Tag Archives: ADF: David French

ACLJ Attorney David French at National Review Online: Even worse, at the same time that the mayor declared that “no neighborhood” in New York was “off-limits to God’s love and mercy,” he was enforcing a unique-in-the-nation policy that in fact declared New York City schools “off-limits” to private religious use that includes worship. My friend, the Alliance Defense Fund’s Jordan Lorence, explained the problem in yesterday’s New York Post:

Ron Paul’s Appeal Among the Military – By David French – The Corner – National Review Online: A fact that many of Ron Paul’s supporters mention to rebut claims that he is dangerous on national security is his overwhelming financial support from the military, and it’s true.

One News Now: David French, senior counsel with Alliance Defense Fund, says the Fourth Circuit’s overturning of that ruling is good for the educational community. “We’re extremely pleased by this decision,” says the attorney. “It vindicates academic freedom not only for Dr. Adams, but for all professors; and it reestablishes the principle that the university is a marketplace of ideas. [Alert editor: Note to the reader - David French is now legal counsel with the ACLJ]

ADF attorney David French appeared on KMJ with Chris Daniel. | MP3 audio 21:33

Christian Post: The ruling is a huge win for Adams and French. “The 4th Circuit’s decision is a ringing vindication of the academic freedom of public university professors,” French stated. “Disagreeing with an accomplished professor’s religious and political views is no grounds for refusing him promotion.”

The Chronicle of Higher Education: David A. French, who, as senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, helped represent Mr. Adams in the case, on Wednesday cheered the Fourth Circuit’s ruling as “a ringing victory for academic freedom,” with language that “is very clear, and not only binding in the Fourth Circuit but, I hope, quite persuasive to the other circuits.” The ruling “deals a real blow to the idea that professors’ speech is somehow wholly owned by the university. It is not,” said Mr. French, whose organization, an Arizona-based alliance of Christian lawyers and like-minded groups, took up the case partly because Mr. Adams had accused the university of religious discrimination.

Inside Higher Ed: David French, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, issued a statement calling Wednesday’s decision “a ringing vindication of the academic freedom of public university professors. Disagreeing with an accomplished professor’s religious and political views is no grounds for refusing him promotion. Opinion columns are among the purest examples of free speech protected by the First Amendment.”

One News Now: ADF senior counsel David French argued before the court on Adams’ behalf. “Christian professors should not be discriminated against because of their beliefs,” French states, “and this decision thoroughly upholds that principle.” French calls the circuit court’s decision “a ringing vindication” of the academic freedom of public university professors.

Warrne Moore at the American Culture: “In an interesting side note, Adams was represented by David French, of the Alliance Defense Fund, an organization dealing in religious liberty issues. French is also a pundit, and he happens to live in a portion of my ancestral domain.”

Decision against UNC-Wilmington sets significant precedent protecting professors who express their views on religious, political topics

World Magazine: A common complaint leveled at evangelical Christians, according to David French, is that they’re obsessed with gays and abortion. “The criticism is so common that it’s often internalized and adopted by the church itself,” he writes. So French, director of the Alliance Defense Fund (“a card-­carrying member of the professional religious right”), decided to crunch some numbers—and found there’s no comparison between what Christians give to cause-oriented organizations like his and what they give to anti-poverty groups like World Vision. We fight culture wars, he said, but our charitable obsession is “serving our fellow man.”

ADF attorney David French appeared on Relevant Radio to discuss this: ADF files two appeals with U.S. Supreme Court over right of students to fight policies that muzzle speech. | MP3 audio 20:32 mins

ADF attorney Travis Barham at the Speak Up Movement University Blog: Standing.  For most people, it is something they mastered when they were about one or two years old.  For lawyers, it is a migraine-inducing set of legal doctrines that dictates whether someone has the right to bring a lawsuit in federal court . . . As David French explains at Phi Beta Cons, this standing question is critical for students because it determines whether courts will even review their schools’ speech codes.  Until recently, the unquestioned rule was that students could challenge policies that “chilled” their speech. | Related ADF Media Information

ADF attorney David French writes at the National Review Phi Beta Cons Blog: “This afternoon, my colleagues and I at the Alliance Defense Fund filed two simultaneous cert petitions to the Supreme Court. The issue: Can students challenge university speech codes in court when those codes chill their free-speech rights, or must they wait until the university formally and officially punishes their speech? Until two recent decisions by the Ninth and Fourth Circuits, the answer to this question had been clear.”

Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund filed two appeals Wednesday with the U.S. Supreme Court asking it to resolve a stark disagreement between federal appeals courts as to whether students can challenge college speech codes that regulate every human interaction they have on campus.

David French’s Patheos article has been reprinted at Virtue Online and partially reprinted on the National Review Phi Beta Cons Blog.

ADF attorney David French writes at Patheos: I’m a card-carrying member of the professional religious right. No, that’s an understatement. To simply call me a “member” would profoundly understate my antagonistic role in the culture wars. Fans of comic book movies (and all of you should be) may remember a scene in X2, the sequel to X-Men, when Pyro tells a frightened police officer: “You know all those dangerous mutants you hear about in the news? Well I’m the worst one!” and then proceeds to wreak fiery havoc on an entire neighborhood

ADF attorney David French appeared on the Hugh Hewitt Show to discuss this: Victory for Catholic student group: U.S. Supreme Court says no to U. of Wis. appeal.  | MP3 audio 8:21 mins

David French writes at National Review: “Why has this been so easy? Because until now Planned Parenthood, ACORN, and NPR have not experienced real media accountability or real journalistic scrutiny — at least not to the extent that conservative politicians and organizations do. The mainstream media (and NPR is obviously part of the MSM) is sympathetic to their goals and purposes, and reporter calls tend to come from friendly voices seeking talking points rather than skeptical reporters demanding answers.”

ADF attorney David French writes at the National Review Phi Beta Cons Blog: “So now at least some of the protestors in Wisconsin have been reduced to hitting a Fox News reporter and covering up his camera to prevent his broadcast. And this in a protest that features a strong university presence. Lest anyone forget, the University of Wisconsin at Madison has been one of the leading college censors in the United States.”

David French writes at National Review Phi Beta Cons Blog: “The outrage of the administration’s DOMA decision comes not from articulating this principle but from its declaration that, essentially, there are no reasonable constitutional arguments in support of Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act. This is a truly astonishing assertion given the great weight of legal authority — some of which is outlined in the attorney general’s own letter. In fact, that political (rather than legal) calculation underlying this determination is given away by the administration’s continued enforcement in spite of its alleged conviction that the act has no reasonable constitutional support.”

One News Now: ADF attorney David French reports that when a small number of pro-life students were denied access to the campus, they continued their demonstration anyway, “doing nothing but holding signs.” “Then it seemed like a literal squad of police officers descended upon them, and as [a] student literally read from the school’s handbook, [which] promised her free speech, they arrested her,” French continues. [more quotes from David French]

An Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney representing members of a pro-life student group filed suit against Carleton University Friday for repeatedly blocking the group from expressing its views on campus while allowing other student groups to express themselves freely.

The Iona Institute: David French, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, said that the definition amounted to “radical political correctness run amok”. He said it was absurd to single out Christians as oppressors and non-Christians as the only oppressed people on campus. [more quotes by David . . . ]

ADF attorney David French appeared on the Bob Dutko Show. | MP3 audio 5:36 mins | Related ADF Media

California Catholic Daily: hristians deserve the same protections against religious discrimination as any other students on a public university campus,” said ADF Senior Counsel David French. “It’s very good to see officials at UC-Davis agree. Anti-Christian discrimination is an epidemic on American university campuses, and that’s what made the UC-Davis definition ridiculously absurd. We wish that more universities would be as proactive in addressing such concerns as UC-Davis has been here.” . . . ADF-allied attorney Tim Swickard, one of nearly 1,900 attorneys in the ADF alliance, had sent a letter to the university explaining that the definition is unconstitutional under both the U.S. and California constitutions . . .

ADF attorney David French appeared on the radio to discuss recent developments in the UC Davis situation. | Related ADF Media | The Hugh Hewitt Show; MP3 audio 8:33 mins | The Janet Mefferd Show; MP3 audio 18:50 mins

University says definition will either be revised or eliminated in wake of concerns expressed in letter from ADF-allied attorney

One News Now: The university has issued a policy statement, asking students to adhere to its definition of “community.” David French, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), tells OneNewsNow the Christians on campus have discovered that the school’s policy, which defines “religious/spiritual discrimination” as “the loss of power and privilege to those who do not practice the dominant culture’s religion,” does not protect them from religious discrimination as — in his words — it is “institutionalized oppressions toward those who are not Christian.” . . . [quote continues]

LifeNews: Pro-life student groups should not be singled out to pay fees that others do not have to pay. The type of fee assessed to Students for Life has been repeatedly ruled unconstitutional,” said ADF Senior Counsel David French. “A very basic and clear constitutional principle is that the government cannot place this sort of price tag on free speech simply because that speech might offend somebody.” The ADF letter explains: “The Supreme Court has made clear that the government may not charge speakers for the security costs driven by listeners’ response to that speech.”

Christian Post: In a letter to university officials Wednesday, Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) attorney Timothy J. Swickard voiced objections to the university’s definition of religious discrimination as listed in the glossary section of the UC Davis campus community relations website . . . “Christians deserve the same protections against religious discrimination as any other students on a public university campus,” said ADF Senior Counsel David French in a statement released Wednesday.

Todd Starnes reports at Fox News: he definition is listed in a document called, “The Principles of Community.” It defines “Religious/Spiritual Discrimination” as “The loss of power and privilege to those who do not practice the dominant culture’s religion. In the United States, this is institutionalized oppressions toward those who are not Christian.” “This is radical political correctness run amok,” said David French, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund . . .

David French writes at National Review Phi Beta Cons: “When you spend any amount of time defending free speech and religious liberty, it’s hard not to be impressed at the sheer creativity and audacity of efforts to censor students and force them to bend to the secular-Left academic establishment. And now comes word that UC-Davis has taken political correctness to bizarre new heights.”

Charisma Online: “Christians deserve the same protections against religious discrimination as any other students on a public university campus,” says Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) Senior Counsel David French. “It’s ridiculously absurd to single out Christians as oppressors and non-Christians as the only oppressed people on campus when the facts show that public universities are more hostile to Christians than anyone else.” A from ADF-allied attorney Tim Swickard to UC-Davis explains, “It is patently clear that UC Davis’s definition of religious discrimination is blatantly unconstitutional under both the Federal and California State Constitutions. The policy singles out some faiths for official school protection while denying the same protection to others solely on the basis of their particular religious views…Moreover, the UC-Davis policy is simply nonsensical given the environment on most University campuses where Christian students, if anything, are among the most likely to be subjected to discrimination because of their faith.”

ADF Attorney David French writes at National Review Phi Beta Cons: “If the university gladly sends tens of thousands of dollars to radical groups like Sex Out Loud, why begrudge a Catholic student group its own piece of the very pie their students helped fund? The answer is clear: The University prefers one message over the other, and would rather fund events like “Condoms and Candy” than a Catholic meeting centered around — gasp — prayer.”

ADF attorney David French appeared on the Zeb Bell Show to discuss this: Renowned professor challenges promotion denial over religion in appellate hearing. | MP3 audio 22:46 mins

One News Now: “Essentially the issue is whether a conservative Christian professor has any First Amendment protection for his writings as a columnist and his public speeches that he delivers,” the attorney explains. “The university literally argued that his writings and his speeches were not protected by the First Amendment.”

David French writes at Patheos: “But revolutions can also be a prelude to unspeakable horror. As we watch the unfolding dramas in Tunisia and Egypt, we should remember the Reign of Terror that followed the storming of the Bastille; Lenin, Mao’s, and Pol Pot’s communist genocides; and the revolutionary Islamic Republic of Iran that stands today, busily building the bomb while supporting worldwide terrorism and uttering apocalyptic threats against Israel and the Jewish people . . . ”

Vanderbilt Orbis: “The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian non-profit organization, filed a civil rights complaint on January 11 for a Mississippi woman looking to apply to the program. ‘You can’t create a better way to screen out pro-life applicants if you try,’ said David French, director of the Alliance Defense Fund.”

Charisma: “‘Christian professors should not be discriminated against because of their beliefs. Disagreeing with an accomplished professor’s religious and political views is no grounds for refusing him promotion,’ says [ADF attorney David French]. ‘Opinion columns are some of the clearest examples of free speech protected by the First Amendment. Mentioning them on a promotion application does not change that.’”

LifeSiteNews: “The conference gave older leaders present a refreshing look at the upbeat pulse sustaining the new generation of pro-lifers. At the morning general session, Alliance Defense Fund Attorney [David French] said, ‘I look out into this crowd and I see the energy and the commitment that is going to transform the future. And I don’t see that everywhere I go, but I see it here.’”

“ADF is representing UNC criminology professor Mike Adams, who contends that he was unconstitutionally denied a promotion because his application referenced his nationally syndicated opinion columns that espoused religious and political views not held by university officials.”

ADF attorney David French appeared on the Hugh Hewitt Show (1.11.2011) to discuss this: Vanderbilt University abandons illegal policy that forced nursing residents to sign abortion pledge. | MP3 audio 7:44 mins

ADF attorney David French writing at Patheos: “[R]ight now there is a discernible and significant historical trend in the United States, and it’s not the trend the Left seeks. Abortion is on the retreat . . . Within the Christian community, young people who are ambivalent about other hot-button cultural issues (like same-sex marriage) are often proving to be far more actively pro-life than their parents . . . As the public grows more pro-life, it is increasingly intolerant of the abortion lobby . . . Finally—and crucially—the abortion industry simply can’t avoid the reality of its own brutality.”

ADF attorney David French appeared on the Mike Gallagher Show to discuss this: Insult to injury: WVU-Parkersburg cuts all student speakers at graduation after students’ plea to reinstate prayers.  | MP3 audio 7:17 mins

Alliance Defense Fund Senior Counsel David French will be available for media interviews Sunday following his presentation at the 2011 Students for Life of America National Conference.

ADF attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “Coming on the heels of June Sheldon’s $100,000 settlement after San Jose Community College fired her for providing a (literally) textbook answer to questions about the origin of homosexual desire, it’s becoming clear that religious discrimination in academia is growing increasingly costly (and those figures don’t include the considerable sums the universities paid to outside counsel to defend their illegal conduct).”

ADF attorney Heather Gebelin Hacker writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “We know that ‘civility codes’ on college campuses are used to stifle speech (see, for example, the case of the College Republicans at San Francisco State University), which is why it is important to oppose them. (Ironically, they were also used by government officials to silence speech during the Civil Rights Movement. Many of the foundational free speech cases come from that era.) We must remember that simply because someone does not like what they hear does not mean the truth should not be spoken.”

ADF attorney David French writing at Patheos: “Sometimes, the truth is not civil. Sometimes, our consciences need to be shocked, and those who occupy the halls of power should be directly challenged. There is injustice in this world—including deadly injustice—and it is a simple fact that civil disagreement is quite often the easiest form of dissent to handle, the easiest to disregard.”

Christian Post: ADF Senior Council David French said of the discrepancy, “A university is never ever going to say we did something wrong.” However, he is pleased with the latest changes.

TimesNews.net (AP): David French, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, called the original version morally reprehensible. “How can you justify asking any medical provider to participate in something they believe to be the unjustified killing of another human being?” The ADF is a conservative Christian group whose founders include James Dobson from Focus on the Family.

Tennessean: The Alliance Defense Fund is withdrawing the complaint it filed Tuesday with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. “It was the right thing for Vanderbilt to do,” said David French, senior counsel for the group, “and they should be commended for it.”

ADF attorney David French writing at National Review Online / Phi Beta Cons: “Yesterday afternoon, I wrote about Vanderbilt’s requirement that applicants for a nursing residency sign a “Women’s Health Acknowledgment” stating that applicants ‘will be expected to care for women undergoing termination of pregnancy.’ Shortly after my post went live, a second applicant came forward and filed a complaint with HHS. Vanderbilt now faces two discrimination claims with the Office for Civil Rights.”

ADF attorney David French writes at National Review Phi Beta Cons: “As a matter of common decency, as a matter of law, and as a matter of conscience, it is hard to imagine a more invasive and reprehensible act than to require individuals who understand that an unborn child is a distinct human life to pledge to participate in killing that child. Yet that is exactly what Vanderbilt requires of nurses in the Women’s Health Track of its Nurse Residency Program.”

