FORMER DAVENPORT, IA—Immediately following the performance of a same-sex marriage ceremony Sunday afternoon at Holy Christ Almighty Lutheran Church on Lincoln Avenue, the city of Davenport, IA and all 99,685 of its residents were reportedly smitten into oblivion by the merciless wrath of God and flung into the deepest bowels of eternal hell.

According to state authorities, the nightmarish incident occurred approximately five seconds after a local pastor pronounced homosexual men Brian Palmer, 39, and Greg DeHaan, 43, married in the eyes of God, at which point a tremor registering 8.5 on the Richter scale ripped the earth asunder and Davenport’s inhabitants were swallowed by a widening chasm, where they found themselves eviscerated on the fiery spears of 10 million shrieking demons.

"They tried to warn us and we didn’t listen—Lord, why did we not listen?" said Rev. Kenneth Hanson, the clergyman who performed the unholy marriage, moments before being dragged into a bottomless pit, flayed alive, and devoured by Satan, the Great Deceiver. "All I wanted to do was provide basic civil rights and legal recognition to Brian and Greg, two people who love each other and have been together for 15 years. But I was wrong. Oh, so wrong!"

"Children of God throughout the nation!" Hanson cried out as he plummeted into the infernal void. "Do not make the same mistake we here in Iowa have made! Save yourselves before it is too late!"

Witnesses reporting from the scene immediately preceding the destruction of Davenport recounted a number of horrific sights, including demonic wraiths clothed in smoke and ash flying through the city’s streets; homosexuals and heterosexuals alike being torn limb from limb by goat-legged imps, the skeletons of live dogs leaping from the creatures’ bodies to feast upon small children; and a great wall of fire that spread from the altar where the small, private wedding ceremony was conducted in west Davenport and consumed all.

In the wake of the disaster, many friends, relatives, and fellow Iowans said they blamed Brian and Greg most of all, for having given in to Satan’s obvious machinations despite the numerous warnings presented to them.

"Why did Brian and Greg insist upon this public, legally binding avowal of their love?" sobbed a relative who now lives in Minnesota and wished to remain anonymous due to fear of reprisals by the Forces of Righteousness. "Why couldn’t they have just kept living as second-class citizens, without the tax incentives and insurance flexibility offered to married couples?"

As friends and family of the longtime couple endured the agony of hot lances pierced through their eyes and a cloud of sulfurous gas enveloped the city, Iowans expressed great remorse for ignoring God’s design and allowing the union of Brian and Greg to occur.

"We should have seen this coming when that Plague of Locusts appeared in central Scott County last month after they applied for the marriage license," said a terrified Marsha Ternus, former chief justice of the Iowa State Supreme Court, who was ousted last November for her support of an earlier ruling declaring the state’s ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional. "It was such a clear omen, yet we were too blind to see. We have brought the Vengeance of the Lord down upon the people of Davenport with our hubristic refusal to obey what is written in holy scripture. May God have mercy on our souls."

The event, which is being called a clear and irrefutable message from God as to his position on gay marriage, came as a shock to many around the nation who believed that allowing gays and lesbians to marry was the right thing to do and therefore could not invoke the displeasure of the Almighty Lord.

Meanwhile, as citizens prayed furiously for the Lord’s forgiveness, officials said they were working around the clock to drain local rivers and lakes of the blood and entrails of sinners, and will soon plug up the gaping, smoldering hole where Davenport once stood and from whence the stench of roasting flesh and the cackle of Satan himself continues to emanate.

Following the immolation of Davenport, LGBT communities across the country immediately issued statements acknowledging their culpability for the catastrophe, admitting that homosexuality was a sinful lifestyle deserving of wrathful punishment. In surveys, 100 percent of homosexuals polled said that, given the clear evidence of God’s Will shown by the tragic events, the best course of action would be to abandon the notion of gay rights altogether and beg the Lord’s forgiveness.

"I thought antigay activism was cruel and bigoted before, but now I can see that, yes, my sexual orientation is truly an abomination in the Eyes of God," said lesbian activist and organizer Professor Julia Cafritz of Houston, responding to early reports of God’s actions in the Midwest. "My very existence is an affront to all that is good and true in this country. I’m sorry, America. I’m so, so terribly sorry."

At press time, officials said the overall strength of the traditional American family had increased by 47 percent following the eternal damnation of Davenport, while pure, hardworking Christians everywhere would continue to be assured a place in heaven.