A British far-right party has suspended a local councilman who blamed recent severe flooding on the government's legalization of gay marriage. David Silvester of the United Kingdom Independence Party had written a letter to the Henley Standard claiming he'd warned Prime Minister David Cameron the legislation would result in "disasters" and that the UK had been beset by storms since the law's passage because Cameron had "acted against the gospel."
The party, known as UKIP, had initially said that Silvester's views were "not the party's belief," but defended his right to express his opinions. It suspended Silvester today for defying instructions not to give any further interviews, after Silvester defended his letter and called homosexuality a "spiritual disease" which can be healed. "Since the passage of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act, the nation has been beset by serious storms and floods," he wrote in the letter. "The scriptures make it abundantly clear that a Christian nation that abandons its faith ... will be beset by natural disasters such as storms, disease, pestilence and war." (More homosexuality stories.)