Prejean's Protege: Miss Not-Quite-Beverly Hills on Gay Damnation

Lauren Ashley, a Miss California USA contestant who has dubbed herself Miss Beverly Hills, has sparked an uproar by announcing that God wants gays executed. The City of Beverly Hills asks, “Lauren who?”

Carrie Prejean, the 2009 Miss California USA and first runner-up in the 2009 Miss USA pageant, made headlines when she informed pageant judge Perez Hilton that she did not support gay marriage. The clever Prejean then made herself a darling of the anti-gay “family values” set . . . at least until her sex tape scandal.

Clever? Why, yes, very clever. Tell me, who won Miss USA 2009? What? You don’t know? Thought so.

Now, Lauren Ashley is competing for the Miss California USA 2010 title. In a Prejeanesque bid for notoriety, Ashley stated in an interview with Fox News that she was against gay marriage. She followed this with her justification:

The Bible says that marriage is between a man and a woman. In Leviticus it says, ‘If man lies with mankind as he would lie with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination. They shall surely be put to death and their blood shall be upon them.’ The Bible is pretty black and white.

I feel like God himself created mankind and he loves everyone, and he has the best for everyone…If he says that having sex with someone of your same gender is going to bring death upon you, that’s a pretty stern warning, and he knows more than we do about life.

Prejean Ashley goes on to say how she has many gay friends, and doesn’t hate anyone. Apparently, she sees no disconnect with thinking her friends should die for their sexual orientation while “not hating” them.

No comment has been forthcoming from her many gay friends. Think they are as real as her friend in the sky who tells her what to think?

The City of Beverly Hills isn’t pleased. In a City press release dated Wednesday, February 24:

The City of Beverly Hills today denounced statements made by Miss California USA contestant Lauren Ashley, the self-described Miss Beverly Hills. Ms. Ashley resides in Pasadena and is currently a contestant for the Miss California USA title. She does not represent Beverly Hills in any capacity. The City of Beverly Hills strongly condemns Ms. Ashley’s recent statements and has contacted pageant officials to determine ways to formally prevent any beauty contestants claiming the title of Miss Beverly Hills in the future.

Yes, Miss Beverly Hills doesn’t even live in Beverly Hills. She lives in Pasadena, 22 miles away, on the other side of the City of Los Angeles.

How did that happen? Didn’t the City interview her to figure out if she would represent them adequately? Why, no. And they don’t get to.

The pageant’s operation may seem a bit odd; the City of Beverly Hills had no pageant, and neither Ashley nor the Miss California USA pageant consulted with the City of Beverly Hills or gained permission to use their name as a title. Pageant director Keith Lewis explains that the contestants are interviewed by a panel from the pageant; if selected, the contestants choose which city they wish to represent.

Lewis adds:

I would love for the City of Beverly Hills to have their own preliminary pageant to determine a representative. But until then, this is the way Miss Universe runs it and this is how it is done in other states.

Lauren Ashley’s concern with things Biblical no doubt ranges far and wide; oddly, she has not given any comment on what the Bible says about women who dress like whores and show off their bodies in public. The Bible is pretty clear on that, as well. As Paul writes:

1 Timothy 2:9

[I exhort therefore that . . .] women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array;

Also, the Bible instructs us not to do things that may cause others to stumble (that is, to sin):

Romans 14

14 I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, to him it is unclean.

15 But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died.

16 Let not then your good be evil spoken of:

17 For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.

18 For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and approved of men.

19 Let us therefore follow after the things which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another.

20 For meat destroy not the work of God. All things indeed are pure; but it is evil for that man who eateth with offence.

21 It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak.

Does dressing in revealing clothes, much like a common streetwalker, encourage men to lust? Is that not the intent of showing one’s cleavage, and one’s firm, muscled bottom? Does that not cause men to stumble?

Alas, it seems that Miss Ashley is concerned about the perceived sins of others, while leaving her own house in disorder. Jesus has words for her:

Matthew 7:5

Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.

Related articles:

1. What We Don’t See and Economists Miss
2. Blink and you’ll miss it (depending, of course, on your religious beliefs)
3. Historians of science sometimes miss the wood for the trees
4. Pray Carrie Prejean Beats Child Porn Rap

Mike Daniels is co-editor of Secular News Daily.

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