God, apparently, is angry.

He’s in one of his smiting moods. And he hates gays.

So he’s decided to kill U.S. soldiers as punishment for fighting for a nation that harbors homosexuals. So sayeth the Rev. Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan.

Until recently, the good reverend was best known for attending funerals of AIDS victims, brandishing signs that read “God Hates Fags.”

But Phelps and his 75-member church have branched out. They’re now protesting at funerals of soldiers and Marines killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, waving signs that proclaim “Thank God for Dead Soldiers” and “America is Doomed” in the faces of grieving families.

No, they’re not protesting the war. Phelps and his gang are trying to send a hateful message.

Since words to describe their actions fail me, I’ll let his church attorney and daughter, Shirley Phelps-Roper, use her own:

“These aren’t private funerals; these are patriotic pep rallies,” she told The Washington Post. “Our goal is to call America an abomination. … You turn this nation over to fags, and our soldiers come home in body bags.”

Families of slain servicemen are arriving at funerals early to avoid Phelps’ followers, only to find them already in place and picketing. In some cases, a veterans’ motorcycle group, the Patriot Guard, has begun to act as a human shield.

Now some 14 states, including Virginia, are considering legislation to limit these sorts of protests at funerals.

Virginia’s legislation would make those who picket at a “solemn ceremony in a loud and unruly manner” guilty of a misdemeanor. Others specify times or distances within which funeral protests would be allowed.

More laws aren’t necessarily good things, particularly ones that challenge free speech.

But there’s free speech, and then there’s common decency.

Grieving families recovering from the shock of the Army’s knock at the door deserve, at bare minimum, dignity at their child’s burial. Everyone does.

There’s a time and place for picketing; graveside isn’t it.

And soldiers’ families aren’t Phelps’ only quarry. Westboro church members also materialized at a memorial for the Sago miners holding signs that read “Miners in Hell” and “God Hates Your Tears.”

Here’s a thought: Maybe God hates Fred Phelps.

I find it curious that God always seems to detest the very same people as Phelps, Pat Robertson and other holy men who profess to have a hot line into the Almighty’s mind.

Convenient, no?

To hear them tell it, we sinners are in the hands of one angry God.

Their God.

His wrath has caused Ariel Sharon’s stroke, Hurricane Katrina, the Asian tsunami, the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 and the spiritual abandonment of the entire town of Dover, Pa., for voting out a school board that had pushed the teaching of intelligent design.

In fact, their God is so filled with rage that he sounds more like a candidate for anger management than the loving, compassionate deity the rest of us learned about in Sunday school.

Phelps’ church preaches a literal reading of The Good Book. It’s surprising, then, how many in its pews – or holding tasteless signs at grave sites – overlook the examples of grace, forgiveness and redemption within those pages.

Not to mention dignity, kindness and respect.

Interesting, too, that they skipped the part about God’s fondness for all his children. Or ignore the philosophical quandary of an omnipotent being who’s so repelled by gays that he’s allowed their existence for millennia.

I thank the heavens above that a God so filled with hatred is a God I don’t know.

There may be some surprised faces on Judgment Day if it turns out that God loves everyone except those who claim to read his mind.