Daily Archives: February 15, 2012

OneNewsNow.com: A conservative military watchdog believes Oklahoma might face some problems from the Obama administration if it passes a measure banning homosexuals from serving in the state’s National Guard.

ZENIT: Each year in the United States over a million children are the innocent parties to the divorce of their parents. While divorce also hurts the parents it is the children who particularly suffer, according to recent research. The findings come in a study published in January by the Marriage and Religion Research Institute, “The Effects of Divorce on Children,” by Patrick F. Fagan and Aaron Churchill. | Study

Hunter Baker at ActonInstitute PowerBlog: The primary point of my first book, The End of Secularism, was to demonstrate that secularism doesn’t do what it claims to do, which is to solve the problem of religious difference.

Futurity.org: Published in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, the study says that by shifting male efforts from seeking wives to paternal investment, institutionalized monogamy increases long-term planning, economic productivity, financial savings, and child investment.

SunHerald.com: A Mississippi senator is proposing an anti-abortion constitutional amendment similar to one rejected by voters last November.

The Washington Post: Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney and his allies at the super PAC Restore Our Future are spending $1,240,230 in Michigan this week, according to a Republican media buyer. The former Pennsylvania senator is spending $42,443 — not a typo — and none of his super PAC supporters have spent anything.

CSMonitor.com: Evidence is mounting that the vote totals for the Maine caucuses, in which Mitt Romney edged out Ron Paul, were pretty messed up. In addition to towns that hadn’t voted yet, others’ totals were not recorded.

DNA India: Anti-gay rights groups, challenging legalisation of homosexual sex, were today asked by the Supreme Court to explain how such acts are against the order of nature as submitted by them.

Huffington Post: Newly appointed Democratic National Convention chairman Antonio Villaraigosa on Wednesday seemed to signal support for same-sex marriage being part of the 2012 Democratic Party platform.

W. James Antle, III at The American Spectator: Let’s take something I’ve been debating in the comments and hash it out here on the main blog: If Rick Santorum won the nomination, could he keep the Democrats from turning the election into a referendum on contraception?

Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed suit against the Dixon R-1 School District Tuesday on behalf of a student who had her pro-life posters torn down by school officials.

Washington Post reports and carries video.

Persecution.org: “A mob of nearly 20,000 radical Muslims, mainly Salafis, attempted this evening to break into and torch the Church of St. Mary and St. Abram in the village of Meet Bashar,in Zagazig, Sharqia province,” the Assyrian International News Agency reports.

Christian Concern: Chancellor George Osborne has decided to postpone the introduction of tax breaks for married couples, attracting criticism from Conservative backbenchers that he was “kowtowing” to the Liberal Democrats.

Christian Concern: The Queen began celebrations to mark her 60-year reign today (15 Feb) by publicly declaring her support for the established Church, which she said was “commonly under-appreciated” despite being “woven into the fabric of this country.”

Seattle Times Newspaper: With the governor’s signature Monday, same-sex marriage became legal in Washington state — even if couples can’t yet marry here. As a result, the ACLU of Washington wants the language in an initiative filed last month by an attorney and gay-marriage opponent to be rewritten to reflect this new state of marriage.

Texas Pastor Council: An inter-ethnic, inter-denominational coalition of pastors has called Mayor Annise Parker’s call for legalization of same-sex marriage a “declaration of war on the traditional family” and are condemning her actions in the strongest terms.

The Washington Post: Lawmakers expect a very close vote by Friday on the bill sponsored by Gov. Martin O’Malley (D). It will take 71 votes to pass in the 141-member House.

Politico: House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi supports a pro-gay marriage plank in the 2012 Democratic platform, her spokesman Drew Hammill confirms to POLITICO. Pelosi’s office endorsed a push the Freedom to Marry campaign’s platform push to the publication MetroWeekly . . .

Reihan Salam at National Review Online: But the notion that opposition to same-sex marriage is rooted in bigotry is now so firmly entrenched that Santorum will have an extremely difficult time overcoming it . . . Santorum has said that his campaign is about freedom. Yet he hasn’t been able to explain that his opposition to same-sex marriage is rooted in a concern for equal freedom in a manner that non-conservatives find sufficiently compelling.

NPR: “I will do anything financially permissible and legally permissible to make socially liberal Republican legislators accountable,” says Ted Maravelias, chairman of a New Hampshire political action committee that’s raising money to oppose members of the GOP who vote to support same-sex marriage . . . The National Organization for Marriage has already set aside $250,000 for the same purpose . . .

NYTimes.com: Mr. Santorum has the support of 36 percent of likely Republican primary voters, trailed by Mitt Romney, with 29 percent. Newt Gingrich follows at 20 percent, and Ron Paul is in last place at 9 percent.

LifeSiteNews.com: Former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau was famous for his fight against Quebec separatists. So his son, Montreal MP Justin Trudeau, caused a stir this week after he appeared to support Quebec sovereignty.

LifeSiteNews.com: n a report it is presenting to a United Nations committee this week in Switzerland, the Brazilian government laments that, “The distancing from conservative positions in relation to the role of men and women in our society is happening less rapidly than would be desired.”

