Monday, April 30, 2007

Italian Cardinal Opposing Same-sex Unions Threatened

From "Threats Escalate with Bullet Mailed to Italian Cardinal Opposing Same-sex Unions" by Gudrun Schultz, posted 4/30/07 at Lifesite.net

Homosexual activists mailed a bullet to the office of Genoese Archbishop Angelo Bagnasco Friday, in the latest threat against the senior church official over his opposition to same-sex civil unions.

Police bodyguards were assigned to protect Archbishop Bagnasco several weeks ago, after threatening graffiti appeared on his cathedral and other buildings across the city. “Death to Bagnaso” and “Shame on you, Bagnasco” were spray painted, along with insults against Pope Benedict XVI and Cardinal Camillo Ruini, previous head of the bishops conference.

Pornographic images of the Virgin Mary portrayed as a bisexual were left in pamphlets in the cathedral at the end of the Easter Vigil Mass, Catholic News Agency reported April 11.

According to a Herald Tribune report, a local newspaper said a photo of the archbishop accompanied the bullet, with a swastika scratched into the image.

Archbishop Bagnasco was recently elected as head of the powerful Italian Bishops Conference. Since his induction into that role, the archbishop has led a campaign against the government proposal to legally recognize homosexual civil unions.

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German Authorities Decree Ceasefire in Homeschooler Case – For Now

From "German Authorities Decree Ceasefire in Homeschooler Case – For Now" by Peter J. Smith, posted 4/30/07 at Lifesite.net

German authorities have decided to leave 16 year old German homeschooler Melissa Busekros and her family in peace for now reports the International Human Rights Group (IHRG).

In a letter to the family’s attorney, the Erlangen Jugendamt (Youth Welfare Office), which was responsible for seizing Melissa from her home in February – affirmed that they were going to “de-escalate” the situation and allow Melissa to remain with her family as long as the Busekros family would continue to dialogue with the authorities.

“This is a great victory for the Busekros family, but the situation is not completely resolved,” said Joel Thornton, president of the IHRG. “We are considering it a significant half-time lead, but not the final win.”

Last Monday, Melissa Busekros decided on her own initiative to return to her family on her 16th birthday making a daring trip in the dead of night and arriving on her doorstep at 3AM. Under German law, Melissa Busekros is entitled to far more rights after turning 16, allowing her to determine her own custody and freely choose to live with her family. (http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/apr/07042301.html)

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Montana Seniors Regain Right to Sing Christian Songs

From "Montana Seniors Regain Right to Sing Christian Songs" posted 4/30/07 at Citizenlink.org

Some seniors in Bozeman, Mont., have their voices back, after nearly losing the right to sing Christian songs before meals.

A few of their peers had threatened to call in the ACLU, but administrators did their homework and the singing can be heard again at the Bozeman Senior Center.

At first, administrators feared they might risk losing federal funding for a Meals on Wheels program. But Amy Smith, an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), said when senior center board members contacted her group, they learned that the seniors are well within their rights.

"On Good Friday, they voted to reinstate the singing of songs before meals, and they were very pleased to do so,” Smith told Family News in Focus.

Kay Owen, a spokeswoman for Crossroads Ministries USA, said seniors in such a situation often fear another joy in their lives is being taken away. She said they deserve support and defense.

“Since they’ve already lost so many things in their life, like their spouse, their home, their friends," she said, "it's very, very difficult to continue to lose them.”

Good News! Illinois House Defeats Bill to Weaken Parental Notification

From "Illinois House Defeats Bill to Weaken Parental Notification" posted 4/30/07 at Citizenlink.org

The Illinois House voted Thursday against a bill that would have allowed teenagers to talk to a counselor before an abortion instead of notifying their parents. Rather than waiting 48 hours, which current statute requires, teens would have been able to have an abortion immediately after meeting with a counselor.

“Under this bill, parents would not know their child is to undergo a serious medical procedure that can have serious and long-lasting medical, emotional and psychological consequences,” Zack Wichmann of the Catholic Conference of Illinois said in a statement.

“This legislation seeks to create the appearance of a parental notice law without involving parents or requiring any notice.”

Sunday, April 29, 2007

Is Discrimination Always Wrong?

From "What's discrimination" by Walter E. Williams, posted 9/6/06 at Townhall.com

There's so much confusion and emotionalism about discrimination that I thought I'd take a stab at a dispassionate analysis. Discrimination is simply the act of choice. When we choose Bordeaux wine, we discriminate against Burgundy wine. When I married Mrs. Williams, I discriminated against other women. Even though I occasionally think about equal opportunity, Mrs. Williams demands continued discrimination.

You say, "Williams, such discrimination doesn't harm anyone." You're wrong. Discriminating in favor of Bordeaux wine reduces the value of resources held in Burgundy production. Discriminating in favor of Mrs. Williams harmed other women by reducing their opportunity set, assuming I'm a man other women would marry.

Our lives are spent discriminating for or against one thing or another. In other words, choice requires discrimination. When we modify the term with race, sex, height, weight or age, we merely specify the choice criteria.

Imagine how silly, not to mention impossible, life would be if discrimination were outlawed. Imagine engaging in just about any activity where we couldn't discriminate by race, sex, height, weight, age, mannerisms, college selection, looks or ability; it would turn into a carnival.

I've sometimes asked students if they believe in equal opportunity in employment. Invariably, they answer yes. Then I ask them, when they graduate, whether they plan to give every employer an equal opportunity to hire them. Most often they answer no; they plan to discriminate against certain employers. Then I ask them, if they're not going to give every employer an equal opportunity to hire them, what's fair about requiring an employer to give them an equal opportunity to be hired?

Sometimes students will argue that certain forms of discrimination are OK but it's racial discrimination that's truly offensive. That's when I confess my own history of racial discrimination. In the late 1950s, whilst selecting a lifelong mate, even though white, Mexican, Indian, Chinese and Japanese women might have been just as qualified as a mate, I gave them no chance whatsoever. It appears that most Americans act identically by racially discriminating in setting up marriage contracts. According to the 1992 Census Bureau, only 2.2 percent of Americans are married to people other than their own race or ethnicity...

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California Bill Would Mandate Gender-Neutral Schools

From "California Bill Would Mandate Gender-Neutral Schools" by Wendy Cloyd, posted 4/27/07 at Citizenlink.org

California state Sen. Sheila Kuehl is again pushing for legislation that would require schools to teach about homosexuality in a positive light.

UPDATE 3/15/12: Same-sex marriage laws eliminate terms "husband" and "wife" etc.

SB 777 is an expansion of a similar bill – SB 1437 – that Kuehl drove through the Legislature last year. That bill was vetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

If Kuehl is successful this year, all teaching material would have to amend the definition of “sex” and references to “male or female.” Instead, students would be taught about “gender defined as either real or imagined, and not limited to a person’s assigned sex at birth.”

Some experts say that means “mom" and "dad," as well as "husband" and "wife," would be edited out of textbooks. And traditional, school-sponsored social activities, such as homecoming and the kings and queens elected by the student body, would be forced to become gender-neutral.

Ron Prentice, executive director of the California Family Council, said Kuehl’s intention is to promote pro-homosexual content in public school curriculum and disallow any instruction or school events that would support a traditional perspective of biologically based gender identity.

“This bill would re-engineer the curricula and culture of publicly funded schools,” he said.

While Kuehl calls it “bias-free education,” Prentice said SB 777 would silence students and teachers who hold a biblical view.

Saturday, April 28, 2007

Let the Python Eat its Tail. Amen.

From "Let the Python Eat its Tail. Amen" by John Piper, posted 4/15/07 at desiringod.org.

Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the opinion of the Supreme Court in upholding the ban on partial birth abortions on April 18, 2007. It is astonishing to read the opinion (PDF). The detail with which abortion is discussed exceeded my expectation. Kennedy’s own descriptions of the various forms of abortion are explicit and extensive. Descriptions of the procedure of partial birth abortion (“intact dilation and extraction”) are given from both doctors’ and nurses’ perspectives.

