Today's Cultural Warfare Update, Part I
Mar. 23rd, 2007 05:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
solarbirdThat's kind of neat; Focus on the Family is slowly shifting to outright opposition to the HPV vaccine that prevents cervical cancer. They aren't there yet, but they're working on it, backing a bill to block Federal funds to schools who include it in their standard vaccinations package, and shifting their coverage of any HPV issue to negative. The other theocon groups are drifting similarly. You'll see that in Parts II and III.
And now, today's news.
Obscenely misleading headline on CNN.COM says "Biology teacher fired for referring to Bible;" no, he was fired for teaching Creationism in direct violation of school policy, and linked evolution to Planned Parenthood and Naziism;
German judge relies on Koran to deny a woman suffering severe beatings by her husband a divorce; there appropriate outrage;
German judge removed from bench over ruling;
ACT-UP founder Larry Kramer's column asking straight people: why do you hate us so much? In particular, he takes GBLT people to task for voting on the basis of lesser hate vs. greater hate;
Andrew Sullivan links to a radio excerpt of a Concerned Women for America wonk's explosive interaction with Mitt Romney;
Faith and Freedom Network praises Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy for speaking at the anti-gay Illinois Family Institute lunch and awards ceremony. They (hysterically) try to claim that the IFI isn't a political organisation and that this is therefore religious intolerance. Now that's comedy. On a more serious note, this is just another manifestation of their underlying position: if you don't let them control your life through their laws, you are religiously oppressing them, because their rights include control over you, in the name of Jehovah;
A second FFN article praising Tony Dungy, who says, "I'm with God and I believe IFI has taken the biblical, Godly position on marriage and so I'm pleased to stand with it";
Faith and Freedom Network asks whether Americans have too much freedom; the poll they have up with it outright asks whether Americans have too much freedom of expression, and answers it by saying only if Americans fail to "embrace the Judeo-Christian principles that made America great." He also quotes quite a bit about how democracy is only a good form of government for Christians and that liberty shouldn't be "a cloak for vice" and so on. As of this writing, the completely unscientific poll about whether Americans have too much freedom of expression is split, 51:49 against. I note for comparison purposes that the self-selected polls normally run 11:1 or so in favour of the FFN position;
FFN opposes bill to instigate a state investigation of anti-abortion "pregnancy resource centres" in Oregon;
From![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cubes, an update on the Largo, Florida case of a city going against its own city policy to fire their city manager because of her gender reassignment;
Faith and Freedom Network condemns the Soulforce religiously-based pro-GBLT activist group as "a sad commentary" and "a missed opportunity," presumably, to try to turn more queers str8;
FFN praises General Pace for (against policy, in uniform) condemning lesbian and gay soldiers as immoral, and praises commentary (same interview, but prefixed with "as an individual") that he's glad that, in the military, "we prosecute that kind of immoral behavior";
Focus on the Family has a story unhappy about the overturning of COPA ("Child Online Protection Act") as overreaching; this is the story with the Colbertian "Families in DANGER" graphic;
Focus on the Family ACTION ITEM against including GBLT people in violent hate-crimes law, and claims it "would make opposition to homosexuality a crime"; I suppose that's true if you consider beatings to be "opposition to homosexuality" that shouldn't, you know, be criminal; I did certainly hear enough in the past from fundamentalist groups such as Concerned Women for America defending gaybashing as a normal and natural response to the perversion of homosexuality;
Focus on the Family supports South Carolina bill requiring doctors offer ultrasounds to women considering abortions;
Alliance Defense Fund sues school over not allowing an anti-gay T-shirt on campus; it's one of several such lawsuits;
Focus on the Family is moving towards more open opposition to the HPV (cervical cancer) vaccine, slowly; they've started taking the "emphasise anything negative about it" approach they take to anything they dislike. In this case, they raise the entirely legitimate point that it hasn't been tested on children under 15 - but it always goes back around to 'but it's an STD andthe little whores unmarried people shouldn't be having sex anyway.' I really find that deeply repulsive - and kind of indicative about where they'd go, if they could;
"Touchdown MARRIAGE" - Focus on the Family likes Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy's anti-gay stance. Even better, they actually make the bizarre claim that Coach Dungy's anti-gay activities and Christian activism should make any queer players on the team feel better about working for him, not worse;
Focus on the Family applauds new Utah law allowing schools to bar clubs "found to be offensive" by the community. The bill's author, Utah State Senator Chris Buttars (R-West Jordan), was overtly targeting Gay-Straight Alliance clubs, and is pleased to have helped pass a law letting schools ban them. Note that they started appearing only after a Supreme Court ruling requiring equal access was won in response to fundamentalists demanding religious clubs be allowed to use school property, and that GSA clubs made it into schools on the basis of that ruling. Again: oppression under the law is the goal, and we see it overtly again here. Also, a quick Google search shows that Senator Buttars shows up a lot in creationism and anti-gay activity;
Focus on the Family condemns fertility clinics offering surrogate services to gay male couples;
Focus on the Family lurvs them some Tom Delay, and runs his condemnation of "the politics of personal destruction" on the very same page he calls liberals a pack of Communist thugs; this is mostly interesting because you get a glimpse into James Dobson's lobbying within the party - Delay slams Dick Armey for not being responsive enough to James Dobson's agenda. This entry includes both Part I and Part II of the interview, the latter of which only came out today. The latter part is headlined, "The Lord Has Had a Major Part in Developing Who Tom DeLay Is";
Focus on the Family backs a Federal effort by US Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA) to deny Federal funds to any school including the HPV/cervical cancer vaccine in their standard vaccinations package;
FotF ACTION ITEM against DP benefits in New Mexico;
Focus on the Family Brazil very unhappy with proposed anti-discrimination law, says it's against their religion not to be able to fire queers;
Focus on the Family USA interviews the head of Focus on the Family Latin America;
FotF makes a weird claim that Jamestown Settlement and Museum is being purged of Christianity-related materials;
FotF alarmed that Mexico City is considering legalising first-trimster abortions;
FotF outraged at "gay indoctrination" at Chicago high schools; anybody know what this is actually about? It looks like one of those things wherein here's a whole bunch of stuff going on and one of the things going on is GBLT students speaking about their own experiences. Focus hates that because one of their man methodologies is keeping GBLT people from being seen as people;
FotF ACTION ITEM against embryonic stem cell research;
Student who joined with ADF to sue her teacher and school over not getting to write a religious paper in a psychology class finally got a grade;
FotF claims a link between abortion and child abuse; anybody heard of the Internet Journal of Pediatrics and Neonatology? Is it real or another sham? Given that they have the word "internet" in their name and gave an interview to LifeNews, I tend to suspect the latter, but am withholding judgement. The study, by the way, was a study of low-income women with a pre-existing history of child abuse;
FotF: "Pope Says Catholic Lawmakers Cannot Compromise";
FotF supports anti-gay remarks made by General Pace; given the similarities between this story and the Faith and Freedom Network version, I rather suspect that FFN sourced theirs from this one;
FotF: Newt Gingrich calls for abolishing the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, saying it doesn't belong in America;
FotF condemns New York State Supreme Court ruling upholding recognition of an out-of-state same-sex marriage. Alliance Defense Fund counsel Brian Raum predicts the court's decision will be overturned, leading one to wonder by whom, exactly? But presumably they expect some sort of Federal intervention;
FotF notes that "[Episcopalian] Denomination refuses to back down from support of homosexuality" and talks up a schism;
FotF reports that the Marriage and Family Institute - a local group that has an anti-marriage wing, and secular and religious forks - will continue receiving Federal funds for its nominally secular portion, a legal challenge having failed.
----- 1 -----
Biology teacher fired for referring to Bible
POSTED: 1356 GMT (2156 HKT), March 21, 2007
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/EDUCATION/03/20/teacherfired.ap.ap/index.html
SISTERS, Oregon (AP) -- During his eight days as a part-time high school biology teacher, Kris Helphinstine included Biblical references in material he provided to students and gave a PowerPoint presentation that made links between evolution, Nazi Germany and Planned Parenthood.
That was enough for the Sisters School Board, which fired the teacher Monday night for deviating from the curriculum on the theory of evolution.
"I think his performance was not just a little bit over the line," board member Jeff Smith said. "It was a severe contradiction of what we trust teachers to do in our classrooms."
[More at URL]
----- 2 -----
German judge rules Koran allows wife abuse
Thu Mar 22, 9:26 AM ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070322/wl_afp/germanyjusticeislam_070322132641
BERLIN (AFP) - A German woman judge has refused a Moroccan-born woman permission to file for divorce by interpreting the Koran as allowing husbands to beat their wives.
"Where are we living? Woman judge allows beating in marriage... and invokes the Koran," said a front-page headline in Germany's top-selling Bild newspaper, reflecting the widespread angry reaction on Thursday.
"This Moroccan woman has the same right to protection from a violent husband as any German woman. Anything else would be misconceived sensitivity to the benefit of the husband and would amount to racist discrimination against the wife," said the Tageszeitung daily.
The Central Council of Muslims in Germany also condemned the decision.
"The judge should have made a decision based on the German constitution instead of the Koran," said spokeswoman Nurhan Soykan, who said that violence and mistreatment, regardless of the gender of the victim, were also grounds for divorce in the Islamic world.
[More at URL]
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German Judge Cites Koran, Stirring Up Cultural Storm
By MARK LANDLER
Published: March 23, 2007
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/23/world/europe/23germany.html?_r=2&th&emc=th&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
FRANKFURT, March 22 — A German judge has stirred a storm of protest by citing the Koran in turning down a German Muslim woman’s request for a speedy divorce on the ground that her husband beat her.
In a ruling that underlines the tension between Muslim customs and European laws, the judge, Christa Datz-Winter, noted that the couple came from a Moroccan cultural milieu, in which it is common for husbands to beat their wives. The Koran, she wrote in her decision, sanctions such physical abuse.
News of the ruling brought swift and sharp condemnation from politicians, legal experts and Muslim leaders in Germany, many of whom said they were confounded that a German judge would put seventh-century Islamic religious teaching ahead of German law in deciding a case of domestic violence.
The court in Frankfurt abruptly removed Judge Datz-Winter from the case on Wednesday, saying it could not justify her reasoning. The woman’s lawyer, Barbara Becker-Rojczyk, said she decided to publicize the ruling, which was issued in January, after the court refused her request for a new judge.
[More at URL]
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Why do straights hate gays?
An aging 72-year-old gay man isn't hopeful about the future.
By Larry Kramer
LARRY KRAMER is the founder of the protest group ACT UP and the author of "The Tragedy of Today's Gays."
March 20, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-oe-kramer20mar20,1,4594749.story?coll=la-news-a_section&ctrack=1&cset=true
DEAR STRAIGHT PEOPLE,
Why do you hate gay people so much?
Gays are hated. Prove me wrong. Your top general just called us immoral. Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, is in charge of an estimated 65,000 gay and lesbian troops, some fighting for our country in Iraq. A right-wing political commentator, Ann Coulter, gets away with calling a straight presidential candidate a faggot. Even Garrison Keillor, of all people, is making really tacky jokes about gay parents in his column. This, I guess, does not qualify as hate except that it is so distasteful and dumb, often a first step on the way to hate. Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama tried to duck the questions that Pace's bigotry raised, confirming what gay people know: that there is not one candidate running for public office anywhere who dares to come right out, unequivocally, and say decent, supportive things about us.
Gays should not vote for any of them. There is not a candidate or major public figure who would not sell gays down the river. We have seen this time after time, even from supposedly progressive politicians such as President Clinton with his "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays in the military and his support of the hideous Defense of Marriage Act. Of course, it's possible that being shunned by gays will make politicians more popular, but at least we will have our self-respect. To vote for them is to collude with them in their utter disdain for us.
