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UCC “Pastor” Calls Devotion to Traditional Family “Idolatry”
December 15th, 2006From our friends at MassResistance: A letter to the editor from a Massachusetts United Church of Christ “pastor” who is responding to Tom Mountain’s article about a GLSEN activist/grade school social worker explaining “transgender” to a class of third graders, without their parents’ permission.
Likewise, here in the Northwest suburbs of Chicago, “Parish Minister” Julie Denny-Hughes of Palatine’s Countryside Unitarian Universalist “Church” passionately defended the use of “Perks of Being a Wallflower“ by teachers in District 214. “Perks” is written at a third or fourth grade reading level, but was planned for a high school class. Should you find this “book” on your child’s required or recommended reading list, you might be interested to know that it offers quite an education in masturbating with a hot dog, forced oral sex, forceable sodomy, voyeurism, attempted drunken sex with a dog, and so on. (Read the excerpts for yourself.)
We’ve heard quite enough from the UCC and Unitarian leaders. Where are the Bible-believing pastors and youth ministers (the ones like Pastor Vincent Fields)? Their voices are sorely needed. — Sonja Dalton
New low in narrow-mindedness
By Reverend Richard Malmberg/ Guest column
Published Nov 15, 2006, in Newton Tab
Flaunting his biases with characteristic reliance on hearsay information, Tom Mountain accused Franklin School Principal Cindy Marchand of overreacting to an irate parent. As a Franklin parent, I know her to be a competent and knowledgeable principal. She was right to defend her staff, especially such a dedicated and professional social worker as Laura Perkins. Further, Ms. O’Shea should have been reprimanded for humiliating a Franklin family and attempting to derail a school meeting to press her own agenda. Other parents present at Curriculum Night confirm that Ms. Marchand handled an awkward situation calmly and capably. I generally try to ignore Tom Mountain’s weekly bitter tirades. They do little to edify, and nothing to enhance the civility of public discourse in Newton. At the risk of responding in kind, I have to say that his column in the Nov. 8 TAB reached a new low in mean-spirited narrow-mindedness.
I have had kids in Franklin School for more than eight years, and had numerous contacts with the family whose presence seems to so outrage Mr. Mountain and Ms. O’Shea. It might surprise them both that my first conversation with the parent who underwent gender reassignment took place at a Little League game. Our sons were on the same team. As we sat in our folding chairs, we had a friendly and stimulating conversation. When I told him I was a minister, the conversation turned to Biblical scholarship. He (then still living as a man) was obviously quite well-read and genuinely interested in the subject. I learned that he is an active lay leader in his own church.
Only after the “teachable moment” Mr. Mountain described did I learn through the Franklin grapevine that this other Little League dad was going through a gender reassignment. I confess that for a while after that, I felt a little awkward – my problem. I regret not being more openly supportive during what must have been a difficult time for their family. I admire the quiet dignity and courage they display through it all. They have not allowed the self-appointed sexuality police to harass them out of full participation in the community. Newton is fortunate to have such solid citizens, active in their congregation, supporting their kids, their school and pursuing happiness in our midst. Their modest refusal to hide makes our city safer for diversity.
I find it interesting that Mr. Mountain, champion of traditional family values, hints at snarky disbelief that this couple remained married after gender reassignment. With divorce rates what they are in our society, he should celebrate a durable commitment and intact family. Mindless devotion to a “Leave It to Beaver” mirage of “traditional family” is simply idolatry. Our fixation on an imagined norm undermines our ability to value real families whatever shape they take. We endanger the actual relationships that sustain us, while damaging our psychic and spiritual well-being. Consider the tragically self-loathing, self-destructive Rev. Ted Haggard. He crusaded against gay marriage in public, and engaged in risky gay sex and drug abuse in secret. This man of deep faith and extraordinary charisma was twisted by intolerant theology that had no room for the man God created him to be.
Read the rest of this article »
New Jersey Lawmakers Pass Transgender Rights Bill
December 15th, 2006Excerpted from New Jersey Lawmakers Pass Transgender Rights Bill, published Dec 14, 2006, by the pro-homosexuality PlanetOut:
The New Jersey state Assembly on Thursday passed a bill that would make the Garden State the ninth in the nation to outlaw discrimination based on gender identity or expression. The bill, passed by the state Senate on Monday, now goes to Gov. Jon Corzine, who is expected to sign it.
“The legislation in New Jersey represents a huge civil rights victory for transgender communities,” Mara Keisling, executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, said in a statement.
“I applaud the amazing efforts of the Gender Rights Advocacy Association of New Jersey, Garden State Equality, and local advocates who showed that when we stand up for what’s right, we can win. While we celebrate that one-third of the US population is now covered, NCTE continues to fight for explicitly transgender-inclusive protections on the federal level.”
