Today's Cultural Warfare Update
Dec. 8th, 2005 12:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
solarbirdCreationism-as-mythology course religion instructor attacked, beaten;
salon.com article on the so-called "war on Christmas," and how it's being used by fundamentalists to whip up religious hatred and paranoia;
President Bush attacked as apparent part of the so-called "war on Christmas";
Several fundamentalist evangelical megachurches can't be bothered to host Christmas services on a Sunday;
Focus on the Family: A school play writing new lyrics to "Silent Night" is UNCONSTITUTIONAL because it "mocks Christian Christmas songs"; they've got lawyers on standby to sue if the school doesn't perform the original lyrics; includes ACTION ITEM to write and phone the school;
FotF reports on success of pressure tactics against retailers saying "Happy Holidays", which they have previously labeled "anti-Christian";
Lawsuit against Ohio's unspecified anti-RU486 law in court;
Wisconsin Senate approves anti-marriage Constitutional amendment;
Anti-marriage signature collectors claim they have 3x the number of signatures needed for their anti-marriage Constitutional amendment in Massachusetts; no mention is made of the documented signature fraud;
Focus on the Family on Michael Schiavo's new PAC, formed in response to brutal fundamentalist abuse of him and his late wife's medical situation;
FotF launches attack ads against Colorado senator Salazar for not supporting Alito for SC; includes action item;
Fox News poll finds 59% of Americans buying into "Christianity is under attack" meme;
Concerned Women for America poo-poohs Alito memo showing strategy for repealing Roe v. Wade;
Social conservatives upset with Bill Frist over lack of progress on their issues in 2005;
Family Research Council ACTION ALERT on anti-marriage initiative in Florida;
AFA, Agape Press: Donor Network of Arizona was right to reject organ donations from gay man solely because the donor was gay (and yes, of course, HIV-negative);
Focus on the Family highlight African-American pastors opposed to gay rights;
Fundamentalist "Canada Family Action Coalition" is "delighted" that Tory Stephen Harper plans a new vote on marriage rights if he becomes PM, hope to turn it into the major issue of the campaign;
Agape Press, WorldNetDaily attack White House's "Happy Holiday Season" cards; same column reports that Ford is saying that the ad withdrawal was purely a business matter and that Ford would NOT be dropping all advertisements in GBLT-friendly publications.
----- 1 -----
Mirecki hospitalized after beating
By Ron Knox, Eric Weslander (Contact)
Lawrence (Kansas) Journal-World
Originally published 05:37 p.m., December 5, 2005
Updated 06:31 p.m., December 5, 2005
Long URL elided
Douglas County sheriff’s deputies are investigating the reported beating of a Kansas University professor who gained recent notoriety for his Internet tirades against Christian fundamentalists.
Kansas University religious studies professor Paul Mirecki reported he was beaten by two men about 6:40 a.m. today on a roadside in rural Douglas County. In a series of interviews late this afternoon, Mirecki said the men who beat him were making references to the controversy that has propelled him into the headlines in recent weeks.
“I didn’t know them, but I’m sure they knew me,” he said.
Mirecki said he was driving to breakfast when he noticed the men tailgating him in a pickup truck.
“I just pulled over hoping they would pass, and then they pulled up real close behind,” he said. “They got out, and I made the mistake of getting out.”
He said the men beat him about the upper body with their fists, and he said he thinks they struck him with a metal object. He was treated and released at Lawrence Memorial Hospital.
[More at URL]
----- 2 -----
How the secular humanist grinch didn't steal Christmas
The right-wing crusade against the liberal "war on Christmas" is great for rallying the troops. Too bad the war doesn't exist.
Salon.com
By Michelle Goldberg
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/11/21/christmas/index_np.html
In 1959, the recently formed John Birch Society issued an urgent alert: Christmas was under attack. In a JBS pamphlet titled "THERE GOES CHRISTMAS?!," a writer named Hubert Kregeloh warned, "One of the techniques now being applied by the Reds to weaken the pillar of religion in our country is the drive to take Christ out of Christmas -- to denude the event of its religious meaning." The central front in this perfidious assault was American department stores, where the "Godless UN" was scheming to replace religious decorations with internationalist celebrations of universal brotherhood.
At the time, the campaign to save Christmas was not widely treated as a matter of great national import. The John Birch Society was generally regarded as a crank, far-right outfit whose paranoid conspiracy theories (it believed fluoridated water was part of an evil Communist plot to poison America's brains) put it outside the pale of reasonable discourse. Staffers on the ultra-right 1964 Barry Goldwater campaign tried to prevent Birchers from volunteering because they carried the taint of extremism. The John Birch Society didn't have access to a major television network. But a lot has changed since then.
Last December, warnings about a war on Christmas -- a war whose central front was the nation's department stores -- once again emanated from the right, but this time, they were on national TV and talk radio. Fox News' Bill O'Reilly began running a regular segment called "Christmas Under Siege." "All over the country, Christmas is taking flak," O'Reilly declared on Dec. 7. "In Denver this past weekend, no religious floats were permitted in the holiday parade there. In New York City, Mayor [Michael] Bloomberg unveiled the 'holiday tree,' and no Christian Christmas symbols are allowed in the public schools. Federated Department Stores -- that's Macy's -- have done away with the Christmas greeting 'Merry Christmas.'" Instead, Macy's was using the malign phrase "Happy Holidays." Noting this, Pat Buchanan wrote, "What we are witnessing here are hate crimes against Christianity."
This year the war on Christmas canard has come early, and with it the latest opportunity for religious conservatives to cast themselves as the oppressed victims of secular tyrants. In October, Fox News anchor John Gibson published a book titled "The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought," which envisions a vast conspiracy with tentacles reaching into many aspects of American life. "The plot to ban Christmas itself is anything but secret," writes Gibson. "It is embedded in the secular 'Humanist Manifesto' (in its three iterations from the American Humanist Association), in the philosophy of teaching of John Dewey, in the legal opinions of Laurence Tribe, in the rulings of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on which sits the most liberal jurist in the land, Stephen Reinhardt, who is married to Ramona Ripston, the southern California ACLU executive director and the national group's most liberal and effective leader."
[More at URL]
----- 3 -----
White House greetings going generic - 'Holiday' cards ringing hollow for some on Bush's list
By ALAN COOPERMAN
Washington Post
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/3508042.html
WASHINGTON - What's missing from the White House Christmas card? Christmas.
This month, as in every December since he took office, President Bush sent out cards with a generic end-of-the-year message, wishing 1.4 million of his close friends and supporters a happy "holiday season."
Many are thrilled to get a White House Christmas card, no matter the greeting inside. But some conservative Christians are reacting as if Bush stuck coal in their stockings.
"This clearly demonstrates that the Bush administration has suffered a loss of will and that they have capitulated to the worst elements in our culture," said William A. Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights.
