Dr. Albert Mohler addresses the recent ruling by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America regarding their reluctant expulsion of openly homosexual “pastor” Bradley Schmeling from St. John’s Lutheran Church in Atlanta. The congregation’s “Trial Update” page declares Schmeling’s homosexual relationship with Darin Easler, a former ELCU “pastor” now seeking ordination in the apostate United Church of Christ. Unfortunately, while recognizing that Schmeling is in violation of church policy, the committee also suggests that the policy should be changed to accommodate openly and practicing homosexual clergy.

Listen online as Dr. Mohler encourages “pitchfork rebellion” — the laity standing firmly for Truth:

Feb 9, 2007

Homosexuality in the Church: Is It Time for a New Reformation?

Also, Dr. Mohler recommends a book called Sex and the Supremacy of Christ, edited by John Piper and Justin Taylor:

From ‘Rhode’ Rage: Ocean State Recognizes Mass. Gay Marriages, published Feb 23, 2007, by Family Research Council:

Based on the political preference of one man, Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch (pictured left), the state will now recognize same-sex unions performed in Massachusetts. In a letter this week, Lynch argued that because Rhode Island has not banned gay marriage, there is “no reason to deny recognition” of gay unions. Although his opinion is not binding, many of the state’s agencies are expected to follow his advice. Although he says his family situation had “zero impact” on the decision, many speculate that Lynch had personal reasons for his opinion. A week before he issued his report, Lynch attended the same-sex “wedding” of his own sister in the Bay State. This abuse of power should sound the alarm for Rhode Island’s pro-family voters and spark a movement to introduce a marriage protection amendment so that the state’s position on marriage is no longer in doubt.
Additional Resources: R.I. May Recognize Gay Unions From Mass.

By Peter LaBarbera

Homosexual Rep. Greg Harris (D-Chicago) pushes counterfeit “marriage.”

Well, we’ve been warning you that the homosexual movement wants to make Illinois the “Massachusetts of the Midwest.” Now it’s official. The state’s only “openly gay” representative, Greg Harris (D-Chicago), has submitted a bill to legalize “same-sex marriage” in the Land of Lincoln. Harris sneakily calls his bill the “Religious Freedom and Marriage Fairness Act” –– despite evidence from Massachusetts that legal “gay marriage” leads to stepped-up discrimination against religious institutions opposed to homosexuality.

TAKE ACTION: If you are an Illinois resident, call your state representative and state senator and politely urge them to:

• OPPOSE HB 1615, the radical redefinition of marriage proposed by new homosexual State Rep. Greg Harris (D-Chicago); click HERE to find your legislators (the page works best if you know your 9-digit zip), and click HERE to view the bill, which would strip out the common-sense prohibition in Illinois law against marriages “between two individuals of the same sex.” You can call the Illinois Capitol Switchboard at 217-782-2000.
• SUPPORT HJRCA 1, the pro-traditional-marriage constitutional amendment offered by State Rep. Dave Reis (R) –– which has languished in the IL General Assembly for years due to the Democrats’ subservience to the state’s powerful “gay” lobby. (In Illinois, a constitutional amendment requires a three-fifths vote by the legislature, followed by a three-fifths popular vote.)

Also, please consider making a financial gift to Protect Marriage Illinois (PMI). We don’t normally solicit funds for other organizations, but PMI urgently needs your help as it gears up for another petition drive to place a pro-traditional marriage advisory question on the 2008 Illinois ballot. PMI’s ballot measure would enable Illinois voters to call on the General Assembly to pass a constitutional Marriage Protection Amendment (like Reis’ amendment above). Make your check out to Protect Marriage Illinois and send it to: PMI, PO Box 419, Wheaton, IL 60189; or go to PMI’s website and click the “Make a Donation” button. (Gifts to PMI are not tax-deductible.)

Background
Homosexual activists, being mostly on the Left, know how politics works: they will strive to gradually build support for legalizing “gay marriage” in Illinois even if it takes decades. This is what they did before finally passing a pro-homosexual “sexual orientation” bill (which also covers the gender-confused) in Illinois in 2005.

