‘Defend Marriage Lobby Day’ today in Springfield aims at stopping bill in House
This will never be a “marriage,” no matter what laws are changed.
Dear AFTAH Readers,
Today (Wed., Feb. 20th) is Defend Marriage Lobby Day in Springfield, Illinois, as pro-family citizens rally in the state capital against a homosexual “marriage” bill proposed by the Democrats for our state. Our friends at Illinois Family Institute organized this special day to help citizens express their unyielding support for real, natural marriage (one man, one woman) in the Land of Lincoln — which is already reeling from previous pro-homosexual laws. The “gay marriage” bill, SB 10, passed the state Senate on Feb. 14 with the votes of 33 Democrats and one lone Republican, Sen. Jason Barickman (Bloomington), so it is critical to stop the bill in the House. The Democrats who run Illinois — from Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel to Gov. Pat Quinn — have made passing a “gay marriage” bill a TOP PRIORITY, so please get involved on the side of “Nature and Nature’s God” to thwart their efforts!
TAKE ACTION — Illinois Citizens: Please attend the Lobby Day today if you are able: there is a 10:30 AM rally outside the Capitol Building in Springfield (401 S. 2nd Street, Springfield, IL), followed by lobbying. IFI will help you lobby your representative if you’ve never done it before! See their site for more details: http://illinoisfamily.org/politics/lobby-day-instructions-what-to-expect-on-feb-20th/. For those in Chicagoland, Kathy Barnette of Truth Exchange still has room on her bus for the trip to Springfield; see the Truth Exchange site.
If you cannot make the trip, make sure to call or write your State Representative and voice your opposition to the “gay marriage” bill. Call the Springfield Capitol Switchboard at 217-782-2000. Find you elected officials HERE.
We already know the ramifications of legalized homosexual “marriage” from other states like Massachusetts:
Religious liberty and freedom of conscience (i.e., the freedom to oppose homosexuality) will be repressed by the state in the name of “gay rights”; Illinois has already experienced this under our “Civil Unions” law [see the case of the Walders' bed-and-breakfast in Paxton, IL]. Despite the current bill being amended to protect churches and religious institutions, business owners — even devout Christians — who cater to weddings (such as banquet hall owners and photographers) could be forced to use their facilities or expertise to celebrate homosexual “marriages”;
Liberal teachers, especially in public schools, will be emboldened to promote homosexual relationships to students in the classroom; homosexual teachers will be given a platform to discuss their “marriages” and to model homosexuality as normal, natural and good to students. Parents will have a harder time stopping the promotion of homosexuality in schools;
Homosexual “sex ed” will gain ground in Illinois schools. Under the radical egalitarian idea that all relationships are morally “equal” and worthy of marriage, “safer gay sex” will be taught non-judgmentally alongside (normal) heterosexual sex. “Abstinence until marriage” (which regrettably is not the norm but only the ideal for most Illinois health classrooms) would apply to homosexual- and bisexual- as well as “straight” students — despite the reality that all homosexual sex is inherently immoral. High-risk and unnatural practices like anal sex will be mainstreamed in our schools. (Could teaching the truth that sex between men is linked disproportionately to HIV and various sexually-transmitted diseases lead to charges of “anti-gay discrimination”?) And deviant lesbian sex will be taught for girls who in the future might “marry” a woman.
Businessmen will be forced to recognize and subsidize their employees’ immoral same-sex “marriages”; a form of this is already happening under Illinois’ “Civil Unions” law;
Society will be corrupted as unequal things are treated as equal; children will be further confused as the law (which is a teacher, as the saying goes) creates a Brave New Morality that officially “weds” sinful, unnatural and changeable behavior to the noble and life-sustaining institution of marriage;
Homosexual activists will be energized to use the homosexual “marriage” law to pressure citizens to approve of their lifestyle and step up their crusade to stigmatize, demonize and discredit pro-family Christians and moral opponents of homosexuality. Groups like AFTAH that embrace wholesome, godly morality will be vilified as “hateful and bigoted.” And, as we have witnessed in Massachusetts, the push for ever more extreme “LGBT rights” would be propelled by enactment of “same-sex marriage” — including “transgender” activism in schools.
Legalized homosexual “marriage” will help “normalize” homosexual adoption, thus consigning greater numbers of innocent children to be raised in households that are motherless or fatherless by design.