Bush "claims to be a born-again, evangelical Christian. But he sure doesn't act like one," said Joseph Farah, editor of the conservative Web site WorldNetDaily.com. "I threw out my White House card as soon as I got it."
[More at URL]
----- 4 -----
Some megachurches closing on Christmas
Pastors anticipate low attendance because day falls on Sunday
Wednesday, December 7, 2005; Posted: 7:33 a.m. EST (12:33 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/12/06/churches.closed.christmas.ap/index.html
(AP) -- This Christmas, no prayers will be said in several megachurches around the country.
Even though the holiday falls this year on a Sunday, when churches normally host thousands for worship, pastors are canceling services, anticipating low attendance on what they call a family day.
Critics within the evangelical community, more accustomed to doing battle with department stores and public schools over keeping religion in Christmas, are stunned by the shutdown.
It is almost unheard of for a Christian church to cancel services on a Sunday, and opponents of the closures are accusing these congregations of bowing to secular culture.
"This is a consumer mentality at work: 'Let's not impose the church on people. Let's not make church in any way inconvenient,' " said David Wells, professor of history and systematic theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a leading evangelical school in Hamilton, Massachusetts.
"I think what this does is feed into the individualism that is found throughout American culture, where everyone does their own thing."
[More at URL]
----- 5 -----
Weigh in on School's Rewriting of 'Silent Night'
Focus on the Family
Editor's Note
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Think you've heard it all when it comes to the war on
Christmas? Not if you haven't heard what a Wisconsin
public school has done to "Silent Night."
The powers that be at Ridgeway Elementary, it seems, were
so offended by the lyrics to the song, which detail the
miracle of Christ's birth, that they rewrote them. The
version to be performed by children during this year's
"winter program" is called "Cold in the Night" and goes
something like this:
"Cold in the night, no one in sight/winter winds whirl and
bite/How I wish I were happy and warm/safe with my family,
out of the storm."
These details come courtesy of the religious-liberties law
firm Liberty Counsel, which is representing a concerned
parent and demanding school officials change the program
-- because their actions are a violation of the
Constitution.
"When a public school intentionally mocks Christian
Christmas songs by secularizing their content," Liberty
Counsel President Mat Staver said, "they cross the line
from a neutral position, which the Constitution requires,
to a hostile position, which the Constitution forbids."
You can help Ridgeway Elementary's principal, Julie Piper,
understand this truth by contacting her and letting her
know -- respectfully -- what you think of the school's
efforts to marginalize Christmas. You can call her at
608-924-3461 or e-mail her by visiting the link below and
clicking on the "Take Action" button.
http://www3.capwiz.com/fof/issues/alert/?alertid=8299621&type=CU
----- 6 -----
Christmas Staging a Retail Comeback
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
November 7, 2005
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0038858.cfm
SUMMARY: In the wake of protests, some retailers are
rethinking their generic "happy holidays" advertising.
Pressure from family advocates has prompted some retailers
to bring back references to and symbols of Christmas to
their seasonal advertising efforts.
Even Target, the subject of a boycott called by the
American Family Association (AFA), seems to be on the
verge of changing its anti-Christmas tune. A spokeswoman
for the retailer told The New York Times on Tuesday that
it might make reference to Christmas in advertising later
this year.
That's a 180-degree turn from last week, when corporate
spokeswoman Carolyn Brookter told CitizenLink the word
"Christmas" was not in company's advertising plan.
"Our focus and our marketing theme is actually called
'Gather Round,' " Brookter explained. "So, all of the
marketing that you'll see in advertising has to do with a
particular theme."
[More at URL]
----- 7 -----
OHIO COURT BATTLES RU-486 IN COURT
A group of doctors calls the abortion pill a "recommended medical practice."
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0038854.cfm
A ban on the use of RU-486, the abortion pill, beyond the
seventh week of pregnancy has landed Ohio in a court
battle with physicians, who claim the ban "criminalizes
recommended medical practices."
The law is intended to ensure that Ohio follows Food and
Drug Administration regulations. Now the U.S. 6th Circuit
Court of Appeals is poised to hear arguments about its
validity.
Daniel McConchie, director of public relations and public
policy for Americans United for Life, said Oklahoma and
New Jersey tried to pass similar legislation last year,
but failed.
----- 8 -----
Wisconsin Senate Approves Marriage Amendment
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
The Wisconsin Senate, on a 19-14 vote, today approved a
marriage-protection amendment to the state Constitution,
the latest step in long process to give residents the
chance to vote on how marriage is defined in their state.
Both the Assembly and the Senate approved the amendment
last year, but it must pass both houses in two consecutive
years before it can be put on a ballot. Traditionally, the
Senate is the harder of the two chambers for conservative
measures to clear, but the measure easily passed.
The vote broke along party lines, with two Democratic
senators -- Roger Breske and Dave Hansen -- voting against
the amendment this time even though they voted for it in
2004.
The amendment now goes to the Assembly for a vote, but it
is not expected to be addressed until early 2006.
----- 8 -----
Bay State Triples Signature Requirement for Marriage Amendment
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Activists in Massachusetts have gathered three times the
number of signatures required to petition the state
government to allow voters to decide the definition of
marriage in the state.
The effort is a response to a 2003 Supreme Judicial Court
decision that legalized marriage for same-sex couples. The
law took effect in May 2004 and thousands of homosexual
couples have since married.
In the past 60 days, VoteOnMarriage.org volunteers across
the state collected 170,000 signatures from residents who
want the chance to vote on the issue.
Kris Mineau, president of Massachusetts Family Institute
and spokesman for VoteOnMarriage.org, said that number is
almost three times the number needed.
"We believe this to be the most signatures ever collected
in Massachusetts history," Mineau said. "The numbers speak
for themselves: this has been a grassroots, bottom-up
effort by concerned, energized and determined citizens who
proved they will not sit idly by and lose their
democracy."
Mineau and others representing VoteOnMarriage.org
delivered the signatures to the secretary of state for
final validation today. Once the required 65,825
signatures are certified, the new amendment must receive
50 votes in two successive legislatures before being
placed on the ballot in the fall of 2008.
"The people have not just spoken," Mineau said. "They have
shouted, 'Let the people vote!' "
And their message is clear: Marriage in the union of one
man and one woman.
----- 9 -----
Schiavo's Husband Forms PAC
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Michael Schiavo, the husband of the disabled Florida women
who died two weeks after her feeding tube was removed by
court order earlier this year, has launched a political
action committee to forward his "right to die" political
leanings.
With money earned through TerriPAC he intends to challenge
candidates on their view of the government's role in
issues such as the one the nation witnessed as he fought
for -- and ultimately won -- the right to watch his wife,
Terri, die.
"The easiest thing would be to move on and let the
headlines fade," Schiavo said. "But my experience with our
political leaders has opened my eyes to just how easily
the private wishes of normal Americans like me and Terri
can be cast aside in the destructive game of political
pandering.
"The best way to hold them accountable," he added, "is to
make sure voters know where the candidates stand when they
come looking for votes next November."
