HARTFORD, Conn. -- The Ku Klux Klan is a 'changed organization' that now welcomes 'any kind of Christian' including Catholics, says the Connecticut commander of the white supremacist organization.
James Farrands, saying he wanted to clarify a teacher's union publication that cited the Klan's past anti-Catholicism, claimed Sunday all but one of his Klan group's leaders in Connecticut are Catholics.
'I am a Catholic. I go to mass from time to time,' said Farrands, who is grand titan of the Louisiana-based Invisible Empire of the Ku Klux Klan. 'All of our top officers here are Catholics except one. He is a Mormon.'
'It's a changed organization,' said Farrands, a former Boy Scout leader who lost his position when his Klan affilation became known last summer. 'We welcome any kind of Christian.'
Farrands, 47, was reacting to a curriculum guide entitled 'Violence, the Ku Klux Klan and the Struggle for Equality,' which was developed for junior and senior high school teachers by the Connecticut Education Association.
The publication unveiled Saturday chronicles the Klan's violent hatred of blacks and Jews. It also suggested that while the Klan was historically anti-Catholic, the Klan's attacks on Catholics had subsided.
'It's different today,' Farrands said from Klan state headquarters in his hometown of Shelton. 'We welcome Catholics, obviously, or I wouldn't be here.'
Speaking at the CEA conference, Georgia State Sen. Julian Bond told the educators the new wave of conservative politics has created a 'climate of callousness' that is encouraging membership in the Klan.
Bond also warned the public not to be fooled by the new breed of 'slicked-down, laid-back, soft-spoken, college-educated' Klansmen.
'The new image of the Klan is as solid as the Reagan safety net, as strong as wet tissue paper. The Klan is violent and as dangerous as ever,' Bond said.
Farrands was arrested outside the CEA conference and charged with disorderly conduct after he began arguing with a member of the International Committee Against Racism who was handing out anti-Klan literature.
A second man identified as a Klan member was arrested later Saturday when Farrands held a news conference in Wallingford to announce that the Klan would hold rallies and cross burnings Oct. 10 and 11 in rural Windham.
John Meyer, 22, of Meriden, was charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest and carrying a concealed weapon when police allegedly found a 3 foot lead pipe in his possession.
Farrands said he didn't 'want to see any violence' at the Windham gathering, which he said would draw 'a couple of hundred' Klansmen, including Invisible Empire leader Bill Wilkinson of Denham Springs, La.
Last September, the Klan held its first public cross burning in Connecticut in more than 70 years, resulting in nine arrests and eight injuries in clashes with anti-racist demonstrators.
Since then, the Klan has demonstrated twice in Meriden and again, violence flared when opponents showed up.