See also this excellent report, “What Same-Sex ‘Marriage’ Has Done to Massachusetts,” by my friends at MassResistance to learn what’s headed our way if Illinois politicians continue to pander to the state’s powerful Homosexual Lobby. Thank you for standing up for natural marriage! God bless you. – Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.org
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AFTAH Interviews Lobbyist Ralph Rivera on Threat of Homosexual ‘Marriage’ Bill in Illinois
[NOTE: this interview occurred BEFORE the Illinois homosexual "marriage" bill, SB10, was amended prior to passage Feb. 14. The amended bill precludes churches and religious institutions from being forced to host homosexual "marriage" celebrations in their building. However, this amendment applies only to explicitly religious institutions; Christian- and other moral-minded business-owners could still be forced to host homosexual "marriage" ceremonies and related celebrations under the bill despite their deeply-felt opposition to "gay marriage." -- Peter LaBarbera]
This interview [click HERE to listen] with Illinois pro-family lobbyist Ralph Rivera was conducted on February 4, 2013. Rivera is a lobbyist for the Illinois Family Institute – which is sponsoring a Defend Marriage Lobby Day against the homosexual “marriage” bill in Springfield on Wednesday, Feb. 20th. Along with AFTAH President Peter LaBarbera and co-host John Kirkwood (of Grace Gospel Fellowship church), Rivera discusses the pro-homosexual-”marriage” bill looming in the state’s General Assembly. (The Illinois Senate is reportedly slated for a floor vote on the bill on Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14.)
Rivera explains the bill’s threat to religious liberty — e.g., how in its original draft (likely to be amended) it would force churches and religious institutions that rent their facilities to the public to host homosexual “weddings.” There is also a discussion of how legalized “gay marriage” effectively forces pro-homosexual ”lessons” into public schools. In addition, the three discuss the Boy Scouts of America’s proposed change allowing openly homosexual Scoutmasters and Scouts. Rivera is also a longtime pro-life lobbyist for Illinois Citizens for Life.
HOW TO LISTEN: This is an mp3 file, supported in most operating systems by Windows Media Player, Quick Time and/or I-Tunes. Real Player is not supported and there may be difficulty when attempting to listen with it. Left click once on the link below to play. (Please be patient, depending upon the speed of your internet connection it may take a moment to load.) OR right click the link then “save target as” to download the whole show.
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Knight exposes New York Times bias on Uganda Anti-Homosexuality law
Grove City College professor Warren Throckmorton -- who is on record affirming homosexuality as "natural, normal and healthy" despite the College's biblical faith charter -- has joined homosexual activists in crusading against Uganda's proposed Anti-Homosexuality law. Perhaps Throckmorton, who has lost his faith in the ability of Jesus Christ to help "homosexuals" leave the lifestyle, could learn something from the more biblically faithful Ugandans.
TAKE ACTION: contact Grove City College HERE and GCC President Richard G. Jewell (rgjewell@gcc.edu; 724-458-2500) and request a written explanation as to why they employ an activist professor who undermines the Bible’s clear teachings on homosexuality as a changeable sin (and not a natural “orientation”).
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Folks, I’ve been trying to avoid the Ugandan “Culture War” on homosexuality because I figure we’re busy enough with our own here in the USA. But that hasn’t stopped American homosexual activists and fellow travelers like Professor Warren Throckmorton of the “evangelical” Grove City College from insinuating themselves into the Ugandan situation. (Sadly, Warren has lost his faith in the ability of God to radically change homosexuals through Christ, and now busily works — even in Uganda! — to promote the faithless and disheartening message that most “gays and lesbians” cannot change their basic “orientation”; see his Uganda Independent column in which he makes that assertion HERE.)
Here’s the question I keep asking myself about the Uganda controversy: just what is it that qualifies the United States of America to lecture the Ugandans about homosexuality? Is it our public policy that enshrines immoral sexual behavior (oops: “sexual orientation”) and gender confusion (er…”gender identity and expression”) as a “civil right”? Is it our homosexual “marriage” laws that make a mockery of this divine institution (laws about which Prof. Throckmorton is curiously silent)? How about our pro-homosexuality educational propaganda in K-12 schools that corrupts young students’ minds in the name of “tolerance”? Or the 24/7 “gay bathhouses” and sex clubs that proliferate in urban centers across the United States to facilitate quick-and-easy (and anonymous) deviant sexual hook-ups? (“Come to America: where you can have all the safe sodomy you want! Discounts for students (no joke) and free condoms available for your perverted pleasure!”)