For example, one nurse described the procedure on a twenty-six-week-old “fetus” as follows—and remember this is a quote from Justice Kennedy’s official Supreme Court decision:

Dr. Haskell went in with forceps and grabbed the baby’s legs and pulled them down into the birth canal. Then he delivered the baby’s body and the arms—everything but the head. The doctor kept the head right inside the uterus. . . . The baby’s little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby’s arms jerked out, like a startle reaction, like a flinch, like a baby does when he thinks he is going to fall. The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby’s brains out. Now the baby went completely limp. . . . He cut the umbilical cord and delivered the placenta. He threw the baby in a pan, along with the placenta and the instruments he had just used. (p. 8)

There is a certain irony to the argument for the Supreme Court’s ruling. One argument against the necessity of a health exception for the mother was that alternative methods of abortion are legally available, if necessary, even at this late stage in the pregnancy. For example, the ordinary D&E (dilation and extraction). The irony is that the Court concedes that the “the standard D&E is in some respects as brutal, if not more, than intact D&E” (p. 6). In other words, in normal, legal abortions, the baby is torn apart limb fromLink limb while still in the womb, but in a partial birth abortion, the baby is mercifully spared the dismemberment and his brains are quickly sucked out of his head.

Such are the contorted conditions in which we find ourselves: The proposal of a manifestly barbaric law (permitting the brain evacuation of a partially born child) is defeated by the legal standing of a more barbaric law (permitting the dismemberment of a child in the womb). But the history of Providence has many such stories to tell—great evils finally being self-destroyed, like a python swallowing its own tail.

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Friday, April 27, 2007

Partial Birth Abortion is Not About Abortion

From "Partial-Birth Abortion Is Not about Abortion" by Greg Koukl, posted 4/6/07 at Townhall.com

When we justify the killing of a fully human child because of severe, congenital defect, we are not making a case for abortion; we're promoting something much more chilling.

Partial-term Abortion Is Not about Abortion.

If there is no good reason to allow partial-birth abortion, then why the intense resistance? Why the repeated challenges to a Federal ban on these procedures? Why do so many--mothers, doctors, Senators, members of Congress--accept such bad reasons for this barbaric practice? Rudy Giuliani's recent comments suggest that he's changed his previous position that he "would vote to preserve the option for women." The Supreme Court will hand down its decision within weeks on a federal law banning partial-birth abortion. Have they finally recognized that nothing justifies killing a baby partially born that can simply be delivered completely?

As I turned this question over in my mind, I realized why people don't see the obvious. They misunderstand this procedure—partial-birth abortion, D&X abortion--because of one very misleading term: abortion.

Abortion is sacred to many in this country. "Abortion is a woman's Constitutional right, therefore all abortions must be defended," we hear. "Make one type of abortion illegal and the dominoes begin to fall," others warn.

There's a problem, though. Simply calling a procedure an abortion doesn't make it one. A thing is what it is, regardless of the name used for it. Language may change perception, but it doesn't change the thing itself.

An abortion is what happens to a child within the womb of its mother. This is clear from every court case dealing with the issue. In partial-birth abortion, however, the delivery is 85% complete. The child is not on the inside of its mother when it's killed; it's on the outside.

If partial-birth abortion is not really an abortion, then what is it? Let me ask a question. What is it called when a newborn child is killed outside the womb? It's not called an abortion; it's called infanticide. The chilling truth is this: Partial-birth abortion is not really abortion; it's infanticide.

...When you start with the view that abortion is a sacred right, then by reason of a logical slippery slope, you must argue for anything called abortion. "All abortions ought to be legal. D&X is an abortion. Therefore, D&X ought to be legal, too." Slide a bit further and it looks like this: "If partial-birth abortion is moral, and partial-birth abortion is essentially the same as infanticide, then infanticide must be moral, too.

...We could, however, regain our moral sanity and slide the other way. If this atrocity is made illegal, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the very same thing is happening out of sight inside the womb in every late-term abortion. If the first is morally grotesque and illegal, then the second is grotesque and should be illegal, too.

Pro-abortionists know this, and that's why they're fighting so hard against the federal ban. They want freedom of choice at any cost, regardless of the moral consequences. When they raise the alarm, "This is the first step towards making all abortions illegal!" we finally have their real objection to the federal ban.

Read the whole article.




The Books were a Front for the Porn

This is an astonishingly courageous and honest article. Please pray for this man.

From "The Books were a Front for the Porn" by Ronald G. Lee, Feb. 2006, posted at theroadtoemmaus.org

There was a "gay" bookstore called Lobo's in Austin, Texas, when I was living there as a grad student. The layout was interesting. Looking inside from the street all you saw were books. It looked like any other bookstore. There was a section devoted to classic "gay" fiction by writers such as Oscar Wilde, Gertrude Stein, and W. H. Auden. There were biographies of prominent "gay" icons, some of whom, like Walt Whitman, would probably have accepted the homosexual label, but many of whom, like Whitman's idol, President Lincoln, had been commandeered for the cause on the basis of evidence no stronger than a bad marriage or an intense same-sex friendship. There were impassioned modern "gay" memoirs, and historical accounts of the origins and development of the "gay rights" movement. It all looked so innocuous and disarmingly bourgeois. But if you went inside to browse, before long you noticed another section, behind the books, a section not visible from the street. The pornography section. Hundreds and hundreds of pornographic videos, all involving men, but otherwise catering to every conceivable sexual taste or fantasy. And you would notice something else too. There were no customers in the front. All the customers were in the back, rooting through the videos. As far as I know, I am the only person who ever actually purchased a book at Lobo's. The books were, in every sense of the word, a front for the porn.

So why waste thousands of dollars on books that no one was going to buy? It was clear from the large "on sale" section that only a pitifully small number of books were ever purchased at their original price. The owners of Lobo's were apparently wasting a lot of money on gay novels and works of gay history, when all the real money was in pornography. But the money spent on books wasn't wasted. It was used to purchase a commodity that is more precious than gold to the gay rights establishment. Respectability. Respectability and the appearance of normalcy. Without that investment, we would not now be engaged in a serious debate about the legalization of same-sex "marriage." By the time I lived in Austin, I had been thinking of myself as a gay man for almost 20 years. Based on the experience acquired during those years, I recognized in Lobo's a metaphor for the strategy used to sell gay rights to the American people, and for the sordid reality that strategy concealed.

This is how I "deconstruct" Lobo's. There are two kinds of people who are going to be looking in through the window: those who are tempted to engage in homosexual acts, and those who aren't. To those who aren't, the shelves of books transmit the message that gay people are no different from anyone else, that homosexuality is not wrong, just different. Since most of them will never know more about homosexuality than what they learned looking in the window, that impression is of the greatest political and cultural importance, because on that basis they will react without alarm, or even with active support, to the progress of gay rights. There are millions of well-meaning Americans who support gay rights because they believe that what they see looking in at Lobo's is what is really there. It does not occur to them that they are seeing a carefully stage-managed effort to manipulate them, to distract them from a truth they would never condone.

For those who are tempted to engage in homosexual acts, the view from the street is also consoling. It makes life as a homosexual look safe and unthreatening. Normal, in other words. Sooner or later, many of these people will stop looking in through the window and go inside. Unlike the first sort of window-shopper, they won't be distracted by the books for long. They will soon discover the existence of the porn section. And no matter how distasteful they might find the idea at first (if indeed they do find it distasteful), they will also notice that the porn section is where all the customers are. And they will feel sort of silly standing alone among the books. Eventually, they will find their way back to the porn, with the rest of the customers. And like them, they will start rooting through the videos. And, gentle reader, that is where most of them will spend the rest of their lives, until God or AIDS, drugs or alcohol, suicide or a lonely old age, intervenes.

...A popular definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing, while expecting a different result. That was me, the whole time I was laboring to become a happy homosexual. I was a lunatic. Several times I turned for advice to gay men who seemed better adjusted to their lot in life than I was. First, I wanted confirmation that my perceptions were accurate, that life as a male homosexual really was as awful as it seemed to be. And then I wanted to know what I was supposed to do about it. When was it going to get better? What could I do to make it better? I got two sorts of reactions to these questions, both of which left me feeling hurt and confused. The first sort of reaction was denial, often bitter denial, of what I was suggesting. I was told that there was something wrong with me, that most gay men were having a wonderful time, that I was generalizing on the basis of my own experience (whose experience was I supposed to generalize from?), and that I should shut up and stop bothering others with my "internalized homophobia."

... Not everyone I spoke to over the years rejected what I had to say out of hand. I once corresponded with an English ex-Dominican. I was ecstatic to learn that he was gay, and was eventually kicked out of his order for refusing to remain in the closet. He included an e-mail address in one of his books, and I wrote him, wanting to know if his experience of life as a homosexual was significantly different from mine. I presumed it must be, since he had written a couple of books, passionately defending the right of homosexuals to a place in the Church. His response to me was one of the last nails in the coffin of my life as a gay man. To my astonishment, he admitted that his experiences were not unlike mine. All he could suggest was that I keep trying, and eventually everything would work out. In other words, this brilliant man, whose books had meant so much to me, had nothing to suggest except that I keep doing the same thing, while expecting a different result. There was only one reasonable conclusion. I would be nuts if I took his advice. It took me twenty years, but I finally reached the conclusion that I did not want to be insane.

... So where am I now? I am attending a militantly orthodox parish in Houston that is one of God's most spectacular gifts to me. My best friend Mark (not his real name) is, like me, a refugee from the homosexual insane asylum. He is also a devout believer, though a Presbyterian (no one is perfect). From Mark I have learned that two men can love each other profoundly while remaining clothed the entire time.

We are told that the Church opposes same-sex love. Not true. The Church opposes homogenital sex, which in my experience is not about love, but about obsession, addiction, and compensation for a compromised masculinity.

... So, what do we as a Church and a culture need to do? Tear down the respectable façade and expose the pornography beneath. Start pressuring homosexuals to tell the truth about their lives. Stop debating the correct interpretation of Genesis 19. Leave the men of Sodom and Gomorrah buried in the brimstone where they belong. Sodom is hidden in plain view from us, here and now, today. Once, when preparing a lecture on Cardinal Newman, I summarized his classic Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine in this fashion: Truth ripens, error rots. The homosexual rights movement is rotten to the core. It has no future. There is no life in it. Sooner or later, those who are caught up in it are going to wake up from the dream of unbridled desire or else die. It is just a matter of time. The question is: how long? How many children are going to be sacrificed to this Moloch?

Warning: There is SO MUCH MORE to this amazing account. It really is a MUST READ. However, the rest of the article contains an honest description of the homosexual "lifestyle." If you don't want to read such accounts, DO NOT READ THIS ARTICLE.

Read the rest of the
article.




Federal Judge: Catholic Church’s Position Against Homosexual Adoptions Justifies Government Hostility Towards Church

From "Federal Judge: Catholic Church’s Position Against Homosexual Adoptions Justifies Government Hostility Towards Church" posted 4/23/07 at Thomas More Law Center

ANN ARBOR, MI – In its brief filed last week with the U. S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the Thomas More Law Center urged the court to reverse a federal judge’s ruling that an anti-Catholic resolution of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors was constitutionally justified because the Church opposed adoptions by homosexual couples. District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel, a President Carter appointee and one-time counsel for the National Organization for Women (NOW), ruled that the Board resolution condemning Catholic moral teaching on homosexuality and urging the Archbishop of San Francisco and Catholic Charities of San Francisco to defy Church directives does not violate the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

The Thomas More Law Center, a national Christian legal advocacy group based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, is appealing the ruling on behalf of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and two Catholic residents of San Francisco. Richard Thompson, President and Chief Counsel of the Law Center, observed, “Judge Patel clearly exhibited hostility toward the Catholic Church. During oral argument and in her written decision she claimed that the Church ‘provoked the debate’ by publicly expressing its moral teaching, and that by passing the resolution the City responded ‘responsibly’ to all of the ‘terrible’ things the Church was saying. This judge attempted to rationalize the evocative rhetoric and venom of the resolution which are sad reminders of Catholic baiting by the Ku Klux Klan.”

Just one week after the anti-Catholic resolution, the San Francisco Board voted—again unanimously—to condemn some 25,000 Evangelical teens who gathered in the city to express their opposition to homosexual conduct. Openly gay San Francisco Assemblyman Mark Leno said the teenage group is “obnoxious” and “disgusting” and should not be tolerated. He told the Christian group to “get out of San Francisco.”

Thompson remarked, “The policy of San Francisco is one of totalitarian intolerance of Christians of all denominations who oppose homosexual conduct. My concern is that if the judge’s ruling is allowed to stand, it will further embolden the San Francisco Board in its anti-Christian attacks.”

Read the whole article.

Internet Providers Censoring Conservative News E-Mail

From "Internet news providers censoring conservative news e-mail" by Jim Kouri, posted 4/26/07 at NewsWithViews.com

Something ominous and sinister has been happening on the Internet lately: two major internet service providers -- without any prior explanation or notice -- have been discriminating against conservative e-zines and web journals.

According to several subscribers to NewsWithViews.Com's newsletter, companies such as Earthlink and SBC Global are intentionally blocking delivery of NWV's e-mail to subscribers.

"When I wasn't receiving my NewsWithViews notices I called their office in Oregon to ask why. I was concerned they had closed down or worse. The gentleman I spoke with told me that all the Earthlink folks were being denied delivery of the daily posts from NWV," complains Jackie Juntti, a NewswithViews.com e-mail subscriber.

"I have to admit that shocked me as Earthlink has long had the reputation of sending EVERYTHING thru their servers -- no holds barred. I tried and tried to make an e-mail complaint about their blocking NWV from getting to me. I explained to them I SUBSCRIBED to that list and I WANT IT DELIVERED!! I tried several different Earthlink e-mail addresses and as of this moment I have yet to receive any response from Earthlink about my emailed complaints on this topic," said Ms. Juntti.

As reported by NewsBusters, the most recent widespread occurrence of this unexplained phenomenon was when Frank Salvato, proprietor of The New Media Journal, realized that his content that day hadn't been disseminated at Google News as it had been on a daily basis since he reached an agreement with the search engine in September 2005.

After sending the Google Help Desk a query concerning the matter, Salvato was informed that there had been complaints of "hate speech" at his website, and as a result, The New Media Journal would no longer be part of Google News. As evidence of his offense, the Google Team supplied Salvato with links to three recent op-eds published by his contributing writers, all coincidentally about radical Islam and its relation to terrorism.

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Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Study: Religion is Good for Kids

From "Study: Religion is Good for Kids" by Melinda Wenner, posted 4/24/07 at LiveScience.com

Kids with religious parents are better behaved and adjusted than other children, according to a new study that is the first to look at the effects of religion on young child development.

The conflict that arises when parents regularly argue over their faith at home, however, has the opposite effect.

John Bartkowski, a Mississippi State University sociologist and his colleagues asked the parents and teachers of more than 16,000 kids, most of them first-graders, to rate how much self control they believed the kids had, how often they exhibited poor or unhappy behavior and how well they respected and worked with their peers.

The researchers compared these scores to how frequently the children’s parents said they attended worship services, talked about religion with their child and argued abut religion in the home.

The kids whose parents regularly attended religious services—especially when both parents did so frequently—and talked with their kids about religion were rated by both parents and teachers as having better self-control, social skills and approaches to learning than kids with non-religious parents.

But when parents argued frequently about religion, the children were more likely to have problems. “Religion can hurt if faith is a source of conflict or tension in the family,” Bartkowski noted.

Why so good?

Bartkowski thinks religion can be good for kids for three reasons. First, religious networks provide social support to parents, he said, and this can improve their parenting skills. Children
who are brought into such networks and hear parental messages reinforced by other adults may also “take more to heart the messages that they get in the home,” he said.

Secondly, the types of values and norms that circulate in religious congregations tend to be self-sacrificing and pro-family, Bartkowski told LiveScience. These “could be very, very important in shaping how parents relate to their kids, and then how children develop in response,” he said.

Finally, religious organizations imbue parenting with sacred meaning and significance, he said.

University of Virginia sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox, who was not involved in the study, agrees. At least for the most religious parents, “getting their kids into heaven is more important than getting their kids into Harvard,” Wilcox said.

Read the rest of the article.

Outrage Award Highlights Campus Intolerance

From "Outrage Awards Highlight Campus Intolerance" posted 4/25/07 at Citizenlink.org

Institutions are ranked for abuses of free speech and academic freedom.

The 10th annual Campus Outrage Awards are out, and several prestigious colleges and universities received top honors for egregious instances of intolerance and intimidation on campus.

The College of William and Mary took first for secretly ordering the removal of a cross from a chapel, followed by U.C. Berkeley for handing out scholarship money to kids with drug convictions. Third place was awarded to Johns Hopkins for trying to shut down a conservative newspaper after it reported on the university-funded appearance of a porn-film director.

...Brad Dacus, president of the Pacific Justice Institute, said universities are headed by people who were students in the rebellious '60s. Ironically, they’ve become what they once hated.

"They believe in one-way tolerance," he said. "And, of course, one-way tolerance is really tyranny.”

Read the whole article.

Grassroots Organizations Fight for Right to Run Ads

Supreme Court must decide if campaign finance laws unfairly limit free speech.

From "Grassroots Organizations Fight for Right to Run Ads" by Wendy Cloyd, posted 4/25/07 at Citizenlink.org

The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments today in challenges to the campaign finance reform law.

The McCain-Feingold Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 prevents groups from running ads that mention a federal candidate within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election.

Wisconsin Right to Life (WRTL) filed suit seeking to run ads during the blackout periods.

Jim Bopp, lead counsel for WRTL, said the First Amendment protects the right of citizens to criticize their government.

“During these blackout periods – when it’s a federal crime to mention the name of a candidate in a broadcast – Congress is in session and they’re voting on extremely important matters,” he said. “Incumbent members of Congress are trying to get a 'twofer.' They passed this law, which prohibits election-related ads, and now they would like to see it apply to grassroots lobbying.”

Bopp said that's contrary to assurances that McCain-Feingold would not affect the grassroots.

Bruce Hausknecht, judicial analyst for Focus on the Family Action, said McCain-Feingold intrudes heavily upon the right of grassroots groups to comment on issues before Congress.

“Even assuming, for the moment, that the law has a legitimate purpose -- which is arguable at best -- it goes way beyond anything reasonable,” Hausknecht said. “It tramples on the free-speech rights of grassroots organizations, preventing citizens from getting valuable information they need to know at the critical moment when Congress is debating an issue.”

He said he hopes the Court takes the necessary action to restore the pre-eminence of political speech in the public square.

Read the rest of the article.

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Why Not Same-Sex Marriage? This is Why Not...MUST SEE VIDEO!!!

From "MUST SEE VIDEO - Homosexual Propaganda Fed to Elementary School Children" by John-Henry Weston, posted 4/24/07, at Lifesite.org

View the video HERE.

In a press release this morning, Stephen Bennett, a man who once lived the "gay" lifestyle and has since founded a ministry to assist people to leave the destructive lifestyle, alerted the media to a video clip demonstrating what he calls first-hand homosexual activist "brainwashing" of elementary school children. The video available on the Internet on Youtube.com follows a Massachusetts school's fourth annual gay and lesbian pride day activities.

The video contains actual classroom footage showing teachers imposing pro-homosexual propaganda on children as young as six. Beyond that the video captures a pre-gay pride day staff meeting where one teacher, an African American, asks if teachers are to tell children whose parents oppose homosexuality that they should nonetheless accept it as a good, to which an affirmative answer is given.

A transcript of that portion of the video follows:

Unidentified African American female teacher: "I don't know what to do about this but, as a school are we saying that kids have to support this? I guess that's what it sounds like to me that we're saying. If a child comes from a background that says homosexuality is not correct, are we telling that child that they're supposed to, this is what you are supposed to do?"

Unidentified Caucasian female teacher, "I think that we are asking kids to believe this is right. Not as a matter of moral principal, but as a matter of, we're educating them and this is part of what we consider to be a healthy education."

Stephen Bennett told LifeSiteNews.com in an interview that he was "horrified" and "had tears in my eyes" after seeing the video. "It's so heartbreaking to see little kids brainwashed," he said.

Stressing that the video must been seen by all concerned parents, Bennett said, "this is what is happening to America's children -- without many parents even knowing a thing. This is a crime against our children. Let the children be children!"

Amazingly, the video, while newly posted on the internet, is a clip from a 1996 pro-homosexual film called "It's elementary". While the first segment of the YouTube clip of the film covers Cambridge Friends School (CFS) in Massachusetts, a second clip covers New York City Public School 87 where similar propagandising occurs.

In the 1996 video, then CFS Principal Thomas Price notes that it is the school's fourth annual celebration of gay pride day.

Homosexual activists have reacted quickly to the publicity of their agenda and have discussed demanding YouTube to remove the videos. The video's seem to have been posted to the internet by a racist and Bennett in his release stressed that the tag on the video reading "faggots" is something he opposes and should be removed.

Homosexual activists have themselves acknowleged however the veracity of the video clips as segments of the film 'It's elementary'.

This is happening everywhere same-sex marriage has been legalized (and even a few places where it hasn't yet, such as New York.) Where same-sex marriage is legal, homosexuals and cross dressers are given the task of designing curriculum for children as young as grade school. The same thing is happening in Canada and Great Britain.

$5000 Fine Sought For Christian Marriage Commissioner Who Declined Gay Couple

From "$5000 Fine Sought For Christian Marriage Commissioner Who Declined Gay Couple" by Hilary White, posted 4/19/07 at Lifesite.org

A Canadian Christian civil marriage commissioner in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Orville Nichols, could face up to $5000 in fines for having referred a homosexual couple to a different commissioner.

Human Rights Commission lawyer Janice Gingell asked the tribunal to find that Nichols contravened the code and order him to pay $5,000 in compensation to the complainant.

The 70 year-old Mr. Nichols used a clearly religious-based conscience argument for his refusal, saying his faith guides his daily life, that he prays and reads the Bible every day. He told the Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal that his faith “takes first place” in his life. He said, “I couldn't sleep or live with myself if I were to perform same-sex marriages.”

The other commissioner to whom the two men were referred performed the ceremony on the same date they requested of Mr. Nichols.

Read the rest of the article.

Top Russian Scientist Warns Euthanasia Will Increase Human Organ Trafficking

From "Top Russian Scientist Warns Euthanasia Will Increase Human Organ Trafficking" by Gudrun Schultz, posted 4/19/07 at Lifesite.org

A leading Russian scientist and politician has warned that trafficking in human organs will explode in the country if legal euthanasia is introduced, Regnum News Agency reported earlier today.

Sergey Kolesnikov is a member of the Russian State Duma, a doctor of medicine and a member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences. He told a Regnum correspondent that a law permitting euthanasia would “sharply increase” the risk of criminal seizure of human organs, already a significant problem in the country.

“I strongly oppose legalization of euthanasia,” Kolesnikov said. “Corruption and crime rates in this country make me take such initiatives very seriously. So, it will become one of legal ways to seize property of an individual, depending on how the procedure is stated by the law.”

“It is no secret that there is a practice of signing contracts with elderly people on using their organs after their death. In this case it would be legal,” he said.

“As a doctor I know that when it becomes impossible to sustain immune activity of the human organism (for instance, in case of brain death), a decision is made to stop resuscitation with consent of the family,” Kolesnikov said. “But this is not euthanasia.

“[Euthanasia] can be called ‘a voluntary decision to take one’s life.’ How voluntary is it here? They would say it is necessary to relieve pain, but today the level of painkilling is almost in 100% enough not to make it a reason to take one’s life.”

“There is another question: who will make the decision and who will carry out the procedure? Doctors should be in no way involved in it. Well, will the family want to be the executioner? Thus, a special position of the executioner is to be introduced in hospitals, but I do not know whether this is legal,” Kolesnikov said.

Proposed by Senator Valentina Petrenko, the euthanasia legislation has been criticized by Russian State Duma deputy chair Vladimir Pekhtin, who said the law would contradict the president’s commitment to improve Russia’s demographic situation. With one of the lowest birthrates in the world, Russia is facing a growing crisis of an aging and dwindling population.

Monday, April 23, 2007

The Gay 'Rights' Movement Becoming the Church's Perfect Storm

From "A Pink Reformation? Sexuality, Credibility and the Church" by Albert Mohler, posted 2/12/07, at AlbertMohler.com

Theo Hobson is a very thoughtful commentator on contemporary Christianity. He holds a doctorate from Cambridge University and writes regularly for The Guardian [London]. In his most recent column, "A Pink Reformation," Hobson argues that controversies over homosexuality now present the Christian church with a credibility crisis of historic proportions. Hobson presents an argument that demands careful attention.

Indeed, Hobson argues that the church now faces a shift as cataclysmic as the Reformation of the 16th century. He asserts that it is "not absurd" to draw this parallel, arguing that the debate about homosexuality poses "a serious threat to organized religion."

It is refreshing to see Hobson point to the "either/or" character of this controversy. He is precisely right -- there is no middle ground -- no third way. Homosexuality will be seen as either normal or sinful. Everything hinges on that assessment. If it is accepted as normal, those who consider it sinful will be seen as repressive, hateful, and dangerous to the good of society. This, he argues, is where the church now stands.

