Televangelist Pat Robertson on Wednesday compared gay marriage advocates to the Illuminati, claiming both are out to destroy God.

Robertson made his comments in a 700 Club segment introducing a report on the debate over legalizing such unions in France.

(Related: French President Francois Hollande denounces violence at anti-gay marriage rally.)

“If you go back in history to the French Revolution, you find there was a thrust spurred by the writings of a group called the Illuminati to destroy the family, to destroy the state, to destroy capitalism, to destroy the church,” Robertson told his viewers. “And it was lived out in the blood of the French Revolution.”

“Well, we have here a debate over same-sex marriage. But is it really just about marriage? Or does it go far beyond that to destroying the traditional family and building a country without God.”

Robertson warned that “those who do not learn the lessons of history are doomed to live them again.” (The video is embedded on this page. Visit our video library for more videos.)

The Enlightenment-era secret society opposed superstition, prejudice, government abuse of power and religious influence over public life and supported gender equality. The Roman Catholic Church worked to disband the group. Theorists have for centuries debated whether the Illuminati was behind the French Revolution.