Don't any of you wonder why heterosexuals treat gays so brutally year after year after year, as your people take away our manhood, our womanhood, our personhood? Why, even as we die you don't leave us alone. What we can leave our surviving lovers is taxed far more punitively than what you leave your (legal) surviving spouses. Why do you do this? My lover will be unable to afford to live in the house we have made for each other over our lifetime together. This does not happen to you. Taxation without representation is what led to the Revolutionary War. Gay people have paid all the taxes you have. But you have equality, and we don't.
[More at URL]
----- 5 -----
Romney Explodes At A Christianist
AndrewSullivan
23 Mar 2007 03:49 pm
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/03/romney_explodes.html
Concerned Women for America's Sandy Rios got into a major spat with governor Mitt Romney over marriage equality at a small gathering with various religious conservatives. She talks about her private confrontation with Romney here on her radio show. Money quote:
"He was absolutely furious with me. He completely lost his composure and his temper."
[Editor's note: I listened to the radio show excerpt; it's not quite transcription-worthy - yes, yes, queers destroy families, all that - but the main uptake from it is the explosive theocon/Romney interaction. Oh, and someone at the conference calls Romney's having gone to Harvard "part of the problem."]
[More at URL]
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Homosexuals Trying to Sac Tony Dungy
Faith and Freedom Network
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/homosexuals-trying-to-sac-tony-dungy.html
Homosexual activists are upset that Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy will be speaking at a banquet next week that is sponsored by an organization that supports the definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
The activists are pressuring both Dungy and the Colts organization in an attempt to stop Dungy from speaking and receiving an award from the Indiana Family Institute.
Both the Colts and their team chaplain have spoken.
The Colts organization issued a statement saying that the coach is free to speak to any group he wishes. The statement said, “The Club does not take positions in political issues in which it is not directly involved. The Colts do not endorse any political or religious position taken by any group that any Colts employee decides to speak or lend his or her name to.”
[More at URL]
----- 7 -----
Coach Dungy Scores a Touchdown
Faith and Freedom Network
Thursday, March 22, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/coach-dungy-scores-touchdown.html
On March 13th, I wrote a blog entitled, "Homosexuals Trying to Sac Tony Dungy" pointing out that the coach of the Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts was going to be speaking and receiving an award for his pro-family, pro-marriage positions.
We pointed out that gay activists were trying to pressure the coach and the Colts organization into canceling Mr. Dungy’s speaking engagement.
Well, it didn’t work.
Coach Tony Dungy spoke this past Tuesday evening after receiving the award from the Indiana Family Institute.
[...]
He also said, “I’m with God and I believe IFI has taken the biblical, Godly position on marriage and so I’m pleased to stand with it.”
[More at URL]
----- 8 -----
Can We Have Too Much Freedom?
Friday, March 23, 2007
Faith and Freedom Network
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/can-we-have-too-much-freedom.html
Last weekend peace people and other anti-war demonstrators gathered in cities across America to protest the war.
Portland, OR probably led in reaching the lowest and least of all the protests.
While the Oregonian and other Oregon news outlets failed to give much, if any coverage to the burning of the flag and an America soldier (in effigy), Rachael Palinkas, a student at Linfield College was taking pictures. The pictures ended up on the internet, then on Drudge and now on the mainstream news.
[...]
This is, of course, all done under the banner of free speech and free expression.
But do we have too much freedom?
[...]
If we were to limit our freedoms, who would decide where to draw the line? Would it be President Bush or perhaps President Bill Clinton or, God help us, President Hillary Clinton or President Obama? God forbid.
[...]
When the conditions that have preserved our freedoms no longer exist, our freedoms will be eroded and lost because freedom – particularly freedom of expression is like an overstretched elastic band, it can snap and bite the hand that holds it.
The New Testament instructs us not to use liberty (or freedom) as a cloak for vice.
National, spiritual blindness is the result of moral and spiritual disarmament on the individual level.
[More at URL]
----- 9 -----
Oregon Pregnancy Resource Centers Need Your Help
Faith and Freedom Network
Monday, March 19, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/oregon-pregnancy-resource-centers-need.html
The Oregon Pregnancy Resource Centers are under attack by the same kind of “work for hire” politicians as are in the majority in Washington State.
Pro-abortion groups, Planned Parenthood, and NARAL are pushing a bill that could ultimately be used to shut down pro-life pregnancy resource centers in Oregon.
[...]
Under SB 776, the Department of Human Services (DHS) would be required to collect and study data on all aspects of the state’s pregnancy-resource centers. It would establish a toll-free number and online complaint form to assist those who have complaints against the pregnancy-resource centers. Here’s how bad it is.
[More at URL]
----- 10 -----
Stanton has 9 days to prepare
But his attorney may not be available March 23.
By LORRI HELFAND
Published March 14, 2007
St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/03/14/Northpinellas/Stanton_has_9_days_to.shtml
LARGO - City Manager Steve Stanton will make his case to keep his job on March 23.
City Commissioners on Tuesday night chose that date for the public hearing because that's when they'll all be available.
But his attorney said she might not be.
"They chose to go with the only date we're not all available," said Karen Doering.
[More at URL]
----- 11 -----
Soulforce: A Sad Commentary
Faith and Freedom Network
Thursday, March 15, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/archives/2007_03_01_archive.html
You may not be familiar with the organization Soulforce, but you will be hearing about them because what they call their “Equality Ride” will soon be coming to a Christian college near you.
For the second year, they are touring the nation with busloads of people visiting colleges, “with policies,” that they perceive “silence or exclude lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students.”
Their 2007 tour is underway and is scheduled to be in both Oregon and Washington.
[...]
Their mission statement seems to be to obtain “Freedom for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people from religious and political oppression through the practice of relentless nonviolent resistance.”
Their tour started earlier this week with their first visit to the Wisconsin Lutheran College on March 13th. The report they filed on their website said, “The administrators were unsympathetic, but the students were excited to speak with us.” They describe scenes where a student will bravely step forward and join them in prayer, “despite the school officials’ outright refusal to do so.”
What actually happened, according to people who were there and the police reports, is that administrators met with the Equality Ride people on Monday and asked them not to disturb the classes and activities. There was no agreement for them to come on campus so when they came on campus, six of them were arrested.
[More at URL]
----- 12 -----
General Pace: "Homosexual acts are immoral."
Faith and Freedom Network
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/archives/2007_03_01_archive.html
General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the nation’s highest-ranking military officer, told the Chicago Tribune on Monday, “I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts. I do not believe that the Armed Forces of the United States are well served by saying through our policies that it’s O.K. to be immoral in any way.”
By yesterday, this story was running across the country and probably around the world.
And homosexual activists were demanding that he apologize. And Sen. John Warner (R) was rebuking him. What I found interesting was the little notice given to his next statement.
“As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with someone else’s wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior.”
[...]
Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness said that calls for an apology from Pace are “absurd,” in that the 1993 Homosexual Conduct Law, which bans homosexuals in the military, is still in effect.
She said, “He doesn’t need to apologize for supporting the law.” She also said the ban on homosexuals serving in the military exists to protect good order, discipline, and unit cohesion in “conditions of forced intimacy” in which military personnel may have little or no privacy from others who might be sexually attracted to them.
Donnelly said, “The activists who are demanding an apology from General Pace have an agenda, an agenda that should not be imposed on the Armed Services, the Marine Corps or any branch of the military.”
I agree.
[More at URL]
[Editor's Note: The "Center for Military Readiness" is an organisation that mostly seems to exist to keep queers out of the military and to move the military towards kicking out women. They have other functions, reportedly, but the only place I see them showing up is in anti-gay and anti-women-soldier activities.]
----- 13 -----
Family Advocates Call COPA Ruling 'Troubling'
Court says federal law keeping kids from Web’s harmful material is unconstitutional.
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
Focus on the Family
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004183.cfm
[Ed. Note: this story has a truly Colbertian "Families in DANGER" graphic, viewable here.]
A federal court in Philadelphia today declared unconstitutional a law that requires commercial pornography Web sites to deny access to children, a ruling pro-family groups called “troubling.”
Congress passed the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) in 1998 to force porn sites to hide harmful images behind an age-verification system. The law was immediately challenged and has been embroiled in a legal battle since – and therefore unenforceable.
[...]
“The court can't push Congress' duties to protect kids from commercial pornographers back onto the parents simply by pointing out the filters are somewhat effective at blocking harmful content,” he said. “Should Congress abandon its ‘compelling interest’ in this area merely because parents have some responsibility there as well? And how do filters protect minors when they are outside the home -- are parents supposed to follow their kids around all day?"
[More at URL]
[Editor's note: This story makes no reference to Judicial Activism. I am surprised - except that he's a Reagan appointee, so presumably immune from such charges.]
----- 14 -----
Hate-Crimes Bill Would Give Gays Special Righs
The House is considering a measure that would make opposition to homosexuality a crime.
Focus on the Family
from staff reports
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004181.cfm
A bill with bipartisan support in Congress would give the Justice Department power to investigate and prosecute “bias-motivated violence.”
Homosexual advocates who support the bill say violence against homosexuals is on the rise. They contend 14 percent of the 1,000 hate crimes reported in 2005 were due to sexual orientation.
“They claim that this is an epidemic, [but] one third of the ‘hate crime’s statistics’ are for ‘name-calling,’ ” Andrea Lafferty, executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition, told Family News in Focus. “This is not a reason to bring in the federal government. The ultimate objective is to use the [prosecution] of hate speech against people of faith.”
Matt Barber of Concerned Women for America said the bill would favor one class of crime victims over another.
“It elevates a certain people group based on their chosen sexual behaviors—homosexuals and so-called transgenders—to a higher level of status in our society,” Barber said, “so that they are considered a more valuable victim.”
The Senate is expected to introduce a bipartisan companion bill next month.
TAKE ACTION
1. Please contact your representative and ask him/her to oppose hate-crimes legislation. For more about the bill, and help in contacting your lawmakers, please see the CitizenLink Action Center.
2. Send an e-mail to President Bush through the CitizenLink Action Center and ask that he veto any hate-crimes legislation that reaches his desk.
----- 15 -----
S.C. State House Approves Ultrasound Bill
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
Focus on the Family
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004182.cfm
In a landslide 91-23 vote, the South Carolina state House passed a bill Wednesday to require abortion-minded women to be given the chance to see an ultrasound of their preborn child prior to the proce
Denise Burke, vice president and legal director for American United for Life, said laws requiring doctors to offer ultrasound are important to ensure “women are getting true and complete, accurate information about their pregnancies and what an abortion actually does.”
[More at URL]
----- 16 -----
T-Shirt Case Highlights Viewpoint Discrimination
Focus on the Family
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004180.cfm
An Illinois high school student forbidden from wearing a T-shirt expressing her personal views on homosexuality has filed suit.
Heidi Zamecnik, a student at Neuqua Valley High School, wore a t-shirt that read, “Be Happy, Not Gay.” The dean told her to change her shirt or go home. After Zamecnik’s mother intervened, she was allowed to stay – but a counselor at the school forced her to cover the words “Not Gay.”
Zamecnik wore the message in response to the “Day of Silence” for which homosexual students and supporters wore shirts that bore messages in support of homosexuality.
[...]
Zamecnik suffered unlawful discrimination, humiliation and punishment at the hands of school personnel for expressing her views, Kellum said.
ADF has filed eight similar lawsuits across the country and is working to “enable Christian students to express a contrasting viewpoint on homosexuality.”
