Baptist Reverend to Maddow: Christians In America 'Are Not Persecuted

Days after Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum caught some heat over Pastor Dennis Terry's controversial introduction at Greenwell Springs Baptist Church in Greenwell Springs, Louisiana, another faith leader is speaking out.

Rev. C. Welton Gaddy, a minister at Northminster Baptist Church in Monroe, Louisiana, had some tough words for Christians in America who allege that there's a war on religion. Additionally, he offered up some stark criticisms of Terry's controversial words.

(Related: Pastor Introducing Santorum Criticized for Allegedly Telling Non-Christians to ‘Get Out!’ of America if They Disagree)

"It angers me and it hurts me when I read the words at first I laughed," he told MSNBC host Rachel Maddow. "And then I thought, 'I can't laugh at this.'"

Gaddy went on to say that Terry wasn't speaking out in a Christian manner.

"That man gave me the feeling that he is the war on religion, because what he was talking about was being anti-American and anti-religious," he said. "He did not conform to the Bible and he didn't conform to the constitution. We are not a nation that kicks people out because of disagreement."

He also dismissed the notion that there is a war on religion and claimed that one can truly remove God from society.

"People who lived so long with an assumed establishment of religion -- Judeo-Christian tradition -- mainly Christian more than Judeo -- are now having to play by the same rules that everybody else does," he said. "And they're saying that that's persecution. And one day they're going to have to apologize to people in Afghanistan, and Iraq and places like that who really know what it's like to be persecuted for their faith. These people are not persecuted."

Watch the interview below, via MSNBC: