There will be no invocation or benediction at commencement ceremonies at Pottsgrove High School in Pottstown, Pennsylvania this year because last year a single, anonymous complaint frightened school officials into a panic. As a result, constitutionally-protected, student-initiated Christian free speech has been officially banned.
"The decision was made after last year's graduation when a student went off script from the nondenominational prayer that has been done over the years and turned it into a very Christian prayer." -- Rick Rabinowitz, school board president
"It was offensive to someone else in the audience and it was reported to me that it was offensive and religious in nature and that we should stop it." -- Shellie A. Feola, Superintendent
Justin Valentine was school board president during 2015 graduation and said a complaint from another board member was the reason prayer was pulled.
"What happened was there was one person, one complaint that we received, and that's what triggered this," he said. "We knew the driving force behind this not happening again."
Valentine declined to identify the individual.
Current board member Patricia Grimm was also on the board in August when the decision on prayer was made.
"To me, it's (prayer) student driven," she said. "This is a tradition we always have regardless of the law and this is what the students want. I know there was a lot of discussion about the student going off of his intended speech but there was only one complaint."
The change apparently is the result of one student’s decision to invoke Jesus Christ in his comments at last year’s graduation.
As a result, [Supt.] Feola consulted the district’s longtime Solicitor Marc Davis, who told her a 2000 ruling in California made the district’s practice illegal.
. . . although the decision was made in August, it did not become a public discussion until Thursday, part of discussion on Facebook — particularly among board members, and two former school board presidents.
“This is very disappointing to me too,” wrote board member Bill Parker. “While the district, due to case law, can not direct that there be a prayer as part of the ceremony, we can also not violate freedom of speech.”
Mike Neiffer, who served as school board president prior to Valentine and acknowledged that there are legal issues to be considered, posted “I think the issue is that the change doesn’t appear to have been discussed in public nor was the public allowed to comment on it. As for me, let the students decide. It’s their graduation.”
Joshua Allenberg, a resident of Monroeville, has enlisted assistance from atheist lawyers to intimidate local officials, and so far, it has worked. The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania is threatening to sue the municipality if the Lord's Prayer continues to open the borough council meetings, as it has for decades.
“Every meeting, they’ve recited the Lord’s Prayer, which from my understanding, is a strictly Christian prayer. I’m Jewish. I wasn’t very familiar with it. To me, shows favoring one religion over another.” -- Joshua Allenberg
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
[ACLU attorney Sara] Rose says that's not accurate because meetings in Greece, New York, open with prayers from representatives of different religions.
. . . on Thursday night, for the first time in many, many years, the borough’s mayor did not lead the gathering in reciting the prayer.
But Monroeville’s mayor believes prayer is necessary. He says he can’t believe it’s being opposed.
“It’s very sad that we have come to this, taken what’s happened in [the terrorist attack in] California. Not just Monroeville, but I think the whole country needs a lot of prayer,” says Mayor Greg Erosenko.
“This politically correct stuff’s getting old, but it’s part of our world, so I’ll adhere to it,” he says.
However, the citizens that attended Thursday night’s meeting say they’re not going to let one person’s views on prayer get in the way of their constitutional rights, including one man who’s of Jewish faith.
“We are not going to have a prayer tonight,” Monroeville Mayor Greg Erosenko, announced at the meeting. “We are reviewing use of the prayer with legal counsel.”
But two residents, upset that the municipality is under threat of a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union for use of the Christian prayer, said aloud their own prayers during the meeting's public-comment session.
“Faith is important in this community,” said the Rev. Rob Marrow, pastor of Crossroads Presbyterian Church in Monroeville, whose prayer invoked Jesus. “I hope you keep a time of prayer in the meeting, whatever that may be.”
“We were settled as a Christian nation. They really should be adopting our lifestyle,” resident Helen Crowell said of challengers to use of the Christian prayer at meetings.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania says that reciting the Lord's Prayer before Monroeville Council meetings is unconstitutional and will consider suing the municipality if it doesn't end the practice.
Sara Rose, staff attorney with the ACLU's Pittsburgh office, said a complaint from Monroeville resident Joshua Allenberg has been reviewed, and the organization has determined that Monroeville Council is violating the First Amendment's Establishment clause, which prohibits government from preferring one religion over another.
Rose said municipal officials will have about a month to respond to the letter, discuss the issue and vote on any changes.
Monroeville Council holds two meetings — a work session for public comment and discussion and a voting meeting — in a typical month. The prayer is mentioned in council meeting minutes and agendas going back at least to 2001, the earliest versions of those documents posted on Monroeville's website.
Last week, Pennsylvania's Bucks County Court of Common Pleas Judge C. Theodore Fritsch Jr. declared Sabrina Maurer of Doylestown, PA to be the legal same-sex spouse of Kimberly Underwood, who died in 2013, because the couple had participated in a union ceremony at a Maplewood, New Jersey Episcopal church in 2001. The judge's ruling yields a financial windfall to the otherwise legally-single Maurer.
"Is this going to create an avalanche of issues that are going to crop up? I think it's very possible, for better or worse." -- Attorney Helen Casale, "Gay Marriage" activist
The decision, handed down Wednesday by Bucks County Court Judge C. Theodore Fritsch Jr., is believed to be the first in which a same-sex union was recognized retroactively, according to Mary Hackett, a Pittsburgh-based lawyer with the Reed Smith firm.
Hackett represented Sabrina Maurer, a Doylestown woman who married Kimberly Underwood in a religious ceremony in 2001. Underwood died of heart disease in 2013. Pennsylvania began recognizing common-law marriages in 2005 and same-sex marriage in 2014.
Hackett offered free legal counsel to Maurer after reading about her situation on Facebook.
The effects of Fritsch's decision could also be thorny, especially if judges around the state concur. Courts would have to decide on a case-by-case basis whether a common-law marriage applied, and whether petitioners should be granted alimony, marital assets, inheritance-tax refunds or even backdated marriage licenses.
[Maurer] and Underwood had been married before 100 people in an Episcopal church in Maplewood, New Jersey, in 2001. They shared bank accounts and exchanged power of attorney. And Underwood's parents, Michael and Patricia Underwood of Haddonfield, New Jersey, supported Maurer's claim of survivorship. "I'm hopeful that this helps other people who might not have had the same support of their relationship when their partner was alive," Maurer, a 47-year-old medical writer, said Friday.
Maurer does not expect an appeal. She has settled with an insurance company over Underwood's death benefits, and said the state - which under Gov. Tom Wolf did not contest her suit - seems poised to refund her inheritance taxes.
"The important part to Sabrina is that the marriage was validated," Hackett said Friday. "(She) hopes that people take a look at their rights, at things they were deprived of - benefits, status - and reconsider whether or not they have legal rights ... to try to undo what was done in the past."
Now, some two years after Ms. Underwood’s death, their union has received retroactive legal recognition as a common law marriage. Ms. Maurer is now entitled to full spousal rights, and will have some $9,000 she paid in inheritance taxes returned to her.
Loosely defined, a common law marriage is one in which the couple represent themselves as being married and participates in a union that resembles a marriage, but which has not been formally recorded with a state.
“Their marriage is valid and enforceable, and they are entitled to all rights and privileges of validly licensed, married spouses in all respects under the laws of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” Judge C. Theodore Fritsch of the Bucks County Court of Common Pleas said in his order, issued Wednesday.
“I do think other couples might be able to go back and do something retroactively now,” Ms. Hackett said. “It’s an area people ought to be exploring. Sabrina really wanted to encourage people to look at their rights in this evolving area of the law.”
Pennsylvania abolished common law marriage in 2005, but any marriage that predates that change still counts.
Judge C. Theodore Fritsch Jr.'s declaration states that Mauer and Underwood were married prior to that deadline, "[entering] into a valid and enforceable marriage, under Pennsylvania common law, on Sept. 2, 2001, and [remaining] married ... until the time of Kimberly M. Underwood's death on Nov. 20, 2013."
Self-described "Philly gay lawyer" Angela Giampolo disagreed with Frisch's interpretation of law.
"The ruling may be on the right side of history," she said, "but it's on the wrong side of the law."
Her reason? When common-law marriage was recognized in Pennsylvania, it clearly only applied to a man and woman.
The court agreed with Maurer's arguments, declaring Maurer and Underwood had entered into a valid common law marriage in Pennsylvania on Sept. 2, 2001, which was the date of their New Jersey commitment ceremony. The court said the couple remained married until Underwood's death in November 2013.
Maurer filed her petition in the fall of 2014 and the judge asked that she put on notice the state attorney general, the state Department of Revenue and any entity from which Maurer would seek benefits, Hackett said. One company settled for a confidential amount and was dismissed from the case. The Department of Revenue sought additional time to respond and then in April 2015 said it was not taking a position on the matter. A representative from the department was in court Wednesday in support of Maurer, Hackett said. No one else took a position on the matter, she said.
Hackett said this case is an example of how the law on same-sex marriage is still evolving. She said it raises the question of whether same-sex couples who are both still living can seek marriage licenses that provide retroactive applications of their civil commitments.
Waldron Mercy Academy in Merion Station (near Philadelphia), Pennsylvania admitted to hiding the fact that long-time religious education director, Margie Winters, has been "married" to her lesbian partner since 2007. Last week, Principal Nell Stetser announced that after a few parents had uncovered the school's secret, the School Board had no choice but to support the firing of the lesbian last month, but did NOT discipline administrators or faculty members who had deceived parents and their children for years.