So why won’t the government move to close down “gay” sex clubs and teach about the special dangers of homosexual sex in schools?
Close down the gay sex clubs? Homosexual sex is dangerous — the CDC says “gay” and “bi” men are 50 times more likely than other groups to have HIV. And yet homosexual sex clubs flourish across the country. At left is Steamworks, a Chicago homosexual bathhouse where men go for anonymous sex with other men. This is a photo taken at the 2005 “Market Days” street fair, at which Steamworks advertises itself like any other business. Why doesn’t the government move to close down such perversion centers as public health hazards, given the overwhelming evidence of the dangers of male homosexual sex?
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So much for gay “equality.” The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) — the U.S. government agency tasked with guarding Americans’ health — has finally put a number on the massively increased HIV risk associated with “men who have sex with men” (MSM): “gay” and “bi” men are 50 times more likely to have HIV. This does not mean that the Obama administration, like the Bush administration before it, will take some tough, politically incorrect steps necessary to prevent AIDS — like closing down homosexual bathhouses and gay (male) sex clubs in major cities, and educating teenagers on the hugely disproportionate health risks associated with homosexual sex. The relentless pandering by federal, state and local governments to “gay” activists even as these same agencies fight diseases specifically linked to homosexual sex is one of the greatest public policy follies of our time — indeed, of history itself.
The issue in this ongoing “culture war” is not the cause of homosexual “orientation” — or merely the legality of “same-sex marriage.” It’s homosexual behavior itself — and whether government should promote it or discourage it, or be neutral. I say discourage it, since the evidence keeps pouring in that conduct which has been proscribed as immoral down through centuries of Judeo-Christian tradition is also highly dangerous. Now if the CDC will only stop blabbering on about “homophobia” and start telling the truth — that the rectum is not a sexual organ, after all, and that we must take tough measures against “gay” promiscuity — America will become a healthier place. — Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.com
CDC reports hard data at National HIV Prevention Conference
By DYANA BAGBY, Washington Blade
Aug. 28, 2009
ATLANTA — Gay and bisexual men account for half of new HIV infections in the U.S. and have AIDS at a rate more than 50 times greater than other groups, according to Centers for Disease Control & Prevention data presented at the National HIV Prevention Conference this week in Atlanta.
Dr. Amy Lansky of the CDC presented research at the Aug. 24 plenary in which the CDC estimated in the U.S. there were 692.2 new HIV cases in 2007 per 100,000 men who have sex with men.
Tom Dart, Sheriff of Cook County, Illinois, shows his support for the homosexual agenda by fielding a float and marching in the 2009 Chicago Gay Pride Parade (June 28, 2009). Ten minutes later in the parade, a radical leftist homosexual organization holds up a banner that reads, “Gay Pride Means Fight Cops.” Note that the faces of the young men holding up the cop-hating banner are covered with Intifada-like headdresses. More description is after the jump and under the video ….
Temple U. Professor Dr. Marc Lamont Hill (left), a frequent guest on FOX News, believes Americans are “homophobic” because most still don’t like to see homosexuality (compared to heterosexuality) on TV or the big screen. We say Prof. Hill should get off his liberal high horse and stop lecturing Americans for their normal reaction to unnatural and immoral behavior. Lamont can’t change his blackness, while many ex-”gay” men and women have left their old homosexual life behind. In the Fall, Lamont will move to Columbia University.
…. I caught the tail end of the segment on tonight’s Red Eye where Prof. Marc Lamont Hill was lecturing us about “homophobia” – comparing gay sexual content with straight sexual content. So, does the ever-expanding definition of that tendentious term now cover all those who don’t want to see two men kissing on TV, or those who recoil at two guys engaged in “gay” foreplay on the big screen? Then guess what: we’re all “homophobes” now except for a small percentage of homosexuals and straight “progressives.” (Note that use of the latter term is curiously conditional on labeling as “progress” the embrace of aberrant sex linked disproportionately to STDs, including HIV; the CDC reports that a full 71 percent of male HIV cases in 2005 were linked to MSM, or “men having sex with men”: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/msm/resources/factsheets/msm.htm.)