LifeSiteNews.com: “Ever since Barack Obama came into office there has been an aggressive effort to undermine peaceful pro-life activity by casting pro-life activists as terrorists,” Scheidler said. “We’ve seen the Department of Homeland Security listing pro-lifers as potential terrorists. We’ve seen special meetings between the FBI and pro-abortion groups.”

LifeSiteNews.com: One thing we learned from the Komen/Planned Parenthood fiasco is that it may be easier to say no to the mob than Planned Parenthood. We saw it again recently in Green Bay, Wisconsin. This one didn’t make much news, but created a local social network bully fest.

LifeNews.com (includes video): Barbara Boxer, the leading pro-abortion member of the U.S. Senate, made some comments in a recent MSNBC interview that are sparking outrage across the Internet today. Boxer essentially says the right to insurance trumps religious rights and freedoms.

The Volokh Conspiracy: The case is Vejdeland v. Sweden (Feb. 9, 2012) . . . In December 2004 the applicants [who are adults] … went to an upper secondary school (gymnasieskola) and distributed approximately a hundred leaflets by leaving them in or on the pupils’ lockers. The episode ended when the school’s principal intervened and made them leave the premises . . .

News from The Associated Press: Nigeria’s secret police say they are searching for an ex-soldier in connection with a Christmas Day bombing of a Catholic church that killed at least 44 people.

Miami Herald: The Senate on Wednesday confirmed Judge Adalberto Jose Jordan to the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which decides the major federal legal disputes of Florida, Georgia and Alabama. Jordan, of Miami, is the first Cuban-born judge to sit on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Cardinal Newman Society: Villanova University, a Roman Catholic Augustinian University outside Philadelphia, has invited a militant gay rights performance artist to be an artist in residence this April and lead workshops for students, according to an email shared with The Cardinal Newman Society.

Norwich Evening News: Norfolk County Council has pledged to keep holding prayers before its full council meetings, despite a High Court ruling which threatened the tradition.

Religion Clause: Mexico’s Constitution (Art. 130) provides that: “priests and ministers cannot form political associations nor carry out propaganda for any candidate, party or political group.” AP reported yesterday that Mexico’s Catholic Church is being criticized for releasing voter guidelines for the faithful as the July 1 presidential elections approach.

HSLDA : Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney Viktor Kostov of Bulgaria explained that the proposed bill is radical and unnecessary. “The Child Act places excessive authority for children into the hands of the state in the name of ‘children’s rights,’ replacing the traditional role of the family in the raising of children and violating provisions in numerous international treaties.

News from The Associated Press: A top adviser to President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign says Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum has taken “divisive positions” on key social issues.

LifeNews.com: The new mandate pro-abortion President Barack Obama put in place forcing religious employers to pay for insurance coverage including birth control and abortion-inducing drugs is so offensive more than 50 members of Congress will speak out against it today.

News from The Associated Press: The debate of whether to grant Colorado same-sex couples rights similar to married couples returns to the state Capitol Wednesday, this time with more momentum than when it failed narrowly last year.

Norwood News: But lawyers with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) filed a lawsuit earlier this month that seeks an injunction against the ban, which the ADF, religious leaders and some Bronx elected officials are calling discriminatory and unconstitutional.

WSJ.com: The birth-control coverage mandate violates the First Amendment’s bar against the “free exercise” of religion. But it also violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. That statute, passed unanimously by the House of Representatives and by a 97-3 vote in the Senate, was signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1993. It was enacted in response to a 1990 Supreme Court opinion, Employment Division v. Smith.

The Hill: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Tuesday that he’ll let the Senate vote on a proposal to reverse the White House’s controversial birth-control mandate.

TheHill.com: A Fox News poll shows that 67 percent of women think that employers should be required to offer birth control, and 29 percent of women think they shouldn’t.

Asia News: Putin signs a decree to introduce the fundamentals of religion at a national level. From September, pupils can choose between Orthodoxy, Buddhism, Judaism and Islam, or opt for “moral ethics”.

OneNewsNow.com: Matt Bowman of the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) points out that exemptions are being granted to various organizations, including unions, but religious ones still face a mandate. “It seems like the only people who don’t get some type of special treatment under ObamaCare are groups that want to exercise their God-given first freedom of religious liberty,” Bowman notes.

The Tennessean: State Rep. Phillip Johnson has introduced legislation that would allow school employees to participate in student-led religious gatherings that are held before and after school . . . The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal group, notified the school district in October that Sycamore High School teacher Gwen White Owl had the constitutional right to participate at the Fields of Faith event, which was sponsored by the school’s Fellowship of Christian Athletes and held after-school hours.

Volunteer TV: The Whitsons were backed in the lawsuit by an Arizona-based Christian legal group called the Alliance Defense Fund.

The first part of the interview is available here. Part two can be accessed here.

HSLDA : Himmelstrand and his wife had homeschooled their three children for multiple years before authorities in the municipality where they live denied them permission in 2008. The Himmelstrands currently face fines in excess of $26,000 in U.S. currency for their choice to homeschool. HSLDA and the Alliance Defense Fund have filed a brief in a Swedish appellate court on behalf of the family. | HSLDA press release at Christian Newswire

OneNewsNow.com: ADF senior counsel Jordan Lorance says it is a multi-front approach to reverse the policy (listen to audio report). “The legislature could repeal it, the mayor could repeal it, or a court could enjoin it,” he explains. “They could stop the court case tomorrow if they change the policy.”