Carrie Gordon Earll, director of issue analysis for Focus
on the Family Action, said Schiavo's latest antics are
upsetting.
"Many Americans will be appalled to learn that Michael
Schiavo has formed a political action committee named
after his deceased wife, Terri Schiavo," Earll said.
"According to its Web site, one of the primary purposes of
TerriPAC is to solicit political donations to use against
elected officials who wanted to allow Terri's parents to
care for their disabled daughter."
Earll said Schiavo is using his late wife's name and
misfortunate to advance a political agenda.
"Instead of trying to pass legislation to protect the
disabled," she said, "he's openly using his limited name
recognition to affect the outcome of political races."
----- 10 -----
Focus Action Ad Targets Salazar
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 6, 2005
by Gary Schneeberger, editor
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0038851.cfm
SUMMARY: Colorado senator's opposition to Samuel Alito is
politically motivated "schoolyard taunt," group contends.
U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar is the subject of a new Focus on the
Family Action ad campaign that spotlights his "politically
motivated attacks" on Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito.
The ads, appearing today in newspapers in Denver and
Colorado Springs, Colo., question Salazar's comments to
The New York Times last month, when he said of Alito's
nomination that "America deserves better than what we got
here."
"It's clear that Colorado's junior senator has failed in
his duty of 'advice and consent' by dismissing the
unparalleled qualifications of Judge Alito," said Tom
Minnery, Focus on the Family Action's senior vice
president of government and public policy. "Judge Alito
possesses more federal judicial experience than 105 of the
109 Supreme Court justices in American history -- and yet,
Senator Salazar believes America deserves better?"
[...]
TAKE ACTION: If you live in Colorado, please take a moment
to contact U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar and urge him to give
Judge Samuel Alito the fair hearing he is entitled to
under the Constitution. For contact information, including
an easy-to-use e-mail form, visit the CitizenLink Action
Center.
http://www3.capwiz.com/fof/bio/?id=31624
[More at URL]
----- 11 -----
Majority of Americans Think Christianity Under Attack
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 6, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Nearly six in 10 Americans believe Christianity is under
seige in the United States, according to a new Fox
News/Opinion Dynamics poll covering a wide range of issues
involving religious expression in the public square.
The survey, which questioned 900 registered voters and has
a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent, found that
59 percent consider Christianity to be under attack, with
37 percent disagreeing and 4 percent unsure. Respondents
also were asked whether America is a more or less
spiritual nation today than it was 25 years ago:
Twenty-five percent said "more," 60 percent said "less"
and 8 percent said "the same."
Several questions focused on the controversy over the
banning of Christmas -- the word and its symbols -- from
the public square. While only 42 percent of those polled
said they believe there is a "war" Christmas in the U.S.,
58 percent said it appears that the public display of
Christian symbols of the holiday is more under attack this
year than in past years.
On another Christmas topic, 83 percent said Nativity
scenes should be permitted on public property.
As for non-seasonal-specific issues, 93 percent said "in
God we trust" should remain on U.S. currency and 90
percent said "under God" should remain in the Pledge of
Allegiance. More than three-quarters of respondents -- 76
percent -- said it should be legal to post the Ten
Commandments on public property, while 66 percent favor
the Decalogue being posted in public schools. Speaking of
public schools, 82 percent of those surveyed want to see
voluntary prayer in schools restored.
One final result: Nearly 8 in 10 of those polled believe
courts have gone too far in taking religion out of public
life.
----- 12 -----
Would O’Connor Have Passed the Left’s ‘Alito Test’?
Concerned Women for America
12/6/2005
By Jan LaRue, Chief Counsel
Document reveals Alito’s ‘strategy’ for reversing Roe v. Wade.
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/9608/LEGAL/scourt/index.htm
The left is whipping itself into further frenzy over a newly released memo written by Supreme Court nominee Judge Samuel Alito 20 years ago. As a Justice Department lawyer in the Reagan administration, Alito expressed a strategy to “advance the goals of bringing about the eventual overruling of Roe v. Wade and, in the meantime, of mitigating its effects.”
Only the left is shocked when a conservative lawyer working in a conservative administration acts like a conservative.
The memo argued that the administration should involve itself in a case before the Supreme Court, Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, to argue that the state regulations on abortion were “eminently reasonable and legitimate.” Alito referred to an abortionist as an “abortionist” and criticized another opinion, which struck down an ordinance that he said was “designed to preclude the mindless dumping of aborted fetuses into garbage piles,” as “almost incredible.”
[More at URL]
----- 13 -----
Angst on right over Frist
By Alexander Bolton
The Hill
http://www.hillnews.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/120705/news1.html
Frustration is mounting among social conservatives over the Senate’s and Majority Leader Bill Frist’s (R-Tenn.) failure this year to schedule votes on legislation important to the movement.
The Family Research Council (FRC), one of the most prominent pressure groups representing Christian evangelical voters, dropped the Senate from its annual congressional scorecard because the chamber voted on not one bill the group cares about.
[...]
“They didn’t have anything that we saw as family votes,” he added. “Sometimes it seems like we got more done during the Reagan administration when [Republicans] didn’t have control [of Congress] or during the Clinton administration when we didn’t have the administration on our side. There is a level of frustration especially among our grassroots.”
[...]
Several conservative leaders have attributed the lack of action partly to Frist, who controls the Senate calendar, and suspect that his presidential ambitions may be to blame. Frist has tried to woo GOP officials in Michigan, an important presidential-primary state where independents and Democrats are allowed to vote in the GOP primary.
Others believe Frist has become less receptive to socially conservative initiatives since being criticized for his role in the controversy over Terri Schiavo, a brain-damaged woman who died this year after a state court sided with her husband and ordered her feeding tube removed.
[...]
“For a good period of time he was very receptive to the [conservative] social agenda,” said Weyrich of Frist. “It seems after the Schiavo case that he hasn’t been as interested. I don’t know whether a connection is there or not.”
[...]
The aide also cited Senate legislation this year that asked a federal court to review the Schiavo case. But Congress’s involvement drew much political fire. Polls showed that a majority of the American public disapproved of congressional intervention.
Frist was a primary target of scorn because, based on video footage he had seen, he questioned the diagnosis that Schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state. An autopsy later showed that Schiavo’s brain had suffered irreversible damage.
Several conservatives suspect that the incident may have made Frist wary of hot-button social issues.
[More at URL]
----- 14 -----
Less Than 25 Days Left to Protect Marriage in Florida
December 7, 2005 - Wednesday
Family Research Council
Forward to a Friend!
http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=AL05L01&f=PG03I03
A massive, statewide petition campaign is in the final stretch in Florida to amend the state constitution to define marriage as being between one man and one woman. Your help is urgently needed to make sure this effort is successful.
There are 2 important steps you can take right now to play a vital role in this historic campaign:
Go to www.Florida4Marriage.org and click on "Sign Petition." Download the PDF document and print it out. Once you fill it in and sign it, simply mail the original document to the address at the bottom.
