Daily Archives: May 9, 2011

The Local: Leading members of the Salvation Army in Sweden told an undercover journalist that “homosexual sex is a sin” and offered to ask God to help “free” the reporter from the condition.

“Navy chaplains would be allowed to perform same-sex civil marriage ceremonies under new training guidance that would take effect if the Defense Department moves this summer to recognize openly gay military service.”

AsiaNews.it: Babar Masih, 25, allegedly used abusive language in regards to the Prophet Muhammad. Muslim religious leaders allegedly put pressures on people to make “false statements” about him. Police arrested him to prevent him from being lynched. The young man’s family has had to flee for fear of reprisals.

AP: House Speaker John Boehner also says that any legislation to raise the so-called debt limit beyond its current $14.3 trillion cap should be accompanied by spending cuts larger than the amount of the permitted increase in the debt.

Politico: President Barack Obama’s reelection campaign is banking on gay donors to make up the cash it’s losing from other groups of wealthy supporters who have been alienated and disappointed by elements of Obama’s first term.

ABC27: “A gay college student says he’s transferring from a Pennsylvania Christian college after being harassed by students and a professor. Messiah College freshman Isaiah Thomas . . . ”

Christian Institute: Changing the law to legalise assisted suicide would result in disabled people being pressured to kill themselves, according to a new survey by a leading disability charity.

LifeNews: A Missouri pro-life group is concerned taxpayers may be on the hook for funding human cloning or embryonic stem cell research and its wants state legislators to do something about it.

LifeNews: No one should accept the falsehood that governments must offer abortions just because pro-abortion advocates want that to happen. Neither European nor international law requires the Czech Republic to offer abortions,” said ADF Legal Counsel Roger Kiska, who is based in Europe. “Forcing this type of illegitimate cross-border recognition is something Americans have already seen attempted in laws related to health care and marriage,” Kiska added. “It must be stopped wherever it rears its ugly head.”

Call it what you will, but that’s not a change to “training”–that’s a circumvention of U.S. law.

IMPRIMIS reprint of Va. AG Ken Cuccinelli speech: Let me explain a bit about our lawsuit. Our first legal argument is that the government’s attempt to use the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to mandate the purchase of a private product—in this case, health insurance—goes beyond Congress’s power. The reason there has never been a mandate like this in all of American history is because, up until now, everyone knew Congress lacked the power to impose one. I often give the example of the colonial period, when the colonists were boycotting British goods while demanding that King George III and Parliament repeal the Stamp Act and the Intolerable Acts. I am sure it was to the king’s dismay, but his own lawyer—the solicitor general—told Parliament that the boycott was legal under British law. In other words, the colonists could not be forced to buy British goods.

Charisma: “No one should accept the falsehood that governments must offer abortions just because pro-abortion advocates want that to happen. Neither European nor international law requires the Czech Republic to offer abortions,” says ADF Legal Counsel Roger Kiska, who is based in Europe. “Forcing this type of illegitimate cross-border recognition is something Americans have already seen attempted in laws related to health care and marriage. It must be stopped wherever it rears its ugly head.”

Des Moines Register: Legislative efforts to block a Nebraska abortion doctor from expanding into Council Bluffs are likely to be approved this year, key senators said today.

Olympic gold medalist Peter Vidmar, who last week was named chef de mission for the 2012 U.S. Olympic team, abruptly resigned Friday after a firestorm of negative attention in the media and inside the U.S. Olympic Committee due to his 2008 actions against gay marriage.

Elizabeth Marquardt at Family Scholars: The the National Catholic Register reporter Steve Wetherbe has a solid story on how researchers are squelching the science, as the gay marriage debate makes scholars otherwise aware of the research on marriage, divorce and child well-being unwilling to say what they used to say.

Homosexual activists fighting for the acceptance of their lifestyle in every corner of society have found a prime target: Christian colleges and universities.

13WHAM: Two full buses departed from Village Gate at about 5:30 this morning, bound for Albany.

Christian Science Monitor: “Lawyers welcomed ruling by India’s Supreme Court Monday that suspended a ruling on the Ayodhya holy site. The ruling last year had divided the disputed site between Muslims and Hindus.”

Blog of the Legal Times: Last week, Senate Democrats broke an attempted filibuster of an Obama judicial nominee. Today, they’ll try to do the same with one of the president’s executive nominees.

MyFox8.com: Mike Johnson is a lawyer with the Christian group Alliance Defense Fund and Katherine Parker of the ACLU will argue against prayer, according to the paper.

Ed Whalen at National Review Bench Memos: When Attorney General Eric Holder announced the Obama administration’s decision to stop pretending to defend the Defense of Marriage Act against challenges in court, he maintained that the executive branch would continue to enforce DOMA. A mere two months after making that commitment, Holder brazenly violated it. And he’s now trying to cover up that fact. Let’s run through the specifics . . .

W. James Antle, III at The American Spectator: Using Ron Paul’s abortion position as a jumping off point, Joe Carter makes the case against applying federalism to life issues, arguing that doing so attaches greater significance to the rights of governments than the rights of individuals. In no particular order, a few quick rejoinders.

Washington Post: “Republican lawmakers in more than one-quarter of the states this year launched an ambitious attempt to break up union-only shops in private-sector workplaces.”