[More at URL]
----- 17 -----
Researcher Warns Against HPV Vaccine Young Girls
Expert says she doesn’t give the shot to girls younger than 18.
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
Focus on the Family
3-21-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004177.cfm
Twenty-six states have considered legislation that would make it mandatory for girls as young as 11 to receive a controversial vaccine to protect them from a sexually transmitted disease, an idea that alarms a researcher who spent two decades developing the drug.
Dr. Diane Harper, director of the Gynecologic Cancer Prevention Center at Dartmouth Medical School, said her trials of the vaccine, marketed by Merck under the name Gardasil, involved girls 15 to 25. In her own practice, she does not recommend the shot until a girl is 18.
“This vaccine should not be mandated for 11-year-old girls,” Harper said. “It’s not been tested in little girls for efficacy.”
[...]
Linda Klepacki, analyst for sexual health at Focus on the Family Action, said governments should not be forcing young girls to take part in this “public-health experiment.”
[...]
While vaccines such as Gardasil may play an important role in protecting women’s health, Klepacki said, the best health practice for young girls is abstinence until marriage and fidelity within marriage.
[More at URL]
----- 18 -----
Coach Dungy Defends Family Values
“We’re not trying to downgrade anyone else, hate anyone else,” he tells supporters of an Indiana marriage amendment.
by Steve Jordahl, Family News in Focus
Focus on the Family
3-21-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004178.cfm
Coach Tony Dungy of the Indianapolis Colts spoke strongly Tuesday night in favor of traditional marriage. Family advocates applauded his statement, homosexual groups expressed disappointment and the National Football League has remained silent.
Dungy made his remarks after receiving a Friend of the Family award from the Indiana Family Institute (IFI).
“We’re not trying to downgrade anyone else, hate anyone else, but we’re trying to promote the family, family values the Lord’s way,” Dungy said.
IFI President Curt Smith was pleased.
“Coach Dungy said, ‘I’m with God and I believe IFI has taken the biblical, godly position on marriage and so I’m pleased to stand with it.’”
[...]
Dr. James Dobson, founder and chairman of Focus on the Family Action, said Dungy “is a good and brave man. To defend God’s truth so simply and strongly on what marriage ought to mean is to invite a blitz of hateful attacks from homosexual activists and others on the Left.”
Cyd Zeigler of Outsports.com, a pro-gay group, didn’t criticize Dungy for speaking out, but he insists that Dungy has created a “hostile” work environment in the Colts organization.
“I’m afraid that he would not allow a gay player on his team because he did not follow the Lord’s way.”
Smith dismissed that thinking.
“It’s crazy,” he said, “to think that when someone takes a biblical position on a public-policy question, that it creates any kind of a hostile workforce at all.”
Melissa Fryrear, director of gender issues at Focus on the Family, said Dungy’s relationship with Christ should have a positive effect on his workplace.
[More at URL]
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Utah Governor Signs Bill Tightening Rules for School Clubs
Focus on the Family
3-20-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004167.cfm
A bill in the Utah Legislature that will allow schools to exercise discretion in the types of student groups allowed may help administrators weed out those the community find objectionable, The Salt Lake Tribune reported.
Sen. Chris Buttars, sponsor of the Senate bill, said in addition to administrator discretion, parents must be fully informed and sign a consent form before a student can join a group.
“This gives 40 school districts the same rules and the ability to weigh in the balance a club they feel will not fit with their school,” he said.
The law reinforces current state Board of Education rules that allow officials to reject groups found to be offensive, but adds a line that requires clubs to stay within the “boundaries of socially appropriate behavior.”
The state Senate’s only openly gay member, Sen. Scott McCoy, said he is worried that students who haven’t yet told their parents they are gay will be denied the emotional support of a group such as a gay-straight alliance (GSA) because some administrators will consider the group outside the norm.
Buttars said GSAs aren’t as much support groups as conditioning clubs that are trying to make homosexuality socially acceptable. He said he’s glad administrators who reject the formation of such groups will have the law behind them.
[More at URL]
----- 20 -----
Clinics Recruit Surrogates to Provide Kids for Gay Couples
Homosexuals can pay extra to choose the sex of their baby.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
3-20-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004169.cfm
Several fertility clinics are recruiting surrogates to provide gay male couples with children.
Pamela Madsen of the American Fertility Clinic said her facility has catered to the homosexuality community for more than a year.
“We support all families,” she said, “all people who are interested in having families through birth and adoption.”
The average cost of surrogacy is $60,000. But it can get pricier for those who want to select the gender of their baby – which three-fourths of gay couples do. Carrie Gordon Earll, senior director of issue analysis for Focus on the Family Action, said it’s all about the green:
“This is no doubt there are folks who want to spend money to try and have a baby in this way.”
[More at URL]
----- 21 -----
‘This is the Criminalization of Politics’
In a new book, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay takes aim at those who have spent more than a decade trying to ruin him simply for being a conservative.
by Gary Schneeberger
Focus on the Family
3-20-2007
(Part I - for Part II, see below)
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004170.cfm
Tom DeLay, author, is a lot like Tom DeLay, congressman: Straightforward. Unflinching. A man who can take the heat – and dish out a few degrees of it, too.
[...]
“I am not a man who apologizes for what he believes,” he writes. “This is because I did not create my beliefs, I received them: from the Bible; from great minds of the ages; from the experiences of nations; and from the principles of American freedom.
“Liberals may hate me for it, and weak-kneed Republicans may back away from it, but I cling to these ideas because I believe them to be true.”
Before you even get into double digits in pages – it’s on page 3 – you make a pretty controversial statement. You say that today’s liberalism is a very early stage of what you describe as “communist thuggery.” What do you say to critics – and you know there are going to be critics – who respond, “Wow, this guy sounds paranoid?”
Well, first of all, “liberal” by its very definition – by those on the Left – is socialist. Communists are socialists, and communists, as part of their agenda, are thugs. And I have witnessed, personally as well as professionally, that if the Left cannot sell its ideas or its agenda or its vision, then the Left is going to go after people personally.
And not just try to defeat them politically; it’s not even good enough to vilify them publicly. They carpet-bomb your life, and decide to disgrace you, bankrupt you, send you to jail, all for political reasons. And to get rid of people who think differently than they do.
[...]
You also have some criticism for Dick Armey, your colleague of many years. You say that he was blinded by ambition. Lately, Mr. Armey has been taking shots at conservative evangelicals like Dr. Dobson for being too inflexible on social issues. Did you see that coming?
Dick Armey was never comfortable with the social issues. He was never comfortable with those issues of abortion and marriage and things that were important to the Right. And because of him being uncomfortable, when Dr. Dobson would show up – as he is so inclined to do – and demand that we do more, Dick Armey didn’t appreciate it.
[...]
[END PART ONE]
[BEGIN PART TWO]
'The Lord Has Had a Major Part in Developing Who Tom DeLay Is'
The former House majority leader explains how Christ – and Dr. James Dobson – helped him become one of Congress' chief defenders of the family.
by Gary Schneeberger
Focus on the Family
3-23-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004195.cfm
Focus on the Family founder Dr. James Dobson has called Tom DeLay "one of America's leading advocates of family values" and "a consistent voice of reason and clarity in America's moral debates."
But did you know Dr. Dobson not only played a pivotal role in DeLay dedicating his life to defending the family, but also in the former House majority leader dedicating his life to Christ?
How watching one of Dr. Dobson's early videos convicted him of neglecting his family and his faith is just one of the intimate anecdotes the former congressman shares in his new memoir, No Retreat, No Surrender: One American's Fight. In his trademark straightforward style, DeLay explains the degree to which his Christianity informs his politics.
"I soon came to understand that there was a whole movement of people like me who had for years been crying out to God for their country," he writes of how he viewed his role as a lawmaker after returning to the faith of his youth. "They wanted to see healing in their land. They wanted to see the age-old covenants renewed and righteousness restored. They believed that America had a unique mission in the world, and it wasn't to be the largest exporter of pornography and abortion on earth.
[More at URL]
[Editor's note: BOLD as in original]
----- 22 -----
Congressman Prefers Voluntary HPV Policies
His bill would block federal funds for states that mandate vaccinations for schoolgirls.
Focus on the Family
from staff reports
3-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004160.cfm
Twenty-five states are considering mandatory vaccinations against the human papillomavirus (HPV) for schoolgirls. U.S. Rep. Phil Gingrey, R-Ga., prefers a voluntary program, and has introduced a bill that would block federal funds to states that don’t respect parental concerns.
“Now if a state implemented a voluntary program, then federal dollars could be used to implement that voluntary program,” said Gingrey spokesperson Becky Ruby.
Linda Klepacki, analyst for sexual health for Focus on the Family Action, said she supports the bill.
“It can’t prohibit states from mandating the vaccine, but what it will do is essentially do that, in that it will block states from receiving many federal funds that are necessary for states to implement mandatory vaccinations,” Klepacki told Family News in Focus.
----- 23 -----
New Mexico Governor Wants Gay Benefits
Your immediate attention is needed to see that the domestic partnership bill fails – again.
by Mona Passignano, state issues analyst
Focus on the Family
3-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004162.cfm
Although the regular session for 2007 had ended, on Saturday, March 17, New Mexico Governor and presidential hopeful Bill Richardson called the New Mexico Legislature back into session. This special session is scheduled for Tuesday, March 20. That’s correct – tomorrow.
State law allows Richardson to limit debate, and he’s restricted the agenda to eight items.
Not surprisingly, one of those items is the domestic partnership bill – HB 603 – which passed 33-24 in the House but which failed in the Senate. If passed during the special session, the bill would grant homosexual couples the same rights, protections and benefits as spouses. These include child support, divorce proceedings, property and insurance rights.
The bill is a priority for Equality New Mexico, a vocal gay rights group that seeks to redefine marriage in New Mexico. The time to speak up in defense of traditional marriage is now.
TAKE ACTION
New Mexico residents, please contact your state legislators and urge them to vote NO on the domestic partnership bill during the special legislative session. For contact information for your legislators, click CitizenLink’s "Action Center" button, and enter your 9-digit ZIP code.
If you do not know your 9-digit ZIP code, click here to get that information first.
----- 24 -----
Ex-gays Concerned about Proposed Law
Focus on the Family
3-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004152.cfm
A bill passed by the Brazilian House and headed for the Senate would impose long prison terms on anyone who denies a homosexual a job.
“This would mean that if you find out your nanny is a lesbian and she’s taking care of your children and you’re not in agreement with that, you would not be able to fire her without probably going to jail,” Esly Carvalho of Exodus Latin America told Family News in Focus. Exodus is an international ministry that offers freedom from homosexuality through faith in Christ.
[More at URL]
----- 25 -----
‘Born to Serve God’
President Bush just completed a tour of Latin America. The press focused on his adversaries in the region, but overlooked a rising star who’s pro-life.
by Stephen Adams, associate editor
Focus on the Family
3-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004143.cfm
Editor’s note: Sixto Porras is becoming a virtual household name as head of Enfoque a la Familia (Focus on the Family) in Latin America. His Nicaraguan mother struggled as a young wife in an unhappy marriage before accepting Christ as her Savior. Sixto, who came to the Lord at age 18, became a pastor, then a parachurch evangelist, when he found a calling working with teens on sexual purity, using Focus materials. Stephen Adams, associate editor of Citizen magazine, interviewed him recently in San José, Costa Rica, for an article to appear in the May issue of Citizen. Here are some excerpts from that interview:
[...]
Citizen: Did you ever think you would become the so-called “Dr. Dobson of Latin America”?