Become a "Defender of Marriage" by printing out 10 copies of the petition and give them out to family and friends who are registered to vote in Florida. Ask those 10 to do the same -- getting the petition in the hands of more and more people before the end of December.
The vast majority of Floridians want to see marriage remain as it has always been -- between one man and one woman. Your help is needed now to make sure that marriage is protected in Florida. Please, visit www.Florida4Marriage.org to learn more about this issue and to sign the petition today!
----- 15 -----
Donor Network Right to Refuse Organs from Homosexual, Says Christian Doc
By Mary Rettig
December 7, 2005
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/afa/72005g.asp
(AgapePress) - Friends and family of a Tucson man are crying discrimination after the homosexual man's organs were rejected by the Donor Network of Arizona. However, a Kansas surgeon who works in organ transplantation says the decision was a good one.
Albert Soto, 51, intended to donate his eyes and other tissues after death, but a spokesman from the Network says the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta has established guidelines allowing centers to reject donations from men who have had sex with men in the last five years. Dr. David Pauls, a spokesman for the Christian Medical Association, says those guidelines are needed regardless -- even if the donor is HIV negative, as in Soto's case.
[More at URL]
----- 16 -----
Black Pastors against Gay Rights, Civil Rights Connection
Focus on the Family
December 7, 2005
by Josh Montez
African-American pastors are bristling at the idea of equating the gay agenda to the civil rights battles of the 60’s.
http://www.family.org/cforum/fnif/news/a0038831.cfm
Gay activists like to talk about the civil rights battles of the 60’s. They claim their struggle is the same. But one group of African-Americans is bristling at the connection, pastors. The latest example is in Indiana where black pastors are protesting an Indianapolis city ordinance that gives special rights to homosexuals. Eric Miller with Advance America is opposed to the change.
“This ordinance stated that a business with six or more employees could not refuse to hire a homosexual or someone based upon their gender identity like a cross dresser.”
And he’s not alone. Joining him in dissent are 21 African-American pastors in Indianapolis. Pastor Terry Webster of Nu Corinthian Baptist Church is one.
“When they’re talking about civil rights, they actually have equated it to the civil rights struggle and discrimination that the black community went through. We’re not against human rights. We are for human rights and we are not for anyone being discriminated against, but we also feel that this is a smokescreen and it’s seeking still to elevate homosexuality.”
[More at URL]
----- 17 -----
Canadian Activist Sees Opportunity for Marriage Traditionalists in Upcoming Election
By Chad Groening
Agape Press
December 6, 2005
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/afa/62005e.asp
(AgapePress) - The head of a Canadian pro-family organization says conservative Canadians will be energized now that Conservative leader Stephen Harper has pledged to reopen the debate on same-sex "marriage" in their country.
Ousted Prime Minister Paul Martin, whose government had only been in power for 17 months, barely fought off an earlier no-confidence vote in May, but was voted down decisively last week 171-133. The Globe & Mail of Canada reported that within hours of the announcement of the no-confidence vote in Parliament, Conservative leader Stephen Harper pledged to work to reinstate the traditional definition of marriage if he is elected prime minister in January.
[Editor's Note: he pledged a free revote on C-38, more or less. If it passes again, he says he's done.]
Brian Rushfeldt of the Canada Family Action Coalition believes Harper has re-energized Canadians who were devastated after same-sex marriage was legalized six months ago.
"I was absolutely delighted to hear him go public with that [announcement], knowing that it's a risky move for a politician to do that in one sense," says the Coalition president and co-founder. "And yet I am so convinced that the majority of Canadians are going to be delighted by that. We're very encouraged with Stephen Harper's comment and commitment to reopen the whole issue on same-sex marriage."
-- and I think that dynamic certainly might help very much on the Conservative side for getting out the vote as well."
Rushfeldt expects the marriage issue will help bring more Conservatives to the polls. "They will be excited; I think we can mobilize them on this fact," he says.
[More at URL]
----- 18 -----
Commentary & News Briefs
December 7, 2005
Agape Press
Compiled by Jenni Parker
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/afa/72005h.asp
...It appears the George W. Bush White House has joined much of corporate America in avoiding the word "Christmas." The Washington Post reports many conservatives are taking offense with the fact that the White House has been sending out greeting cards in the last few weeks, wishing people a happy "holiday season" rather than "Merry Christmas." WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah opines that President Bush "claims to be a born-again, evangelical Christian, but he sure doesn't act like one." Farah says he threw out his White House "holiday card" as soon as he received it. [Fred Jackson]
...Ford Motor Company says it was not giving in to pressure from Christian conservatives when it decided to stop advertising Jaguars and Land Rovers in homosexeual publications. The second-biggest automaker has announced that the two luxury brands will not be placing any more ads in homosexual publications like The Advocate. Ford spokesman Mike Moran says it is "a business decision" and had nothing to do with conservative Christian boycotts. And he says Ford's Volvo brand will keep advertising to homosexuals. Last week, the American Family Association canceled a Ford boycott it started in May. AFA chairman Donald Wildmon credits intercession by Ford dealers, who Wildmon says "are basically our kind of people who share many of our concerns." [AP]
[More at URL]
salon.com article on the so-called "war on Christmas," and how it's being used by fundamentalists to whip up religious hatred and paranoia;
President Bush attacked as apparent part of the so-called "war on Christmas";
Several fundamentalist evangelical megachurches can't be bothered to host Christmas services on a Sunday;
Focus on the Family: A school play writing new lyrics to "Silent Night" is UNCONSTITUTIONAL because it "mocks Christian Christmas songs"; they've got lawyers on standby to sue if the school doesn't perform the original lyrics; includes ACTION ITEM to write and phone the school;
FotF reports on success of pressure tactics against retailers saying "Happy Holidays", which they have previously labeled "anti-Christian";
Lawsuit against Ohio's unspecified anti-RU486 law in court;
Wisconsin Senate approves anti-marriage Constitutional amendment;
Anti-marriage signature collectors claim they have 3x the number of signatures needed for their anti-marriage Constitutional amendment in Massachusetts; no mention is made of the documented signature fraud;
Focus on the Family on Michael Schiavo's new PAC, formed in response to brutal fundamentalist abuse of him and his late wife's medical situation;
FotF launches attack ads against Colorado senator Salazar for not supporting Alito for SC; includes action item;
Fox News poll finds 59% of Americans buying into "Christianity is under attack" meme;
Concerned Women for America poo-poohs Alito memo showing strategy for repealing Roe v. Wade;
Social conservatives upset with Bill Frist over lack of progress on their issues in 2005;
Family Research Council ACTION ALERT on anti-marriage initiative in Florida;
AFA, Agape Press: Donor Network of Arizona was right to reject organ donations from gay man solely because the donor was gay (and yes, of course, HIV-negative);
Focus on the Family highlight African-American pastors opposed to gay rights;
Fundamentalist "Canada Family Action Coalition" is "delighted" that Tory Stephen Harper plans a new vote on marriage rights if he becomes PM, hope to turn it into the major issue of the campaign;
Agape Press, WorldNetDaily attack White House's "Happy Holiday Season" cards; same column reports that Ford is saying that the ad withdrawal was purely a business matter and that Ford would NOT be dropping all advertisements in GBLT-friendly publications.
