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(Virginia Beach, Virginia) Seven members of a
nondenominational group protesting at universities that the organization says
bar LGBT students were arrested Tuesday afternoon as they tried to enter the
Regent University campus in Virginia Beach.
The university is affiliated with Christian
Broadcaster Pat Robertson.
The arrests came on the second day of
demonstrations by members of the Equality Ride. The seven were charged with
trespassing and later released without bond.
Last week 24 members of the group were arrested
when the entered Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in Lynchburg,
Virginia. (story)
Regent was the second of 18 schools the Equality
riders will visit on their 51 day trip across the country.
Organized by the non-denominational group
Soulforce the Equality Ride was inspired by the Freedom Rides of the 1950s and
60s.
The thirty-five young adults taking part in the
ride want to engage students in discussions about gay equality and the school's
decisions to bar enrolment of gays.
Yesterday a number of students left the campus to
meet with the riders.
"Students were told today that if they left
the campus to speak to us they would not be allowed back in," Jacob Reitan,
one of the organizers of the Equality Ride, told 365Gay.com.
Reitan said that as students came to the entrance
of the campus to talk to them riders crossed onto school property and were
arrested.
All six were later released.
Regent University originally said it would
welcome the Equality Ride but later changed its mind.
Vice President of Academic Affairs Randall
Pannell said the the school has no such policy, something Soulforce continues to
dispute, pointing to the Regent University student handbook which states
"...homosexual conduct or any other conduct, which violates Biblical
standards, is prohibited."
On Thursday the Equality Riders will visit Lee
University in Cleveland, Tennessee.
©365Gay.com 2006
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