An Indiana sheriff is disputing reports that a local pastor has received death threats over a viral video of his congregation cheering a young boy as he sang: "Ain't no homo gonna make it to heaven."
“To my knowledge, there are no death threats at this time,” Decatur County Sheriff Gregory Allen told FoxNews.com. He was responding to a report on TMZ.com that Jeff Sangl, pastor of Apostolic Truth Tabernacle Church in Greensburg, Ind., had received death threats after the video hit the Internet Wednesday.
The video shows a boy who appears to be just four or five years old singing the offending lyric as congregants applaud. Church members told the website the church has since received harassing phone calls and Sangl has gotten death threats at home.
Allen told FoxNews.com that Sangl, who has left town and could not be reached for comment, contacted the department and asked him to keep an eye on the church's property following the surfacing of the video.
Sangl, 49, and his wife left town on Wednesday without informing anyone where they were going, one congregant told the website.
Allen told FoxNews.com that any investigation into alleged death threats would need to emanate from the pastor, who did not mention the threats when he asked the law enforcement officer to "keep an eye on" the church after the video had been posted.
The video, which had at least 8,000 views apiece in two separate versions early Friday, prompted charged responses from viewers on YouTube.
“The mindless cheering is the most disgusting part,” one commenter wrote. “If these morons are going to heaven, I'd rather burn in hell.”
Another comment read: “The kids are cute but it's sick how the adults manipulated them into singing that.”
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