----- 1 -----
Mirecki hospitalized after beating
By Ron Knox, Eric Weslander (Contact)
Lawrence (Kansas) Journal-World
Originally published 05:37 p.m., December 5, 2005
Updated 06:31 p.m., December 5, 2005
Long URL elided
Douglas County sheriff’s deputies are investigating the reported beating of a Kansas University professor who gained recent notoriety for his Internet tirades against Christian fundamentalists.
Kansas University religious studies professor Paul Mirecki reported he was beaten by two men about 6:40 a.m. today on a roadside in rural Douglas County. In a series of interviews late this afternoon, Mirecki said the men who beat him were making references to the controversy that has propelled him into the headlines in recent weeks.
“I didn’t know them, but I’m sure they knew me,” he said.
Mirecki said he was driving to breakfast when he noticed the men tailgating him in a pickup truck.
“I just pulled over hoping they would pass, and then they pulled up real close behind,” he said. “They got out, and I made the mistake of getting out.”
He said the men beat him about the upper body with their fists, and he said he thinks they struck him with a metal object. He was treated and released at Lawrence Memorial Hospital.
[More at URL]
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How the secular humanist grinch didn't steal Christmas
The right-wing crusade against the liberal "war on Christmas" is great for rallying the troops. Too bad the war doesn't exist.
Salon.com
By Michelle Goldberg
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/11/21/christmas/index_np.html
In 1959, the recently formed John Birch Society issued an urgent alert: Christmas was under attack. In a JBS pamphlet titled "THERE GOES CHRISTMAS?!," a writer named Hubert Kregeloh warned, "One of the techniques now being applied by the Reds to weaken the pillar of religion in our country is the drive to take Christ out of Christmas -- to denude the event of its religious meaning." The central front in this perfidious assault was American department stores, where the "Godless UN" was scheming to replace religious decorations with internationalist celebrations of universal brotherhood.
At the time, the campaign to save Christmas was not widely treated as a matter of great national import. The John Birch Society was generally regarded as a crank, far-right outfit whose paranoid conspiracy theories (it believed fluoridated water was part of an evil Communist plot to poison America's brains) put it outside the pale of reasonable discourse. Staffers on the ultra-right 1964 Barry Goldwater campaign tried to prevent Birchers from volunteering because they carried the taint of extremism. The John Birch Society didn't have access to a major television network. But a lot has changed since then.
Last December, warnings about a war on Christmas -- a war whose central front was the nation's department stores -- once again emanated from the right, but this time, they were on national TV and talk radio. Fox News' Bill O'Reilly began running a regular segment called "Christmas Under Siege." "All over the country, Christmas is taking flak," O'Reilly declared on Dec. 7. "In Denver this past weekend, no religious floats were permitted in the holiday parade there. In New York City, Mayor [Michael] Bloomberg unveiled the 'holiday tree,' and no Christian Christmas symbols are allowed in the public schools. Federated Department Stores -- that's Macy's -- have done away with the Christmas greeting 'Merry Christmas.'" Instead, Macy's was using the malign phrase "Happy Holidays." Noting this, Pat Buchanan wrote, "What we are witnessing here are hate crimes against Christianity."
This year the war on Christmas canard has come early, and with it the latest opportunity for religious conservatives to cast themselves as the oppressed victims of secular tyrants. In October, Fox News anchor John Gibson published a book titled "The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought," which envisions a vast conspiracy with tentacles reaching into many aspects of American life. "The plot to ban Christmas itself is anything but secret," writes Gibson. "It is embedded in the secular 'Humanist Manifesto' (in its three iterations from the American Humanist Association), in the philosophy of teaching of John Dewey, in the legal opinions of Laurence Tribe, in the rulings of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on which sits the most liberal jurist in the land, Stephen Reinhardt, who is married to Ramona Ripston, the southern California ACLU executive director and the national group's most liberal and effective leader."
[More at URL]
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White House greetings going generic - 'Holiday' cards ringing hollow for some on Bush's list
By ALAN COOPERMAN
Washington Post
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/3508042.html
WASHINGTON - What's missing from the White House Christmas card? Christmas.
This month, as in every December since he took office, President Bush sent out cards with a generic end-of-the-year message, wishing 1.4 million of his close friends and supporters a happy "holiday season."
Many are thrilled to get a White House Christmas card, no matter the greeting inside. But some conservative Christians are reacting as if Bush stuck coal in their stockings.
"This clearly demonstrates that the Bush administration has suffered a loss of will and that they have capitulated to the worst elements in our culture," said William A. Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights.
Bush "claims to be a born-again, evangelical Christian. But he sure doesn't act like one," said Joseph Farah, editor of the conservative Web site WorldNetDaily.com. "I threw out my White House card as soon as I got it."
[More at URL]
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Some megachurches closing on Christmas
Pastors anticipate low attendance because day falls on Sunday
Wednesday, December 7, 2005; Posted: 7:33 a.m. EST (12:33 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/12/06/churches.closed.christmas.ap/index.html
(AP) -- This Christmas, no prayers will be said in several megachurches around the country.
Even though the holiday falls this year on a Sunday, when churches normally host thousands for worship, pastors are canceling services, anticipating low attendance on what they call a family day.
Critics within the evangelical community, more accustomed to doing battle with department stores and public schools over keeping religion in Christmas, are stunned by the shutdown.
It is almost unheard of for a Christian church to cancel services on a Sunday, and opponents of the closures are accusing these congregations of bowing to secular culture.
"This is a consumer mentality at work: 'Let's not impose the church on people. Let's not make church in any way inconvenient,' " said David Wells, professor of history and systematic theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a leading evangelical school in Hamilton, Massachusetts.
"I think what this does is feed into the individualism that is found throughout American culture, where everyone does their own thing."
[More at URL]
----- 5 -----
Weigh in on School's Rewriting of 'Silent Night'
Focus on the Family
Editor's Note
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Think you've heard it all when it comes to the war on
Christmas? Not if you haven't heard what a Wisconsin
public school has done to "Silent Night."
The powers that be at Ridgeway Elementary, it seems, were
so offended by the lyrics to the song, which detail the
miracle of Christ's birth, that they rewrote them. The
version to be performed by children during this year's
"winter program" is called "Cold in the Night" and goes
something like this:
"Cold in the night, no one in sight/winter winds whirl and
bite/How I wish I were happy and warm/safe with my family,
out of the storm."
