Daily Archives: January 10, 2012

Christian News: The ministry of Open Doors promotes religious liberty abroad; the focus of Gateways to Better Education is freedom of religion in the United States – specifically its public schools. These organizations are joining forces to support Religious Freedom Sunday, Jan. 15, which raises awareness of students’ and teachers’ religious liberties in public schools.

Seattle Times: Gov. Christine Gregoire named King County Superior Court Judge Steven González to the state Supreme Court Tuesday, replacing the retiring Justice Gerry Alexander.

Christian Newswire: It goes without saying that “politics happen” — but they should not happen on the taxpayer dime on lampposts along Market Street in San Francisco. The Life Legal Defense Foundation has challenged the City of San Francisco with a blatant violation of its own city code.

WI State Journal: Embattled Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman has been hit with another ethics complaint — this time from the group that defended Milwaukee’s mandatory sick leave ordinance.

WSJ.com: The Federal Reserve turned $76.9 billion over to the U.S. Treasury last year, close to the record amount transferred to the government’s coffers in 2010, amid a strong profit generated from its expanding portfolio of securities.

Mail Online: A group of Muslim men handed a leaflet out to the public that called for homosexuals to be ‘punished’ and given the death sentence, a court has heard.

LifeNews.com: A bill in the Washington state legislature would require that any insurance policy sold to state residents for maternity coverage also require policyholders to pay for coverage of abortions.

CSMonitor.com: Last year, an Air Force study – the most comprehensive survey yet conducted by the military – found that 1 in 5 female airmen says she has been sexually assaulted since joining up. The report was seen as a key motivation behind an unprecedented push by the Pentagon to address sexual abuse in all service branches.

The Washington Post: As the dust settled after the Iowa caucuses, it became clear that a plurality of evangelical Christians had thrown in their hat with an unexpected, but strangely apt candidate. Rick Santorum, the former Pennsylvania senator who lost his seat in 2006, performed substantially better than any of his rivals among born-again or evangelical Christians, with 32 percent of the coveted demographic’s vote.

ADF Attorney Kevin Theriot at the Speak Up Movement Churc Blog: Ken Hutcherson, pastor of Antioch Baptist Church in Redmond, Washington, reportedly took a stand against the Washington governor’s recent efforts to legalize same-sex “marriage,” stating: ”As long as the Bible says it’s wrong, I’m going to fight against it . . .

CSMonitor.com: Salman Rushdie’s plans to attend literary festival in India have prompted protests from members of the Muslim community.

News from The Associated Press: People sterilized against their will under a discredited North Carolina state program should each be paid $50,000, a task force voted Tuesday . . .

The Guardian: Alex Salmond has revealed he plans to stage his independence referendum in the autumn of 2014 after he resisted UK government demands to set an early date for the historic poll.

Religion Clause: In 2007, the Australian government began offering schools up to $20,000 per year to fund chaplaincy services.

MercatorNet: It is not the time — or the place — for the Conservative Party to legislate for same-sex marriage

Seattle Times Newspaper: Washington state Sen. Steve Litzow told The Seattle Times editorial board he will be the first Republican in the Senate to support gay marriage. His decision is a profile in courage. He will make a big difference. Passage in the Senate has been described as uncertain.

Sacramento Bee: While some local districts are working to design new curriculum, many others are simply waiting for the state’s next adoption of new history and social science textbooks, scheduled for 2015. School officials say they have received little direction and have few resources – financial and otherwise – to do much else.

Religion Clause: Yesterday the U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals en banc heard oral arguments in Phelps-Roper v. City of Manchester, Missouri.

Christian Concern: ADF attorney Jordan Lorence said that the ban reflects an irrational and anti-religious sentiment in New York, one that portrays religion as “dangerous and something that must be kept entirely out of the public square.” “Our city is trying to do away with faith,” Lorence said. “We can tolerate everybody but religious viewpoints. That’s pretty scary.”

Seattle Times Newspaper: The King County Council voted Monday to support gay marriage — with the caveat that no religious entity would be required to perform or recognize same-sex marriage.

Kathleen Hunker at Townhall.com: The New Jersey controversy prompted a series of questions regarding the rights of individuals who oppose abortion, and whether they retain the right to abstain from facilitating what they view as the termination of a human life in the course of their professional and/or business activities.. . . Kathleen Hunker has an LL.M. in Public Law and Human Rights from the University College London. She is a third-year student at the Columbia University School of Law and an Alliance Defense Fund Blackstone Fellow.

SpeakUpMovement: verflowing joy at the child’s safe birth, and a father prouder of his baby girl than of anything else he has ever produced. “God makes no mistakes.” If Jay-Z had spoken like this about preborn children in another context, cultural elites might be furious. Just look at what pro-life Senator Rick Santorum’s family has endured from their grieving actions to humanize their prematurely born child after the young one’s death.