Conservatives and people of faith, too, have to learn to think long-term. We must retain the goal of repealing all “sexual orientation” laws –– in Illinois and across the nation –– since they are incompatible with the basic American freedoms of religion, conscience and association. And we must act to protect marriage as between a man and a woman at the state and federal constitutional levels.

In his odd legislative biography, Rep. Harris –– who replaced another homosexual Chicago Democrat –– states, almost proudly, that he is the “only openly gay member of the Legislature and openly a person with AIDS.” (Please read this interesting first-hand testimonial about Harris’ sad life and pray for him if you are so moved.)

Indeed, behavior that runs contrary to nature carries a heavy physical price. When “gay” activists talk about “marriage equality,” we should answer: same-sex relationships do not deserve to be treated as “equal” to marriage because they are not — far from it. True marriage serves society and mankind by ordering the sexes and producing future generations and providing stable, mother-father homes for children.

Conversely, society has no stake in legalizing “gay marriage,” which would reward unhealthy and changeable behavior and have such ill side-effects as facilitating intentionally fatherless or motherless homosexual adoptions.

Giving immoral homosexual relationships all the rights and benefits of marriage also sends a terrible message to young people, and certainly will lead to Christians and religious people being punished for “anti-gay” discrimination. A homosexual “marriage” or “civil union” law would be a huge stepping stone toward forcing small businesses –– even religiously-owned ones such as day care centers –– to provide marital-type benefits to homosexual employees even if they oppose subsidizing that lifestyle.

And how long will it be before a church or pastor is sued for refusing to perform a marriage ceremony for a homosexual couple — HB 1615’s title notwithstanding?

We must do all we can to shore up real marriage by encouraging citizens to value it more and by making divorces tougher to get. Radically redefining marriage to include homosexuality would only erode this great institution further.

TAKE ACTION — First, contact IL State Rep Greg Harris
and express your opposition to this legislation.

Then contact your own representative and ask them to OPPOSE this bill.
You can find your legislator’s contact information HERE.

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Excerpted from Lawmaker: Legalize Gay Marriages, by Doug Finke, published Feb 22, 2007, by PJ Star:

State Rep. plans to introduce bill aiming to equalize rights

A Chicago Democrat wants Illinois to be the second state to legalize gay marriages.

State Rep. Greg Harris (pictured left) plans to introduce legislation today to permit same-sex couples to get married. Although four states recognize civil unions among gays, only Massachusetts provides for gay marriages.

“It would extend the same rights and obligations of marriage to same-sex couples in Illinois as are previously enjoyed, or not enjoyed, by heterosexual couples,” Harris said. “If you look at recent polls … people of Illinois very thoroughly understand that same-sex couples deserve the same rights and benefits” as heterosexual couples.

David Smith, executive director of the Illinois Family Institute, disagreed…

Harris, who is gay and represents a district with a large homosexual population, acknowledged that pushing for legalized gay marriages rather than civil unions will be controversial.

“It is undoubtedly true that the word marriage is a very emotionally charged term, so there may have to be some negotiations on that,” he said. “From my community, we believe we should have the full, equal rights as our heterosexual siblings to marry who we choose, and we should call it marriage. We should not call it civil union.”

Continue reading at PJ Star…

Mike Heath, Executive Director of the Christian Civic League of Maine since 1994, is a bona fide hero in the fight against “gay” activism and the normalization of homosexuality in the United States. Working with pro-family leaders, Heath fought back not not but two statewide “gay rights” laws in Maine. (In 2005, “sexual orientation” became law in the state, and now, as the thinking goes, the granting of one counterfeit “right” — same-sex “marriage” — must follow another.) Heath is serving Americans For Truth as an advisor. — Peter LaBarbera.

I’ve been doing this job too long. I can remember when leftist activists were screaming about how there was no agenda, and there was especially no effort underway to persuade society to accept sodomy-based “marriage.” Those lies started to become muted when Vermont used their “sexual orientation” law to force a new concept on civilized society called “civil unions.” That is another euphemism for sodomy-based “marriage.” Massachusetts, of course, followed soon after by discovering that the puritan Christian John Adams actually wrote sodomy-based “marriage” into the Commonwealth’s constitution. Imagine that. No … don’t.

