A Mississippi wedding venue rejected an interracial couple, citing ‘Christian belief.’ Facing a backlash, the owner apologized.

By Allyson Chiu September 3 at 7:04 AM

When LaKambria S. Welch drove to Boone’s Camp Event Hall on Saturday, she was in search of an explanation.

Welch told The Washington Post in an email that her brother and his fiancee had recently been coordinating with the wedding venue in Booneville, Miss., about hosting their upcoming nuptials until they were informed that they were no longer welcome.

Why? Welch said it’s because her brother is black and his bride-to-be is white.

In a now-viral video shared to social media by Welch over the weekend, a woman identified as the event hall’s owner can be seen telling the 24-year-old, “First of all, we don’t do gay weddings or mixed race … because of our Christian race, I mean, our Christian belief.”

Link to tweet

By early Tuesday, the clip had amassed more than 2 million views across Twitter and YouTube, with critics slamming the business’s owners as “hateful racists” and calling for the venue to be shuttered. Following the backlash, Boone’s Camp Event Hall took down its Facebook page and its owner penned a lengthy apology, which, in part, chronicled her realization that “biracial relationships were NEVER mentioned in The Bible!” The video was first reported on by the website Deep South Voice.

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