Note: we apologize to Amy Contrada for wrongly attributing her critique of Massachusetts Family Institute’s pro-marriage-amendment strategy in the Bay State to Brian Camenker. Here is an updated version of her compelling piece on the MassResistance blog:

VoteOnMarriage Failed the People, June 14, 2007

By Amy Contrada, MassResistance.org 

http://massresistance.blogspot.com/2007/06/voteonmarriage-failure-predicted-here.html

The VoteOnMarriage amendment went down in flames today, with an even more appalling result than anyone could have imagined. Prayers without compromising the truth may work. Prayers when the truth is compromised cannot.

VoteOnMarriage’s campaign failed because the debate was boiled down to “letting the people vote” and ensuring “children have both a mother and a father.” But it left out the important truth about homosexual “marriage”: It’s based on immoral and unhealthy sexual perversions. Morality and public health needed to be part of the debate.

But VoteOnMarriage (and its prime actor, Massachusetts Family Institute) never spoke about these issues. Why didn’t they say plainly that disordered sexuality cannot become an accepted basis for “marriage”? And after compromising with [the then Massachusetts Republican governor], they could hardly address preserving the integrity of our constitution, and the common accepted meaning of the words therein.

VoteOnMarriage depleted our side’s energy and financial resources in pursuit of a terribly flawed amendment. We’ve warned about their failing strategy (“Be polite! Dialogue with the other side!”) and compromised amendment wording for two years now. We said: “Don’t feed the bears! They’ll just come back for more and more. They’ll smell your weakness. And they’ll eat you alive.”

But VoteOnMarriage said they had a good relationship with MassEquality. They spoke to the homosexual newspaper Bay Windows, badmouthed MassResistance to them and to people on Beacon Hill (including the last several governors) and to pro-family conservatives around the nation. They rigidly controlled what people said in their demonstrations, including their signs. It was a top-down movement, no real grassroots sentiments allowed. Time and again, as we walked through the VoteOnMarriage demonstrators, we would hear individuals corrected if they stepped out of line, said something “inappropriate” or with a little too much emotion.

Their strategy of endless compromise with evil, their attempted appeasement of those destroying the minds of children, and their puerile censorship of pro-family rhetoric has no origin in the Old or New Testament, and anyone who thinks otherwise has subconsciously blacked out the most powerful parts of the Holy Scriptures.

We hear from an MFI insider that they plan to regroup! How do you regroup with failed leadership, and a failed vision? Just a week ago, we heard that another MFI insider said the homosexual lobby was tiring out! They are detached from reality. They don’t understand the foe we’re facing.

When leaders fail to achieve their goal, they should be fired. VoteOnMarriage and the Massachusetts Family Institute have been discredited, they have failed the faithful pro-family people of Massachusetts. So we say to them: Don’t ask for another penny, another drop of our blood and sweat.

 Doesn’t e-Harmony.com and its Christian founder have a fundamental right to promote traditional marriages between a man and a woman — and not cater to unnatural “unions”? Will this and all private American companies be forced to promote the homosexual agenda? Above are happy normal couples brought together by e-Harmony’s online dating service.

TAKE A MINUTE TO SUPPORT e-HARMONY.com and respectfully ask that they support real marriage by not leaving open the possibility of providing “matches” for homosexuals. Write them via their Contact page or call their corporate offices in Pasadena, California, at 626-795-4814 (hit #9 when you get the machine). Their snail-mail address is e-Harmony.com, P.O. Box 60157, Pasadena, CA 91116.
Also, call or write your U.S. Representative and Senators (202-224-3121; http://www.congress.org/) and urge them to oppose H.R. 2015, the “Employment Nondiscrimination Act (ENDA), the pro-homosexual/pro-trannsexual employment bill — which will only embolden “gay” harassment lawsuits against tradition-minded companies.

Below is a Reuters news story describing the homosexual activist lobby’s latest attack on the freedom to be moral. There are plenty of places offering “match” services for homosexual couples — just try any (liberal) “City Paper,” where all sorts of disordered unions can be arranged. But no, e-Harmony must bend to the tiny minority of homosexual militants who have no regard for others’ liberties — including your freedom to live out your religious beliefs as you see fit.

We hope eHarmony.com, a private business run by a born-again Christian, Dr. Neil Clark Warren, does not cave in to this outrageous demand by lesbian Linda Carlson. (It appears that by keeping open the possibility of including “gay” matches, eHarmony is moving away from Warren’s assertion to ex-homosexual Christian activist Steve Bennett that he would never consider such a thing; also, see Warren’s 2005 NPR interview HERE.)