"I actually had a conversation with the principal a few weeks after I was hired to say, how should I handle this." said Winters, adding that she was advised that she could be open about her life with the faculty but to avoid discussing it with students' parents. "So that's what I've done," she said. "I've never been open. And that's been hard."
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
The school's principal released a letter this week alluding to Winters' marriage to a woman as a conflict.
More than 100 parents and community members met on Wednesday to show their support for Winters, who received a standing ovation from the crowd and even led the group in an opening prayer, WPVI reported.
Organizers say this is only the beginning as they will continue to work to get Winters her job back.
According to State Senator Daylin Leach (D-Montgomery), sponsor of the Pennsylvania Senate's Marriage Equality Bill, Waldron receives state funding that might override the religion exemption of the township ordinance.
Winters said she and her wife "kept a really low profile" about their relationship at the school.
Still, parents of at least two students discovered that Winters was in a same-sex marriage. Winters said one complained to the school and the other contacted the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.
Winters refused a request to resign and was fired in a June 22 letter from the school.
Winters said she thought the school's connection to the archdiocese played a role in that decision. The school, she said, worried that its "Catholic identity would be in jeopardy."
"The primary consideration that guided my decision-making process was to sustain the Catholic identity of Waldron Mercy Academy," Stetser said.
. . . principal Nell Stetser informed parents that Winters, who was the director of religious education and outreach, would no longer be with the school by sending out an email — which both praised Winters for her “amazing contributions” and noted that her personal life is in conflict with the school’s beliefs. “In the Mercy spirit, many of us accept life choices that contradict current Church teachings,” she wrote in the email, a copy of which was forwarded to Yahoo Parenting, “but to continue as a Catholic school, Waldron Mercy must comply with those teachings.”
Stetser added, “I realize some disagree with my decision. I believe, however, I have acted in the best interest of the Waldron Mercy community and preserved our heritage as a Catholic school. We are not alone in this plight. My hope is the pain we experience today adds to the urgency of engaging in an open and honest discussion about this and other divisive issues at the intersection of our society and our Church.”
But Nancy Houston, the mom of an incoming sixth grader, tells Yahoo Parenting that parents felt “shock on so many levels” upon receiving the news about Stetser’s firing. On Wednesday evening, Houston hosted a gathering and brainstorming session for nearly 200 upset parents and school alumni (and a couple of fellow Waldron teachers) at her Philadelphia restaurant, Jack’s Firehouse. “So many of us spent the whole weekend being upset, we had to come together,” she says. “This is not something we expected from Waldron.”
Parents of Waldron Mercy Academy students are planning to meet today after, according to a letter sent to parents, a director at the school was fired for being in a same-sex marriage.
[Excerpts from] Full letter:
Dear Parents,
While it was known by many close to her that she is gay, a recent complaint from a family that has since left Waldron escalated this situation to the school administration, the Board, the Sisters of Mercy and the Archdiocese.
For the past eight years, Margie has done a phenomenal job guiding our children in the spirit of Mercy. We feel blessed to have her in our children’s lives. She embodies the Mercy spirit.
As members of the Waldron community, we are standing with Margie and hope you will join us. We need your help. The media around this story could have major implications for our community. We hope that in the spirit of Mercy, we can stand together to support Margie.
Jim Kenney, the Democratic nominee for Philadelphia mayor, is blaming the Archdiocese of Philadelphia for the controversial firing of a Catholic school faculty member who is in a same-sex marriage.
"The personnel decision was one made by Waldron, not the archdiocese, and the archdiocese did not influence the decision," spokesman Ken Gavin said when asked for reaction to Kenney's comments.
Kenney, a Catholic who has clashed with the church on LGBT rights issues, said he doesn't buy it.
"If you're a church official and you feel that strongly that this woman and her partner are such a threat to society, stand up and say so," Kenney said.
"The children she teaches love her. The parents love her also," Kenney said of Winters. "I just hope the pope comes in September and really puts some people in line."
Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, in a statement, thanked Waldron Mercy Academy leaders "for taking the steps to ensure that the Catholic faith is presented ... in accord with the teaching of the church. They've shown character and common sense at a moment when both seem to be uncommon."
"Schools describing themselves as Catholic take on the responsibility of teaching and witnessing the Catholic faith in a manner true to Catholic belief," [Archbishop Chaput] wrote. "There's nothing complicated or controversial in this. It's a simple matter of honesty."
. . . he said parents choose Catholic schools for their children so they can see their religious beliefs "fully taught and practiced."
"That simply can't be done if teachers need to worry about wounding the feelings of their students or about alienating students from their parents," said Chaput, who described people with different viewpoints on marriage as "often people of sincerity and good will."
Unbeknownst to taxpayers who funded it . . . Fifty teachers and school administrators of Lebanon (Pennsylvania) School District bowed to chants of "Allahu Akbar" at the Lebanon Valley Mosque while attending an all-day in-service workshop. School Superintendent Marianne T. Bartley, who participated, authorized the Islamic training to help the staff relate to the religious aspects of their Arabic students.
"We have so many students from different Hispanic countries, but slowly but surely the Arabic population is growing." -- Fred Shattls, faculty "I think this is the first time ever in the United States that a school district goes to a mosque." -- Hamid Housni, Lebanon Valley Mosque
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
It was the second year that the workshop was offered to the staff, according to Fred Shattls, director of the district's English as a Second Language department. The workshop was led by Mohamed Omar, a former teacher's aide and Arabic translator for the district who also served a year as president of the mosque.
Providing a course on Arabic culture and Islam is important, Shattls said, because the number of students from Middle Eastern countries in the district is growing and now totals 87. Most of them are from Eygpt and Morocco, two of the 33 countries represented by students in the district.
At noon, the teachers took a bus to the mosque, located not far away at 13th and Florence streets. Following Islamic practice, each took off their shoes before entering the prayer room where they took a seat on a maroon-colored carpet with intricate designs.
Omar, dressed in a suit and tie, spent about 20 minutes instructing the teachers on the many facets of Islam, including some nearly identical to Christianity, like the belief that all who are faithful to the religion will one day be called before God who will judge them to determine if they will go to Heaven or Hell.
Approximately 50 teachers and officials from Pennsylvania’s recently gathered at a taxpayer-funded workshop during church services at a local Baptist church to learn about the problems Christian children face in today’s secular educational environment.
No, wait. Scratch that. That didn’t happen. That’s totally wrong.
Instead, approximately 50 teachers and staffers in the town of Lebanon, Pa. attended a workshop at a local mosque to learn all about Islam and Arab culture, EAGnews.org reports.
Homosexuals Norman MacArthur and Bill Novak, both in their 70s, became father and son in 2000 when Novak adopted MacArthur for estate planning purposes, but now that "gay marriage" is legal in their state of residence, they will now become "husband and husband."
“Not only does it pave the way for this couple to obtain a marriage license, it is an important precedent for others who may be in the same position.” -- Attorney Clemons, Richter & Reiss
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
The same-sex couple, who have been together for more than 50 years, registered as domestic partners in New York City in 1994. After moving to Bucks County, they learned that Pennsylvania law does not recognize domestic partners and prohibits same sex marriages.
They were advised by a lawyer that the only avenue to becoming legally related was through adoption. “It was the only legal method we could use in Pennsylvania to give underpinning to our relationship,” MacArthur said.
The pair’s Petition to Vacate Adoption Decree was granted on May 14, allowing them to marry. This is the first case in Pennsylvania history seeking to vacate an adoption to allow a same sex couple to marry, their lawyer Terry Clemons said.
Clemons said the approach of using adoption to gain rights was not uncommon around the turn of the century as same-sex couples were navigating estate planning and access to medical care.
When the United States District Court declared unconstitutional Pennsylvania’s marriage laws prohibiting same-sex marriage unconstitutional in 2014, Novak and MacArthur wanted to tie the knot in marriage, but their earlier legal gambit now became an obstacle. Pennsylvania law doesn’t permit marriage between parents and children.
So, a week ago, the father and son’s Petition to Vacate Adoption Decree was approved, and the pair simply became two single men now allowed to marry.
“We are ecstatic beyond belief,” MacArthur said. “I feel an enormous sense of not only relief but freedom that we can finally do something in Pennsylvania that I’ve been dreaming of for years.”
The pair has been given a marriage license and is planning a summer wedding.
The mainstream media always give top billing to the sexual orientation of news makers, except when the news reflects poorly on sexually deviant minorities. A case in point is the fact that Amtrak's homosexual engineer Brandon Bostian, responsible for this week's train derailment in Philadelphia, is documented as a Gay Agenda activist.
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
The Midtown Gazette in Manhattan interviewed Bostonian in 2012 at a rally for equal rights in New York.
That article said,
Brandon Bostian, a recent transplant to New York, attended the event. Bostian was active in the [California] Proposition 8 fight, which defined marriage as the union of one man and one woman, in San Francisco. While he is still interested in working for marriage equality, Bostian admitted that he is less enthusiastic this time around. “It’s kind of insulting to have to beg people for my right to marry,” he said. “I feel like we shouldn’t even have to have this fight.”