Hobson's depiction of this moral transformation in the society is chilling, but seemingly impossible to refute. The trends seem all too clear. Can we argue that traditionalist sexual morality is not losing the moral high ground in the larger culture?

The most interesting section of Hobson's article is his explanation that the shift on homosexuality in the culture is "taking the form of a moral crusade," so that those who were once seen as upholding the high moral position are now seen as immoral, with the reverse also true -- those just recently seen as engaged in sexual immorality are seen as morally superior to those who believe homosexuality to be sinful.

As Hobson explains, this seems to represent "the church's perfect storm." In his words: "So the issue of homosexuality has the strange power to turn the moral tables. The traditional moralist is subject to accusations of immorality. And this inversion is doing terrible damage to the Christian churches."

This is where my judgment is likely to diverge from Theo Hobson's. I agree with his assessment of the changed cultural situation, and with his depiction of the crisis as a "perfect storm" for the church. Yet, the believing church that remains faithful to Christ and faithful to the Scriptures cannot surrender to a moral revolution that demands the abandonment of Scriptural teaching -- no matter how powerful the revolution may appear.

The church does not get to choose its cultural context or moral challenges. It may well be that the church does now face a credibility crisis over this issue -- but this is just one of several issues that would present such a challenge.

The church may well lose this debate within the culture, and thus find itself suffering what the world sees as a credibility crisis, but it cannot abandon the Scriptures or deny its Lord. Scriptural credibility is infinitely more important than cultural credibility.

Read the whole article.

Friday, April 20, 2007

Gay Activists Reversing 800 Years of Progress

From "Requiem for the Magna Carta" by Scott Lively, posted 4/11/07, at Defend the Family

...To the global homosexual political movement, the freedom to speak certain words from the Bible is a freedom which cannot be allowed. Wherever this movement has obtained power, it has exercised it to deny freedom of speech. In January of this year a Catholic member of the Kamloops (British Columbia) City Council was fined $1,000 by the local Human Rights Commission for stating his opinion that homosexuality was "not normal or natural." The Human Rights Commission, following the law in all such cases, then paid the $1,000 directly to the homosexual complainant (this law has provided the incentive for complaints, true or false, by homosexuals all over Canada). In 2004, in Borgholm, Sweden, Protestant pastor Åke Green was sentenced to one month in prison for reading a sermon in his church on the Biblical view of homosexuality. In 2006, nine Glasgow firefighters were ordered to undergo "intense diversity training," and one was demoted with a large reduction in salary, because they refused to put on their uniforms and distribute fire-safety fliers at "Scotia Pride," a homosexual event in which participants publicly lampooned Christianity. Similar news items are now available everywhere in the press, the broadcast media, and on the Internet. Those who wield power in the homosexual movement have not concerned themselves with the niceties of their critics'
human rights.

It is as a reversal of the larger course of human rights history that this "repeal" of the first clause of the Magna Carta has its most profound effect. Upon the philosophical foundation of the Magna Carta is built the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution, and on that foundation rests the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the basis of human rights provisions throughout all of contemporary international law. And it is no accident that the freedom of the church figured so importantly in that crucial early step in the development of human rights law. For the medieval church, though a flawed human institution in many ways, was the permanent repository of the concept of the value of the individual human soul, its essential dignity and worth. When selfish and arrogant kings and warlords wielded power for their own ends, there was often asylum for their victims in the church and respite in its courts.

It is within this history that the whole ideology of human rights took shape, the placing of certain individual human freedoms beyond the reach of temporal powers. These freedoms alone support the democracies which have sprung up everywhere on our planet. We should be deeply grieved that this great backward step has been taken, merely at the insistence of a determined interest group which will brook no opposition.




Wednesday, April 18, 2007

GREAT NEWS! Supreme Court Says Limits on Partial Birth Abortion Constitutional


From "Partial Birth Abortion Ban Upheld by U.S. Supreme Court - A Pro-Life Legacy for Bush Established" by John-Henry Westen, posted 4/18/07, at Lifesite.net

In a 5-4 majority decision penned by Justice Anthony Kennedy, the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the federal partial birth abortion ban which was signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2003.

The law bans "partial-birth abortion," a legal term of art, defined in the law itself as any abortion in which the baby is delivered feet-first "past the [baby's] navel . . . outside the body of the mother," or "in the case of a head-first presentation, the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother," before being killed.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia, who have previously voted on the court against the gruesome late-term abortion procedure, voted with the majority. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito who were appointed by President Bush also voted with the majority.

"This will be President Bush's pro-life legacy," said Jim Hughes, Vice President of the International Right to Life Committee. Hughes, also the President of Campaign Life Coalition Canada added: "Thank God for him because what he's doing there is going to affect us greatly here north of the 49th parallel."

Referring to Planned Parenthood and other abortion groups which argued against the ban, Justice Kennedy wrote that they "have not demonstrated that the Act would be unconstitutional in a large fraction of relevant cases."

Kennedy maintained that the current ruling upheld the Roe v. Wade 1973 abortion decision. He said that since other abortion options are available, "it does not construct a substantial obstacle to the abortion right."

A short adjoining opinion written by Justice Thomas and joined by Justice Scalia, said "that the Court's abortion jurisprudence...has no basis in the Constitution." Of note, neither Justice Alito nor Chief Justice Roberts joined that opinion.

Good News! Judge Rules NY Taxpayers Not Required to Recognize Canadian Same-Sex “Marriages”

From "N.Y. judge: Taxpayers have right to challenge state recognition of Canadian same-sex “marriages” posted 4/18/07 at AllianceDefenseFund.org

A New York Supreme Court judge denied a bid by same-sex couples to dismiss a case questioning the state’s recognition of same-sex “marriages” performed in Canada. ADF filed suit on behalf of New York taxpayers in 2006 seeking to block the state comptroller’s attempts to recognize of out-of-state same-sex “marriages.”

“The New York Court of Appeals has already decided that marriage is defined as one man and one woman,” said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Brian W. Raum. “The legislature never intended for the term ‘spouse’ to include same-sex couples ‘married’ in Canada.”

...The suit, Godfrey v. Hevesi, filed in 2006 by ADF attorneys on behalf of New York taxpayers, charges that the New York State Comptroller’s office acted illegally when it decided to recognize out-of-state same-sex “marriages” for purposes of retirement benefits (www.telladf.org/news/story.aspx?cid=3850).

Read the whole story.

Adult Stem Cells Restore Sight

From "Adult Stem cell patch restores vision" posted 4/18/07 at Lifesite.net

A man's vision has been restored by a corneal patch grown from adult stem cells by a team at the University of Melbourne's Centre for Eye Research Australia (CERA) and the Bernard O'Brien Institute of Microsurgery (BOBIM).

The patch, which replicates the cornea, was cultivated from a single stem cell from a donor eye and was transplanted to the surface of the man's eyes.

The research team was led by Dr Mark Daniell (CERA) and Dr Erik Thompson (BOBIM).

The process, known as a limbal stem cell transplant, is thought to be the first of its kind in Australia. The Melbourne success significantly advances international research in limbal stem cell transplantation in the eyes.

The patient had severe vision loss caused by stem cell failure on the surface of the eye, causing scarring and a vascularised and opaque appearance.

"He had reduced mobility, could not read and could not work, but he has now resumed duties as an accountant, enjoys sight (slightly lower than normal 20/20 acuity) and has increased mobility and quality of life and renewed optimism," Dr Daniell reports.

He says the surface of the man's eyes was removed and the patch (about 50mm long and a micron thick) was applied and is healing well. "This technique can now assist people with alkaline burns who have damage to the surface of their eyes."

Dr Daniell and his team are now working toward developing a totally bio-engineered cornea, using a stem cell extracted from elsewhere on a person's body other than the eye.

Netherlands Forces Homosexual ‘Marriage’ on Aruba

From "Netherlands Forces Homosexual ‘Marriage’ on Aruba" by Gudrun Schultz, posted 04/18/07 at Lifesite.net

The Caribbean island state of Aruba must recognize same-sex marriages performed in the Netherlands, the Dutch Supreme Court ruled April 13, forcing legal recognition of homosexual marriages in the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba, as well as the Netherlands proper.

The case went to the Supreme Court after a municipal official for the civil marriage register in Aruba refused to enter a lesbian couple in the register in 2001, Expatica reported April 13. The Dutch women, Charlene and Esther Oduber-Lamers,
took the case to court, winning first in the lower court and then in the appeals court.