If eHarmony capitulates, it will only encourage other lawsuits. Who’s next? Christian-owned day care centers? Summer camps run by orthodox Jews? The message coming from the liberal, pro-homosexual activists here is simple: you can have your beliefs in your church or synagogue or home (for now…) but don’t you dare try to live them out in the public square.

They are telling us: retreat into your church closet. All of America — our schools, corporations, and our laws — must now affirm homosexuality.

It’s become all too clear: no special interest group threatens our basic freedoms like the homosexual and gender confusion (“transgender”) lobbies. They are the new legal bullies on the block, and can only be stopped if good people lose their apathy and their fear of being Politically Incorrect — and say “No” to this oppressive, unhealthy agenda. Call (626-795-4814) or write eHarmony today!

May 31, 2007
 
eHarmony sued in California for excluding gays
 
By Jill Serjeant

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The popular online dating service eHarmony was sued on Thursday for refusing to offer its services to gays, lesbians and bisexuals.

A lawsuit alleging discrimination based on sexual orientation was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of Linda Carlson, who was denied access to eHarmony because she is gay.

Lawyers bringing the action said they believed it was the first lawsuit of its kind against eHarmony, which has long rankled the gay community with its failure to offer a “men seeking men” or “women seeking women” option.

They were seeking to make it a class action lawsuit on behalf of gays and lesbians excluded from the dating service.

eHarmony was founded in 2000 by evangelical Christian Dr. Neil Clark Warren and had strong early ties with the influential religious conservative group Focus on the Family.

By Peter LaBarbera 

TAKE ACTION:  Call the Congress (202-224-3121) or use e-mail to urge your Representative and Senators to reject ENDA (H.R. 2015) and the insanity of forcing business across the nation to accommodate and subsidize gender confusion in the name of “civil rights.” Also, call President Bush (202-456-1414) or e-mail him at comments@whitehouse.gov and urge him to veto the “trans”-affirming ENDA, along with the “Hate Crimes” bill (H.R. 1592) that his aides have indicated will likely be vetoed.  

At bottom is the religious exemption language for H.R. 2015, ENDA, the Employment Nondiscrimination Act, which would use federal government powers to ban “employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.” (Emphasis is added below.) ENDA would apply to businesses with 15 or more employees.

We at Americans For Truth generally oppose the concept of religious exemptions to pro-homosexual laws because religious people alone should not be able to exercise their freedoms to oppose aberrant sexual behavior. What about secular-minded citizens who also believe that homosexual acts are immoral and unhealthy and shouldn’t be promoted as OK to kids?

Regardless, note the careful circumscription of the religious “exemptions” under ENDA. According to paragraph “b” below, the law would not apply to employees in a religiously-oriented business whose job is linked to “doctrine.” So, then, can we assume that in “partially exempt” religious organizations, the law WOULD apply to employees (e.g., a secretary) whose jobs are NOT directly linked to teaching religion or doctrine?

In my state of Illinois, the ACLU used similar language to argue along these lines: a Bible-believing church would have full freedom to hire and fire its pastors but it COULD fall under the state’s “sexual orientation/gender identity” law (our state’s version of ENDA) if it fired a janitor who announced he was homosexual — because the janitor’s job does not deal with church “doctrine.”

Can you see the immense capacity for “gay” troublemaking and harassing lawsuits under this proposed legislation? Even the threat of federal lawsuits, especially in states like Illinois that have their own “sexual orientation” laws, could inhibit morality-based groups from acting on their belief that homosexuality is wrong.

 

I suppose that is precisely the goal of the homosexual and “transgender” lobbies with regard to ENDA.

And remember: the discussion above is only for explicitly religious organizations. Under ENDA, an orthodox Jew who owns his own secular-oriented business (with 15 or more employees) would be out of luck if he endeavored to not hire homosexuals or transsexuals based on his own personal religious beliefs. Once again, “gay” (and “trans”) rights would supersede religious freedoms.

The following is ENDA’s (H.R. 2015) language pertaining to religious exemptions:

SEC. 6. EXEMPTION FOR RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS.
(a) In general.—This Act shall not apply to any of the employment practices of a religious corporation, association, educational institution, or society which has as its primary purpose religious ritual or worship or the teaching or spreading of religious doctrine or belief.