Tasha Bartholomew, the spokesperson for Caltrain and Sam Trans confirmed that 32-year-old Brandon Bostian did operate Caltrain trains several years ago, as an Amtrak employee.
The Tennessee native used to live in Memphis, and graduated from University of Missouri-Columbia in 2006 with a degree in business management and administration.
During his studies he was a member of the Acacia fraternity, according to his Linkedin page, which allegedly has ties to Freemasonry.
He also worked as a cashier at Target between 2005 and 2006.
Bostian is a gay-rights activist who previously lived in San Francisco before moving to New York. In 2012, he was interviewed by the Midtown Gazette, which covers parts of Manhattan, during the campaign for marriage equality.
Philadelphia Mayor Michael Mutter responded to the National Transportation Safety Board briefing on Wednesday evening by saying that it proved 'reckless driving by the engineer' in an interview with Wolf Blitzer on CNN.
Outraged parents of Monessen Middle School (Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania) demanding answers at Tuesday's school board meeting were told nothing about the unnamed employee who handed out a crossword puzzle filled with sex terminology. Although there was an attempt to quickly collect the puzzles, one student managed to retain his and posted it online.
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
The students in Monessen were given puzzles based on "Fifty Shades of Grey" that contained terms including "spanking," "submissive," "leather cuffs" and "bondage." Other words on the list were more explicit [and cannot be printed here].
Parent James Carter complained about it at Tuesday night's school board meeting, saying he tried to question the school's principal and dean of students, but they refused to talk when he insisted on recording their conversation.
Monessen district officials said at the meeting that they couldn't discuss the issue because they just learned about it Monday. Superintendent Leanne Spazak said the circumstances of the puzzle are under investigation.
Young children at Franklin D. Roosevelt Middle School in Bristol, Pennsylvania have been sexting each other with a video showing minors performing incestuous sex according to local authorities who are warning parents that children who forward such materials via the Internet face criminal charges under Pennsylvania law forbidding minors to transmit nude images of anyone between the ages of 12 and 17, including "selfies". Children are quickly learning thatIncest is OK; It's the New Gay
Click headlines below for documentation of the frequency of such sexting by ever-younger children, thus demonstrating the effect of sexualization indoctrination programs in public schools, and the effect of sexual predator teachers:
The video, discovered on Tuesday being shared by students during an after school event, shows two minors engaged in activities “that are inappropriate and, in fact, illegal,” said Superintendent of Schools Samuel Lee in a statement posted on the district’s website.
When school officials discovered the video, Lee said he “immediately notified local law enforcement and child welfare agencies and the parties involved in this video are now part of an active investigation.”
“A number of cellphones have been secured by police for investigation, which is ongoing,” police said.
As part of their inquiry, [Bristol Township Police acting chief Lt. John] Godzieba said, investigators confiscated 10 cellphones from pupils at Roosevelt, on Veterans Highway near Winder Drive in Bristol.
In a statement distributed Wednesday, Samuel Lee, superintendent of the Bristol Township School District, said school administrators caught wind of the video late Tuesday and turned over all information about the footage to police and child-welfare agencies.
Under a 2012 amendment to Title 18, the state's criminal code, it's illegal for minors to possess, view or distribute sexually explicit depictions of other minors.
"We're going to get to the bottom of this," Bristol Township Police Lt. Terry Hughes said.
. . . Bucks County District Attorney David Heckler is telling WPVI-TV that the video depicting middle school-aged children having what appears to be sex may be a case of incest.
The DA adds that the two juveniles caught engaged in the sex act may have been recorded without their knowledge.
The Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) has claimed victory in its battle to force Penn State to remove the Gideon Bibles from Nittany Lion Inn and the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel.
“The Bible calls for killing nonbelievers, apostates, gays, ‘stubborn sons,’ and women who are not virgins on their wedding nights. . . . What is obnoxious in a private hotel, however, becomes inappropriate and unconstitutional in state-run lodgings.” -- Annie Laurie Gaylor, FFRF attorney and co-president
Penn State has removed Gideon Bibles from hotel rooms after a complaint from the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) accused the Bibles of advocating the killings of nonbelievers.
“The decision to remove Bibles from individual guest rooms was made following questions from the Freedom From Religion Foundation,” Lisa Powers, director of strategic communications at Penn State told Campus Reform in an email. “It raised our awareness and we took the opportunity to review our hotel practices. We wish to be respectful of all religions, and also of those who have differing beliefs, yet we still want to make the publication available to those who desire to read it while staying with us.”
Powers said that the Bibles had been in the Nittany Lion Inn rooms for “decades” and had been in place in the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel for “probably a dozen years.”
Contradicting a press release by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a representative of Penn State told The Christian Post that the Bibles have not been taken out of their hotels.
