If you’ve ever been on Bourbon Street in New Orleans during a big festival, after the Sugar Bowl, during Mardi Gras, or just some Tuesday night when, for like no reason, the street is packed with wandering-eyed couples from Missouri, you’ve seen the inevitable cluster of Christians huddling around a tall cross and bearing signs that proclaim pleasantries such as, “You’ll all burn in Hell!” while the more loquacious of their number screams into a megaphone. Until last year, it was incumbent upon the hedonistic pedestrian to ignore these street preachers, but then New Orleans passed an ordinance that restricted such demonstrations. Now, after a recent series of preaching arrests during Southern Decadence, a New Orleans pastor is suing to block the city ordinance that he claims sets unconstitutional limits on free speech, because what we’re really missing from a fun night wasted on Bourbon is the chance to argue about dinosaurs with bigoted Evangelical Christians from Arkansas (I’m sure Arkansas is an otherwise wonderful place full of wonderful, intelligent people).
Pastor Paul Gros filed a federal lawsuit on Thursday claiming that a New Orleans city ordinance making it a crime to “loiter or congregate on Bourbon Street for the purpose of disseminating any social, political or religious message between the hours of sunset and sunrise” has infringed upon his and other religiously aggressive individuals’ right to make hate screeds in front of large groups of shirtless men. More or less. Violating the ordinance, which was passed last October, is a misdemeanor punishable by six months in jail and a $500 fine. Gros’ lawsuit names New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, Police Superintendent Ronald Serpas and the city council’s members as defendants.