Porras: I wanted to be a lawyer focusing on international law. That was what I really liked. The first year in the university, I gave my life to Jesus Christ, and that changed all my life. In 1983, my priorities changed. I knew that I was born to serve God. I always was a good student. I enjoyed studying. I didn’t imagine myself doing another thing. And when Jesus Christ came into my heart, everything changed.
Citizen: Tell us about the great demand for sexual-abstinence material like Focus’ Sex, Lies and the Truth in Latin America.
Porras: That also changed my life and was a turning point. Because then I was spending 90 percent of my time teaching Sex, Lies and the Truth. This project led us to relationships with the First Lady of Costa Rica, the First Lady of Guatemala, the secretary of education of Paraguay and in that way with officials in 13 other governments in Latin America. Because of that, in September of 1998 we began the Focus office in Costa Rica.
In fact, more than 400,000 youths [all over Latin America] received Christ as a result of this. We have done this through partnerships with other ministries all over the region. This is the data that we have—we believe it is much more than this. About 1 million youths have been exposed to the materials, to Sex, Lies and the Truth. Teachers don’t have answers to talk about the issues regarding sexuality with the youth.
[...]
Citizen: And now Enfoque is reaching an entire continent.
Porras: Toda America Latina. Gloria a Dios! [All Latin America. Glory to God!]
[More at URL]
----- 26 -----
Ashamed of the Gospel in Jamestown
Focus on the Family
3-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004139.cfm
Recent visitors to Jamestown, Va., say they were shocked and upset to discover that tour guides at the Jamestown Settlement and Museum were not allowed to acknowledge the existence of “religious” items such as the Ten Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer.
California pastor and researcher Todd DuBord told WorldNetDaily.com that visitors are being told the settlers came only to make money, with no mention of their commission to spread the Gospel on orders from King James I.
[More at URL]
----- 27 -----
Mexican Abortion Proposal Stirs Opposition
Focus on the Family
3-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004140.cfm
The Mexico City Legislature is considering legalizing first-trimester abortions in the capital, which could be the first place in Mexico to allow the practice.
The city of 8.7 million people is a federal district like Washington, D.C., with its own Legislature.
The bill is supported by the Leftist Democratic Revolution Party, which holds the mayoralty and a majority in the Legislature, according to the Associated Press. It is heavily opposed by the Catholic church and officials of the conservative National Action Party of President Felipe Calderon, who claim it would violate articles in the Constitution protecting life.
The College of Catholic Lawyers in Mexico City promised to rally broad opposition.
[More at URL]
----- 28 -----
Gay Indoctrination Infuriates Chicago Parents
Mandatory class for freshmen includes section on accepting homosexuality.
by Steve Jordahl and Wendy Cloyd
Focus on the Family
03-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004132.cfm
Parents of freshmen at Chicago's Deerfield High School say students are required to attend lectures on gay sexuality, and then sign a contract forbidding them to talk about it afterward.
Ellen Waltz's son and his friends told her about the lectures -- delivered by other students -- and the contract.
"[They said,] 'We had to sit there and listen to them tell us about their feelings and what it's like to be gay,' " Waltz said. "They make them sign a contract stating that they won't say anything that's in the room."
Lora Sue Hauser, a school-issues adviser for North Shore Student Advocacy, said a group of boys told her school officials threatened those who were reluctant to sign the contract.
"[They were told] 'You will sign this or you will go to the dean,' " Hauser said.
Dr. Sue Hebson, vice-superintendent of the school district, told Family News in Focus that there is no contract. She also denied that the classroom discussions involve sexuality.
"That's not part of the conversation," Hebson said.
But Hauser said that's just not so.
"During the semester they have a panel of gay, transgender (and) bisexual students who speak to these freshmen," she said. "Sometimes they talk about statistics and causality."
Parents complained last year when the school asked students to match sexually deviant terms with their definitions. The school responded by posting the curriculum information behind a password-protected page on the school's Web site.
Matt Barber, policy director for cultural issues at Concerned Women for America, said this year’s freshmen orientation is part of an aggressive plan to corrupt American sexual practices.
"If you can maintain control of undeveloped and impressionable youth and spoon-feed them misinformation -- lies and half-truths about dangerous, disordered and extremely risky behaviors -- then you can control the future and ensure that those behaviors are not only fully accepted, but celebrated," Barber told World Net Daily.
Candi Cushman, education analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said it is important for parents across the nation to realize that this is not an isolated incident.
"Schools in many states are opening their doors to outside gay-rights groups who conduct so-called gay-awareness events or diversity days," Cushman said. "And there are now more than 3,000 pro-gay clubs in high schools nationwide."
Parents in Deerfield must take a stand, she added.
"These public school officials are blatantly disrespecting local parents and students who hold different viewpoints," Cushman said. "But the good news is that parents and students can fight back by standing up for their equal access rights."
TAKE ACTION
Chicago residents can e-mail local school board members at Township High School District 113.
----- 29 -----
U.S. Senate May Vote on Embryo Research
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004129.cfm
The U.S. Senate may vote this week on a bill that would force taxpayers to fund destructive embryonic stem-cell research. The House approved the bill earlier this year.
President Bush has promised to veto it.
"If history repeats itself, senators will hear some wildly inaccurate statements from their colleagues who are pushing this immoral legislation, including claims that the federal government 'bans' and refuses to fund embryonic stem cell research," said Carrie Earll, senior analyst for bioethics for Focus on the Family Action. "That's simply not true. This research is underway and limited federal funding has been in place for six years to the tune of $600 million dollars. The issue before the Senate will be whether our tax dollars will be used as an incentive for scientists to destroy living human embryos in the process."
TAKE ACTION
Contact your two senators and urge them to oppose any bill which uses your tax dollars to support research that destroys human embryos.
For help in contacting your lawmakers, please see the CitizenLink Action Center.
To help you understand the embryonic stem-cell issue, we recommend Dawn Vargo's article, "What the Media Won't Tell You about Embryonic Stem-Cell Research."
----- 30 -----
School Finally Grades Student’s Paper
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004128.cfm
A college student whose paper on post-abortion syndrome was held hostage by a professor has received a grade after all.
Southern Illinois graduate student Christine Mize removed faith-based references from her paper, as her professor had requested, but the professor, Dr. Laura Dreuth-Zeman, still refused to issue a grade.
Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), a legal services group based in Arizona, sent Southern Illinois University (SIU) officials a letter demanding that the Mize receive a grade.
The university backed down and gave Mize her grade, which she needed to graduate.
“No student should be punished for exercising their constitutional rights, including the right to include faith-based opinions in their academic work,” said Amy Smith, an ADF attorney. “We are pleased that, upon receiving our letter explaining Christine’s constitutional rights, officials at SIU moved quickly to right this injustice and allow Christine’s paper to be graded.”
[more at URL]
----- 31 -----
Link Found Between Abortion and Child Abuse
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004127.cfm
Women who have had an abortion are more likely to mistreat their children, according to new study in the Internet Journal of Pediatrics and Neonatology.
Low-income women with a history of child mistreatment were the subjects of the study.
"We found that the severity of abuse was more pronounced among mothers with a history of abortion compared to those without a history," Dr. Pricilla Coleman, the author of the study, told Lifenews.com. "This makes sense since we do know that abortion can precipitate difficult to resolve anger issues."
----- 33 -----
Pope Says Catholic Lawmakers Cannot Compromise
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004126.cfm
Pope Benedicx XVI has called on Catholic politicians to support policies that show “respect for human life, its defense from conception to natural death, the family built on marriage between a man and a woman, the freedom to educate one’s children and the promotion of the common good in all its forms.”
“These values are not negotiable,” he said. “Catholic politicians and legislators … must feel particularly bound … to introduce laws inspired by values grounded in human nature.”
[More at URL]
----- 34 -----
Joint Chiefs Chairman Calls Homosexual Acts 'Immoral'
Gay-advocacy groups demand apology for general's remarks about
Focus on the Family
by Stephen Adams
3-13-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004123.cfm
Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the nation’s highest-ranking military officer, is taking unfriendly fire for calling homosexual acts "immoral" and likening them to heterosexual adultery.
“I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts," Pace told the Chicago Tribune on Monday. "I do not believe that the armed forces of the United States are well served by saying through our policies that it’s OK to be immoral in any way.
“As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else’s wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not.
"We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior.”
[...]
Pace, apparently feeling the heat, issued a statement today, saying he regretted having stirred up the controversy and that he should have confined his remarks to official policy and “less on my personal moral views.” In the Monday remarks he attributed his views to his “upbringing.”
Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, said calls for an apology from Pace are “absurd,” noting that the 1993 Homosexual Conduct law, which bans homosexuals in the military, is still in effect.
“He doesn’t need to apologize for supporting that law,” she said.
[...]
“The activists who are demanding an apology from General Pace have an agenda," Donnelly said, "an agenda that should not be imposed on the armed services, the Marine Corps or any branch of the military."
[More at URL]
----- 35 -----
Ninth Circuit Draws Fresh Criticism
Gingrich says liberal courts should be abolished.
by Stephen Adams
Focus on the Family
3-13-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004124.cfm
The list of detractors for the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals—arguably the most liberal court in America—continues to grow, with former U.S. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich flat-out advocating the court's abolition.
“The Ninth Circuit is so consistently wrong, it is so consistently radical, it is such a violation of the spirit of American history, that we’d be better off if we simply abolished it,” Gingrich told Focus on the Family Chairman Dr. James Dobson in a radio broadcast last week.
[...]
Gingrich's plan is likely just a pipe dream, though. Supreme Court justices Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas have spoken recently about splitting the court into smaller circuits because of caseload -- but that won't solve the problem of how the judges on the court rules on cases.
[...]
Hausknecht indicated the only hope is for more appointments of conservative judges to overcome the current 16-11 dominance by justices appointed by presidents Carter and Clinton.
“The Ninth Circuit is the perfect example of why elections matter,” Hausknecht said. “When we have presidents who can appoint judges who value the Constitution and don’t legislate from the bench, you have decisions that are in line with the Constitution. If you have presidents who don’t believe that and who believe judges should make law rather than interpret it, then you get the Ninth Circuit.”
Josh Montez contributed to this story.
[More at URL]
----- 36 -----
New York Supreme Courts Upholds Same-Sex Marriage
Focus on the Family
3-13-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004121.cfm
The New York Supreme Court has upheld a county official’s recognition of a same-sex marriage performed outside the state.
Last year, Westchester County Executive Andrew Spano issued an order giving privileges to same-sex couples that had been available only to heterosexual couples.
[...]
Brian Raum, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, predicted the Supreme Court decision would be overturned.
[More at URL]
----- 37 -----
Episcopalians Reject Conciliation Proposal
Denomination refuses to back down from support of homosexuality.
Focus on the Family
from staff reports
23 March 2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004193.cfm
The Episcopal Church has rejected a demand from the worldwide Anglican Communion that they provide conservative leaders for parishes that disagree with the U.S. church's liberal stance on homosexuality.
Episcopal priest Don Armstrong of Colorado Springs told Family News in Focus a denominational split is inevitable.
"The national leadership and the House of Bishops just have no more patience for classic Christianity," Armstrong said, "and are determined to drive it out sooner rather than later."
[More at URL]
----- 38 -----
Suit Against Faith-Based Marriage Institute Rejected
Focus on the Family
3-23-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004191.cfm
A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit that sought to deny a Washington State faith-based organization access to government funds.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed the suit against the state's Department of Health and Human Services for giving money to the Northwest Marriage Institute, which provides both biblically based and secular marriage-education workshops.
The institute has been awarded three federal grants that allowed it to provide free workshops for low-income families.
[More at URL]
And now, today's news.
