Conflict Between Christian Coffee Shop and LGBTQ+ Communists Gets Frothy

With signs reading “get Nazis out of Denver” and “stand up to bigotry,” members of a group calling themselves the Denver Communists have protested a Christian coffee shop every month for the last two years. They say that The Drip Café, which was founded by local ministry leader Jamie Sanchez, is a hateful, anti-gay front for Christian propaganda.

Sanchez says he just wants to sell coffee and uplift Denver’s local homeless community while doing so.

Is it possible that an unassuming coffee shop in the Denver arts district could really be a secret front for anti-gay hatred?

Grande Backlash

Sanchez opened The Drip Café in 2023 as an extension of his homeless ministry, “Recycle God’s Love.” Through his ministry, Sanchez works with local churches, businesses, and volunteers to provide the homeless with food, clothing, haircuts – and now through his coffee shop – jobs.

He says that he started receiving messages accusing him of being anti-gay before his coffee shop even opened its doors a few years ago. "I was in shock," Sanchez explained. "Our whole purpose opening the café was to serve the homeless community and help people get off the street, change their lives. And here we got a group who just hates us because we're doing that, and we're Christian."

Those messages were referencing the mission statement posted on the Recycle God’s Love website, and were mass organized by the Denver Communists group. “This organization is opposed to homosexuality as an alternate lifestyle,” reads the RGL mission statement, which has since been scrubbed from the internet amid the controversy. “The Bible instructs that it is a sin that leads to death.”

The Protests Begin

Dozens of members of Denver Communists were there to protest the opening of The Drip, and for months after the coffee shop opened they were there every single week with signs, bullhorns, and literature to hand out to passersby.

"It is bigoted,” said protester Chelsea Jacobs. The coffee shop is “a front for a right-wing, bigoted church that is against the queer community.”

For the last two years, Denver Communists have continued protesting every single month outside the coffee shop during the city’s art walk event, when foot traffic is high. They say they want patrons to know the values of Drip’s owner, as well as what their coffee purchase might fund.

The group even says Sanchez’s proclaimed charity work is anything but. "They also disguise [the cafe] as a charity by hiring unhoused folks and exploiting their labor," Jacobs stated.

"This is something they use to garner credibility to make themselves look good. But in reality, the profits that they make are going to their right-wing church.”

Super-Charged Demonic Gay Commies?

Sanchez has an answer as to why the Denver Communists have been so relentless in their protesting pursuit: They’re possessed by demons.

“It was very clear that they’re all being led by demons because they have it on their shirt,” said Sanchez, referencing a shirt worn by a protester reading ‘All Hail Satan’.” They’re not afraid to claim that they’re following Satan.” Sanchez described the spiritual battle against the allegedly demonic protesters as “so intense… like the walls were closing in on me.”

But protesters say they’re not motivated by Satan, or even to drive bigotry out of their community, though they say that would be a major plus. Rather, Denver Communists say that the protests are part of the bigger picture to tackle anti-gay bigotry at a national scale. 

“Our protests are part of a broader struggle against a wave of reaction that seeks to force queer people back into the closet — or into an early grave,” reads a statement on the group’s website. “LGBTQ+ rights and lives are under attack by the Trump administration…. [and] the protests against the hate-café are serving as a training ground for new queer-rights activists.”

What is your response? We’re often told to vote with our wallet… but just how much should the faith and politics of businesses we frequent impact our purchasing decisions? Do the protesters have a point, or are they taking things too far?