NEW HAVEN, Conn.--About 75 students held a silent protest of anti-gay bigot Rev. Fred Phelps, who came to "celebrate" the defeat of the state's domestic partnership legislation.

Family members and supporters of Phelps numbered only five on one corner of a busy intersection in the downtown area. They carried signs that read "Praise God for AIDS" and "God hates fags" after they traveled from Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., to what they termed "fag-infested" Yale University to preach their message of hate.

For more than 10 years, Phelps and members of his twisted church have picketed the funerals of gay men that they assume have died of AIDS. Phelps first gained notoriety picketing the funeral of Matthew Shepard, a young gay man brutally murdered in Laramie, Wyo.

At a larger afternoon vigil at city hall, 500 supporters--including Yale students, members of the New Haven Gay and Lesbian Community Center, antiwar and community activists and ministers--chanted and carried pro-gay signs.

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