Obscenely misleading headline on CNN.COM says "Biology teacher fired for referring to Bible;" no, he was fired for teaching Creationism in direct violation of school policy, and linked evolution to Planned Parenthood and Naziism;
German judge relies on Koran to deny a woman suffering severe beatings by her husband a divorce; there appropriate outrage;
German judge removed from bench over ruling;
ACT-UP founder Larry Kramer's column asking straight people: why do you hate us so much? In particular, he takes GBLT people to task for voting on the basis of lesser hate vs. greater hate;
Andrew Sullivan links to a radio excerpt of a Concerned Women for America wonk's explosive interaction with Mitt Romney;
Faith and Freedom Network praises Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy for speaking at the anti-gay Illinois Family Institute lunch and awards ceremony. They (hysterically) try to claim that the IFI isn't a political organisation and that this is therefore religious intolerance. Now that's comedy. On a more serious note, this is just another manifestation of their underlying position: if you don't let them control your life through their laws, you are religiously oppressing them, because their rights include control over you, in the name of Jehovah;
A second FFN article praising Tony Dungy, who says, "I'm with God and I believe IFI has taken the biblical, Godly position on marriage and so I'm pleased to stand with it";
Faith and Freedom Network asks whether Americans have too much freedom; the poll they have up with it outright asks whether Americans have too much freedom of expression, and answers it by saying only if Americans fail to "embrace the Judeo-Christian principles that made America great." He also quotes quite a bit about how democracy is only a good form of government for Christians and that liberty shouldn't be "a cloak for vice" and so on. As of this writing, the completely unscientific poll about whether Americans have too much freedom of expression is split, 51:49 against. I note for comparison purposes that the self-selected polls normally run 11:1 or so in favour of the FFN position;
FFN opposes bill to instigate a state investigation of anti-abortion "pregnancy resource centres" in Oregon;
From
cubes, an update on the Largo, Florida case of a city going against its own city policy to fire their city manager because of her gender reassignment;Faith and Freedom Network condemns the Soulforce religiously-based pro-GBLT activist group as "a sad commentary" and "a missed opportunity," presumably, to try to turn more queers str8;
FFN praises General Pace for (against policy, in uniform) condemning lesbian and gay soldiers as immoral, and praises commentary (same interview, but prefixed with "as an individual") that he's glad that, in the military, "we prosecute that kind of immoral behavior";
Focus on the Family has a story unhappy about the overturning of COPA ("Child Online Protection Act") as overreaching; this is the story with the Colbertian "Families in DANGER" graphic;
Focus on the Family ACTION ITEM against including GBLT people in violent hate-crimes law, and claims it "would make opposition to homosexuality a crime"; I suppose that's true if you consider beatings to be "opposition to homosexuality" that shouldn't, you know, be criminal; I did certainly hear enough in the past from fundamentalist groups such as Concerned Women for America defending gaybashing as a normal and natural response to the perversion of homosexuality;
Focus on the Family supports South Carolina bill requiring doctors offer ultrasounds to women considering abortions;
Alliance Defense Fund sues school over not allowing an anti-gay T-shirt on campus; it's one of several such lawsuits;
Focus on the Family is moving towards more open opposition to the HPV (cervical cancer) vaccine, slowly; they've started taking the "emphasise anything negative about it" approach they take to anything they dislike. In this case, they raise the entirely legitimate point that it hasn't been tested on children under 15 - but it always goes back around to 'but it's an STD and
"Touchdown MARRIAGE" - Focus on the Family likes Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy's anti-gay stance. Even better, they actually make the bizarre claim that Coach Dungy's anti-gay activities and Christian activism should make any queer players on the team feel better about working for him, not worse;
Focus on the Family applauds new Utah law allowing schools to bar clubs "found to be offensive" by the community. The bill's author, Utah State Senator Chris Buttars (R-West Jordan), was overtly targeting Gay-Straight Alliance clubs, and is pleased to have helped pass a law letting schools ban them. Note that they started appearing only after a Supreme Court ruling requiring equal access was won in response to fundamentalists demanding religious clubs be allowed to use school property, and that GSA clubs made it into schools on the basis of that ruling. Again: oppression under the law is the goal, and we see it overtly again here. Also, a quick Google search shows that Senator Buttars shows up a lot in creationism and anti-gay activity;
Focus on the Family condemns fertility clinics offering surrogate services to gay male couples;
Focus on the Family lurvs them some Tom Delay, and runs his condemnation of "the politics of personal destruction" on the very same page he calls liberals a pack of Communist thugs; this is mostly interesting because you get a glimpse into James Dobson's lobbying within the party - Delay slams Dick Armey for not being responsive enough to James Dobson's agenda. This entry includes both Part I and Part II of the interview, the latter of which only came out today. The latter part is headlined, "The Lord Has Had a Major Part in Developing Who Tom DeLay Is";
Focus on the Family backs a Federal effort by US Rep. Phil Gingrey (R-GA) to deny Federal funds to any school including the HPV/cervical cancer vaccine in their standard vaccinations package;
FotF ACTION ITEM against DP benefits in New Mexico;
Focus on the Family Brazil very unhappy with proposed anti-discrimination law, says it's against their religion not to be able to fire queers;
Focus on the Family USA interviews the head of Focus on the Family Latin America;
FotF makes a weird claim that Jamestown Settlement and Museum is being purged of Christianity-related materials;
FotF alarmed that Mexico City is considering legalising first-trimster abortions;
FotF outraged at "gay indoctrination" at Chicago high schools; anybody know what this is actually about? It looks like one of those things wherein here's a whole bunch of stuff going on and one of the things going on is GBLT students speaking about their own experiences. Focus hates that because one of their man methodologies is keeping GBLT people from being seen as people;
FotF ACTION ITEM against embryonic stem cell research;
Student who joined with ADF to sue her teacher and school over not getting to write a religious paper in a psychology class finally got a grade;
FotF claims a link between abortion and child abuse; anybody heard of the Internet Journal of Pediatrics and Neonatology? Is it real or another sham? Given that they have the word "internet" in their name and gave an interview to LifeNews, I tend to suspect the latter, but am withholding judgement. The study, by the way, was a study of low-income women with a pre-existing history of child abuse;
FotF: "Pope Says Catholic Lawmakers Cannot Compromise";
FotF supports anti-gay remarks made by General Pace; given the similarities between this story and the Faith and Freedom Network version, I rather suspect that FFN sourced theirs from this one;
FotF: Newt Gingrich calls for abolishing the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, saying it doesn't belong in America;
FotF condemns New York State Supreme Court ruling upholding recognition of an out-of-state same-sex marriage. Alliance Defense Fund counsel Brian Raum predicts the court's decision will be overturned, leading one to wonder by whom, exactly? But presumably they expect some sort of Federal intervention;
FotF notes that "[Episcopalian] Denomination refuses to back down from support of homosexuality" and talks up a schism;
FotF reports that the Marriage and Family Institute - a local group that has an anti-marriage wing, and secular and religious forks - will continue receiving Federal funds for its nominally secular portion, a legal challenge having failed.
----- 1 -----
Biology teacher fired for referring to Bible
POSTED: 1356 GMT (2156 HKT), March 21, 2007
http://edition.cnn.com/2007/EDUCATION/03/20/teacherfired.ap.ap/index.html
SISTERS, Oregon (AP) -- During his eight days as a part-time high school biology teacher, Kris Helphinstine included Biblical references in material he provided to students and gave a PowerPoint presentation that made links between evolution, Nazi Germany and Planned Parenthood.
That was enough for the Sisters School Board, which fired the teacher Monday night for deviating from the curriculum on the theory of evolution.
"I think his performance was not just a little bit over the line," board member Jeff Smith said. "It was a severe contradiction of what we trust teachers to do in our classrooms."
[More at URL]
----- 2 -----
German judge rules Koran allows wife abuse
Thu Mar 22, 9:26 AM ET
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070322/wl_afp/germanyjusticeislam_070322132641
BERLIN (AFP) - A German woman judge has refused a Moroccan-born woman permission to file for divorce by interpreting the Koran as allowing husbands to beat their wives.
"Where are we living? Woman judge allows beating in marriage... and invokes the Koran," said a front-page headline in Germany's top-selling Bild newspaper, reflecting the widespread angry reaction on Thursday.
"This Moroccan woman has the same right to protection from a violent husband as any German woman. Anything else would be misconceived sensitivity to the benefit of the husband and would amount to racist discrimination against the wife," said the Tageszeitung daily.
The Central Council of Muslims in Germany also condemned the decision.
"The judge should have made a decision based on the German constitution instead of the Koran," said spokeswoman Nurhan Soykan, who said that violence and mistreatment, regardless of the gender of the victim, were also grounds for divorce in the Islamic world.
[More at URL]
----- 3 -----
German Judge Cites Koran, Stirring Up Cultural Storm
By MARK LANDLER
Published: March 23, 2007
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/23/world/europe/23germany.html?_r=2&th&emc=th&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
FRANKFURT, March 22 — A German judge has stirred a storm of protest by citing the Koran in turning down a German Muslim woman’s request for a speedy divorce on the ground that her husband beat her.
In a ruling that underlines the tension between Muslim customs and European laws, the judge, Christa Datz-Winter, noted that the couple came from a Moroccan cultural milieu, in which it is common for husbands to beat their wives. The Koran, she wrote in her decision, sanctions such physical abuse.
News of the ruling brought swift and sharp condemnation from politicians, legal experts and Muslim leaders in Germany, many of whom said they were confounded that a German judge would put seventh-century Islamic religious teaching ahead of German law in deciding a case of domestic violence.
The court in Frankfurt abruptly removed Judge Datz-Winter from the case on Wednesday, saying it could not justify her reasoning. The woman’s lawyer, Barbara Becker-Rojczyk, said she decided to publicize the ruling, which was issued in January, after the court refused her request for a new judge.
[More at URL]
----- 4 -----
Why do straights hate gays?
An aging 72-year-old gay man isn't hopeful about the future.
By Larry Kramer
LARRY KRAMER is the founder of the protest group ACT UP and the author of "The Tragedy of Today's Gays."
March 20, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-oe-kramer20mar20,1,4594749.story?coll=la-news-a_section&ctrack=1&cset=true
DEAR STRAIGHT PEOPLE,
Why do you hate gay people so much?
Gays are hated. Prove me wrong. Your top general just called us immoral. Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, is in charge of an estimated 65,000 gay and lesbian troops, some fighting for our country in Iraq. A right-wing political commentator, Ann Coulter, gets away with calling a straight presidential candidate a faggot. Even Garrison Keillor, of all people, is making really tacky jokes about gay parents in his column. This, I guess, does not qualify as hate except that it is so distasteful and dumb, often a first step on the way to hate. Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama tried to duck the questions that Pace's bigotry raised, confirming what gay people know: that there is not one candidate running for public office anywhere who dares to come right out, unequivocally, and say decent, supportive things about us.
Gays should not vote for any of them. There is not a candidate or major public figure who would not sell gays down the river. We have seen this time after time, even from supposedly progressive politicians such as President Clinton with his "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays in the military and his support of the hideous Defense of Marriage Act. Of course, it's possible that being shunned by gays will make politicians more popular, but at least we will have our self-respect. To vote for them is to collude with them in their utter disdain for us.
Don't any of you wonder why heterosexuals treat gays so brutally year after year after year, as your people take away our manhood, our womanhood, our personhood? Why, even as we die you don't leave us alone. What we can leave our surviving lovers is taxed far more punitively than what you leave your (legal) surviving spouses. Why do you do this? My lover will be unable to afford to live in the house we have made for each other over our lifetime together. This does not happen to you. Taxation without representation is what led to the Revolutionary War. Gay people have paid all the taxes you have. But you have equality, and we don't.