"The Bibles have not been removed from our hotels. The decision to make Bibles and other publications available in our libraries and other public access areas was made in mid-summer," said Powers. "There are still Gideon Bibles at our facilities and they have been there for decades. We do not have a specific date for when they originated."
While the Bibles are not in "individual guest rooms," they remain "available in our public access areas" for "those who wish to use them," explained Powers.
Although it's common, and legal, for abortionists like Planned Parenthood to satisfy requests of 13-year-old girls who want their unborn child killed, when a Pennsylvania 16-year-old asked her mother for assistance, it ended in a prison sentence. This week, 39-year-old Jennifer Ann Whalen received a 12 to 18 month sentence for purchasing abortifacient drugs for her daughter online from a legal source in Europe.
Jennifer Ann Whalen, 39, of Washingtonville, a single mother who works as a nursing home aide, pleaded guilty in August to obtaining the miscarriage-inducing pills from an online site in Europe for her daughter, 16, who did not want to have the child.
Whalen was sentenced on Friday by Montour County Court of Common Pleas Judge Gary Norton to serve 12 months to 18 months in prison for violating a state law that requires abortions to be performed by physicians.
She was also fined $1,000 and ordered to perform 40 hours of community service after her release. The felony offense called for up to seven years in prison and a $15,000 fine.
The Pennsylvania case follows the prosecution of a Florida man who pleaded guilty to tricking his girlfriend into taking an abortion pill. He was sentenced in January to 13 years in prison and $28,500 restitution. In June, Florida toughened state law to allow for prosecutions in the death of non-viable fetuses.
After a teacher showed Principal William Mudlock at Shafer Elementary School in the Nazareth (Pennsylvania) Area School District one of the Valentine's Day cards that J.A. Abramo was about to hand out to friends, all of the Christian messages were confiscated and the devastated boy was told that Bible verses are forbidden in school.
"St. Valentine was imprisoned and martyred for presiding over marriages and for spreading the news of God's love. In honor of St. Valentine's Day, I want you to know that God loves YOU!!! '. . . God so lived the world that he gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not parish but might have eternal life.' John 3:16" -- Abramo's forbidden message
For background, click headlines below to read previous articles:
According to the suit, [Donald and Ellen Abramo's] three other school-aged children were permitted to hand out the notes with Valentines to their classmates, but only because teachers didn't notice their religious nature, school officials said.
The suit says Ellen Abramo helped her children create the notes to fill an empty slot in their store-bought cards — left when they removed a piece of candy to comply with a separate policy banning sweets.
The lawsuit, which identifies the Abramos' first-grade boy only as J.A., notes that other students at Shafer Elementary were permitted to hand out cards with human skulls, guns and other weapons, and with rub-on tattoos.
But elementary school Principal William Mudlock told Ellen Abramo that because J.A.'s cards were religious and might be offensive to someone, the school would not allow them to be distributed, the lawsuit says.
The Abramos' cause has been taken up by an organization called the Alliance Defending Freedom [ADF], which wrote to Nazareth Area superintendent Dennis Riker in December 2013 urging him to change the policy banning the distribution of religious materials, the suit says. When the family reached out to him to intervene on Feb. 19, Riker allegedly told them he forwarded the matter to the district attorney to handle, the suit says.
School district solicitor Gary Brienza followed up with an email to the Abramos saying he was looking into the matter and said it is "being taken seriously."
According to the suit, J.A. cried when he wasn't allowed to distribute the notes. The teacher tried to explain the rules and console him, but their conversation left the boy "extremely upset and humiliated," the suit says. According to the suit, the boy no longer prays over his meals at school because he is "afraid of getting in trouble."
A meeting with Brienza and principal William Mudlock on Feb. 28 failed to satisfy the Abramos.
The lawsuit was filed by attorney L. Theodore Hopp Jr., of Media, PA.
Matt Sharp, an attorney with the Georgia-based nonprofit Alliance Defending Freedom, said Donald and Ellen Abramo have been personally impacted by the district's policy.
The couple moved to Upper Nazareth Township a year ago and this is their first-grade son's first year in the district. They also have a third-grader at Shafer in Nazareth.
The suit challenges the school district to revoke its policy on religious material. Sharp claims similar cases have been successful in Pennsylvania and he is hoping the same for the Abramos.
“A Bible verse and a reference to God does not make such a card unconstitutional,” said ADF Legal Counsel Matt Sharp. “Religious expression is just as protected by the First Amendment as other messages that students communicate.”
ADF Senior Legal Counsel Jeremy Tedesco said that to “single out a faith-based message for censorship is exactly the type of hostility to religion that the First Amendment forbids.”
[School] Officials cited their Policy 220, “which states that the school officials can prohibit student expression that seeks ‘to establish the supremacy of a particular religious denomination, sect or point of view.’”