Nobody is surprised now when “gays” use euphemisms. I think people stopped being surprised by anything these folks say years ago. They are master manipulators, bobbing and weaving with their words and phrases. It’s amazing to most of us that the Harvards and Yales have fallen for this tripe hook, line and sinker ….

By Peter LaBarbera

TAKE ACTION — Call your U.S. Representative and Senators (202-224-3121) and politely convey your opposition to the new “Hate Crimes” bill that includes “sexual orientation” (HR 254), and ENDA, the “Employment Nondiscrimination Act.” Also, call or write President Bush (202-456-1414) and urge him to veto these two top “gay’-priority bills if they are passed by the Democratic Congress.

If enacted, HR 254 and ENDA would federalize “sexual orientation” law, creating the long-term foundation for widespread anti-religious tyranny in our nation in the name of pro-“gay” tolerance. To see two good ads featuring victims of Pennsylvania’s “hate crimes” law, click on www.stophatecrimesnow.com. Events in Great Britain should warn us about the grave dangers ahead…

Blair: ‘Gay Rights’ trump religious freedom

When homosexual activists and “gay equality” win, Christians and religious freedom lose. So do children who need a mom and a dad, as the world is witnessing again in Great Britain.

Prime Minister Tony Blair unwittingly cut to the nub of how “sexual orientation” laws inevitably destroy religious freedom when he said that Britain’s “gay”-inclusive nondiscrimination laws should not exempt Catholic adoption agencies that refuse, for reasons of faith, to place children in homosexual households:

“There is no place in our society for discrimination. That’s why I support the right of gay couples to apply to adopt like any other couple. And that way there can be no exemptions for faith-based adoption agencies offering public funded services from regulations that prevent discrimination.”

Under Blair’s “compromise,” Catholic adoptions agencies will have 21 months to comply with the “sexual orientation” laws, but some say they would rather close down than violate their religious beliefs, BBC News reports.

Christians are fast becoming second-class citizens in Western nations that have bought into the ideology of homosexuality as a civil right. In Canada and France, legislators recently were fined for publicly criticizing homosexuality. In 2004, pastor Ake Green was jailed for a month for preaching –– in his small church in Borgholm, Sweden –– that homosexual behavior is an egregious yet forgivable sin. And recently, a British couple told how they were denied the chance to adopt because it was determined that their Christian faith might “prejudice” them against a homosexual child put in their care.

Britain’s “gay adoption” travesty parallels that which followed the triumph of homosexual “equality” and legal “same-sex marriage” in Massachusetts. Last year, Catholic Charities of Boston ceased all adoption operations in the state after being told that under Massachusetts’ pro-“gay” nondiscrimination law, only agencies that place children in homosexual-led households would get licensed by the state.

Catholic doctrine states that it is “gravely immoral” to put children in such homes:

As experience has shown, the absence of sexual complementarity in these [homosexual] unions creates obstacles in the normal development of children who would be placed in the care of such persons. They would be deprived of the experience of either fatherhood or motherhood. Allowing children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development. This is gravely immoral and in open contradiction to the principle, recognized also in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, that the best interests of the child, as the weaker and more vulnerable party, are to be the paramount consideration in every case.
Source: Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons”

But “gay rights” tramples religion in post-Christian England, where the government has lately even set out to prosecute “homophobic” speech. It is almost inconceivable that the same country that gave us the rule of law and limited government –– and powerfully gifted Christian preachers like George Whitfield who helped shape America –– now bows down to the homosexual revolution of organized sin masquerading as “civil rights.”

Queer, indeed.

“Breeders” Still Required
Sad as it is, this is a marketing story for the ages: in a few short decades, “gay liberation” activists went from including the notorious “man-boy love” group NAMBLA in their “pride” parades and mocking married couples as “breeders” –– to passing “sexual orientation” laws worldwide that put government officially in the role of defying Nature and Nature’s God, to quote our Declaration of Independence.