Greeley Gazette: “The approach,” Fr. Pavone explained, “is simple: a) uncover the ways abortionists break the law and get them punished for it; b) reveal the nature of the abortion procedure itself; c) show the harm abortion does to the very people the abortion industry claims to serve, and d) pray more intensely than ever for abortion to end.”

AUL: Americans United for Life (AUL) filed a brief in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives – including Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner and U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn—supporting Ohio’s commonsense regulation of the dangerous abortion-inducing drug RU-486.

American Federation for Children: Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell yesterday announced an expansive education reform agenda for the 2012 legislative session that is poised to significantly expand educational options through creation of a scholarship tax credit program for the state’s low-income families.

EllwoodCity.org: Despite over 100 people present at the borough council meeting last night and some strong words by religious leaders and residents alike, the Borough of Ellwood City will still plan to move the traditional Nativity Scene off borough property come next Christmas.

NewsOK.com: A federal appeals court has upheld a judge’s order blocking an amendment to the Oklahoma Constitution that would ban state courts from considering international or Islamic law when deciding cases. | Awad v. Ziriax, No. 10-6273

LifeNews.com: Thanks to a recently issued document that analyzes international law, pro-life supporters possess a new and potentially powerful tool to uphold domestic laws protecting unborn human life.

ADF Attorney Matt Bowman on the Zeb Bell Show to discuss this. | MP3 audio 13:13 mins

LifeSiteNews: Stephen Casey, vice president and chief counsel of Texas Center for Defense of Life (TCDL), and TCDL President Greg Terra are representing the teen . . . TCDL provides its legal services pro bono throughout the state of Texas. Casey said those outside the state should contact the Alliance Defense Fund.

Opposing Views: Alliance Defense Fund attorney Jordan Lorence, who represented the Bronx Household of Faith in the suit, says the policy won’t force schools in other cities to throw churches out on the street, but if there are members on other school boards who “want to get rid of the churches, this would give them an excuse to do so.”"New York City allows anything pertaining to the welfare of the community–that ranges from labor union meetings to Alcoholics Anonymous groups, to filming episodes of ‘Law & Order’–to meet in schools.” Excluding religious groups is a violation of the Equal Access Act. It also jeopardizes a longstanding cooperation between cities and faith-based groups. If you trace the roots of some of America’s largest churches, like California’s Saddleback, most of them started in rented schoolrooms. Now, it seems a struggling system like New York City’s would rather turn away income than allow for the free exercise of religion.

MyFoxNY.com (includes video): Some orthodox Jewish congregations also meet in the city’s schools for meetings on certain Jewish holidays and are also affected by the ruling, according to the Alliance Defense Fund.

How Appealing and SCOTUS Blog link to the rulings and coverage.

A Texas abortion law passed last year that requires doctors to show sonograms to patients can be enforced while opponents challenge the measure in court, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

LifeNews.com: A Michigan court has allowed a local Planned Parenthood to build a new abortion business in the Detroit area despite a restriction on the deed Planned Parenthood obtained for a building prohibiting an abortion clinic.

News from The Associated Press: Britain’s government says it will give Scotland the power to hold a binding vote that would give it independence from Britain, turning back centuries of history.

News from The Associated Press: Authorities told relatives who traveled to China’s remote Xinjiang region to see Gao Zhisheng that he will be able to have visitors after the education period only if he behaves well, said Geng He, his wife.

News from The Associated Press: The ministry stopped accepting applications for stem cell procedures until July and is implementing a yearlong campaign to halt unauthorized stem cell therapy trials.

News from The Associated Press: Interviews across the state found GOP voters eager to replace President Barack Obama. But they’re also disillusioned with Washington in general and wary of politicians’ promises.

News from The Associated Press: Forty-two percent of children in India younger than 5 are underweight and nearly 60 percent are stunted, a new survey found.

News from The Associated Press: Nigeria’s army says suspected members of a radical Muslim sect have killed two Christians in separate attacks despite an increased security presence in the area

James Antle III at WSJ.com: Are Democrats and Republicans now engaged in a ‘death struggle’ over dwindling resources, making gridlock and dysfunction more likely?

News from The Associated Press: Pakistan’s top court said Tuesday it could dismiss the prime minister unless he begins corruption proceedings against the president, opening another front against a government already under pressure from the army

WSJ.com: These columns have defended the independence of the Federal Reserve from attacks on the right and left, but after last week the central bank is on its own. It’s impossible to defend the Fed’s rank electioneering as it lobbies for more political and taxpayer intervention in the housing market—just in time for the election campaign.

Michael McConnell at WSJ.com: It’s a mistake to excuse Obama’s disregard for the Constitution. Precedents set now will be exploited by the next administration.

NationalJournal.com: Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, run neck-and-neck with President Obama in a general-election matchup, according to a new CBS News poll released late on Monday that shows the two front-runners in Tuesday’s New Hampshire GOP primary running stronger against the president than their fellow Republicans.

Byron Johnson at Public Discourse: Senior citizens are less likely to support same-sex marriage than younger Americans, but that does not mean that they are anti-gay.

The Union Leader has posted this page.