 

(b) Certain employees.—For any religious corporation, association, educational institution, or society that is not wholly exempt under subsection (a), this Act shall not apply with respect to the employment of individuals whose primary duties consist of teaching or spreading religious doctrine or belief, religious governance, supervision of a religious order, supervision of persons teaching or spreading religious doctrine or belief, or supervision or participation in religious ritual or worship.

 

(c) Conformity to religious tenets.—Under this Act, a religious corporation, association, educational institution, or society may require that applicants for, and employees in, similar positions conform to those religious tenets that such corporation, association, institution, or society declares significant. Under this Act, such a declaration by a religious corporation, association, educational institution or society stating which of its religious tenets are significant shall not be subject to judicial or administrative review. Any such declaration made for purposes of this Act shall be admissible only for proceedings under this Act.

The “gay” lobby has pried open a legal Pandora’s Box, that’s for sure. Once you “mainstream” one particular deviance, it’s very hard to keep the rest from asserting their “rights.” For years, homosexuality advocates mocked “slippery slope” arguments — hey, whatever it takes to achieve the Sexual Revolution, right? Now it turns out the pro-family conservatives were right. When even Time magazine concedes we’re in trouble, you know it’s bad.–Peter LaBarbera

LAWFUL INCEST MAY BE ON THE WAY
By Jeff Jacoby
The Boston Globe
Wednesday, May 2, 2007

(Link to article on Boston Globe website)

When the BBC invited me onto one of its talk shows recently to discuss the day’s hot topic — legalizing adult incest — I thought of Rick Santorum.

Back in 2003, as the Supreme Court was preparing to rule in Lawrence v. Texas, a case challenging the constitutionality of laws criminalizing homosexual sodomy, then-Senator Santorum caught holy hell for warning that if the law were struck down, there would be no avoiding the slippery slope.

“If the Supreme Court says you have the right to consensual sex within your home,” he told a reporter, “then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything.”

It was a commonsensical observation, though you wouldn’t have known it from the nail-spitting it triggered in some quarters. When the justices, voting 6-3, did in fact declare it unconstitutional for any state to punish consensual gay sex, the dissenters echoed Santorum’s point. “State laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity are . . . called into question by today’s decision,” Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the minority. That opinion too was scorned by the politically correct. But now Time magazine acknowledges: “It turns out the critics were right.”

Time’s attention, like the BBC’s, has been caught by the legal battles underway to decriminalize incest between consenting adults. An article last month by Time reporter Michael Lindenberger titled “Should Incest Be Legal?” highlights the case of Paul Lowe, an Ohio man convicted of incest for having sex with his 22-year-old stepdaughter. Lowe has appealed his conviction to the Supreme Court, making Lawrence the basis of his argument. In Lawrence , the court had ruled that people “are entitled to respect for their private lives” and that under the 14th Amendment, “the state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime.” If that was true for the adult homosexual behavior in Lawrence , why not for the adult incestuous behavior in the Ohio case?

The BBC program focused on the case of Patrick and Susan Stubing, a German brother and sister who live as a couple and have had four children together. Incest is a criminal offense in Germany , and Patrick has already spent more than two years in prison for having sex with his sister. The two of them are asking Germany ‘s highest court to abolish the law that makes incest illegal.

“Many people see it as a crime, but we’ve done nothing wrong,” Patrick told the BBC. “We are like normal lovers. We want to have a family.” They dismiss the conventional argument that incest should be banned because the children of close relatives have a higher risk of genetic defects. After all, they point out, other couples with known genetic risks aren’t punished for having sex. In any event, Patrick has had himself sterilized so that he cannot father any more children.

Some years back, I’d written about a similar case in Wisconsin — that of Allen and Patricia Muth, a brother and sister who fell in love as adults, had several children together, and were prosecuted, convicted, and imprisoned as a result. Following the Supreme Court’s decision in Lawrence , they appealed their conviction to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, where they lost. Lowe will probably lose too.

But the next Lowe or Muth to come along, or the one after that, may not lose. In Lawrence , it is worth remembering, the Supreme Court didn’t just invalidate all state laws making homosexual sodomy a crime. It also overruled its own decision just 17 years earlier (Bowers v. Hardwick, 1986) upholding such laws. If the court meant what it said in Lawrence — that states are barred from “making . . . private sexual conduct a crime” — it will not take that long for laws criminalizing incest to go by the board as well. Impossible? Outlandish? That’s what they used to say about normalizing homosexuality and legalizing same-sex [“marriage.”]