But is it progress to empower a legal and cultural revolution that criminalizes the common sense idea that society should put the welfare of children first by favoring natural parenting (mom and dad) over an experimental version (dad and male lover) that models perversion to innocent children in their own home?

Let’s be clear: Nature discriminates against homosexuality. Same-sex arrangements can never be “equal” to the God-ordained institutions of marriage and family. They cannot produce children by themselves. Homosexual partners cannot acquire a child without involving heterosexual procreation in some way.

Yep, those irritating “breeders” come in handy once in a while.

Excerpted from the Jan 23, 2007, press release from REAL Women of Canada:

On July 17, 2006, REAL Women of Canada laid a complaint with the Canadian Judicial Council about the conduct of Ontario Chief Justice Roy McMurtry in the same-sex marriage case, which was handed down in June 2003. We stated in our complaint that his actions in that case gave rise to an apprehension of bias for a number of reasons, including the fact that Chief Justice McMurtry’s daughter was a lesbian living in a homosexual union at the time the case was argued…

Further, two weeks subsequent to the court’s decision, the Chief Justice partied with two of the litigants and a photograph of the Chief Justice and the litigants together is widely available on the internet.

In the Judicial Council’s letter to REAL Women dated December 19, 2006, the Council claimed:

… the sexual orientation of a judge’s children, and indeed the fact that a judge’s children are married or living in a common law relationship are not, in Chief Justice Scott’s view, indicative of any bias on the part of a judge.

The Council, however, was well aware that the issue before the Court was whether same-sex unions should be legally recognized, i.e., whether they should be recognized and acquire legal rights. That is, the case dealt specifically with the legal rights of same-sex unions – a matter which directly related to Judge McMurtry’s daughter’s own personal relationship…

The Council, however, concluded that there is no basis to support the view that Chief Justice McMurtry should have recused himself on the basis of the personal relationship of members of his family.

This conclusion, however, flies directly in the face of the guidelines of the Canadian Judicial Council set out in its document, “Ethical Principles for Judges,” (1998), Chapter 6:

Conflicts of Interest

• Judges should disqualify themselves in any case in which they believe they will be unable to judge impartially.
• Judges should disqualify themselves in any case in which they believe that a reasonable, fair minded and informed person would have a reasoned suspicion of conflict of interest between a judge’s personal interest (or that of a judge’s immediate family or close friends or associates) and a judge’s duty.
• The potential for conflict of interest arises when the personal interest of the judge (or of those close to him or her) conflicts with the judge’s duty to adjudicate impartially. Judicial impartiality is concerned both with impartiality in fact and impartiality in the perception of a reasonable, fair minded and informed person.
• … a judge … should disqualify him or herself if aware of any interest or relationship which, to a reasonable, fair minded and informed person would give rise to reasoned suspicion of lack of impartiality.
• …a judge should disclose on the record anything which might support a plausible argument in favour of disqualification ….

It seems clear that the Judicial Council chose to ignore its own guidelines in order to protect Chief Justice McMurtry.

Continue reading at REAL Women of Canada…

Excerpted from Moscow Mayor Calls Gay Pride Parade Satanic, published Jan 29, 2007, by MosNews:

Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov said Monday he would never allow a gay parade to take place in Moscow despite pressure from the West, Russia’s RIA-Novosti news agency reports.

“Last year, Moscow came under unprecedented pressure to sanction the gay parade, which can be described in no other way than as Satanic,” Luzhkov said at the 15th Christmas educational readings in the Kremlin Palace.

“We did not let the parade take place then, and we are not going to allow it in the future,” said Luzhkov who has been in office since 1992.

…Luzhkov thanked the attending head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II, for his support at a time when, he said, the West is exerting considerable pressure on Moscow authorities and trying to promote gay relationships under the cover of creativity and freedom of expression.

“Religious thinkers throughout the world have said that the West has reached a crisis of faith. Some European nations bless single-sex marriages and introduce sexual guides in schools,” Luzhkov said. “Such things are a deadly moral poison for children.”

Continue reading at MosNews…