But the complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, noted that the same federal court struck down an identically worded policy in 2008, because it restricted “what effectively amounts to all religious speech, which is clearly not permissible under the First Amendment.”
Ordained clergy, including bishops, have been trying for decades to persuade Christian leaders of the United Methodist Church (UMC) to embrace the Gay Agenda, but after repeated defeats in denomination-wide votes, these desperate homosexual activists are adopting "scorched earth" tactics.
"Most folks, after 40 years of trying legislative solutions, realize they won't work. The way forward is to claim what we know to be true. And we're going to continue doing it in an aggressive way." -- Matt Berryman, executive director of Reconciling Ministries Network (a formal homosexualist group within the UMC)
"The time for talking is over." -- UMC California Bishop Melvin Talbert
The intensity of the conflict was laid bare over the last several months, when the church tried, convicted and defrocked Frank Schaefer, a Pennsylvania pastor who presided at the wedding of his son to another man. Berryman said the case galvanized Methodists advocating for recognition of gay marriage, increasing donations to the group and traffic on Reconciling Ministries' online sites. Schaefer has since been traveling the country giving talks and sermons on gay acceptance.
Frustration over the lack of change fueled the new movement to openly defy church law, starting in 2011 in Minnesota and New York. Methodist ministers had already been quietly officiating at same-gender ceremonies in some communities for years. A few of the more publicly defiant clergy had faced formal complaints or had been tried by the church. But the public marriage pledges brought new energy to the campaign.
Last month, a new Methodist group formed called the Wesleyan Covenant Network to support theologically conservative Methodists and keep them from leaving the denomination. The meeting in Atlanta drew about 130 clergy and others. One speaker choked back tears while telling the group his son is considering entering ministry — but not in the United Methodist Church.
Almost daily, evidence mounts of defiant United Methodist clergy breaking church law on behalf of gays and lesbians as the nation’s second-largest Protestant denomination struggles with what may be its most vexing rebellion in decades.
Every week, another Methodist minister “comes out” and acknowledges performing a same-sex wedding on the website of the New York-based Methodists in New Directions. So far, 14 clergy have made such disclosures; none has faced a church complaint, said Dorothee Benz, MIND spokeswoman.
“The defrocking of [UMC Pennsylvania pastor] Frank Schaefer brought great shame to our denomination and much pain to our LGBTQ brothers and sisters,” said Bishop Minerva G. Carcano of the California-Pacific Conference of the United Methodist Church.
She sees the growing movement challenging church policy as a turning point.
The Rev. Thomas Ogletree [80] will be tried March 10 for violating church law against officiating at gay unions, his spokeswoman, Dorothee Benz, said Friday. . . . Ogletree is a theologian, a former Yale Divinity School dean, and a retired elder in the church’s New York district, or Annual Conference. Some clergy had filed a complaint after his son’s 2012 wedding announcement appeared in The New York Times.
In the last few years, as gay marriage has gained legal recognition by US states, Methodists advocating for gays and lesbians have intensified their protests, hosting gay weddings in Methodist churches or officiating at ceremonies elsewhere.
Two other similar cases are pending within the Methodist church. The Rev. Stephen Heiss of the Upper New York Annual Conference is expected to face a church trial for presiding at same-sex marriages, including officiating at his daughter’s 2002 wedding. The Rev. Sara Thompson Tweedy, of the New York Annual Conference, is facing a formal complaint that she is a "self-avowed practicing" lesbian, or lives openly with a same-sex partner, which is barred by church law.
In addition to considering homosexuality "incompatible with Christian teaching", the UMC Book of Discipline also states that clergy cannot perform same-sex marriages.
Ogletree's actions were "injurious to the church", said Rev. Thomas Lambrecht, vice president and general manager of the conservative Methodist group Good News, according to the NY Times. "And it undermines the whole covenant of accountability that we share with each other as pastors," continued Lambrecht.
Rev. Stephen Heiss, of Tabernacle United Methodist Church, 83 Main St., Binghamton, and the Rev. Frank Schaefer, whose defrocking drew national media coverage and invigorated the same-sex marriage debate, want the 12 million member church to allow clergy to extend marriage ceremonies to everyone, regardless of sexual preference.
Schaefer will be the speaker at a 10:30 a.m. worship service Feb. 2 as Tabernacle celebrates the seventh anniversary of its decision to become a Reconciling Congregation.
A reconciling United Methodist congregation has formally adopted a statement to welcome people of all sexual orientations and gender identities. Reconciling Congregations are not officially endorsed by the United Methodist Church.
In the Southern Tier, several congregations have approved this welcoming statement, including Tabernacle and Centenary-Chenango Street churches in Binghamton, St. Paul’s in Ithaca and First United Methodist Church in Oneonta. . . .
