Story highlights Bob Jones III suggested homosexuals should be stoned in 1980

A petition asking for an apology gathered 1,900 signatures

(CNN) Three and a half decades after calling for homosexuals to be stoned, former Bob Jones University President Bob Jones III has apologized.

"I take personal ownership of this inflammatory rhetoric," Jones said . "This reckless statement was made in the heat of a political controversy 35 years ago."

The weekend apology came days after the conservative Christian school in South Carolina received a petition asking for an apology for a statement Jones made to the Associated Press in 1980 at the White House.

"I'm sure this will be greatly misquoted," Jones said at the time. "But it would not be a bad idea to bring the swift justice today that was brought in Israel's day against murder and rape and homosexuality. I guarantee it would solve the problem post-haste if homosexuals were stoned, if murderers were immediately killed as the Bible commands."

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When he made the comments, Jones was part of a group of fundamentalist ministers who went to the White House with 70,000 signatures on a petition opposed to extending provisions of the Civil Rights Act to homosexuals.

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