How condescending and pompous of Dr. Hill to peer into each of our hearts and minds and diagnose us with irrational fear (“phobia”). I didn’t see the rest of the segment — could you please post it online? — but please, please, don’t tell me that FOX is now joining the legions of pseudo-moralists who judge anyone who doesn’t celebrate homosexuality or cheerlead for “same-sex marriage” as somehow fearful, bigoted and hateful.
The following was sent out March 10 by Scott Lively, founder of Abiding Truth Ministries and its affiliated website, www.defendthefamily.com. It has been fascinating to watch the homosexual activists — and their new, unexpected ally, Warren Throckmorton of Grove City College — seek to make a huge controversy over the illegality of homosexual acts in Uganda and the call at this conference to substitute reparative (ex-”gay”) therapy for incarceration. (Note in bold below how Lively says they distorted his advice to the Ugandans.) Perhaps the “queer” ideologues and their misguided fellow travelers ought to reflect on the massive crisis that legal and celebrated homosexuality has caused here in the United States of America — including hundreds of thousands of premature deaths linked to deviant sexual behavior — before lecturing the poor Ugandans, who are attempting to maintain a pro-Christian-morality public policy (what a concept).
At AFTAH, we preach Christian mercy and have denounced Talibanesque capital punishment for homosexuals in countries like Iran. But we also believe that if states and localities here in America (and governments abroad) wish to ban sodomy, they have every right to do so — notwithstanding polemical U.S. Supreme Court decisions inventing newfangled “constitutional rights” and influenced by inaccurate homosexual activist amicus briefs. We’ll have more on the Throckmorton controversy (see his Christianity-defying, pro-homosexuality 2007 interview quotes HERE) in the coming days, including Lively’s public call on Throckmorton to repent. — Peter LaBarbera, www.aftah.com
P.S. I wish Warren would cease his gossipy, online correspondence with activists committed to aberrant, ungodly sexuality and think about the answer to this: How many American men would still be alive today had they never practiced the sin of sodomy?
Folks, I e-mail back-and-forth frequently with “Gerald,” a committed critic of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality. Below, Gerald reacts to our piece, reprinted from the Urban Dictionary, on the definition of “Power Bottom” (yuck). Per the usual, AFTAH received the kill the messenger (or maybe mock the messenger) treatment from “gay” apologists like Jeremy Hooper, a New York City blogger. The poor homosexual activists, their minds reprobate and sold out to sexual sin, can’t understand our purpose: to expose the real (destructive and wicked) behaviors associated with homosexuality lifestyles (and yes, there are many different lifestyles, not one “gay lifestyle”).
We post items like this because the public discussion about homosexuality has moved so far away from the actual behaviors associated with homosexuality. We’re trying to bring people back to the reality of what we oppose — and away from euphemistic abstractions (e.g., “gay civil rights” and “marriage equality”). Try this, painful as it is: go back and read the “‘Power Bottom’ Defined” post and see if you don’t gain a better understanding of why God through His Word pronounces homosexual acts “detestable.” See if you don’t perceive homosexuality as more about “human wrongs” than “human rights.” Only a person committed to practicing or justifying deviance, or a zealous libertine, can’t see it. (And yes, we also oppose heterosexual anal “sex” — and lesbian-lesbian simulated anal “sex”: there’s not much to be said for imitating male homosexual sodomy, a causative factor for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases.)
The dangers of “men having sex with men” (MSM) should be obvious to all
By Peter LaBarbera
In the world of proud, American, male homosexuality, there is great denial of the linkage between homosexual behavior and disease, and even early death. Confronted with evidence of the disproportionate connection between male homosexuality and disease — evidence so clear even a child could comprehend it — “gay” activists and their liberal enablers often respond by talking about how “heterosexuals also get STDs,” or how “heterosexuals are dying of AIDS in Africa,” etc. Their pat answers help them rationalize a decidedly “queer” ideology that celebrates unnatural sexual identities and lifestyles defined by deviant sex practices that are actually quite dangerous.
Americans for Truth
P.O. Box 5522
Naperville, IL 60567-5522
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[NOTE: this interview occurred BEFORE the Illinois homosexual "marriage" bill, SB10, was amended prior to passage Feb. 14. The amended bill precludes churches and religious institutions from being forced to host homosexual "marriage" celebrations in their building. However, this amendment applies only to explicitly religious institutions; Christian- and other moral-minded business-owners could still be forced to host homosexual "marriage" ceremonies and related celebrations under the bill despite their deeply-felt opposition to "gay marriage." -- Peter LaBarbera]
