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Scientology: All-American or Aging Hoax?

…y has been digging for dirt on Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of South Park, for satirizing the church in the 2005 episode “Trapped in the Closet.” The church allegedly hired investigators to go through their trash and to collect information about their staff. (Meanwhile, the most offensive thing about the episode was that it wasn’t all that funny.)   While there is something undeniably disturbing about The Church of Scientology, there’s…

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Thanksgivukkah, With a Side of Christmas Envy

…ic piety, and Norman Rockwell-ian family celebrations. Long ago, it seems, South Park featured the young Jewish character Kyle Broslowski singing “It’s hard to be a Jew on Christmas.” Though he ultimate reconciles himself to his Jewishness, he also bemoans his social position. “I can’t sing christmas songs or decorate a christmas tree, or leave water out for rudolph ’cause there’s something wrong with me! My people don’t believe in Jesus Christ’s…

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US Names Int’l Envoy for LGBT Rights; Marriage revolution spreads in Mexico; Scott Lively Warns World of Anti-Christ; Global LGBT Recap

…en used to target activists and journalists in Russia. The bill’s sponsors promote it as a measure to “protect children from harmful information.” Member of Parliament Aldan Smayil said the legislation’s intent was ““to protect children from information that kills the feeling of warmth and humanity, which is harmful to the health and psyche, promotes violence and is, in short, spiritually devastating to the younger generation.” Finland: Marriage E…

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Conservative French Catholics a ‘Rightwing Patriarchal Bunch’?; Indonesian Prez Decries Anti-LGBT Discrimination; Romanian Prez Warns Against ‘Religious Fanaticism’; Global LGBT Recap

…ries were presenting gay rights as a threat to family values. “That’s been promoted by key figures around the globe including the Russian state and the Orthodox church,” he said. As tensions with Brussels spiralled over Ukraine in 2014, some of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s supporters took to calling Europe “Gayropa” and promoting Russia as the antithesis of the West. Singapore: New rules require government permission for foreign involvement…

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Latest “Religious Freedom” Bills Reveal a New Strategy

…s just the latest salvo in a growing trend that uses weaponized “religious freedom” legislation to target specific state functions or agencies, effectively gutting existing LGBT protections in those areas. South Dakota led the way, followed by Alabama, and Texas’ SB 156. The avalanche of anti-LGBT legislation already passing necessitates a sobering reminder: It’s only March. “Several state legislatures have filed religious refusal laws this year,…

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The GOP’s Race to the
Dark Ages

…administration’s anti-Catholic bias. Catholics beg to differ. The right to free exercise of religion, a First Amendment right, does not entitle a religious organization to a government contract. Nor does it entitle religious organizations to have every one of their beliefs accommodated by the government. The USCCB wants the Obama administration, for example, to exempt all colleges, universities, and hospitals from the requirement under the Afforda…

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What the USCCB’s New “Religious Liberty” Initiative Took from Evangelicals

…and even some Eastern Orthodox Christians joined hands in protecting their freedom from the scourges of LGBT rights, reproductive freedom, feminism, and secularism. At the time, a handful of Catholic bishops signed the document. Now the USCCB seems to have been motivated by its success: it is, after all, touted widely at conservative and religious right gatherings and now claims nearly half a million signers. Religious liberty, the document procla…

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8 Bill Maher Statements For UC Berkeley To Consider Before Commencement

…ding this ruckus, however, are a few missing (and critical) points. First, free speech does not guarantee Maher or anyone the right to be invited by elite institutions to deliver keynote speeches. In no way does uninviting Maher infringe upon his ability to express his views in public. In fact, he does so regularly on his primetime cable television show to roughly 4 million viewers. Second, the purpose of a university commencement address is to sp…

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Bishops Have No Religious Freedom Claim

…— free exercise of religion, that in order for a law to violate somebody’s free exercise, it has to impinge — substantially burden — their religious practice. And there is no substantial burden on Catholics’ religious practice by providing coverage — insurance coverage for contraception for other people. No one is making Catholics who do not want contraception to take it. No one is making the bishops take it, and so it’s not really a First Amendme…

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Barack Obama, Pro-Life Hero

…g initiatives, conservative activists are finding they may apply religious freedom to any number of disparate issues. Apart from trivializing what ought to be a sacred liberal right, the widespread deployment of religious freedom arguments indicates a weak rhetorical posture. In each of the cases mentioned above, opponents of a particular piece of legislation embraced religious freedom only after other strategies failed to persuade. Such arguments…

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