These details come courtesy of the religious-liberties law
firm Liberty Counsel, which is representing a concerned
parent and demanding school officials change the program
-- because their actions are a violation of the
Constitution.
"When a public school intentionally mocks Christian
Christmas songs by secularizing their content," Liberty
Counsel President Mat Staver said, "they cross the line
from a neutral position, which the Constitution requires,
to a hostile position, which the Constitution forbids."
You can help Ridgeway Elementary's principal, Julie Piper,
understand this truth by contacting her and letting her
know -- respectfully -- what you think of the school's
efforts to marginalize Christmas. You can call her at
608-924-3461 or e-mail her by visiting the link below and
clicking on the "Take Action" button.
http://www3.capwiz.com/fof/issues/alert/?alertid=8299621&type=CU
----- 6 -----
Christmas Staging a Retail Comeback
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
November 7, 2005
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0038858.cfm
SUMMARY: In the wake of protests, some retailers are
rethinking their generic "happy holidays" advertising.
Pressure from family advocates has prompted some retailers
to bring back references to and symbols of Christmas to
their seasonal advertising efforts.
Even Target, the subject of a boycott called by the
American Family Association (AFA), seems to be on the
verge of changing its anti-Christmas tune. A spokeswoman
for the retailer told The New York Times on Tuesday that
it might make reference to Christmas in advertising later
this year.
That's a 180-degree turn from last week, when corporate
spokeswoman Carolyn Brookter told CitizenLink the word
"Christmas" was not in company's advertising plan.
"Our focus and our marketing theme is actually called
'Gather Round,' " Brookter explained. "So, all of the
marketing that you'll see in advertising has to do with a
particular theme."
[More at URL]
----- 7 -----
OHIO COURT BATTLES RU-486 IN COURT
A group of doctors calls the abortion pill a "recommended medical practice."
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0038854.cfm
A ban on the use of RU-486, the abortion pill, beyond the
seventh week of pregnancy has landed Ohio in a court
battle with physicians, who claim the ban "criminalizes
recommended medical practices."
The law is intended to ensure that Ohio follows Food and
Drug Administration regulations. Now the U.S. 6th Circuit
Court of Appeals is poised to hear arguments about its
validity.
Daniel McConchie, director of public relations and public
policy for Americans United for Life, said Oklahoma and
New Jersey tried to pass similar legislation last year,
but failed.
----- 8 -----
Wisconsin Senate Approves Marriage Amendment
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
The Wisconsin Senate, on a 19-14 vote, today approved a
marriage-protection amendment to the state Constitution,
the latest step in long process to give residents the
chance to vote on how marriage is defined in their state.
Both the Assembly and the Senate approved the amendment
last year, but it must pass both houses in two consecutive
years before it can be put on a ballot. Traditionally, the
Senate is the harder of the two chambers for conservative
measures to clear, but the measure easily passed.
The vote broke along party lines, with two Democratic
senators -- Roger Breske and Dave Hansen -- voting against
the amendment this time even though they voted for it in
2004.
The amendment now goes to the Assembly for a vote, but it
is not expected to be addressed until early 2006.
----- 8 -----
Bay State Triples Signature Requirement for Marriage Amendment
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Activists in Massachusetts have gathered three times the
number of signatures required to petition the state
government to allow voters to decide the definition of
marriage in the state.
The effort is a response to a 2003 Supreme Judicial Court
decision that legalized marriage for same-sex couples. The
law took effect in May 2004 and thousands of homosexual
couples have since married.
In the past 60 days, VoteOnMarriage.org volunteers across
the state collected 170,000 signatures from residents who
want the chance to vote on the issue.
Kris Mineau, president of Massachusetts Family Institute
and spokesman for VoteOnMarriage.org, said that number is
almost three times the number needed.
"We believe this to be the most signatures ever collected
in Massachusetts history," Mineau said. "The numbers speak
for themselves: this has been a grassroots, bottom-up
effort by concerned, energized and determined citizens who
proved they will not sit idly by and lose their
democracy."
Mineau and others representing VoteOnMarriage.org
delivered the signatures to the secretary of state for
final validation today. Once the required 65,825
signatures are certified, the new amendment must receive
50 votes in two successive legislatures before being
placed on the ballot in the fall of 2008.
"The people have not just spoken," Mineau said. "They have
shouted, 'Let the people vote!' "
And their message is clear: Marriage in the union of one
man and one woman.
----- 9 -----
Schiavo's Husband Forms PAC
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 7, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Michael Schiavo, the husband of the disabled Florida women
who died two weeks after her feeding tube was removed by
court order earlier this year, has launched a political
action committee to forward his "right to die" political
leanings.
With money earned through TerriPAC he intends to challenge
candidates on their view of the government's role in
issues such as the one the nation witnessed as he fought
for -- and ultimately won -- the right to watch his wife,
Terri, die.
"The easiest thing would be to move on and let the
headlines fade," Schiavo said. "But my experience with our
political leaders has opened my eyes to just how easily
the private wishes of normal Americans like me and Terri
can be cast aside in the destructive game of political
pandering.
"The best way to hold them accountable," he added, "is to
make sure voters know where the candidates stand when they
come looking for votes next November."
Carrie Gordon Earll, director of issue analysis for Focus
on the Family Action, said Schiavo's latest antics are
upsetting.
"Many Americans will be appalled to learn that Michael
Schiavo has formed a political action committee named
after his deceased wife, Terri Schiavo," Earll said.
"According to its Web site, one of the primary purposes of
TerriPAC is to solicit political donations to use against
elected officials who wanted to allow Terri's parents to
care for their disabled daughter."
Earll said Schiavo is using his late wife's name and
misfortunate to advance a political agenda.
"Instead of trying to pass legislation to protect the
disabled," she said, "he's openly using his limited name
recognition to affect the outcome of political races."
----- 10 -----
Focus Action Ad Targets Salazar
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 6, 2005
by Gary Schneeberger, editor
http://www.family.org/cforum/news/a0038851.cfm
SUMMARY: Colorado senator's opposition to Samuel Alito is
politically motivated "schoolyard taunt," group contends.
U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar is the subject of a new Focus on the
Family Action ad campaign that spotlights his "politically
motivated attacks" on Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito.
The ads, appearing today in newspapers in Denver and
Colorado Springs, Colo., question Salazar's comments to
The New York Times last month, when he said of Alito's
nomination that "America deserves better than what we got
here."
"It's clear that Colorado's junior senator has failed in
his duty of 'advice and consent' by dismissing the
unparalleled qualifications of Judge Alito," said Tom
Minnery, Focus on the Family Action's senior vice
president of government and public policy. "Judge Alito
possesses more federal judicial experience than 105 of the
109 Supreme Court justices in American history -- and yet,
Senator Salazar believes America deserves better?"
[...]