New Jersey’s new law prohibits discriminatory practices in employment, housing and public accommodations based on “gender identity or expression” — the legislative language that covers transgender people.
Bad News for the “Gay Rights” Movement: Privacy v. Revolution
December 14th, 2006This article is the second in a series by my good friend here in Illinois, John Biver, of the Family Taxpayers Network. (To read the first article, click HERE.) We often hear that it’s only the “fundamentalist Christians” on the “radical right” who oppose normalizing homosexuality and that we Christians are determined to impose our belief system on everyone. Well, it’s not only conservative evangelicals and Catholics who recognize the problem; John Biver’s excellent series of articles proves that there is also a strong secular argument against elevating homosexuality to normalcy. — Peter LaBarbera
We also know what tolerance doesn’t mean:
“I embrace and endorse how you like to have sex.”
–John Biver
The following article entitled Privacy v. Revolution, by John Biver, was published Jun 19, 2006, by Family Taxpayer Network:
A year ago writer Peggy Noonan opened her column with a story of having met a young man at a wedding who introduced himself, asked her a question, but before she could answer he went on to say, “I’m gay, by the way.” Noonan wrote:
“I nodded as if this were my business, but thought: I wonder why a total stranger thinks I want to know what he wishes to do with his genitals? What an odd way to say hello.
“We live in a time in which people routinely violate their own privacy.”
Noonan doubted whether the man would have been as open about his annual salary, as that would have been too personal. In the old America, she wrote, people knew certain things were better kept private,
“But in the new and infinitely stranger America there are a lot of people who need to be told, ‘Buddy, that’s none of my business.’”
One of the reasons I’m optimistic about the future of the discussion of morality in this country is that despite decades of work attempting to get every American to discuss their sex life in public, most people still prefer not to. I believe human nature suggests that won’t change any time soon.
A few simple concepts have been pushed to society’s back burner as the heat has been turned up in favor of an extremist social agenda. The honest proponents of this agenda admit that it’s “not a civil rights movement” or “sexual liberation movement” but rather is “a moral revolution.”
Read the rest of this article »
ADF Sues Massachusetts Legislature
December 13th, 2006Dec 12, 2006, press release from ALLIANCE DEFENSE FUND:
Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel Glen Lavy will address the media Wednesday [Dec 13, 2006] after filing a lawsuit against members of the Massachusetts Legislature. The suit alleges that the lawmakers have acted illegally by refusing to vote on a citizen initiative that would define marriage in the commonwealth’s constitution as the union between one man and one woman.
“Elected officials should be held accountable when they deliberately violate the law,” Lavy said. “The legislators have a constitutional duty to vote on citizen initiatives. Some members of the legislature have even admitted publicly that they are deliberately violating their constitutional duty. This flagrant violation of the constitutional right of the citizens to amend their constitution must be stopped.”
Also participating in the press conference is Kris Mineau, president of the Massachusetts Family Institute.
“All we are asking is that the legislature fulfills its responsibility to the voters of Massachusetts,” Lavy said. “These legislators will face no liability if they vote on the amendment, but it appears that the Legislature is only going to stop their illegal behavior when they understand they’ll be held accountable for it.”
ADF is a legal alliance defending the right to hear and speak the Truth through strategy, training, funding, and litigation.
Pro-Family Leaders Believe Homosexual Divorce is a Tactic
December 12th, 2006Excerpted from Lesbian Couple Married in Massachusetts Seeks Divorce in Rhode Island, by Josh Montez, published Dec 11, 2006, by Family News in Focus:
Since RI doesn’t recognize gay marriages, gay divorce seems pointless. Could it be the couple wants another way to legitimize same-sex unions?
The divorce-seeking lesbian couple is working their way through the Rhode Island court system. A family court refused the case, referring it on to the State Supreme Court. Kris Mineau with the Massachusetts Family Institute believes this is a ploy to get the legal system to recognize gay marriage, through divorce.
“Isn’t that bizarre? They’ll seize at any opportunity, whereas in New Jersey and Maryland, they are seeking to marry, and suing through the courts. Here they’re seeking to divorce and suing through the courts.”
Attorneys for the gay couple say they aren’t asking Rhode Island to recognize same-sex marriage, just same-sex divorce. But Peter LaBarbera with Americans for Truth doesn’t buy that argument.
“I think if you recognize same-sex divorce, you’re recognizing same-sex marriage. It’s amazing how political the activists are. The problem here is we’re dealing with a very political movement and Americans on the side of decency and truth just aren’t as political as the gay activists.”
LaBarbera says this is more than a gay couple trying to make headlines; it’s an attempt to change the law.
