eve” to Anderson. The campaign, which had an initial goal of $10,000, has raised more than $18,000 so far.