Catholic Missionaries Buy 'Bar of Sodom'

Have mercy! That's what a conservative French Catholic group says it's peddling, but its definition of "mercy" won't be agreeable to LGBT and allied folks. The Missionaries of Divine Mercy, which apparently found its location next to a gay bar unseemly, jumped at the chance to purchase the adjacent property and has vowed to transform the "bar of Sodom" into a "pub of Mercy," Time reports.

The purchase occurred after Texas Bar in Toulon went bankrupt. Eager to snap up the property (now reportedly slated to become a mission), Missionaries of Divine Mercy members prayed during the auction, a move that the members credit with putting off other prospective buyers, the U.K.'s Pink News notes. "The importance of this place for the evangelisation of the neighbourhood is clear," said a statement issued by the group. "The bar of Sodom will now become the pub of Mercy."

A gay activist in Toulon told The Local, an English-language site for French news, that he'd have preferred that the bar go to someone besides the anti-LGBT group -- but he's evidently keeping a sense of humor about it. He noted the organization would "need a whole bunch of exorcists to get rid of everything that's happened in there."