The government of Aruba appealed the case a second time to the Supreme Court, with the support of much of the population--Aruba is 80% Roman Catholic.

“If we accept gay marriage, would we next have to accept Holland's marijuana bars and euthanasia?” said government spokesman Ruben Trapenberg in 2005. “They have their culture, we have ours.”

“We can't let this become a precedent," said Hendrik Croes, a lawyer for Aruba's government. "Gay marriage is against the civil code and Aruban morals."

Read the rest of the story.

Political Correctness Kills Australians

From "Deliberate HIV-Infection Rampage Kept from Australian Police by Health Officials" by Gudrun Schultz, posted 4/18/07, at Lifesite.net

Two Australian men who openly admitted their campaigns to intentionally infect others with HIV were not reported to police, out of health officials’ concerns for the individuals’ medical privacy, according to a report published April 10 in The Daily Telegraph.

Melbourne resident Michael Neal was committed March 29 to stand trial on 106 charges, including deliberately spreading HIV, attempting to spread a lethal disease, rape and child pornography.

The Victorian Department of Human Services had been contacted nine times over a four year period by doctors and concerned individuals who accused Neal of deliberately infecting others with the disease, according to the Telegraph report. Neal himself told the DHS at his first meeting with health officials that he had unprotected sex with multiple partners and only sometimes informed them he was HIV positive.

A psychiatrist who examined Michael Neal in 2004 informed the DHS that Neal was the “most evil man I have seen in 20 years” who “enjoys infecting men with HIV”--Neal allegedly referred to his infection attempts as “breeding” the disease.

One witness at Neal’s committal hearing reported that Neal hosted a “conversion party” to infect a 15-year-old boy with HIV. The boy was reportedly drugged with methamphetamines before undergoing sex with about 15 HIV-positive men.

Despite numerous accusations of dangerous and criminal behavior, the DHS failed to inform police authorities, instead following a lengthy process including counseling, education and support. That was followed by a letter of warning when his behavior did not change, and officials finally issued orders that restricted his sexual activity and required him to make daily contact with a department official.

Counseling? Education? Support?
How about PRISON -- swiftly followed by the death penalty?

Pro-homosexual Churches Begin Campaign of Misinformation on Biblical Prohibitions Against Sodomy

Billboard ads present interpretations alien to their scriptural authors

From "Pro-homosexual Churches Begin Campaign of Misinformation on Biblical Prohibitions Against Sodomy" by Peter J. Smith, at Lifesite.net

Several homosexual “churches” in the Indianapolis area have begun a month-long advertising campaign of misinformation to distort the clear biblical prohibitions against homosexual behavior of Christian tradition.

The Jesus Metropolitan Community Church of Indianapolis, Faith In America and Metropolitan Community Churches started the campaign this week, placing five different billboards around the Indianapolis area distorting the biblical foundation of Christianity’s clear prohibitions against sodomy.

The “Would Jesus Discriminate?” Campaign, funded nationally by Faith in America, Inc., features such signs as “Jesus Affirmed a Gay Couple”: Matt. 8:5-13; “The Early Church Welcomed a Gay Man”: Acts 8:26-40; “Jesus Said Some are Born Gay”: Matt. 19:10-12; “Ruth Loved Naomi as Adam Loved Eve”, Gen. 2:24, Ruth 1:14; and “David Loved Jonathan More than Women” II Sam 1:26.

The campaign perverts these Bible passages – known for thousands of years in Christian and Jewish tradition to have nothing to do with homosexuality – by reinterpreting them with meanings and connotations that would have been alien to their scriptural authors and Jews and Christians of the time.

Far from making exceptions for “loving gay relationships”, Mosaic Law, believed by Jews and Christians to have been given to Moses by God Himself, severely condemns homosexual acts or sodomy in Leviticus 18 and carried the death penalty. The very name “sodomy” derived its name from the Biblical city, Sodom, which God told Abraham he would destroy for its unnatural crimes. Leviticus 18 is devoted to prohibitions against adultery, incestuous relationships, and in fact, the prohibition against homosexual behavior falls between verses prohibiting bestiality and infant sacrifice.

Leviticus 18:22: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.”

Leviticus 18:29-30: “For whoever shall do any of these abominations, the persons that do them shall be cut off from among their people. So keep my charge never to practice any of these abominable customs which were practiced before you, and never to defile yourselves by them: I am the LORD your God.”

Both the immediate context of the Levitical passage and approximately 3500 years of Jewish and Christian tradition strongly refute the contortions of “Would Jesus Discriminate?” campaign.

Early Christian teaching vigorously reaffirms Levitical proscriptions against homosexual behavior in New Testament scripture (Rom. 1:21-29, 1 Cor. 6:9, Jude 1:7, 1 Tim 1:10). Contemporary extra-biblical Christian writings, such as the Didache, also confirm the understanding of the early Church that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered and destructive.

In an earlier interview with LifeSiteNews.com, orthodox Rabbi Yehuda Levin explained that Jewish celebrations of Hannukah go back to a struggle by Jews to defeat the pagan forces corrupting Jewish society.

“The main celebration of Hanukkah was the defeat of the pagan forces within Judaism, those who were attempting to paganize Judaism by aping the Greek culture, and endorse all kinds of pagan rituals and pagan ideologies including the practice of homosexuality,” said Rabbi Levin.

District 214 Votes to Continue the Flow of Porn and Obscenity to Their Kids

Incumbent victory was decisive, but not overwhelming. Challengers garnered a significant percentage of the vote spending much less money.

From "Veterans a lock in District 214" by Erin Holmes, posted 4/18/07, at the Daily Herald

An incumbent trio with nearly 40 decades of collective board experience clinched a decisive victory Tuesday in Northwest Suburban High School District 214, holding off three challengers in a hard-fought, expensive and closely watched campaign that will go down in Illinois' history books.

In unofficial totals, with 97 percent of 224 precincts reporting late Tuesday, incumbent Bill Dussling had the biggest chunk of votes: 13,460, or about 21 percent. Incumbent Alva Kreutzer had 12,486; incumbent Bob Zimmanck secured the final seat with 12,150.

The next-closest competitor, retired District 214 educator Jim Harbaugh, finished with 9,107 votes. Dennis Konczyk and Ken Frizane, the two challengers pointed to by incumbents throughout the race as having Christian conservative ties, had 8,756 and 7,956 votes, respectively.

"What it tells me is the community values what this district is," said Dussling...

What it tells me is either:

A. The majority of the community didn't bother to read the excerpts

OR

B. The majority community did read the excerpts but has difficulty making a sound moral judgment -- even when it's obvious.


Either way, it does not bode well for the future of this country...

America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.
-- Alexis DeToqueville

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

District 214: Attempted Religious Takeover? No, Democracy in Action

From "School Board Battles in the Heartland" by Robby Moeller, posted 4/10/07, at A Voice in the Wilderness

Things have reached a boiling point for many concerned parents around the country. Enrollment in private schools, and home-schooling, are both at all-time highs. More Moderate and Conservative candidates are running for positions on school boards to help reign in the secular-progressive agenda that has run rampant for far too long. Parents are beginning to resent the blatant attempt to mold young minds in the fashion decided upon by previously unaccountable officials and administrators.

In my own district (#214 in the Chicago-land suburbs) there have been recent, heated town hall meetings and inflammatory editorials in local newspapers between the entrenched liberal positions of the overwhelmingly lopsided, left-leaning, school board, who are content with the status quo; and the new conservative candidates who wish to have their voices heard and new policies adopted.

Most have characterized this as some sort of religious coup or hijacking of the schools by religious zealots who want to suppress free speech and force teachers to read the Ten Commandments before each lesson. The concerted effort of the local Left has been to portray the proponents of needed change as crazy, extreme, and out of touch with “mainstream” constituents. The real issues (over-budget spending, declining graduation rates, and blatantly inappropriate material being taught in classes) are all but ignored; and the focus (and sole strategy) of sympathetic journalists and liberal city/county officials are vicious ad homenin (personal) attacks on the conservative candidates running for school board.

The reality is that in District 214 we are seeing Democracy in action. Just because many parents have neglected to get directly involved in the decision-making processes (that directly affect their child’s education), and Left-leaning candidates have found it easy to get elected up until now (because the public has been misinformed), the other members of the school board and their allies are now trying to “project” their own attempts at indoctrination on the benign intentions of truly dissatisfied parents who merely want things “cleaned up” in their tax-paid school systems.