TAKE ACTION: If you live in Colorado, please take a moment
to contact U.S. Sen. Ken Salazar and urge him to give
Judge Samuel Alito the fair hearing he is entitled to
under the Constitution. For contact information, including
an easy-to-use e-mail form, visit the CitizenLink Action
Center.
http://www3.capwiz.com/fof/bio/?id=31624
[More at URL]
----- 11 -----
Majority of Americans Think Christianity Under Attack
Focus on the Family
Family News in Focus
December 6, 2005
[Received in email; no URL]
Nearly six in 10 Americans believe Christianity is under
seige in the United States, according to a new Fox
News/Opinion Dynamics poll covering a wide range of issues
involving religious expression in the public square.
The survey, which questioned 900 registered voters and has
a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent, found that
59 percent consider Christianity to be under attack, with
37 percent disagreeing and 4 percent unsure. Respondents
also were asked whether America is a more or less
spiritual nation today than it was 25 years ago:
Twenty-five percent said "more," 60 percent said "less"
and 8 percent said "the same."
Several questions focused on the controversy over the
banning of Christmas -- the word and its symbols -- from
the public square. While only 42 percent of those polled
said they believe there is a "war" Christmas in the U.S.,
58 percent said it appears that the public display of
Christian symbols of the holiday is more under attack this
year than in past years.
On another Christmas topic, 83 percent said Nativity
scenes should be permitted on public property.
As for non-seasonal-specific issues, 93 percent said "in
God we trust" should remain on U.S. currency and 90
percent said "under God" should remain in the Pledge of
Allegiance. More than three-quarters of respondents -- 76
percent -- said it should be legal to post the Ten
Commandments on public property, while 66 percent favor
the Decalogue being posted in public schools. Speaking of
public schools, 82 percent of those surveyed want to see
voluntary prayer in schools restored.
One final result: Nearly 8 in 10 of those polled believe
courts have gone too far in taking religion out of public
life.
----- 12 -----
Would O’Connor Have Passed the Left’s ‘Alito Test’?
Concerned Women for America
12/6/2005
By Jan LaRue, Chief Counsel
Document reveals Alito’s ‘strategy’ for reversing Roe v. Wade.
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/9608/LEGAL/scourt/index.htm
The left is whipping itself into further frenzy over a newly released memo written by Supreme Court nominee Judge Samuel Alito 20 years ago. As a Justice Department lawyer in the Reagan administration, Alito expressed a strategy to “advance the goals of bringing about the eventual overruling of Roe v. Wade and, in the meantime, of mitigating its effects.”
Only the left is shocked when a conservative lawyer working in a conservative administration acts like a conservative.
The memo argued that the administration should involve itself in a case before the Supreme Court, Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, to argue that the state regulations on abortion were “eminently reasonable and legitimate.” Alito referred to an abortionist as an “abortionist” and criticized another opinion, which struck down an ordinance that he said was “designed to preclude the mindless dumping of aborted fetuses into garbage piles,” as “almost incredible.”
[More at URL]
----- 13 -----
Angst on right over Frist
By Alexander Bolton
The Hill
http://www.hillnews.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/120705/news1.html
Frustration is mounting among social conservatives over the Senate’s and Majority Leader Bill Frist’s (R-Tenn.) failure this year to schedule votes on legislation important to the movement.
The Family Research Council (FRC), one of the most prominent pressure groups representing Christian evangelical voters, dropped the Senate from its annual congressional scorecard because the chamber voted on not one bill the group cares about.
[...]
“They didn’t have anything that we saw as family votes,” he added. “Sometimes it seems like we got more done during the Reagan administration when [Republicans] didn’t have control [of Congress] or during the Clinton administration when we didn’t have the administration on our side. There is a level of frustration especially among our grassroots.”
[...]
Several conservative leaders have attributed the lack of action partly to Frist, who controls the Senate calendar, and suspect that his presidential ambitions may be to blame. Frist has tried to woo GOP officials in Michigan, an important presidential-primary state where independents and Democrats are allowed to vote in the GOP primary.
Others believe Frist has become less receptive to socially conservative initiatives since being criticized for his role in the controversy over Terri Schiavo, a brain-damaged woman who died this year after a state court sided with her husband and ordered her feeding tube removed.
[...]
“For a good period of time he was very receptive to the [conservative] social agenda,” said Weyrich of Frist. “It seems after the Schiavo case that he hasn’t been as interested. I don’t know whether a connection is there or not.”
[...]
The aide also cited Senate legislation this year that asked a federal court to review the Schiavo case. But Congress’s involvement drew much political fire. Polls showed that a majority of the American public disapproved of congressional intervention.
Frist was a primary target of scorn because, based on video footage he had seen, he questioned the diagnosis that Schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state. An autopsy later showed that Schiavo’s brain had suffered irreversible damage.
Several conservatives suspect that the incident may have made Frist wary of hot-button social issues.
[More at URL]
----- 14 -----
Less Than 25 Days Left to Protect Marriage in Florida
December 7, 2005 - Wednesday
Family Research Council
Forward to a Friend!
http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=AL05L01&f=PG03I03
A massive, statewide petition campaign is in the final stretch in Florida to amend the state constitution to define marriage as being between one man and one woman. Your help is urgently needed to make sure this effort is successful.
There are 2 important steps you can take right now to play a vital role in this historic campaign:
Go to www.Florida4Marriage.org and click on "Sign Petition." Download the PDF document and print it out. Once you fill it in and sign it, simply mail the original document to the address at the bottom.
Become a "Defender of Marriage" by printing out 10 copies of the petition and give them out to family and friends who are registered to vote in Florida. Ask those 10 to do the same -- getting the petition in the hands of more and more people before the end of December.
The vast majority of Floridians want to see marriage remain as it has always been -- between one man and one woman. Your help is needed now to make sure that marriage is protected in Florida. Please, visit www.Florida4Marriage.org to learn more about this issue and to sign the petition today!
----- 15 -----
Donor Network Right to Refuse Organs from Homosexual, Says Christian Doc
By Mary Rettig
December 7, 2005
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/afa/72005g.asp
(AgapePress) - Friends and family of a Tucson man are crying discrimination after the homosexual man's organs were rejected by the Donor Network of Arizona. However, a Kansas surgeon who works in organ transplantation says the decision was a good one.
Albert Soto, 51, intended to donate his eyes and other tissues after death, but a spokesman from the Network says the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta has established guidelines allowing centers to reject donations from men who have had sex with men in the last five years. Dr. David Pauls, a spokesman for the Christian Medical Association, says those guidelines are needed regardless -- even if the donor is HIV negative, as in Soto's case.
[More at URL]
----- 16 -----
Black Pastors against Gay Rights, Civil Rights Connection
Focus on the Family
December 7, 2005
by Josh Montez
African-American pastors are bristling at the idea of equating the gay agenda to the civil rights battles of the 60’s.
http://www.family.org/cforum/fnif/news/a0038831.cfm
Gay activists like to talk about the civil rights battles of the 60’s. They claim their struggle is the same. But one group of African-Americans is bristling at the connection, pastors. The latest example is in Indiana where black pastors are protesting an Indianapolis city ordinance that gives special rights to homosexuals. Eric Miller with Advance America is opposed to the change.
