Unions That Divide: Churches Split Over Gay Marriage

At a black Pentecostal church in Raleigh, N.C., the Rev. Patrick Wooden entered the sanctuary on Sunday to a standing ovation, exulting that God’s “high hand” had led voters last week to pass a statewide amendment banning same-sex marriage. He took to the pulpit and denounced President Obama for taking a stand “in support of sin,” and “in opposition to the biblical model of marriage.”

Same-sex marriage became a reality in the United States in 2004 in the wake of a ruling by the Massachusetts Supreme Court that it was required under the equal protection clause of the commonwealth' Constitution. Prior to 2012, same-sex marriage was also legalized in New York, Connecticut, Iowa, New Hampshire, Vermont and Washington, D.C. Early in 2012, Washington State and Maryland both approved same-sex marriage laws, but neither took effect immediately and both were expected to be challenged in referendums.

In early May, North Carolina voted in large numbers for a constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriages, partnerships and civil unions, becoming the 30th state in the country and the last in the South to include a prohibition on gay marriage in the state constitution. A thousand miles away, at a predominantly white, Lutheran church in Madison, Wis., where a rainbow banner greets churchgoers arriving for services, the Rev. Susan Schneider preached that gay men and lesbians were included when Jesus commanded his followers to love one another: “Knocking down the walls is what Jesus was after.”

Mr. Obama’s declaration last week that he supports same-sex marriage prompted ministers around the country to take to their pulpits on Sunday and preach on the issue. But in the clash over homosexuality, the battle lines do not simply pit ministers against secular advocates for gay rights. Religion is on both sides in this conflict. The battle is actually church versus church, minister versus minister, and Scripture versus Scripture.

The dividing lines are often unpredictable. There are black churches that welcome openly gay couples, and white churches that do not. Some Presbyterian churches hire openly gay clergy members, while others will not. The Roman Catholic Church teaches that homosexual behavior is a sin, but there are Catholic priests who secretly bless gay unions.

And leaders in the United Methodist Church have been debating whether to ordain openly gay ministers for four decades, and voted again just this month to uphold their prohibition. But there are Methodist ministers who perform same-sex marriages in defiance of church rules who share the denomination with ministers who preach that America is going the way of Sodom and Gomorrah because of homosexuality.

More at the New York Times

Kentucky's alleged equality organizations failing

Since I was been absent things have gotten better, witness the awesome power of the Family Foundation of Kentucky:

The future of instant racing gambling in Kentucky is back in the hands of a trial judge who the Kentucky Court of Appeals on Friday ordered to further develop the issues surrounding the slot-like game.

The 2-1 decision doesn't expressly prohibit instant racing at Kentucky Downs in Franklin near the Kentucky-Tennessee state line and Ellis Park in Henderson. Instead, the court sent the case back to Franklin Circuit Judge Thomas Wingate with instructions to allow the Family Foundation of Kentucky and the state to explore several issues surrounding the game, in which patrons bet on historic races without knowing the names of the trainers, jockeys or horses involved.

In December 2010, Wingate upheld a proposal allowing tracks to accept pari-mutuel bets on rebroadcasts of the old races. The Family Foundation intervened in a lawsuit seeking to clarify the issue.

By not allowing the state and the Family Foundation of Kentucky to exchange evidence and flesh out the issues, it is impossible to tell what the trial judge relied on to justify upholding instant racing, Senior Judge Joseph E. Lambert wrote for the appeals court.

Martin Cothran, a senior policy analyst for the Lexington-based Family Foundation of Kentucky, said the ruling levels the playing field in the litigation.

"With an issue as ripe for corruption as expanded gambling, the public has a right to question, know and understand the underlying facts relating to the gambling activity and the special interests involved," Cothran said.

Social clubs like the faux and defunct Kentucky Fairness Alliance pose no threat to family values in Kentucky. Other social groups, Lexington Fairness and the Gay and Lesbian Services Organization or GLSO are also without power or merit, just a bunch of homosexuals getting together to get drunk? Cocktail anyone?

Louisville Fairness Campaign has proven how useless they are with the Berea ordinance. Chris Hartman the director of Louisville Fairness Campaign publicly promised a Madison County Human Rights Commission.  They created it and omitted the gay agenda, a major slap in the face to Hartman's credibility.