“The modus operandi of the homosexual activists is to use anything possible, even divorce, to win approval of their lifestyle. That’s what the main agenda is. They are desperate for approval of their lifestyle and even if it means recognizing gay divorce as opposed to gay marriage, they’ll do that.”
The Rhode Island Supreme Court has yet to decide if it will take the case.
A Pastor with Courage
December 12th, 2006“In times of universal deceit,
telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”
–George Orwell
Excerpted from Pastor at Senate Invocation curses ‘Spirit’ of Gay Marriage, published Dec 12, 2006, by Star-Ledger (New Jersey):
A pastor delivering the invocation at the opening of yesterday’s Senate session included in his prayer a condemnation of gay marriage.
“We curse the spirit that would come to bring about same-sex marriage,” the Rev. Vincent Fields, pastor of Greater Works Ministries in Absecon, prayed as lawmakers listened, heads bowed. “We ask you to just look over this place today, cause them to be shaken in their very heart in uprightness, Lord, to do that is right before you.”
Earlier yesterday the [NJ state] Senate Judiciary Committee approved legislation to allow gay couples to form civil unions with the same rights as married couples.
Tony Perkins: All You Need Is Love?
December 11th, 2006From the Dec 8, 2006, issue of “Washington Update by Tony Perkins, Family Research Council:
For the last three days, media outlets from across the country have flooded FRC with calls on our reaction to the news that Vice President Cheney’s daughter, who has a lesbian partner, is expecting a child. We have purposefully declined to comment on the story, in order to maintain FRC’s focus on policy discussions. However, when an event such as this is used by some as a catalyst for advancing a political agenda or promoting public policy that attacks traditional marriage or parenting, I have no reservations about stepping forward and defending morality and the family — regardless of who is involved. Today’s Washington Post features such an attempt by editorial columnist Ruth Marcus. With an air of noble tutelage, Marcus writes, “Whether she intends it or not, [Mary Cheney’s] pregnancy will, I think, turn out to be a watershed in public understanding and acceptance of this phenomenon.”
Unlike Marcus, authorities on child and family health do not use anecdotes as the basis for public policy. Their analysis is fact-driven, not emotion-driven. And those facts have seldom changed. Marcus writes that “To be a badly wanted child… in a home with two loving parents is no tragedy. If they’re worried about ’emotional devastation,’ they would do better to reserve their lamentations for children in poverty, those who are abused or neglected, or for children in families splintered by divorce.” Children’s needs, however, are more than the sum of the wants in the lives of the adults who reside with them. Study after study demonstrates that no amount of care or financial privilege can compensate for the missing physical and emotional benefits experienced by children who enjoy the lifelong love and presence of a married mother and father.
Comprehensive studies published in the peer-reviewed journals Archives of General Psychiatry, Interpersonal Violence, Social Service Research, Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Nursing Research, Developmental Psychology, Adolescence, and others too numerous to list here, all cite the devastating effects of domestic violence, increased substance abuse, mental health problems, sexual identity confusion, depression, and suicide associated with the homosexual lifestyle. A child fortunate enough to escape those realities still faces a distinct disadvantage throughout childhood — the irreplaceable influence of the missing biological parent. In rearing children, the complementary contributions of a mother and father are rooted in the innate differences of the two sexes, and can no more be arbitrarily replaced than can the very nature of male and female.
But besides dismissing science, Marcus misrepresents the reality of Virginia law. In her eagerness to exploit the circumstances, she asserts that the state’s new marriage protection amendment “casts doubt on the ability of Cheney and Poe to write binding medical directives and wills.” The law casts no doubt on the matter. It implicitly allows individuals to engage in private contracts. Here Marcus succeeds in personalizing her argument but not substantiating it. She concludes, “[This] high-profile pregnancy will help the Republican party come to grips with [the] facts of life. If not, [Mary Cheney] will have to explain to her child what mommy was doing trying to help a party that doesn’t believe in fairness for families like theirs.” What is at stake in these debates, however, is ultimately not the fate of political parties or the lateral “fairness” adults seek, but what is fair and favorable for children, all of whom have a stake in whether our nation stands by the ideal of homes embraced by, and embracing, a mother and father, a husband and a wife.
A&E’s “Wedding Wars” and GLAAD’s War on Normalcy
December 11th, 2006
If the homosexual activist group GLAAD (Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation) is recommending a new show, it must be pretty bad for traditional values. So watch out for “Wedding Wars,” a new movie produced by A&E debuting tonight (Monday, Dec. 11, 9:00 PM EST, 8:00 Central) and which is the subject of the giddy online post, below, by GLAAD.
Just what America needs: more homosexual propaganda on TV. Yep, every day I’m reminded just how disenfranchised this poor, beleaguered “gay minority” is. Who are they kidding? The homosexual activist lobby has elite power — far disproportionate to their tiny numbers — and they aren’t afraid to use it.