ADF attorney David French writing at National Review Online / Bench Memos: “While I can’t claim to have known Judge Roll as well as many other attorneys at the Alliance Defense Fund did (our headquarters is in Arizona), I did speak with him several times and knew him by reputation. He was a great American — a man of deep faith, a longtime public servant of the highest integrity, and unfailingly kind and humble.”

ADF attorney David French writing at Patheos: “Here’s a prediction: The new congress will land in Washington and discover the same reality that faced their ‘revolutionary’ predecessors, pass budgets that don’t differ dramatically from the budgets that came before, and pray fervently that the mighty American economy pulls their chestnuts out of the fire . . . A majority of Americans do not want to see their own government benefits cut, limited, or eliminated, and since a majority of Americans receive one or more tangible government benefits, the entitlement majority may be the most enduring majority in American politics.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at National Review Online / Bench Memos: “[L]et’s not forget that the secular Left created an entire litigation engine out the ‘offended observer.’ When religious symbols are taken from public land, those cases are launched through a unique standing rule that allows a person who’s merely offended at the sight of a religious symbol to literally make a federal case out of their fit of pique. As a general rule, we do not enjoy a right not to be offended (and it’s a good thing too; imagine a world where every perceived slight could launch litigation) — except when it comes to public religious displays.”

Rob Boston writes at Americans United for Separation of Church and State / Wall of Separation: “[T]here are people out there bound and determined to use Christmas as another front in their misguided ‘culture war’ . . . Consider this column by David French, an attorney with the right-wing Alliance Defense Fund, which appeared on The Washington Post’s website. While I disagree with French’s views, he at least has the virtue of candor. He freely admits why the Religious Right carps on this issue so much – it’s a reminder to the rest of us that Christians (of his stripe) rule.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at The Washington Post / On Faith: “For decades, the secular left has argued that religious offensiveness is a very big deal . . . Let’s try to sort this out. So it is a big deal when a nativity scene is put on public land but no big deal at all if it’s removed? You can be upset when memorial crosses are put up, but not when they’re taken down? . . . In reality, the presence or absence of religious symbols is important. The Christmas skirmish is just one (easily lampooned) part of a larger battle over our nation’s history.”

“This week, the Tolerance Law Center, a civil rights association headed by a director who has spent more than a decade defending civil liberties, issued a report labeling the Southern Poverty Law Center a hate group. Previously, the TLC has condemned Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Taliban for ‘crimes against humanity.’”

The Daily of the University of Washington: “At UA, officials are mulling over an up-and-coming style of dorm rooms: coed housing. This type of room assignment is designed to make gay students more comfortable, The Arizona Republic report . . . However, many conservatives oppose the idea, saying that sexual harassment and assaults would actually increase, the Republic reported. ‘That’s completely at odds with common sense,’ David French, senior counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Scottsdale-based Christian organization that seeks to preserve family values, said to the Republic.”

The Daily (University of Washington): “At UA, officials are mulling over an up-and-coming style of dorm rooms: coed housing. This type of room assignment is designed to make gay students more comfortable, The Arizona Republic reported. ‘That’s completely at odds with common sense,’ [David French], senior counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Scottsdale-based Christian organization that seeks to preserve family values, said to the Republic.”

Wintery Knight: “This is timely, at a time where I am considering whether I would do more good supporting Christian/conservative groups on campus as an assistant professor or as a free speech lawyer defending campus groups from student governments. No one is better at these kinds of issues than the ADF. Here’s the article.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Speak Up Movement / University: Last week’s post on the Crushing Burden of Divorce generated more than a little push-back, both in the comments section of the post itself (which was cross-posted on our companion church site) and on Facebook . . . How, you ask, can parents be so much happier when their children are so much worse off? Wouldn’t the emotional and sexual collapse of their own children cripple the parents’ emotional well being? Not if they long ago shifted their life priorities — away from the Biblical model of self-denial and to the world’s model of personal fulfillment.”

KTAR: “The University of Arizona is considering a pilot program that would allow students of the opposite sex to live in the same dorm room . . . ‘That’s completely at odds with common sense,’ said [David French], senior counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Scottsdale-based Christian organization that seeks to preserve family values.”