Hartman also proved that he himself is a bully, covered by major news outlets:

The leading supporter of the so-called “Bullying Bill” became verbally and physically abusive in a Capitol Annex hallway with an opponent of the bill after the bill went down to defeat in a House committee, attracting the attention of State Police and other observers. The Family Foundation called on the Fairness Campaign to issue a public apology for the behavior of its director, Chris Hartman. “If you are really opposed to bullying, the last thing you probably want to do is engage in it in plain sight after a meeting in which a bill prohibiting it was just discussed,” said Family Foundation spokesman Martin Cothran. Hartman obstructed the path of Andrew Walker, who had lobbied the committee against the bill, harassing him as he was leaving the restroom after the meeting and began interrogating him in an intimidating way. Several minutes later, Hartman cornered Walker again and began verbally bullying him with charges of being opposed to student safety.

According to Louisville’s Courier Journal, Hartman “became verbally and physically abusive toward Andrew Walker, a policy analyst for The Family Foundation of Kentucky, who had lobbied against the bill.” As a result, The Family Foundation of Kentucky has called on the Fairness Campaign to issue a public apology for the behavior of Hartman.

Personally I think criminal charges should have been filed but the Louisville Fairness Campaign still has some political strength.

Kentucky Equality Federation's former president, Jordan Palmer successfully lobbied the feds to prosecute the first so-called gay hate crime in the United States. So what? They also forced the city of Hazard to make changes and got a true Christian suspended from his job just because he didn't want homosexuals kissing in his pool.

With Palmer no longer in the drivers seat, the future political power of Kentucky Equality Federation is in question. With Palmer and his political connections gone Kentucky Equality Federation will collapse on itself.  Palmer stepped down for health reasons, he probably has AIDS knowing how easy the gays have sex.

Joshua Koch the Kentucky Equality Federation's new president condoned the illegal removal of a freedom of speech billboard which told God fearing people the truth: "Abortion is Murder and Homosexuality is a Sin!" Just how hard do you think the Lexington Police Department is going to investigate the removal of that billboard with a gay mayor?

Be warned, David Adams may be busy but I am back!

T-shirt company victim of modern witch hunt

Kentucky.com
Ky. Voices: T-shirt company victim of modern witch hunt
By Martin Cothran

The Family Foundation of Kentucky covered this story and commented in the Lexington Herald:

Martin Cothran is spokesman for the Family Foundation, a conservative advocacy group.

Herald-Leader columnist Tom Eblen cheered on the witch hunt over a Christian businessman's refusal to print T-shirts with a message that contradicts his religious views.

The man is being hauled before the Lexington Human Rights commission, which is being called upon to throw him into the political water to see if he floats.

Taking up his torch, Eblen added his voice to those of the Gay and Lesbian Services Organization and Lexington Mayor Jim Gray, who are chanting the political equivalent of "Burn him!"

The University of Kentucky, too, has added its increasingly anti-religious voice to the din. This is the same university that refused to hire a science professor on the grounds that he was an evangelical, resulting in a complaint to the Kentucky Commission on Human Rights, which was completely ignored.

Eblen and the rest of the mob are arguing that the business, Hands on Originals, has violated the Lexington Fairness Ordinance, an ordinance which added coverage for sexual orientation to that for race, religion, gender and national origin in anti-discrimination laws governing housing, employment and public accommodations.

The ordinance prohibits a business from refusing to serve a person on the basis of his sexual orientation.

In a famous scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, a woman is accused of being a witch. The reason? "She looks like one." To Eblen and the rest of the witch hunters, Hands On Originals looks like it's discriminating, even though it's not.

What Eblen and the mob haven't noticed in the midst of their frenzied denunciations is that Hands On Originals did not discriminate against any customer on the basis of sexual orientation. In fact, the business has an expressed policy against it. What it did do was refuse to print a T-shirt with a message that went against its religious convictions.

It didn't refuse to print the T-shirts because of who was asking it to print them; it refused to print them because of what the T-shirts said. This is not prohibited by the ordinance.

Had the group come to Hands On to print a shirt that said "I love the Wildcats," there would have been no problem.

