Falwell Pays $8,900 to Homosexual Activist

The Rev. Jerry Falwell has paid a court-ordered award to a homosexual activist in Sacramento who sued him over remarks he made about a gay-oriented church.

Activist Jerry Sloan displayed a poster-size blowup Thursday of an $8,982.90 check he said his lawyer received from Falwell’s Moral Majority Inc.

“He (Falwell) had indicated that I was a liar and that I was not a reliable person,” Sloan said. “So it was a matter of personal integrity.”

Sloan sued Falwell after the minister failed to settle a $5,000 wager on whether he had condemned the Metropolitan Community Church in a sermon. Falwell, who knew Sloan from the mid-1950s when both attended Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Mo., denied having made the remarks but Sloan produced a tape recording of them.

A Sacramento Municipal Court judge last September ordered Falwell to pay the $5,000, plus 7% interest. A three-judge panel rejected Falwell’s appeal in June and added attorney fees.