Arizona Republic: “The University of Arizona is considering a pilot program that would allow students of the opposite sex to live in the same dorm room, an option designed to make gay students feel more comfortable living on campus . . . ‘You mix all those together and then say, “Hey, guys and girls, why don’t you just go ahead and room together?” and it seems to be asking for an even greater degree of trouble than already exists,’ [ADF Attorney David French] said.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “The longer I live, and the more time I spend in the Christian conservative movement, the more keenly I’m aware of the extent to which divorce is devastating the Body of Christ. It’s destroying children’s lives, destroying their parents, and destroying our cultural witness . . . How can we tell any population of Americans — whether inclined to homosexual behavior or even polygamy — that marriage is the earthly model of Christ’s relationship to his church if we treat it as an instrument of our own happiness?”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Phi Beta Cons: “I’d submit that a significant amount of the much-vaunted youth support for same-sex marriage is less the result of considered cultural change than years of one-sided, often inaccurate indoctrination . . . Regardless of whether the topic is Islam, marriage, ‘torture,’ war, economics, or any other issue of real consequence, the ideological monoculture of the academy is better suited for producing partisans, activists, and Internet comment board trolls than informed and thoughtful citizens.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Patheos: “Let’s flip the script for a moment. Let’s imagine that in the United States our Christian population was producing thousands of suicide bombers, recruiting tens of thousands of Jihadists, financing hundreds of millions of dollars of arms and ammunition, and distributing literature proclaiming Jews and others as worthy of death. Would Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg walk of the set at criticism of Christians? Would Time magazine decry ‘Christophobia’? Of course not. They would argue that Christianity was in crisis, and they would be right.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “Over at Prop 8 Trial Tracker, Jeremy Hooper takes issue with my recent post regarding Iowa voters’ rejection of three state supreme court justices who invented a state constitutional right to same-sex marriage . . . [I]t’s true that marriage supporters put money in the race. But is it true that money guarantees victory? It helps — of course — but if money made all the difference, this past election cycle would look very different.”

Prop 8 Trial Tracker: “The Alliance Defense Fund’s David French is using the Iowa judicial retention vote to question whether same-sex marriage is actually inevitable . . . ‘I see the poll data indicating that young people increasingly support same-sex marriage, but I also believe that much of that support is soft — dependent on the unique peer pressures and ideological environment on college campuses’ . . . But here’s the thing: The Iowa judge vote was a battle between one hyper-motivated, highly-funded, out-of-state-supported coalition solely focused on the single issue of same-sex marriage vs. everyone else in the state.”

At Bench Memos, ADF Attorney David French responds to Robert VerBruggen on tax-credit voucher programs: “Taxpayers give money to nonprofit organizations based upon shared beliefs and shared goals. Arizona has chosen to further incentivize one segment of charitable giving (in the arena of education, which is a public and private function) by giving a relatively modest tax credit.”

ADF Attorney David French writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “Why does it keep getting hammered at the ballot box? . . . Yesterday, three of the seven Iowa justices were up for retention, and all three lost.”

Student Free Press Association: “‘[Gender-neutral housing] is just part of the next logical step in a university project that is designed to cause students to rethink essentially everything they knew about sex and gender,’ said [David French], the director of the Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian organization . . . In just five years, the rest of the Ivy League and another 40 other schools have followed suit, thanks in large part to the National Student Genderblind Campaign. The group has campaigned for gender-neutral housing and more relaxed policies because, according to their website, ‘traditional policies are premised upon outdated beliefs and stereotypes about gender and sexuality.’”

ADF Attorney David French responds to Robert VerBruggen’s (NRO) criticisms of his “Christianity, stigma, and suicide” column: “First, the argument that comes largely from external (typically Leftist) critics of Christianity is that Christian opposition to homosexual behavior creates a ‘climate’ conducive to suicide. I think this is frankly absurd . . . what is the Left’s argument? That the mere existence of people who think homosexual behavior is wrong makes it more likely that a person who identifies as gay will kill himself? . . . My argument is that sin affects the conscience in ways that can be quite profound — and that effect often exists regardless of the existence of any external moral critique. Within orthodox Christian theology, it’s understood that the ‘requirements’ of God’s laws are written on the human heart. In other words, people do, as you put it, ‘naturally process a given behavior as sinful,’ at least until hearts are hardened or consciences corrupted.”