Sage Stallone Funeral To Be Protested By Westboro Baptist Church

On the same day Sage Stallone's body was found, Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., announced it would picket his funeral. After making their name protesting the funerals of fallen soldiers, the group (whose website can be found at godhatesfags.com) will now take advantage of Stallone's death to target his famous father's marriage history. The Rocky actor has been married three times.

Sage, who died Friday at age 36 due to unknown causes, was the lone child from Sylvester Stallone's marriage with first wife Sasha Czack.

On Friday night, Margie Phelps, daughter of church founder Fred Phelps, retweeted a message from her father that said So Westboro will picket Sage Stallone's funeral so Syl's other children will finally see some truth... That statement followed one from her father that read, Adulterous dad brought wrath of God on son. #BloodOnDadsHands #picketfuneral #woe

Tell @TheSlyStallone to mourn for his sins, not pimp out son's dead body to more proud sin, Phelps later tweeted, according to The Huffington Post.

Sage appeared with his father in Rocky V as the son of his father's character and then in Daylight in 1996, reports IMDB. Earlier this week the celebrity gossip site TMZ quoted a source as saying Sylvester is a wreck.

The elder Stallone has asked that his family's privacy be respected, a request that the Westboro Baptist Church will ignore, as usual. They first made the news in 1998 when they protested the funeral of Matt Shepard, a Wyoming man two other men beat to death because he was gay. The church made national headlines again for appearing outside the funerals of soldiers killed overseas with signs like God Hates Fags and Thank God For Dead Soldiers.

Last year the Supreme Court decided in an 8-1 ruling that the members of the small church (who are mostly named Phelps) had a right to picket outside the funerals to promote what CNN called a broad-based message. The justices ruled the protests were protected under freedom of speech.

The church has also protested at the funerals of Michael Jackson, heavy metal singer Ronnie James Dio, among many others.

The most recent announcement comes in the wake of the Texas A&M students Sea of Maroon that blocked the church members from entering a fallen soldiers' funeral. When the group of over 650 students, family and alumni made it clear they would resist the church members without physically attacking them, Phelps and his followers failed to show up at all.

The group's philosophy is not always clear, although it's obvious they thrive on publicizing their messages of hate and ignorance. Along with their blatant homophobia, church members have burned Korans, spoken out against Jews, and protested Pope Benedict XVI's New York City visit in 2008.