Police in Washington, DC, have canceled a Christian event intended to take place as atheists hold a gathering – but that won’t stop all of the opportunities for evangelizing.

Ray Comfort of Living Waters ministries had planned to go to the nation’s capital this weekend, distribute some of his books, and bless the atheists gathered there with cards redeemable for sandwiches. Comfort says a thousand supporters agreed to go with him.

“When the city found out about that, DC said that’s a protest, with a thousand people,” he explains. “And that moved it up a lot, and they said, You need a special permit. And without a permit, you’re Christians, so you’re not allowed to go down and talk to those atheists because that would cause problems – which I can understand.

“In today’s climate, they’re worried about terrorism and they don’t want Christians arguing and having the police distracted.”

Comfort adds that otherwise the atheists would have been blessed with lunch, courtesy of Christians.

“We had $25,000 worth of Subway sandwich gift cards,” he says. “What we’re going to do is give them to homeless in Los Angeles. And when I said this on an atheist website, they reported it, and the atheists were saying, What a great idea. I disagree with what you believe in, but I think that’s good and I commend you for it. So we’re going to do that with those cards.”

Comfort will be in DC for an open-air preaching session about a mile away at the other end of the National Mall and film a television program. He expects atheists to join them and expects they will “have some nice, angry hecklers, which always makes it interesting.”