High-school holy war: Bible verses vs. LGBT pride

Gabby Helsinger (Video screenshot)

An Ohio family is at war with their local high school after their daughter was suspended for posting Bible verses in response to LGBT-pride flags on campus.

Tina Helsinger (Facebook)

"Lebanon schools celebrates [sic] evil and punishes righteousness!!" proclaimed Tina Helsinger, the mother of student Gabby Helsinger, on Facebook.

The dispute at Lebanon High School began when Gabby wrote Bible verses on Post-It notes and stuck them in various locations, after having seen numerous rainbow-colored pride flags throughout the building.

She described on video what happened, explaining:

"So on Thursday when I got to school, I see that there were pride flags, posters around my school. And I felt the need to write down some Bible verses so I could put them around my school," she said. "And I wrote them down and I put them around my lockers, the walls."

"I was coming back from lunch ... I see the teachers taking them down, and the next day, I got called to the office and there is a letter that says that I have an ISS, which is an in-school suspension, and the reason why I have it is because 'abuse of others, disrespect, rudeness' because I put Bible verses up 'targeting the GSA organization,'" Gabby said, alluding to the school's Gay-Straight Alliance.

"I did not know what the GSA organization was or meant," she continued. "Seeing that there was [sic] people in my school that needed help and they don't need to be living in the confusion of wondering if they should be gay, bi, lesbian, trans, anything like that, and I know that God is the only way that they can be healed by that, and that's why I did it. I was not targeting any kind of organization or anything like that."

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The principal, Scott Butler, met with Gabby, and she noted: "When I got sent to the office, he was talking to me and he said, 'Why did you put these up here?' And I said, 'Because I wanted to spread the word of God.'"

"And he goes, 'Well did you have permission?" And I said, 'No.' And I didn’t know you had to have permission because people do it a lot, putting post-it notes up on people’s lockers, so I just did it."

"And I asked him why every time Jesus or God or anything like that gets brought up at school, it gets taken down right away. But we can put gay and pride stuff all over the school and not have to take it down and people can talk about it, but when you talk about God or Jesus you just get put down, you're not allowed to talk about it."

Tina Helsinger is staunchly defending her daughter, and went public about the matter on social media: "I appealed the punishment stating 'Posting a Bible verse is not abuse of others, disrespect/insolence/rudeness and in no way was it targeting GSA' but the school principal, Scott Butler, says 'Gabby was targeting the GSA organization' and therefore must report to ISS Wednesday 3/13/19."

She concluded:

Parents - if this was happening to your child - what would you do? Please listen to her story. If you feel she is being unjustly punished please flood emails and calls to the Principal and Assistant Principal if Lebanon High School. Their email addresses and phone numbers are below!

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[email protected]
513.934.5100

[email protected]
513.934.5104

The family is receiving both positive and negative feedback on Facebook, including:

Missy Silvestri Forti: "Good for her.. who the hell are any of you to tell her she can't display their beliefs as well! She didn't do it in a evil way, she didn't call them names, she believes in God and should be able to post it anywhere she wants! Just like he LGBT does with their signs. Stop with the double-standard cr-p! And stop telling people what they are allowed to say and believe! That's Dem behavior 101!"

Stephen W. Hawkins: "Pray for her deliverance from evil. She is in the lion's den. Her faith and speaking truth, God will honor. Adults need to wake up and see that children are being taught under the guise of the 'tolerance of no tolerance,' and being told what to think, act and say."

Shelby Lynn Mcintosh: "I realize its not your daughters fault she's homophobic. i feel bad for you and all your children. You are not a pure or good christian, you are the worst of all and one day your God will place judgement on you for trying to play his role. You, or your kids are no one to say what is or isn't right for someone else, you all are not 'saving' anyone from their own life choices but only making it harder on them to learn the love of the lord or have a personal relationship with jesus. Since you love bible verses so much you should practice loving your neighbor. You should also teach your kids to love their neighbors instead of being judgmental and crude to people already struggling to be themselves in this world. That is not the godly thing to do and I truly pray for your soul, that your own sins and false judgement wont lead you to a path of eternal damnation and your children wont follow."

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