Washington Times: Arab Christians here are trying to separate themselves from a boisterous Muslim community that has served as a punching bag for “terrorism” stereotypes since Sept. 11.

AP on the Daily Journal: A key lawmaker is predicting the Legislature will find a compromise that would block a proposed clinic in Council Bluffs that would perform late-term abortions.

MSNBC: However, the findings do not necessarily mean that being gay, lesbian or bisexual increases risk of cancer, said study researcher Ulrike Boehmer, of the Boston University School of Public Health . . . The study was published online today (May 9) in the journal Cancer . . .

LifeSiteNews: A Quebec judge has ordered a three-year-old and a five-year-old to attend state-funded day care following claims that the children lacked proper “socialization.”

AZ Republic: Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer wants the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a ruling that put the most controversial parts of the state’s immigration enforcement law on hold.

Des Moines Register: Council Bluffs Mayor Tom Hanafan has come to the defense of Iowa Senate Majority Leader Michael Gronstal, also of Council Bluffs, who is under pressure from residents to help block a controversial abortion doctor from practicing in their community. | More reports here.

LifeSiteNews: In a recent address to the Pontifical Academy on Social Sciences, Pope Benedict XVI lamented the attack on the basic human right of religious freedom in today’s society.

LifeNews: Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich will announce on Wednesday he is campaigning for the GOP nod to take on pro-abortion President Barack Obama in the 2012 presidential elections.

LifeNews: Republican businessman Herman Cain is widely expected to launch a formal bid for the GOP nomination for president later this month after the pro-life advocate surprised political observers with a strong debate performance last week.

Minnesota Independent: Newspapers throughout the state have come out against a Republican bill that proposes a constitutional amendment barring same-sex marriage in Minnesota.

NY Times: After two instances in which deportations were suspended in immigration cases involving same-sex couples, the Justice Department has cautioned that it will continue to enforce a law that bars the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages.

Religion Clause Blog: In ACLU-TN v. Sumner County Board of Education, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 47977 (MD TN, May 3, 2011), a Tennessee federal district court rejected the ACLU’s emergency motion for a temporary restraining order in a case alleging that the Sumner County schools violate the Establishment Clause by a series of practices that promote and endorse religion . . .

Wall Street Journal: Christians blamed Saturday’s deadly sectarian clashes at two churches near Cairo on Egypt’s ultraconservative Salafis, a radical Islamist ideology whose growing influence is worrying both secularists and the country’s Christian minority.

AP on One News Now: A Swiss group that assists people to commit suicide says it wants to lower the legal hurdles for elderly clients seeking its help.

ADF corrects falsehood that EU member states must provide abortions to citizens of other member states

ADF attorney Jeremy Tedesco appeared on the Zeb Bell Show to discusses the Julia Ward case and other efforts to stifle free speech on campus and in the helping professions. | MP3 audio 14:06 mins | Related ADF press release: ADF: Ariz. law protecting student religious expression comes at perfect time

AP: “Relations between Egypt’s Muslims and Christians degenerated to a new low Sunday after riots overnight left 12 people dead and a church burned, adding to the disorder of the country’s post-revolution transition to democracy.”

Charlotte Observer (includes large photo): Chapman Cox, a retired lawyer and former general counsel of the U.S. Department of Defense, recently joined the McIntosh Law Firm of Davidson as a legal assistant consulting its lawyers on managing the firm’s estate planning and probate practice . . . Cox, a Marine Corps officer, also served as assistant secretary of the Navy and assistant secretary of Defense. He is chairman of the Alliance Defense Fund and trustee of several private trusts . . .

Winston-Salem Journal: Meanwhile, the county enlisted the help of a conservative Christian group, the Alliance Defense Fund. The ADF helped the county craft an ordinance that would regulate the invocations by opening them to all clergy on a first-come, first-served basis, with no oversight on what the clergy members could say . . . Mike Johnson, the ADF attorney for the county, called the case one with “nationwide implications.” Johnson said that no appellate court has mandated only non-sectarian invocations

Baptist Joint Committee: This week, a panel of the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals is ready to hear the county’s appeal – which was brought only after a local religious organization promised to pay for the Alliance Defense Fund attorney fees. (Mike Johnson quoted)

Greg Forster at Public Discourse: You haven’t heard about it, but for over a year the U.S. Department of Education has been quietly working behind the scenes to establish national control of K-12 education curriculum.

AP: China has banned an outspoken writer and government critic from leaving the country to attend a literary festival in Australia, and warned him not to publish any of his controversial works overseas, event organizers said Monday. Liao Yiwu . . .

AP: Malaysia’s government sought to defuse new religious tensions Monday following allegations that church leaders were conspiring to make Christianity the official religion in this Muslim-majority country

AP: Documents from gay rights history are on display for the first time at the Library of Congress as part of an exhibit on the nation’s constitutional history and civil rights protections.

The Hill: The April jobs numbers offered tentative hope for President Obama’s reelection bid, but a potentially more telling indicator will come later this month — the latest state-by-state unemployment data.

AP: Hundreds of Egyptians, many of them Coptic Christians, demonstrated on Monday in Cairo to protest Muslim-Christian clashes that left 12 dead and a church burned.

NY Post: Kids don’t have to hide dirty magazines under their mattresses anymore — they can just go to the library.

AFP reports on Yahoo.