Parts of Europe are already heading down this road. In Germany , the Green Party is openly supporting the Stubings in their bid to decriminalize incest. “We must abolish a law that originated last century and today is useless,” party spokesman Jerzy Montag says. Incest is no longer a criminal offense in Belgium , Holland , and France . According to the BBC, Sweden even permits half-siblings to marry.

Your reaction to the prospect of lawful incest may be “Ugh, gross.” But personal repugnance is no replacement for moral standards. For more than 3,000 years, a code of conduct stretching back to Sinai has kept incest unconditionally beyond the pale. If sexual morality is jettisoned as a legitimate basis for legislation, personal opinion and cultural fashion are all that will remain. “Should Incest Be Legal?” Time asks. Over time, expect more and more people to answer yes.

By Chuck Colson, Breakpoint, Prison Fellowship 

The Gay Agenda and Schoolkids

Once upon a time there was a handsome young prince. When he grew up, he began searching for a wife, but could not find a princess he wanted to marry. One day, he met another prince—and fell in love. The two men married and lived happily ever after.

They must have been the only ones who did. When the fairy tale—which ended with the newly married “couple” kissing—was read to Massachusetts first graders, Christian parents were outraged.

Two sets of parents sued the Lexington school district, claiming that district officials violated both state law and their civil rights by allowing a teacher to read to their 6-year-olds a book that normalizes homosexual love and marriage.

Not surprisingly—this is Massachusetts, after all—federal judge Mark Wolf dismissed the lawsuit. Public schools, he wrote, are “entitled to teach anything that is reasonably related to the goals of preparing students to become engaged and productive citizens in our democracy.”

I guess it is not possible to become a productive citizen without embracing the teachings of radical gays.

Incredibly, the judge said parents did not even have a right to pull their kids from classes that discuss and depict homosexual behavior. Allowing kids to leave, the judge said, “could send the message that gays, lesbians, and the children of same-sex parents are inferior and, therefore, have a damaging effect on those students.”

This decision is so ghastly it is hard to know where to begin. Since when did parents not have the right to control what their children are exposed to when it comes to matters of sexuality? And what about the damaging effect on kids who are taught ideas that conflict with their parents’ teachings?

If the school district is really committed to teaching about all kinds of families, then why not give children a story about a prince who longs for another prince, realizes his longings are disordered, undergoes reparative therapy, and lives happily ever after—with a princess?

The real goal, of course, is normalizing homosexuality. The judge tipped his hand on this when he said that children should be taught to “respect” differences in sexual orientation.

The two families are appealing Judge Wolf’s decision, and we ought to be praying for their ultimate success. But we must also realize what is really going on here.

When it comes to sin, humans have been playing the denial game ever since the Fall. In Romans, Paul says that even pagans know God’s moral law because it is “written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness.”

That’s why it is not enough for homosexuals to be tolerated; in order to live with their own consciences, homosexuals demand unanimous assent that homosexuality is a moral good. And that means silencing those who believe that homosexuality is a disorder, and that homosexual behavior is a moral sin.

You and I must fight back when homosexuals attempt to promote gay “marriage” in public schools. But we must also reach out with compassion to those ensnared by disordered sexual desires.

The Bible teaches that sin—and a guilty conscience—can be erased only by the grace of God through faith in Christ.

More links to resources on this story can be found on Breakpoint’s website.

This is great, but the real “apology to the world” should come from Canada’s homosexual activists, who put their own misguided sexial affirmation goals above protecting traditional marriage and the welfare of children. Add to that their role in the destruction of freedom in Canada, which of course is sublimated to their selfish goal of forcing the acceptance of all things homosexual. — Peter LaBarbera

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

______________________________

Media Release:  REAL Women of Canada

REAL Women of Canada
“Women’s Rights Not at the Expense of Human Rights” 

NGO in SPECIAL consultative status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations

 Media Release

For immediate release, April 11, 2007

Apology for Canada’s Same-sex Marriage Legislation

It is necessary to apologize to the people of the world for the difficulties caused in other countries by the legislation in Canada which permits same-sex marriages. 

It is unfortunate that some foreign same-sex partners have come to Canada to participate in same-sex marriage ceremonies and subsequently applied to the courts in their own country to recognize this so-called Canadian marriage.  Canadian marriage law does not demand residency requirements and this is being used by activists to attempt to change the marriage laws in their own country. 