[More at URL]
----- 5 -----
Romney Explodes At A Christianist
AndrewSullivan
23 Mar 2007 03:49 pm
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/03/romney_explodes.html
Concerned Women for America's Sandy Rios got into a major spat with governor Mitt Romney over marriage equality at a small gathering with various religious conservatives. She talks about her private confrontation with Romney here on her radio show. Money quote:
"He was absolutely furious with me. He completely lost his composure and his temper."
[Editor's note: I listened to the radio show excerpt; it's not quite transcription-worthy - yes, yes, queers destroy families, all that - but the main uptake from it is the explosive theocon/Romney interaction. Oh, and someone at the conference calls Romney's having gone to Harvard "part of the problem."]
[More at URL]
----- 6 -----
Homosexuals Trying to Sac Tony Dungy
Faith and Freedom Network
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/homosexuals-trying-to-sac-tony-dungy.html
Homosexual activists are upset that Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy will be speaking at a banquet next week that is sponsored by an organization that supports the definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman.
The activists are pressuring both Dungy and the Colts organization in an attempt to stop Dungy from speaking and receiving an award from the Indiana Family Institute.
Both the Colts and their team chaplain have spoken.
The Colts organization issued a statement saying that the coach is free to speak to any group he wishes. The statement said, “The Club does not take positions in political issues in which it is not directly involved. The Colts do not endorse any political or religious position taken by any group that any Colts employee decides to speak or lend his or her name to.”
[More at URL]
----- 7 -----
Coach Dungy Scores a Touchdown
Faith and Freedom Network
Thursday, March 22, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/coach-dungy-scores-touchdown.html
On March 13th, I wrote a blog entitled, "Homosexuals Trying to Sac Tony Dungy" pointing out that the coach of the Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts was going to be speaking and receiving an award for his pro-family, pro-marriage positions.
We pointed out that gay activists were trying to pressure the coach and the Colts organization into canceling Mr. Dungy’s speaking engagement.
Well, it didn’t work.
Coach Tony Dungy spoke this past Tuesday evening after receiving the award from the Indiana Family Institute.
[...]
He also said, “I’m with God and I believe IFI has taken the biblical, Godly position on marriage and so I’m pleased to stand with it.”
[More at URL]
----- 8 -----
Can We Have Too Much Freedom?
Friday, March 23, 2007
Faith and Freedom Network
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/can-we-have-too-much-freedom.html
Last weekend peace people and other anti-war demonstrators gathered in cities across America to protest the war.
Portland, OR probably led in reaching the lowest and least of all the protests.
While the Oregonian and other Oregon news outlets failed to give much, if any coverage to the burning of the flag and an America soldier (in effigy), Rachael Palinkas, a student at Linfield College was taking pictures. The pictures ended up on the internet, then on Drudge and now on the mainstream news.
[...]
This is, of course, all done under the banner of free speech and free expression.
But do we have too much freedom?
[...]
If we were to limit our freedoms, who would decide where to draw the line? Would it be President Bush or perhaps President Bill Clinton or, God help us, President Hillary Clinton or President Obama? God forbid.
[...]
When the conditions that have preserved our freedoms no longer exist, our freedoms will be eroded and lost because freedom – particularly freedom of expression is like an overstretched elastic band, it can snap and bite the hand that holds it.
The New Testament instructs us not to use liberty (or freedom) as a cloak for vice.
National, spiritual blindness is the result of moral and spiritual disarmament on the individual level.
[More at URL]
----- 9 -----
Oregon Pregnancy Resource Centers Need Your Help
Faith and Freedom Network
Monday, March 19, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/2007/03/oregon-pregnancy-resource-centers-need.html
The Oregon Pregnancy Resource Centers are under attack by the same kind of “work for hire” politicians as are in the majority in Washington State.
Pro-abortion groups, Planned Parenthood, and NARAL are pushing a bill that could ultimately be used to shut down pro-life pregnancy resource centers in Oregon.
[...]
Under SB 776, the Department of Human Services (DHS) would be required to collect and study data on all aspects of the state’s pregnancy-resource centers. It would establish a toll-free number and online complaint form to assist those who have complaints against the pregnancy-resource centers. Here’s how bad it is.
[More at URL]
----- 10 -----
Stanton has 9 days to prepare
But his attorney may not be available March 23.
By LORRI HELFAND
Published March 14, 2007
St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/03/14/Northpinellas/Stanton_has_9_days_to.shtml
LARGO - City Manager Steve Stanton will make his case to keep his job on March 23.
City Commissioners on Tuesday night chose that date for the public hearing because that's when they'll all be available.
But his attorney said she might not be.
"They chose to go with the only date we're not all available," said Karen Doering.
[More at URL]
----- 11 -----
Soulforce: A Sad Commentary
Faith and Freedom Network
Thursday, March 15, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/archives/2007_03_01_archive.html
You may not be familiar with the organization Soulforce, but you will be hearing about them because what they call their “Equality Ride” will soon be coming to a Christian college near you.
For the second year, they are touring the nation with busloads of people visiting colleges, “with policies,” that they perceive “silence or exclude lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students.”
Their 2007 tour is underway and is scheduled to be in both Oregon and Washington.
[...]
Their mission statement seems to be to obtain “Freedom for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people from religious and political oppression through the practice of relentless nonviolent resistance.”
Their tour started earlier this week with their first visit to the Wisconsin Lutheran College on March 13th. The report they filed on their website said, “The administrators were unsympathetic, but the students were excited to speak with us.” They describe scenes where a student will bravely step forward and join them in prayer, “despite the school officials’ outright refusal to do so.”
What actually happened, according to people who were there and the police reports, is that administrators met with the Equality Ride people on Monday and asked them not to disturb the classes and activities. There was no agreement for them to come on campus so when they came on campus, six of them were arrested.
[More at URL]
----- 12 -----
General Pace: "Homosexual acts are immoral."
Faith and Freedom Network
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
http://www.faithandfreedom.us/weblog/archives/2007_03_01_archive.html
General Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the nation’s highest-ranking military officer, told the Chicago Tribune on Monday, “I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts. I do not believe that the Armed Forces of the United States are well served by saying through our policies that it’s O.K. to be immoral in any way.”
By yesterday, this story was running across the country and probably around the world.
And homosexual activists were demanding that he apologize. And Sen. John Warner (R) was rebuking him. What I found interesting was the little notice given to his next statement.
“As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with someone else’s wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior.”
[...]
Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness said that calls for an apology from Pace are “absurd,” in that the 1993 Homosexual Conduct Law, which bans homosexuals in the military, is still in effect.
She said, “He doesn’t need to apologize for supporting the law.” She also said the ban on homosexuals serving in the military exists to protect good order, discipline, and unit cohesion in “conditions of forced intimacy” in which military personnel may have little or no privacy from others who might be sexually attracted to them.
Donnelly said, “The activists who are demanding an apology from General Pace have an agenda, an agenda that should not be imposed on the Armed Services, the Marine Corps or any branch of the military.”
I agree.
[More at URL]
[Editor's Note: The "Center for Military Readiness" is an organisation that mostly seems to exist to keep queers out of the military and to move the military towards kicking out women. They have other functions, reportedly, but the only place I see them showing up is in anti-gay and anti-women-soldier activities.]
----- 13 -----
Family Advocates Call COPA Ruling 'Troubling'
Court says federal law keeping kids from Web’s harmful material is unconstitutional.
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
Focus on the Family
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004183.cfm
[Ed. Note: this story has a truly Colbertian "Families in DANGER" graphic, viewable here.]
A federal court in Philadelphia today declared unconstitutional a law that requires commercial pornography Web sites to deny access to children, a ruling pro-family groups called “troubling.”
Congress passed the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) in 1998 to force porn sites to hide harmful images behind an age-verification system. The law was immediately challenged and has been embroiled in a legal battle since – and therefore unenforceable.
[...]
“The court can't push Congress' duties to protect kids from commercial pornographers back onto the parents simply by pointing out the filters are somewhat effective at blocking harmful content,” he said. “Should Congress abandon its ‘compelling interest’ in this area merely because parents have some responsibility there as well? And how do filters protect minors when they are outside the home -- are parents supposed to follow their kids around all day?"
[More at URL]
[Editor's note: This story makes no reference to Judicial Activism. I am surprised - except that he's a Reagan appointee, so presumably immune from such charges.]
----- 14 -----
Hate-Crimes Bill Would Give Gays Special Righs
The House is considering a measure that would make opposition to homosexuality a crime.
Focus on the Family
from staff reports
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004181.cfm
A bill with bipartisan support in Congress would give the Justice Department power to investigate and prosecute “bias-motivated violence.”
Homosexual advocates who support the bill say violence against homosexuals is on the rise. They contend 14 percent of the 1,000 hate crimes reported in 2005 were due to sexual orientation.
“They claim that this is an epidemic, [but] one third of the ‘hate crime’s statistics’ are for ‘name-calling,’ ” Andrea Lafferty, executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition, told Family News in Focus. “This is not a reason to bring in the federal government. The ultimate objective is to use the [prosecution] of hate speech against people of faith.”
Matt Barber of Concerned Women for America said the bill would favor one class of crime victims over another.
“It elevates a certain people group based on their chosen sexual behaviors—homosexuals and so-called transgenders—to a higher level of status in our society,” Barber said, “so that they are considered a more valuable victim.”
The Senate is expected to introduce a bipartisan companion bill next month.
TAKE ACTION
1. Please contact your representative and ask him/her to oppose hate-crimes legislation. For more about the bill, and help in contacting your lawmakers, please see the CitizenLink Action Center.
2. Send an e-mail to President Bush through the CitizenLink Action Center and ask that he veto any hate-crimes legislation that reaches his desk.
----- 15 -----
S.C. State House Approves Ultrasound Bill
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
Focus on the Family
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004182.cfm
In a landslide 91-23 vote, the South Carolina state House passed a bill Wednesday to require abortion-minded women to be given the chance to see an ultrasound of their preborn child prior to the proce
Denise Burke, vice president and legal director for American United for Life, said laws requiring doctors to offer ultrasound are important to ensure “women are getting true and complete, accurate information about their pregnancies and what an abortion actually does.”
[More at URL]
----- 16 -----
T-Shirt Case Highlights Viewpoint Discrimination
Focus on the Family
3-22-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004180.cfm
An Illinois high school student forbidden from wearing a T-shirt expressing her personal views on homosexuality has filed suit.
Heidi Zamecnik, a student at Neuqua Valley High School, wore a t-shirt that read, “Be Happy, Not Gay.” The dean told her to change her shirt or go home. After Zamecnik’s mother intervened, she was allowed to stay – but a counselor at the school forced her to cover the words “Not Gay.”
Zamecnik wore the message in response to the “Day of Silence” for which homosexual students and supporters wore shirts that bore messages in support of homosexuality.
[...]
Zamecnik suffered unlawful discrimination, humiliation and punishment at the hands of school personnel for expressing her views, Kellum said.
ADF has filed eight similar lawsuits across the country and is working to “enable Christian students to express a contrasting viewpoint on homosexuality.”
[More at URL]
----- 17 -----
Researcher Warns Against HPV Vaccine Young Girls
Expert says she doesn’t give the shot to girls younger than 18.
by Wendy Cloyd, assistant editor
Focus on the Family
3-21-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004177.cfm
Twenty-six states have considered legislation that would make it mandatory for girls as young as 11 to receive a controversial vaccine to protect them from a sexually transmitted disease, an idea that alarms a researcher who spent two decades developing the drug.
