God, Gays and the Atlanta Fire Department

By The New York Times THE EDITORIAL BOARDJAN. 13, 2015 

Until last week, Kelvin Cochran was the chief of the Atlanta fire department, where he oversaw a work force of more than 1,000 firefighters and staff.

Mr. Cochran, a veteran firefighter, is also a deeply religious man, and he was eager to bring his Christian faith into the daily functioning of his department — or, as he put it in a book he authored in 2013, to “cultivate its culture to the glory of God.”

But, as the book revealed, his religious beliefs also include virulent anti-gay views. He wasfired on Jan. 6 by Atlanta’s mayor, Kasim Reed, for homophobic language in the book, “Who Told You That You Were Naked?” Among other things, he called homosexuality a “perversion,” compared it to bestiality and pedophilia, and said homosexual acts are “vile, vulgar and inappropriate.