This problem and conflict is not unique to my area. Debates over what should be taught, how it should be taught, how best funds should be allocated, etc., are raging all across the nation. The established educational proponents are up in arms to defend the current powers they possess, and privileges they enjoy. It is easier for most citizens to retain their collectivist outlook and assume everyone in the education system has their child’s best intentions in mind (and actually respect their own family’s values). The best way to ensure that a fairer representation exists in the decision-making processes for school policies and curriculum is to welcome debate and dialogue from those most directly affected: students and their tax-paying parents.

In District #214 we are vastly over-budget and have lower graduation rates then neighboring areas. Many parents have legitimate concerns over what books are being used in classes and have been asking tough questions (no one wants to burn or even singe any literature). There are seven total board members, and currently there is a single, lone voice that isn’t a lock-step liberal. Two new candidates have decided to run on a conservative platform of reform and accountability, and the reaction from the local press, administrators, and current board members would make one think that former followers of the Hale-Bopp Comet cult had promised to bring purple shrouds and cyanide-laced kool-aid to our schools.

Why would we see such a backlash from these groups if they were so confident that their own views were actually the mainstream, and thus incumbency would be a “sure thing” in the upcoming election? What makes so many of us so afraid to challenge entrenched bureaucracies? Let both sides get their views out (that means newspapers actually have to print what Christian Conservatives say too), and the public will choose. Socialism is where the power of the masses are in the hands of a few, largely unaccountable politically-minded officials who, like all humans, thrive on self-interest and personal security.

Sound familiar?

Read the whole commentary.

Don't forget to vote today!

Monday, April 16, 2007

MN: Community College to Constuct Footwashing Facilities for Muslims

From "Is college using a double standard on entanglement with religion?" by Katherine Kersten, posted 4/12/07, at StarTribune.com

Cultural clashes involving Islam have recently made headlines in Minnesota. At the airport, some Muslim taxi drivers refuse to transport passengers carrying alcohol; at Target stores, some Muslim cashiers won't scan pork products. Now there's a new point of friction: Minneapolis Community and Technical College.

Its officials say the college, a public institution, has a strict policy of not promoting religion or favoring one religion over another. "The Constitution prevents us from doing this in any form," says Dianna Cusick, director of legal affairs.

But that seems to depend on your religion.

Where Christianity is concerned, the college goes to great lengths to avoid any hint of what the courts call "entanglement" or support of the church. Yet the college is planning to install facilities for Muslims to use in preparing for daily prayers, an apparent first at a public institution in Minnesota.

Separation of church and state is clearest at the college during the Christmas season. A memo from Cusick and President Phil Davis, dated Nov. 28, 2006, exhorted supervisors to banish any public display of holiday cheer: "As we head into the holiday season ... "all public offices and areas should refrain from displays that may represent to our students, employees or the public that the college is promoting any particular religion." Departments considering sending out holiday cards, the memo added, should avoid cards "that appear to promote any particular religious holiday."

Last year, college authorities caught one rule-breaker red-handed. A coffee cart that sells drinks and snacks played holiday music "tied to Christmas," and "complaints and concerns" were raised, according to a faculty e-mail. College authorities quickly quashed the practice.

They appear to take a very different attitude toward Islam. Welcome and accommodation are the order of the day for the college's more than 500 Muslim students. The college has worked with local Muslim leaders to ensure that these students' prayer needs and concerns are adequately addressed, Davis told me.

Muslim prayer is an increasingly controversial issue. Many Muslim students use restroom sinks to wash their feet before prayer. Other students have complained, and one Muslim student fell and injured herself while lifting her foot out of a sink.

Some local Muslim leaders have advised the college staff that washing is not a required practice for students under the circumstances, according to Davis. Nevertheless, he says, he wants to facilitate it for interested students. "It's like when someone comes to your home, you want to be hospitable," Davis told me. "We have new members in our community coming here; we want to be hospitable."

So the college is making plans to use taxpayer funds to install facilities for ritual foot-washing.

Read the rest of the article.

You can weigh in with your concerns:

Minneapolis Community & Technical College
1501 Hennepin Ave, Minneapolis, 55403 - (612) 659-6200
Director Dianna Cusick 612-659-6319
President Phil Davis at 612-659-6300

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Pres. Bush Set to Veto Embryonic Stem Cell Funding Bill

From "President Bush Responds to Passage of Embryonic Stem Cell Research Bill" by Steven Ertelt, posted 4/12/07, at OneNewsNow.com

President Bush responded to the Senate's approval Wednesday of a bill that would force taxpayers to pay for embryonic stem cell research even though it requires the destruction of human life. He confirmed a statement the White House issued on his behalf earlier this week saying he would veto the bill.

The president said "the advancement of science and medicine need not conflict with the ethical imperative to protect every human life."

Saying he was a "strong supporter of scientific research," President Bush pointed out that his administration was the first to provide federal funding for stem cell research.

Overall, more than $3 billion has gone to innovative research on all forms of stem cells under the Bush administration, contributing to proven medical treatments that use human stem cells from adult and other non-embryonic sources.

"While encouraging -- not banning -- research, my policy also ensures that federal funds are not used to create incentives to destroy, or harm, or create living human embryos for purposes of research," he explained.

Contact Pres. Bush and thank him for his courageous stand for life.

Read the rest of this article.

Liberal Understanding of Objections to Same-Sex Marriage are Not Deep

From "Liberal reactions to the marriage amendment are not deep" by Dennis Prager, posted 6/06/06, at Townhall.com

...That most liberals cannot understand conservatives' views about marriage as anything but bigotry and/or pandering is part of a narcissism that characterizes much of the Left. The very definition of narcissism is an inability to see the world through the eyes of another. Whatever conservatives' flaws, far more conservatives understand liberals' views on same-sex marriage. Most opponents of same-sex marriage appreciate that liberals feel bad about gays' inability to marry a person of the same sex. In fact, as a proponent of a marriage amendment, I not only understand the liberal desire to enable people to marry someone of the same sex, I feel genuine compassion for gays on this matter.

But such empathy for ideological foes is all but absent from the narcissistic world of the Left. To virtually every liberal writer and spokesman, only liberals mean well, only they are sincere, only they are compassionate, and only they are intellectual, rational and tolerant.

Liberals' use of the word "radical" to describe opponents of same-sex marriage illustrates this self-aggrandizing mindset. To describe as "radical" those who wish to preserve the man-woman-based definition of marriage known to every civilization is to stand the word on its head. It is beyond intellectually dishonest -- it is mendacity -- to describe those who favor preserving the definition of marriage as "radical" rather than to so describe those who wish to change the gender-based definition of marriage for the first time in history. Even if you support same-sex marriage, you should at least have the honesty to admit that it is you who favors something radical.

Some of those who want a constitutional amendment to define marriage as man-woman are indeed bigoted against gays, regarding them as something less than fully human. But most people who want to maintain marriage as male-female consider homosexuals to be just as much created in the image of God as anyone else. But though it is painful for us to see a perfectly decent homosexual unable to marry a person of the same sex, we are nevertheless more preoccupied with:

(1) Giving every child the opportunity to at least begin life with a mother and father; (2) Honoring the will of the great majority of Americans, secular and religious, liberal and conservative, to preserve the man-woman marital ideal, and not allow a judge to single-handedly destroy that ideal; (3) Preserving the ability of teachers and clergy to tell the story of marriage to young children in terms of a man and woman and not confuse the vast majority of kids who are forming their vision of marriage and sexuality.

These preoccupations are neither bigoted nor radical. They are, in our view, civilization-saving.

Read the whole commentary.


More Inappropriate Books: When Do We Start Demanding Beauty, Modesty and Virtue?

From "Burlingame schools pull 8th-grade book from class" by Nanette Asimov, posted 4/12/07, at The San Francisco Chronicle


Citing his concern for "the morals of our society," Burlingame schools Superintendent Sonny Da Marto has stopped four eighth-grade classes from reading "Kaffir Boy," an award-winning memoir of growing up in a South African ghetto during apartheid.

Da Marto had banned the book from the Burlingame Intermediate School late last month when the 13- and 14-year-old students were nearly halfway through it, said their English teacher, Amelia Ramos, who was required to take the books back from 116 students.

"The kids were angry," Ramos said. "They were frustrated. They were appalled. And some were so upset that they couldn't muster any type of verbal response. They were very quiet."

