Westboro Baptist Church to picket the Cotton Bowl

Dallas - The Westboro Baptist Church will continue their round of bowl game protests with an appearance scheduled for today at Cowboy Stadium where the Arkansas Razorbacks will take on the Kansas State Wildcats in the 76th AT&T Cotton Bowl Classic.

The Topeka, Kansas, based group led by patriarch Fred Phelps has been in Dallas this week to stage demonstrations at the Cotton Bowl and the TicketCity Bowl, where Houston triumphed in a 30-14 win over Penn State. Football fans who attended the TicketCity Bowl were treated to what the Dallas Observer called "a sideshow" made up of Westboro Church members and counter-protesters who organized on Facebook. The Westboro Baptist Church media release said, "Instead of humbling yourself before your God, you worship football and football players, like former University of Arkansas "Razorbacks" player Garrett Uekman, who recently died for the sins of this fag-marriage-loving nation. Make no mistake: God killed the lad of 19 years (1 Samuel 2:6). If you gave even a fraction of the time, money, or interest in serving God that you give to the players on the field, this country wouldn't be in the mess it is in. We are coming in warning to this foolish evil generation." The death of Arkansas player Uekman, from what is being reported to have been an undiagnosed heart condition, sparked a round of Twitter comments from Margie Phelps that Kolby Paxton of Bleacher Report called "an exploitation of the young man's death." The Westboro Church group has used the death of Uekman, the arrest of former Penn State coach Jerry Sandusky, and the subsequent firing of Joe Paterno as the Nittany Lion's head coach as a springboard to launch their round of bowl protests. The church group is expected to be at Cowboy Stadium from 4 to 6pm today.