Dr. Diane Harper, director of the Gynecologic Cancer Prevention Center at Dartmouth Medical School, said her trials of the vaccine, marketed by Merck under the name Gardasil, involved girls 15 to 25. In her own practice, she does not recommend the shot until a girl is 18.
“This vaccine should not be mandated for 11-year-old girls,” Harper said. “It’s not been tested in little girls for efficacy.”
[...]
Linda Klepacki, analyst for sexual health at Focus on the Family Action, said governments should not be forcing young girls to take part in this “public-health experiment.”
[...]
While vaccines such as Gardasil may play an important role in protecting women’s health, Klepacki said, the best health practice for young girls is abstinence until marriage and fidelity within marriage.
[More at URL]
----- 18 -----
Coach Dungy Defends Family Values
“We’re not trying to downgrade anyone else, hate anyone else,” he tells supporters of an Indiana marriage amendment.
by Steve Jordahl, Family News in Focus
Focus on the Family
3-21-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004178.cfm
Coach Tony Dungy of the Indianapolis Colts spoke strongly Tuesday night in favor of traditional marriage. Family advocates applauded his statement, homosexual groups expressed disappointment and the National Football League has remained silent.
Dungy made his remarks after receiving a Friend of the Family award from the Indiana Family Institute (IFI).
“We’re not trying to downgrade anyone else, hate anyone else, but we’re trying to promote the family, family values the Lord’s way,” Dungy said.
IFI President Curt Smith was pleased.
“Coach Dungy said, ‘I’m with God and I believe IFI has taken the biblical, godly position on marriage and so I’m pleased to stand with it.’”
[...]
Dr. James Dobson, founder and chairman of Focus on the Family Action, said Dungy “is a good and brave man. To defend God’s truth so simply and strongly on what marriage ought to mean is to invite a blitz of hateful attacks from homosexual activists and others on the Left.”
Cyd Zeigler of Outsports.com, a pro-gay group, didn’t criticize Dungy for speaking out, but he insists that Dungy has created a “hostile” work environment in the Colts organization.
“I’m afraid that he would not allow a gay player on his team because he did not follow the Lord’s way.”
Smith dismissed that thinking.
“It’s crazy,” he said, “to think that when someone takes a biblical position on a public-policy question, that it creates any kind of a hostile workforce at all.”
Melissa Fryrear, director of gender issues at Focus on the Family, said Dungy’s relationship with Christ should have a positive effect on his workplace.
[More at URL]
----- 19 -----
Utah Governor Signs Bill Tightening Rules for School Clubs
Focus on the Family
3-20-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004167.cfm
A bill in the Utah Legislature that will allow schools to exercise discretion in the types of student groups allowed may help administrators weed out those the community find objectionable, The Salt Lake Tribune reported.
Sen. Chris Buttars, sponsor of the Senate bill, said in addition to administrator discretion, parents must be fully informed and sign a consent form before a student can join a group.
“This gives 40 school districts the same rules and the ability to weigh in the balance a club they feel will not fit with their school,” he said.
The law reinforces current state Board of Education rules that allow officials to reject groups found to be offensive, but adds a line that requires clubs to stay within the “boundaries of socially appropriate behavior.”
The state Senate’s only openly gay member, Sen. Scott McCoy, said he is worried that students who haven’t yet told their parents they are gay will be denied the emotional support of a group such as a gay-straight alliance (GSA) because some administrators will consider the group outside the norm.
Buttars said GSAs aren’t as much support groups as conditioning clubs that are trying to make homosexuality socially acceptable. He said he’s glad administrators who reject the formation of such groups will have the law behind them.
[More at URL]
----- 20 -----
Clinics Recruit Surrogates to Provide Kids for Gay Couples
Homosexuals can pay extra to choose the sex of their baby.
from staff reports
Focus on the Family
3-20-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004169.cfm
Several fertility clinics are recruiting surrogates to provide gay male couples with children.
Pamela Madsen of the American Fertility Clinic said her facility has catered to the homosexuality community for more than a year.
“We support all families,” she said, “all people who are interested in having families through birth and adoption.”
The average cost of surrogacy is $60,000. But it can get pricier for those who want to select the gender of their baby – which three-fourths of gay couples do. Carrie Gordon Earll, senior director of issue analysis for Focus on the Family Action, said it’s all about the green:
“This is no doubt there are folks who want to spend money to try and have a baby in this way.”
[More at URL]
----- 21 -----
‘This is the Criminalization of Politics’
In a new book, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay takes aim at those who have spent more than a decade trying to ruin him simply for being a conservative.
by Gary Schneeberger
Focus on the Family
3-20-2007
(Part I - for Part II, see below)
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004170.cfm
Tom DeLay, author, is a lot like Tom DeLay, congressman: Straightforward. Unflinching. A man who can take the heat – and dish out a few degrees of it, too.
[...]
“I am not a man who apologizes for what he believes,” he writes. “This is because I did not create my beliefs, I received them: from the Bible; from great minds of the ages; from the experiences of nations; and from the principles of American freedom.
“Liberals may hate me for it, and weak-kneed Republicans may back away from it, but I cling to these ideas because I believe them to be true.”
Before you even get into double digits in pages – it’s on page 3 – you make a pretty controversial statement. You say that today’s liberalism is a very early stage of what you describe as “communist thuggery.” What do you say to critics – and you know there are going to be critics – who respond, “Wow, this guy sounds paranoid?”
Well, first of all, “liberal” by its very definition – by those on the Left – is socialist. Communists are socialists, and communists, as part of their agenda, are thugs. And I have witnessed, personally as well as professionally, that if the Left cannot sell its ideas or its agenda or its vision, then the Left is going to go after people personally.
And not just try to defeat them politically; it’s not even good enough to vilify them publicly. They carpet-bomb your life, and decide to disgrace you, bankrupt you, send you to jail, all for political reasons. And to get rid of people who think differently than they do.
[...]
You also have some criticism for Dick Armey, your colleague of many years. You say that he was blinded by ambition. Lately, Mr. Armey has been taking shots at conservative evangelicals like Dr. Dobson for being too inflexible on social issues. Did you see that coming?
Dick Armey was never comfortable with the social issues. He was never comfortable with those issues of abortion and marriage and things that were important to the Right. And because of him being uncomfortable, when Dr. Dobson would show up – as he is so inclined to do – and demand that we do more, Dick Armey didn’t appreciate it.
[...]
[END PART ONE]
[BEGIN PART TWO]
'The Lord Has Had a Major Part in Developing Who Tom DeLay Is'
The former House majority leader explains how Christ – and Dr. James Dobson – helped him become one of Congress' chief defenders of the family.
by Gary Schneeberger
Focus on the Family
3-23-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004195.cfm
Focus on the Family founder Dr. James Dobson has called Tom DeLay "one of America's leading advocates of family values" and "a consistent voice of reason and clarity in America's moral debates."
But did you know Dr. Dobson not only played a pivotal role in DeLay dedicating his life to defending the family, but also in the former House majority leader dedicating his life to Christ?
How watching one of Dr. Dobson's early videos convicted him of neglecting his family and his faith is just one of the intimate anecdotes the former congressman shares in his new memoir, No Retreat, No Surrender: One American's Fight. In his trademark straightforward style, DeLay explains the degree to which his Christianity informs his politics.
"I soon came to understand that there was a whole movement of people like me who had for years been crying out to God for their country," he writes of how he viewed his role as a lawmaker after returning to the faith of his youth. "They wanted to see healing in their land. They wanted to see the age-old covenants renewed and righteousness restored. They believed that America had a unique mission in the world, and it wasn't to be the largest exporter of pornography and abortion on earth.
[More at URL]
[Editor's note: BOLD as in original]
----- 22 -----
Congressman Prefers Voluntary HPV Policies
His bill would block federal funds for states that mandate vaccinations for schoolgirls.
Focus on the Family
from staff reports
3-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004160.cfm
Twenty-five states are considering mandatory vaccinations against the human papillomavirus (HPV) for schoolgirls. U.S. Rep. Phil Gingrey, R-Ga., prefers a voluntary program, and has introduced a bill that would block federal funds to states that don’t respect parental concerns.
“Now if a state implemented a voluntary program, then federal dollars could be used to implement that voluntary program,” said Gingrey spokesperson Becky Ruby.
Linda Klepacki, analyst for sexual health for Focus on the Family Action, said she supports the bill.
“It can’t prohibit states from mandating the vaccine, but what it will do is essentially do that, in that it will block states from receiving many federal funds that are necessary for states to implement mandatory vaccinations,” Klepacki told Family News in Focus.
----- 23 -----
New Mexico Governor Wants Gay Benefits
Your immediate attention is needed to see that the domestic partnership bill fails – again.
by Mona Passignano, state issues analyst
Focus on the Family
3-19-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004162.cfm
Although the regular session for 2007 had ended, on Saturday, March 17, New Mexico Governor and presidential hopeful Bill Richardson called the New Mexico Legislature back into session. This special session is scheduled for Tuesday, March 20. That’s correct – tomorrow.
State law allows Richardson to limit debate, and he’s restricted the agenda to eight items.
Not surprisingly, one of those items is the domestic partnership bill – HB 603 – which passed 33-24 in the House but which failed in the Senate. If passed during the special session, the bill would grant homosexual couples the same rights, protections and benefits as spouses. These include child support, divorce proceedings, property and insurance rights.
The bill is a priority for Equality New Mexico, a vocal gay rights group that seeks to redefine marriage in New Mexico. The time to speak up in defense of traditional marriage is now.
TAKE ACTION
New Mexico residents, please contact your state legislators and urge them to vote NO on the domestic partnership bill during the special legislative session. For contact information for your legislators, click CitizenLink’s "Action Center" button, and enter your 9-digit ZIP code.
If you do not know your 9-digit ZIP code, click here to get that information first.
----- 24 -----
Ex-gays Concerned about Proposed Law
Focus on the Family
3-16-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004152.cfm
A bill passed by the Brazilian House and headed for the Senate would impose long prison terms on anyone who denies a homosexual a job.
“This would mean that if you find out your nanny is a lesbian and she’s taking care of your children and you’re not in agreement with that, you would not be able to fire her without probably going to jail,” Esly Carvalho of Exodus Latin America told Family News in Focus. Exodus is an international ministry that offers freedom from homosexuality through faith in Christ.
[More at URL]
----- 25 -----
‘Born to Serve God’
President Bush just completed a tour of Latin America. The press focused on his adversaries in the region, but overlooked a rising star who’s pro-life.
by Stephen Adams, associate editor
Focus on the Family
3-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004143.cfm
Editor’s note: Sixto Porras is becoming a virtual household name as head of Enfoque a la Familia (Focus on the Family) in Latin America. His Nicaraguan mother struggled as a young wife in an unhappy marriage before accepting Christ as her Savior. Sixto, who came to the Lord at age 18, became a pastor, then a parachurch evangelist, when he found a calling working with teens on sexual purity, using Focus materials. Stephen Adams, associate editor of Citizen magazine, interviewed him recently in San José, Costa Rica, for an article to appear in the May issue of Citizen. Here are some excerpts from that interview:
[...]
Citizen: Did you ever think you would become the so-called “Dr. Dobson of Latin America”?
Porras: I wanted to be a lawyer focusing on international law. That was what I really liked. The first year in the university, I gave my life to Jesus Christ, and that changed all my life. In 1983, my priorities changed. I knew that I was born to serve God. I always was a good student. I enjoyed studying. I didn’t imagine myself doing another thing. And when Jesus Christ came into my heart, everything changed.
Citizen: Tell us about the great demand for sexual-abstinence material like Focus’ Sex, Lies and the Truth in Latin America.