The Rev. Trina Bose North and the Rev. Deborah Ingraham [of Edmond, Oklahoma] said their group, informally called Oklahoma United Methodists for Marriage Equality, wanted to counter the public statements made by the Rev. Robert Hayes Jr., Oklahoma United Methodist bishop, upholding the denomination's stance against same-gender marriage.
North [38] and Ingraham, 60, said Epworth United Methodist Church, where Ingraham is senior pastor, is part of the Reconciling Network, a network of United Methodist churches across the country working toward full inclusion for people of all sexual orientations and gender identities in the life of the church.
. . . they said it's important that United Methodists who disagree with the prohibitions tied to homosexuality let people know how they feel.
. . . North and Ingraham said momentum for such public dissent is growing. They said 70 Oklahoma United Methodist clergy and 280 laypeople signed a 2011 statement in favor of the denomination changing its stance on same-sex marriage and ordination of openly gay individuals. Ingraham said the local statement tied in with a similar national statement called Altar for All.
The denomination's highest court, the Judicial Council, will review the Desert Southwest Annual Conference's "Marriage Equality Resolution" in April it was announced.
In the recently released docket for the Judicial Council, the reproduced resolution stated that the Conference took a stand in favor of gay marriage, even though the UMC Book of Discipline defines marriage as being between one man and one woman.
Last July, the Arizona-based Desert Southwest Annual Conference passed the "Marriage Equality Resolution," validating the regional body's open support for the pro-LGBT wing of the mainline protestant denomination.
Bishop Robert Hoshibata, head of the Conference, decided to allow the resolution and concluded that it did not conflict with the Book of Discipline.
In an “Open Letter to the Council of Bishops (COB)” released today, Wake Forest University professor and United Methodist polity expert the Rev. Dr. Thomas E. Frank asked the council “…for the sake of the unity of the church, to stop the trials.” “We need to engage our differences through “Christian conversation” within our conferences and particularly within our orders of elders. Church trials are “an expedient of last resort” and are not the way forward,” Frank wrote.
Frank believes that the constitution of the United Methodist Book of Discipline empowers the bishops to act in opposition to the will of the General Conference in the face of peril to the denomination.
Frank believes that it is within the power of the bishops to refrain from referring complaints to counsel for the church, and the subsequent church trials. “You have discretion as the chief pastors of the church over the manner, purpose, and conduct of any supervisory response and just resolution under ‘fair process.’”
To read the entire article above and the full text of Frank’s letter, CLICK HERE.
When Michael Griffin told administrators of Holy Ghost Preparatory School near Philadelphia that he would be "marrying" another man, the leaders told him that such action would result in him being fired for breaching the employment contract requirement to live in conformance with Catholic teaching. After taking such action, and being fired, Griffin went before media cameras criticizing the school for holding him to his contract, thus advocating President Obama's insistence on passing new legislation (ENDA) to force Christian schools to hire anti-Christians.
Father James McCloskey, the school's headmaster, said in a statement that faculty at the school are required to follow church teachings, NBC Philadelphia reported.
He said in the statement that Griffin's decision "contradicts the terms of his teaching contract at our school, which requires all faculty and staff to follow the teachings of the Church as a condition of their employment. In discussion with Mr. Griffin, he acknowledged that he was aware of this provision, yet he said that he intended to go ahead with the ceremony."
Griffin, who graduated from the school and has taught French and Spanish there for 12 years, said that his relationship with his partner of 12 years wasn't a secret from the school and that his partner had even been to McCloskey's house.
Griffin lives in New Jersey, which became the 14th state to recognize same-sex marriage in October.
Michael Griffin says he emailed the principal of Holy Ghost Prep earlier in the week saying he may be late Friday, that he was applying for a marriage license. After an in-service day he says he was called into the office of School President Father James McCloskey, along with Principal Jeffrey Danilak.
Griffin explains, "He said, 'It's not really a secret here that you're gay.' I said, 'Correct.' He said, 'I assume this is a same sex marriage.' 'Yes.' He said if I go through with it, he had no choice but to terminate my position."
In tears, he left. His over a decade-long tenure at Holy Ghost was over.
Holy Ghost Preparatory is a 116-year-old all-boys private Catholic high school in Bensalem, Pa., about 15 miles northeast of Philadelphia. Griffin graduated from the school in 1996 and taught French and Spanish there for nearly 13 years before being fired on Friday, according to the school's website.
While Griffin's fate may sound outrageous, the U.S. still has a long way to go to protect homosexuals from workplace discrimination. Under federal law, Pennsylvania state law, and by law in 28 other states, it is still perfectly legal to fire someone because of their sexual orientation.