A divided Burlingame Board of Education discussed the issue at a public meeting Tuesday night but declined to reverse Da Marto's decision.

The book has been challenged frequently since its publication in 1986 because of two graphic paragraphs describing men preparing to engage in anal sex with young boys. Although Ramos taught "Kaffir Boy" last year without incident, a parent complained this year -- and Da Marto agreed.

At the board meeting, Da Marto called "Kaffir Boy" an outstanding book, but said the paragraphs in question rendered it "inappropriate for this grade level." He said he would allow an abridged version in which the controversial words were removed.

In "Kaffir Boy," Mark Mathabane tells his brutal but ultimately triumphant story as one of nine children growing up in poverty during the 1960s and 1970s in a nation where the civil rights of black people were nonexistent. In South Africa, "kaffir" is a gross racial slur.

..."Kaffir Boy has been taught in eighth grade and in many high schools across the United States," Ramos said. "I wanted to challenge and motivate my students, to broaden their perspectives on life beyond the borders of Burlingame."

That strategy worked last year, when Ramos freely taught the memoir after it was approved by the Burlingame School District's "core literature committee" of parents, teachers, a librarian, a student and a school board member.

But in late March, Ramos received an e-mail from a parent complaining about the graphic scene.

On Page 72, readers find a description of child prostitution witnessed by Mathabane when he was younger than Ramos' students.

He runs away rather than participate in the sex-for-food arrangement with migrant workers that his starving companions agree to -- but not before he sees that "the boys, now completely naked, had begun lining up along the bunks." In two paragraphs, Mathabane uses the words "anuses," "Vaseline" and "penises" as he describes preparations for the worst.

Ramos forwarded the parent's e-mail to her principal, Ted Barone, who sent it to Da Marto. That very day, Ramos said, the superintendent ordered the class to stop reading the book.

"I'm very concerned about the morals of our society and that children who don't have support are not prepared emotionally to read it," the superintendent said at Tuesday's board meeting. "They're already exposed to violence and sex. As a public agency, are we going to contribute to it?" An abridged version of the book has been ordered, Barone told him.

...Board Vice President Michael Barber said, "I don't want to be the censor board."

Parent Kerbey Altmann said the banning decision had "echoes of a police state."

"I feel my right as a parent was usurped unceremoniously and quickly. There was not full disclosure," he said.

His son, eighth-grader Tom Altmann, asked the board how "shielding us from the scene in the book will benefit us."

No one spoke in favor of the ban.

Read the whole article.

Yes, I can see how one would think that refusing to teach a book to thirteen-year-olds that includes homosexual sodomy of five-year-olds is the equivalent of living in a police state. America: prudish, puritanical, book-burning, hidebound, sex-phobic police state.

In order to prove that America is intellectually advanced, open, tolerant, diverse, sophisticated, hip, modern, post-modern, and aware, we must teach texts that include profanity, obscenity, bestiality, and sodomy. It's an interesting cultural place we're in. The media and arts foist images of immorality on our children and when parents object to sexually graphic texts, the powers that be tell us that there's no reason to withhold texts that include material kids see everyday. That's a tricky strategy to befoul the culture and then claim the befouled culture as justification for exposure to inappropriate texts. We're idiots for tolerating this for so long. The ubiquity of vulgarity is no justification for the participation of public education in our cultural decline.

When do parents start demanding that art uphold and promote beauty or modesty or virtue or truth? When do we demand to know why the politically correct treatment of race, gender, class, and sexual orientation has assumed such a privileged place in text selection? When do we challenge the notion that virtually any criteria but a consideration of the graphic nature of sex and violence may be used when determining the suitability of a text. Since when is obscenity, profanity, extreme violence and graphic sex of no concern?

In all four years of high school, students probably read between 25-30 texts, give or take a few. Neither their intellectual and aesthetic experiences nor their constitutional rights are diminished or compromised by decisions to exclude texts that include graphic sex and violence or extreme profanity and obscenity. Even liberal teachers censor in that they reject texts due to content they find morally objectionable. For example, you find very few high schools and no middle schools teaching Brett Easton Ellis' American Psycho, at least for now.

Several additional points: First, there are innumerable texts that teach lessons about resisting peer pressure including ones that don't address homosexual sodomy of five-year-olds, a premise that is irrelevant to the lives of most teens. Liberals often use relevance as their justification for teaching texts that include graphic sex and violence and vulgar language. And then when dissenters object to a text that includes graphic sex and violence, pointing out that, in addition, it is irrelevant to the lives of most teens, liberals will cite multiculturalism and diversity as their justification. Where there's a will to include provocative material, there's a justification.

Second, how adolescents feel about the exclusion of vulgar, sexual, and violent texts is irrelevant to sound decision-making. Adults make these decisions based on the, perhaps no longer valid, assumption that they are more mature, knowledgeable, and wise than teens. Adolescents are precluded from the decision-making process because they make up in rebelliousness what they lack in maturity, knowledge, and wisdom.

Third, if thirteen is not too young to introduce homosexual sodomy, is twelve? If twelve is okay, how about eleven? Is there any age at which homosexual sodomy ought not to be introduced?

Finally, in response to eighth-grader Tom Altman's question regarding how they benefit from being shielded from "this scene," I would say that those children who have not heard of homosexual sodomy will have their innocence preserved just a little longer; those boys and girls who find images of homosexual sodomy disturbing will be protected from having to entertain them in their imaginations; and those students who have managed to preserve their natural sense of modesty in an immodest culture will not have their school texts and classroom discussions undermining it.

Additionally, parents who want their children's innocence and modesty preserved will not have the institution to which they entrust their children violating that trust.
--Clive

Friday, April 13, 2007

The Feminist's Dream: A Civilization Without Men

Scientists create artificial sperm cells; Papers hype all-female conception

Scientists say they have managed for the first time to create artificial sperm cells, a development that the popular press has seized upon as a sign that sterile men -- and even women -- may be able to fertilize eggs in the future.

The researchers turned adult stem cells from bone marrow into immature sperm cells. They're excited about the discovery, but say that it could take three to five years to develop a process whereby the cells develop into the more mature sperm cells found in the testes.

"This finding is of interest but we really need to be very cautious about the interpretation," a leading biologist tells BBC News.

A transplant technique has been devised that could effectively remove men from the process of creating life.

Women might soon be able to produce sperm in a development that could allow lesbian couples to have their own biological daughters, according to a pioneering study published today.

Due to the lack of the 'y' chromosome in the artificial sperm, the offspring would ALL BE FEMALE!

Thursday, April 12, 2007

Canadians Apologize for Harm Caused by Legalizing Same-Sex Marriage

From "Canadians Apologize for Harm Caused by Legalizing Homosexual 'Marriage' posted 4/12/07 at Americans for Truth

LETTER OF APOLOGY TO THE WORLD

April 11, 2007

To the world’s leaders and people,

We, the people of Canada who support marriage solely as the union of a man and a woman, apologize to the people of the world for harm done through Canada’s legalization of homosexual marriage.

We are grieved and troubled as we consider the impact this is having in weakening the fundamental institution of marriage in countries and cultures around the world. We understand that because Canada does not impose citizenship or residency requirements in order for same-sex individuals to be “married” here, couples are coming to Canada to seek legal sanction for their homosexual relationships with the intent of returning to their own countries to challenge those countries’ legal definition of marriage.

We understand that Canada is seen by people around the world as a country in which public policy is developed carefully and judiciously. It would, therefore, be a natural assumption that in legalizing homosexual marriage our government and courts thoroughly considered the implications of this action through proper and extensive study of social sciences and facts. But it is essential that the people of the world understand that this was not the case. Our government and courts only considered adult “rights.” Among other things, the impact on children’s rights, children’s education, parental rights, religious rights, adoption, the economy and family law were never fully considered. Changes were thrust upon us by court actions followed by a vote that did not allow for a free vote of every member of our federal parliament.

Our warning to you, the people of the world, is to learn from our mistakes and avoid repeating them in your own countries.

Forewarned should be forearmed.

Signed,

Canada Family Action Coalition

REAL Women of Canada

United Families Canada

British Columbia Parents and Teachers for Life

Alberta REAL Women

Christian Heritage Party of Canada

Third Watch Ministries

United Mothers, Fathers & Friends

Sault Ste. Marie - CFAC

Dawn Stefanowicz - Author

MY Canada Association

Father’s Resting Place