Porras: That also changed my life and was a turning point. Because then I was spending 90 percent of my time teaching Sex, Lies and the Truth. This project led us to relationships with the First Lady of Costa Rica, the First Lady of Guatemala, the secretary of education of Paraguay and in that way with officials in 13 other governments in Latin America. Because of that, in September of 1998 we began the Focus office in Costa Rica.
In fact, more than 400,000 youths [all over Latin America] received Christ as a result of this. We have done this through partnerships with other ministries all over the region. This is the data that we have—we believe it is much more than this. About 1 million youths have been exposed to the materials, to Sex, Lies and the Truth. Teachers don’t have answers to talk about the issues regarding sexuality with the youth.
[...]
Citizen: And now Enfoque is reaching an entire continent.
Porras: Toda America Latina. Gloria a Dios! [All Latin America. Glory to God!]
[More at URL]
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Ashamed of the Gospel in Jamestown
Focus on the Family
3-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004139.cfm
Recent visitors to Jamestown, Va., say they were shocked and upset to discover that tour guides at the Jamestown Settlement and Museum were not allowed to acknowledge the existence of “religious” items such as the Ten Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer.
California pastor and researcher Todd DuBord told WorldNetDaily.com that visitors are being told the settlers came only to make money, with no mention of their commission to spread the Gospel on orders from King James I.
[More at URL]
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Mexican Abortion Proposal Stirs Opposition
Focus on the Family
3-15-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004140.cfm
The Mexico City Legislature is considering legalizing first-trimester abortions in the capital, which could be the first place in Mexico to allow the practice.
The city of 8.7 million people is a federal district like Washington, D.C., with its own Legislature.
The bill is supported by the Leftist Democratic Revolution Party, which holds the mayoralty and a majority in the Legislature, according to the Associated Press. It is heavily opposed by the Catholic church and officials of the conservative National Action Party of President Felipe Calderon, who claim it would violate articles in the Constitution protecting life.
The College of Catholic Lawyers in Mexico City promised to rally broad opposition.
[More at URL]
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Gay Indoctrination Infuriates Chicago Parents
Mandatory class for freshmen includes section on accepting homosexuality.
by Steve Jordahl and Wendy Cloyd
Focus on the Family
03-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLtopstories/A000004132.cfm
Parents of freshmen at Chicago's Deerfield High School say students are required to attend lectures on gay sexuality, and then sign a contract forbidding them to talk about it afterward.
Ellen Waltz's son and his friends told her about the lectures -- delivered by other students -- and the contract.
"[They said,] 'We had to sit there and listen to them tell us about their feelings and what it's like to be gay,' " Waltz said. "They make them sign a contract stating that they won't say anything that's in the room."
Lora Sue Hauser, a school-issues adviser for North Shore Student Advocacy, said a group of boys told her school officials threatened those who were reluctant to sign the contract.
"[They were told] 'You will sign this or you will go to the dean,' " Hauser said.
Dr. Sue Hebson, vice-superintendent of the school district, told Family News in Focus that there is no contract. She also denied that the classroom discussions involve sexuality.
"That's not part of the conversation," Hebson said.
But Hauser said that's just not so.
"During the semester they have a panel of gay, transgender (and) bisexual students who speak to these freshmen," she said. "Sometimes they talk about statistics and causality."
Parents complained last year when the school asked students to match sexually deviant terms with their definitions. The school responded by posting the curriculum information behind a password-protected page on the school's Web site.
Matt Barber, policy director for cultural issues at Concerned Women for America, said this year’s freshmen orientation is part of an aggressive plan to corrupt American sexual practices.
"If you can maintain control of undeveloped and impressionable youth and spoon-feed them misinformation -- lies and half-truths about dangerous, disordered and extremely risky behaviors -- then you can control the future and ensure that those behaviors are not only fully accepted, but celebrated," Barber told World Net Daily.
Candi Cushman, education analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said it is important for parents across the nation to realize that this is not an isolated incident.
"Schools in many states are opening their doors to outside gay-rights groups who conduct so-called gay-awareness events or diversity days," Cushman said. "And there are now more than 3,000 pro-gay clubs in high schools nationwide."
Parents in Deerfield must take a stand, she added.
"These public school officials are blatantly disrespecting local parents and students who hold different viewpoints," Cushman said. "But the good news is that parents and students can fight back by standing up for their equal access rights."
TAKE ACTION
Chicago residents can e-mail local school board members at Township High School District 113.
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U.S. Senate May Vote on Embryo Research
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004129.cfm
The U.S. Senate may vote this week on a bill that would force taxpayers to fund destructive embryonic stem-cell research. The House approved the bill earlier this year.
President Bush has promised to veto it.
"If history repeats itself, senators will hear some wildly inaccurate statements from their colleagues who are pushing this immoral legislation, including claims that the federal government 'bans' and refuses to fund embryonic stem cell research," said Carrie Earll, senior analyst for bioethics for Focus on the Family Action. "That's simply not true. This research is underway and limited federal funding has been in place for six years to the tune of $600 million dollars. The issue before the Senate will be whether our tax dollars will be used as an incentive for scientists to destroy living human embryos in the process."
TAKE ACTION
Contact your two senators and urge them to oppose any bill which uses your tax dollars to support research that destroys human embryos.
For help in contacting your lawmakers, please see the CitizenLink Action Center.
To help you understand the embryonic stem-cell issue, we recommend Dawn Vargo's article, "What the Media Won't Tell You about Embryonic Stem-Cell Research."
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School Finally Grades Student’s Paper
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004128.cfm
A college student whose paper on post-abortion syndrome was held hostage by a professor has received a grade after all.
Southern Illinois graduate student Christine Mize removed faith-based references from her paper, as her professor had requested, but the professor, Dr. Laura Dreuth-Zeman, still refused to issue a grade.
Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), a legal services group based in Arizona, sent Southern Illinois University (SIU) officials a letter demanding that the Mize receive a grade.
The university backed down and gave Mize her grade, which she needed to graduate.
“No student should be punished for exercising their constitutional rights, including the right to include faith-based opinions in their academic work,” said Amy Smith, an ADF attorney. “We are pleased that, upon receiving our letter explaining Christine’s constitutional rights, officials at SIU moved quickly to right this injustice and allow Christine’s paper to be graded.”
[more at URL]
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Link Found Between Abortion and Child Abuse
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004127.cfm
Women who have had an abortion are more likely to mistreat their children, according to new study in the Internet Journal of Pediatrics and Neonatology.
Low-income women with a history of child mistreatment were the subjects of the study.
"We found that the severity of abuse was more pronounced among mothers with a history of abortion compared to those without a history," Dr. Pricilla Coleman, the author of the study, told Lifenews.com. "This makes sense since we do know that abortion can precipitate difficult to resolve anger issues."
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Pope Says Catholic Lawmakers Cannot Compromise
Focus on the Family
3-14-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004126.cfm
Pope Benedicx XVI has called on Catholic politicians to support policies that show “respect for human life, its defense from conception to natural death, the family built on marriage between a man and a woman, the freedom to educate one’s children and the promotion of the common good in all its forms.”
“These values are not negotiable,” he said. “Catholic politicians and legislators … must feel particularly bound … to introduce laws inspired by values grounded in human nature.”
[More at URL]
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Joint Chiefs Chairman Calls Homosexual Acts 'Immoral'
Gay-advocacy groups demand apology for general's remarks about
Focus on the Family
by Stephen Adams
3-13-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004123.cfm
Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the nation’s highest-ranking military officer, is taking unfriendly fire for calling homosexual acts "immoral" and likening them to heterosexual adultery.
“I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts," Pace told the Chicago Tribune on Monday. "I do not believe that the armed forces of the United States are well served by saying through our policies that it’s OK to be immoral in any way.
“As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else’s wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not.
"We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior.”
[...]
Pace, apparently feeling the heat, issued a statement today, saying he regretted having stirred up the controversy and that he should have confined his remarks to official policy and “less on my personal moral views.” In the Monday remarks he attributed his views to his “upbringing.”
Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, said calls for an apology from Pace are “absurd,” noting that the 1993 Homosexual Conduct law, which bans homosexuals in the military, is still in effect.
“He doesn’t need to apologize for supporting that law,” she said.
[...]
“The activists who are demanding an apology from General Pace have an agenda," Donnelly said, "an agenda that should not be imposed on the armed services, the Marine Corps or any branch of the military."
[More at URL]
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Ninth Circuit Draws Fresh Criticism
Gingrich says liberal courts should be abolished.
by Stephen Adams
Focus on the Family
3-13-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004124.cfm
The list of detractors for the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals—arguably the most liberal court in America—continues to grow, with former U.S. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich flat-out advocating the court's abolition.
“The Ninth Circuit is so consistently wrong, it is so consistently radical, it is such a violation of the spirit of American history, that we’d be better off if we simply abolished it,” Gingrich told Focus on the Family Chairman Dr. James Dobson in a radio broadcast last week.
[...]
Gingrich's plan is likely just a pipe dream, though. Supreme Court justices Anthony Kennedy and Clarence Thomas have spoken recently about splitting the court into smaller circuits because of caseload -- but that won't solve the problem of how the judges on the court rules on cases.
[...]
Hausknecht indicated the only hope is for more appointments of conservative judges to overcome the current 16-11 dominance by justices appointed by presidents Carter and Clinton.
“The Ninth Circuit is the perfect example of why elections matter,” Hausknecht said. “When we have presidents who can appoint judges who value the Constitution and don’t legislate from the bench, you have decisions that are in line with the Constitution. If you have presidents who don’t believe that and who believe judges should make law rather than interpret it, then you get the Ninth Circuit.”
Josh Montez contributed to this story.
[More at URL]
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New York Supreme Courts Upholds Same-Sex Marriage
Focus on the Family
3-13-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004121.cfm
The New York Supreme Court has upheld a county official’s recognition of a same-sex marriage performed outside the state.
Last year, Westchester County Executive Andrew Spano issued an order giving privileges to same-sex couples that had been available only to heterosexual couples.
[...]
Brian Raum, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, predicted the Supreme Court decision would be overturned.
[More at URL]
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Episcopalians Reject Conciliation Proposal
Denomination refuses to back down from support of homosexuality.
Focus on the Family
from staff reports
23 March 2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLNews/A000004193.cfm
The Episcopal Church has rejected a demand from the worldwide Anglican Communion that they provide conservative leaders for parishes that disagree with the U.S. church's liberal stance on homosexuality.
Episcopal priest Don Armstrong of Colorado Springs told Family News in Focus a denominational split is inevitable.
"The national leadership and the House of Bishops just have no more patience for classic Christianity," Armstrong said, "and are determined to drive it out sooner rather than later."
[More at URL]
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Suit Against Faith-Based Marriage Institute Rejected
Focus on the Family
3-23-2007
http://www.citizenlink.org/CLBriefs/A000004191.cfm
A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit that sought to deny a Washington State faith-based organization access to government funds.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed the suit against the state's Department of Health and Human Services for giving money to the Northwest Marriage Institute, which provides both biblically based and secular marriage-education workshops.
The institute has been awarded three federal grants that allowed it to provide free workshops for low-income families.
[More at URL]
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Steve Stanton's appeal hearing
Date: 2007-03-24 02:29 am (UTC)http://www.sptimes.com/2007/webspecials07/special_reports/stanton/
and
http://blogs.tampabay.com/breakingnews/2007/03/largo_police_cl.html
Re: Steve Stanton's appeal hearing
Date: 2007-03-24 06:20 am (UTC)Re: Steve Stanton's appeal hearing
Date: 2007-03-24 10:23 am (UTC)