There are many Canadians who do not, and will not, accept the marriage of same-sex partners.  Such Canadians will continue to work to restore the traditional definition of marriage defined as being between a man and a woman only.  To do so is not to discriminate against same-sex partners, since their relationships are markedly different from those of opposite-sex relationships, regardless of what the law in Canada states.   

Linton: HB 1826 would “empty the institution of marriage of all substance” 

Memorandum

Date:  March 19, 2007

To:  Illinois pro-family groups, including Illinois Citizens for Life, Americans For Truth, Illinois Family Institute, CWA of Illinois, and Real Civil Rights Illinois

From: Paul Linton, Esq.

Re:  Analysis of Amendment No. 1 to House Bill 1826

Introduction

Amendment No. 1 to House Bill 1826, if enacted by the General Assembly, would create civil unions in Illinois for both same-sex and opposite-sex couples.  The Amendment would “deconstruct” the meaning of marriage in two vital respects:

First, it would allow same-sex couples to enjoy “all the same protections, benefits, and responsibilities under law . . . as are granted to spouses in a marriage.” § 105(a).  This is contrary to the longstanding public policy of Illinois (and, until very recently, every other State in the Union and every other country in the world) to confer such “protections, benefits, and responsibilities” only upon married couples who, by definition and the very nature of marriage, are opposite-sex. 

Second, it would allow opposite-sex couples to enjoy “all the same protections, benefits, and responsibilities under law . . . as are granted to spouses in a marriage,” § 105(a),  see also §§ 105(c), 106, 201, without actually being married, a legislative novelty that has not been adopted in any other State, including those States that have enacted civil unions statutes (Connecticut, New Jersey and Vermont) or their equivalent (California’s Domestic Partner Act).  Opposite-sex couples (who, of course, may marry under current law) are included for the twin purposes of diluting the meaning of marriage and blurring the distinction between opposite-sex and same-sex relationships (by calling them by the same name).

Amendment No. 1 would empty the institution of marriage of all substance, leaving only an empty form (i.e., the name, “marriage”) as a “consolation prize” for those who oppose same-sex “marriage.”  Marriage, however, is more than a name–it is an institution that is fundamental to the existence and continuity of societies throughout history, in all times and places.
 
Legal Land Mines

Apart from the public policy reasons for opposing Amendment No. 1, which are discussed below, there are legal reasons for opposing the Amendment, as well.

Earlier this week we explored the immorality of the homosexual practice of “rimming“; here we have a story of a man who likes to have “sex” with horses and deer. Disgusting, you say? Immoral? Why so? On what objective authority does our secular society still condemn bestiality? Isn’t it simply a personal, alternative choice?

The fact is that humans are hard-wired to distinguish normal, natural behaviors from depraved, wicked acts. God instilled man with a conscience whereby we know, intuitively and with confidence, that acts of righteousness evoke joy and that other acts are wicked and morally reprehensible…at least we recognize that until we start to rationalize, unless the conscience has been seared, hardened by sin’s deceitfulness. Nearly everyone understands that having “sex” with animals is appalling — there is no organized, multi-million dollar movement to advance the rights of those with a sexual proclivity for livestock (at least not yet), no claim that they were “born that way.”

The same God who condemns bestiality as “perversion” also calls homosexual acts “detestable.” His morality is the one upon which our nation’s laws were founded. If Christian morality is exiled, whose morality will become our standard?

And the real question is this: If we as a society still believe that bestiality is immoral, why are we so foolishly embracing “proud” homosexuality as “moral” — when it clearly cannot be? — Sonja Dalton

(For more on the Biblical parallels between God’s condemnation of homosexuality and that of other sexual sins like bestiality and incest, see Professor Rob Gagnon’s website at www.robgagnon.net. Gagnon is one of the world’s leading authorities on “The Bible and Homosexual Practice,” and has written a scholarly book by the name.)

——————————

Excerpted from Man Faces Probation in Animal Abuse Case, by Anna Kurth, published Mar 20, 2007, by The Daily Telegram:

A Superior man convicted of having sexual contact with a dead deer was given probation Tuesday in Douglas County Circuit Court…

Hathaway was found guilty of mistreatment of an animal in April 2005 after killing a horse with the intention of having sex with it…

“The type of behavior is disturbing. It’s disturbing to the public. It’s disturbing to the court,” Lucci said.

Continue reading in The Daily Telegram…