Ironically, the people really discriminating are UK and any other organization that pulls its business from the T-shirt company, since they are doing so on the basis of the owner's religious beliefs. If they were providing the service rather than receiving it, they would be the ones violating anti-discrimination laws.

It used to be witches who were supposed to contort themselves into strange positions, but now gay activist groups, marching under the banner of tolerance, are twisting themselves into the tolerance police, intent, not on preventing discrimination against individuals, but on using the power of government to force others to agree with them.

But in their increasingly intolerant crusade, they have apparently failed to take note of the consequences.

Imagine that you ran a T-shirt business and a white supremacist group came to you to print T-shirts that said, "Down with N-----s!" According to the reasoning of Eblen and the mob, anti-discrimination laws would require you to print them. Not to do so would be to discriminate against a racial group, in this case, Aryans.

Here's where the gay rights activists and liberal journalists meet the Aryan Nation.

Eblen's bizarre reasoning doesn't end there. He ventures into the issue of what Christianity actually says about homosexuality, saying that, the way he reads it, the Gospels aren't against it. Notice the subtle avoidance of the rest of the New Testament, in which Paul leaves little doubt about the issue. Or the Old Testament, which doesn't exactly read like a gay rights tract.

Then, as if to amuse those of his readers who have actually read the thing, he charges those who disagree with him with selectively reading the Bible.

Might as well burn the Bible along with the witch.

I have a new slogan for a T-shirt: "Down with the Tolerance Police!" I'll take it to a gay-owned T-shirt company and point out that, according to the groups who say they represent them, they have no choice but to print it.

Drag Queen Research at the University of Louisville

The Family Foundation of Kentucky did a great job with this:

Sex group says Family Foundation is the modern day KKK

This is outrageous. If you do not want Kentucky to become the new Massachusetts we are members of the K.K.K. according to the Kentucky Equality Federation.

“It is time to bear witness to the fact that the people of Kentucky have stood for marriage, and do stand for marriage now,” said Kent Ostrander, executive director of the Lexington-based Family Foundation, which sponsored the rally.

Several legislators — most Republicans — spoke in support of the effort to get the General Assembly to pass legislation during the special yesterday, or in a special session Gov. Ernie Fletcher plans to call beginning Aug. 13.

The sex groups joined together to issue a joint press statement.

Unlike Kentucky Fairness Alliance, Kentucky Equality Federation has teeth. If you follow news about Kentucky Equality Federation in Louisville or Northern Kentucky they are young in comparison to the Louisville sex group or the KY Fairness Alliance meaning their management and members appear to be 28 or younger.

Are these tactics a sign of the times of what I have to look forward to as I get closer to 60? Maybe they are more than a sex group and possibly an age group also?

Join the fight against domestic partner benefits

It looks as if Kentucky Equality Federation and Kentucky Fairness Alliance have been successful in getting the General Assembly (Democrats no doubt) to drop the issue of boyfriend benefits from the Extraordinary Session Agenda. But do not worry just yet, the Family Foundation of Kentucky is planning a "protest" at the Capital to greet the House when they return. Join them if you can.

About 250 people are expected to gather Monday in Frankfort in opposition to domestic partner benefits in Kentucky’s public universities and agencies.

The “Rally to Protect Marriage” is set for 2 p.m. in the state Capitol Rotunda, said Kent Ostrander, executive director of the Family Foundation of Kentucky, the sponsor.

Ostrander said “we want to simply encourage the legislature to take up Senate Bill 5.” The legislation passed the upper chamber 28-6 in a truncated special session earlier this month.

In 2004, more people voted "Yes" for the Kentucky Marriage Protection Amendment than had ever voted both "Yes" and "No" combined on any other constitutional amendment in Kentucky history. After passage with record-breaking participation by citizens, those pushing "other" sexual relationships counter-attacked by influencing the upper-level administrations of the state’s two flagship universities – the University of Kentucky and University of Louisville.

There they set out to create "domestic partnerships" and offer them benefits. U of L started offering such benefits to employees who had live-in homosexual or heterosexual lovers in January and UK's Board decided to follow U of L's lead in April. Their goal is to establish them at the two largest universities, move them into other schools, then into cities and, ultimately, render the Marriage Protection Amendment useless.