“This ordinance stated that a business with six or more employees could not refuse to hire a homosexual or someone based upon their gender identity like a cross dresser.”
And he’s not alone. Joining him in dissent are 21 African-American pastors in Indianapolis. Pastor Terry Webster of Nu Corinthian Baptist Church is one.
“When they’re talking about civil rights, they actually have equated it to the civil rights struggle and discrimination that the black community went through. We’re not against human rights. We are for human rights and we are not for anyone being discriminated against, but we also feel that this is a smokescreen and it’s seeking still to elevate homosexuality.”
[More at URL]
----- 17 -----
Canadian Activist Sees Opportunity for Marriage Traditionalists in Upcoming Election
By Chad Groening
Agape Press
December 6, 2005
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/afa/62005e.asp
(AgapePress) - The head of a Canadian pro-family organization says conservative Canadians will be energized now that Conservative leader Stephen Harper has pledged to reopen the debate on same-sex "marriage" in their country.
Ousted Prime Minister Paul Martin, whose government had only been in power for 17 months, barely fought off an earlier no-confidence vote in May, but was voted down decisively last week 171-133. The Globe & Mail of Canada reported that within hours of the announcement of the no-confidence vote in Parliament, Conservative leader Stephen Harper pledged to work to reinstate the traditional definition of marriage if he is elected prime minister in January.
[Editor's Note: he pledged a free revote on C-38, more or less. If it passes again, he says he's done.]
Brian Rushfeldt of the Canada Family Action Coalition believes Harper has re-energized Canadians who were devastated after same-sex marriage was legalized six months ago.
"I was absolutely delighted to hear him go public with that [announcement], knowing that it's a risky move for a politician to do that in one sense," says the Coalition president and co-founder. "And yet I am so convinced that the majority of Canadians are going to be delighted by that. We're very encouraged with Stephen Harper's comment and commitment to reopen the whole issue on same-sex marriage."
-- and I think that dynamic certainly might help very much on the Conservative side for getting out the vote as well."
Rushfeldt expects the marriage issue will help bring more Conservatives to the polls. "They will be excited; I think we can mobilize them on this fact," he says.
[More at URL]
----- 18 -----
Commentary & News Briefs
December 7, 2005
Agape Press
Compiled by Jenni Parker
http://headlines.agapepress.org/archive/12/afa/72005h.asp
...It appears the George W. Bush White House has joined much of corporate America in avoiding the word "Christmas." The Washington Post reports many conservatives are taking offense with the fact that the White House has been sending out greeting cards in the last few weeks, wishing people a happy "holiday season" rather than "Merry Christmas." WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah opines that President Bush "claims to be a born-again, evangelical Christian, but he sure doesn't act like one." Farah says he threw out his White House "holiday card" as soon as he received it. [Fred Jackson]
...Ford Motor Company says it was not giving in to pressure from Christian conservatives when it decided to stop advertising Jaguars and Land Rovers in homosexeual publications. The second-biggest automaker has announced that the two luxury brands will not be placing any more ads in homosexual publications like The Advocate. Ford spokesman Mike Moran says it is "a business decision" and had nothing to do with conservative Christian boycotts. And he says Ford's Volvo brand will keep advertising to homosexuals. Last week, the American Family Association canceled a Ford boycott it started in May. AFA chairman Donald Wildmon credits intercession by Ford dealers, who Wildmon says "are basically our kind of people who share many of our concerns." [AP]
[More at URL]
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 10:50 am (UTC)And I wonder what the figures in the Fox News poll would have been like in the Clinton years...
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 12:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 04:50 pm (UTC)It is almost unheard of for a Christian church to cancel services on a Sunday, and opponents of the closures are accusing these congregations of bowing to secular culture.
"This is a consumer mentality at work: 'Let's not impose the church on people. Let's not make church in any way inconvenient,' " said David Wells, professor of history and systematic theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, a leading evangelical school in Hamilton, Massachusetts.
Oh, for Gods' sake....
The local churches in my area have always been closed whenever Christmas fell on either a Saturday or Sunday. If only because they were fully aware that practically no one was going to be in attendance. As if it's not enough that church clergy would like to spend Christmas with their families just as everyone else.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 05:13 pm (UTC)Because OMG if someone were to get a GAY KIDNEY that might MAKE THEM GAY!!!!!111111!!
That first item makes me so sad. But Kansas, I guess.
I always thought a big Christmas Eve service was the norm, but hadn't thought much about what happens if Christmas Day is a Sunday. I think
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 05:54 pm (UTC)Foamy says it best: http://www.illwillpress.com/xmas.html
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 06:09 pm (UTC)Stille Nacht! Heil'ge Nacht!
Alles schläft; einsam wacht
Nur das traute hoch heilige Paar.
Holder Knab' im lockigten Haar,
Schlafe in himmlischer Ruh!
Schlafe in himmlischer Ruh!
or, reasonably direct translation,
Silent Night! Holy Night!
All is calm, all is bright
Round yon godly tender pair.
Holy infant with curly hair,
Sleep in heavenly peace,
Sleep in heavenly peace.
Doesn't quite have that same ring to it, now does it?
Carols get rewritten all the time. I kind of think the version the school used sucked, but so what? People have the right to suck too.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 07:41 pm (UTC)Like the Squirrel said, you preach 'tolerance' and then are highly 'intolerant' of one specific group of people.
Coming up with 'cutsey' excuses shows you're being just as much of a jerk as they are. If they were making fun of Wiccan's or Muslims in the same fashion, I bet you'd be all up in righteous indignity over it and there'd be lawsuits springing up everywhere.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 08:42 pm (UTC)The school used the tune of Silent Night to make a secular song... so the fuck what? I don't see where the song is intolerant, or makes fun of Christianity, or even mentions Christianity. The only thing the song's really guilty of is sucking. Then again, so does the original, hence why people tend to prefer the modified version we sing today rather than the version where Christ has curly hair.
Then again, presently we're hearing how the President is a traitor to Christians because his card (with a passage from the Christian Bible IN IT) wished people Happy Holidays rather than specifically saying Merry Christmas (And what, New Years doesn't count as a holiday anymore? Even for Christians, there's more than one holiday this time of year.). So I'm quite sure there are people out there more than willing to make a noise over such "persecution" as borrowing the tune to a Christian song in the public domain to make a new song that *gasp* *shock* *HORROR* is not specifically Christian as well.
Let's hope they never hear such classics as "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" or they'll be utterly convinced that the intolerant atheist homosexual commie liberals are out attacking Christmas and Family and Grandmothers with kamikazee pinko Reindeers.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 09:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 07:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 06:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 07:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-08 08:54 pm (UTC)He's also resigned his post as department head, at the recommendation of his colleagues. I'm guessing he's generally something of an asshole.