Trust me ... the media knows who to vilify when it comes to churches and "religion". The media will NOT highlight that they are an anomaly for a Baptist church. Instead the media will try to have them look like the typical Baptist church that is part of the SBC. The main stream liberal media has no time for Godly people but all the time in the world for disinformation and conveniently vilifying their view of groups - recall "right wing conspiracy" people if you are a conservative. The same thing will happen here. If the SBC issues a statement condemning this, it won't be highlighted either - look at how the main stream liberal media reports on the war in Iraq - same thing - reality means nothing to them. They have an agenda.
Not taking up for this mentally unstable, Phelps piece of crap, but every church should be independent. Otherwise you have such organizations as the National and World council of churches, dictating doctrine to local congregations.
Phelps and crew has been a detriment and embarrassment to all Christian churches, but the evil they do is nothing, compared to the evil the NCC and WCC has done in the name of Christianity.