If you have any doubts about how ludicrous it is to say that the “gay marriage” movement has ANYTHING in common with the noble civil rights struggle that ended state-sponsored segregation in this country, check out this link for the annual “Aspen Gay and Lesbian Ski Week” (note the appropriate theme of the Seven Deadly Sins). Talk about wealth, power, and privilege.
We can chuckle at the symbolism of actor John Stamos’ career path, from playing a caring father of twins in “Full House” to playing a homosexual party planner in “Wedding Wars.” But the downward evolution of the fight for “equality” in America — from Selma to Aspen, from ending horrible Jim Crow laws to shilling for counterfeit “marriage,” from stigmatizing racist bigotry to scoffing at Christian morality — is a sober reminder of the corruption of civil rights in this nation.
A&E need not have bothered with its condescending GLAAD “public service” announcement (actress Julianne Moore lecturing us about “freedom and equality”) running alongside the show. Looks like the whole “Wedding Wars” movie is designed to promote GLAAD’s perspective. Memo to GLAAD and A&E: homosexual practice will always be wrong, no matter how many millions of dollars worth of PC programming you throw at the public. “Gay marriage” is the ultimate rebellion against a God who lovingly created men and women for each other, united in marriage to raise children.
Which takes us to an aspect of the ongoing “gay” crusade that many Americans are only now beginning to understand. So often pro-family advocates are asked why we care so much about “what two people do in their bedroom,” “why can’t we just leave them alone?” etc., as if homosexuality is a private matter that just sort of exists without demanding attention. For some, of course, it is. But “Wedding Wars” shows us the flip side of the “gay” movement, which proudly DEMANDS approval at every opportunity, and feels the need to ridicule Judeo-Christian values in order to score points for the “gay” cause.
Makes sense: sinful lifestyles cannot be elevated to normal and even “Christian” status unless sin itself is redefined, and normalcy and Christianity are brought lower.
This seeming pathological drive for approval (tolerance is passe) is why proud homosexuality will remain the most divisive social issue this country has faced in a long time. The “gay” activists won’t leave us alone. They can’t. To achieve their revolutionary, egalitarian goal of treating homosexuality the same as heterosexuality in our culture, they and their increasingly radical straight allies are forced to discredit and destroy a lot of good, Bible-based tradition — and turn the hearts of America’s children against God’s created purpose for sexuality.
There are other sins like pornography, pre-marital sex and abortion that war against tradition, but none has the organizational, insider power that homosexuality now has, nor the massive chip on their shoulder that drives self-styled “queer” activists, compulsively, to sneer at normalcy and true religion.
Yes, “gay”-friendly Hollywood is laughing at us and our supposedly antiquated beliefs. But I have to believe that although confirmed liberals might watch and enjoy shows like “Wedding Wars,” the average American is put off by the overkill of “gay, gay, gay” in the popular culture. Please take a minute to remind yourself that God is right and GLAAD is wrong, then tell A&E what you think about their latest sellout to the homosexual lobby. — Peter LaBarbera
TAKE ACTION – Tell A&E that you do not appreciate
programming that promotes homosexuality.
The A&E Network will premiere Wedding Wars on Monday, Dec. 11 at 9pm ET, a comedic take on the battle for marriage equality starring John Stamos (ER), Eric Dane (Grey’s Anatomy) and James Brolin (The Reagans).
Stamos plays Shel, a gay party planner, who agrees to organize the nuptials for straight brother Ben (Dane) and Maggie (Bonnie Somerville), the governor of Maine’s (Brolin) daughter. After Shel finds out that Ben, a campaign manager for his future father-in-law, is behind the governor’s speech against marriage equality, he decides to go on strike for equal rights. Shel’s strike picks up steam and eventually spreads nationwide, showing the extent that gay and lesbian people make up the workforce of this country.
“A&E’s original movie Wedding Wars offers a fresh, entertaining take on marriage equality — and how people are growing to realize that banning their gay family members, friends and acquaintances from marrying is both unfair and hurtful to everyone,” says GLAAD President Neil G. Giuliano. “This is the kind of storytelling that can invest more and more people in our lives and our families, and we’re thrilled that millions of A&E viewers will soon be able to see this movie and share it with their loved ones and friends.”
During the world premiere broadcast of Wedding Wars, A&E will air an award-winning GLAAD public service announcement starring Julianne Moore.
Produced by Storyline Entertainment in association with Sony Pictures Television,Wedding Wars is directed by Jim Fall (Trick, The Lizzie McGuire Movie) from a script by Stephen Mazur (Liar, Liar). Storyline Entertainment’s Craig Zadan and Neil Meron serve as executive producers.
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