Religion Dispatches
…. Lakers fan. Unlike me, he was a successful dentist who lived in southern California, which rendered his experience of the Lakers qualitatively superior to mine in nearly every respect. Since the early 1980s, this man had had season tickets to our favorite team. He’d not just lived through but witnessed firsthand the golden ages of purple reign. He’d sat through the playoffs, too. Magic, Kareem, Worthy, Shaq, Kobe. On their way to ten titles! I w…
Read More…that Cordileone was also one of the major driving forces behind Prop. 8 in California, which outlawed same-sex marriage.) Also on the committee is Most Rev. George Rassas. In 2008, Cardinal Francis George, Archbishop of Chicago, said in a deposition that Rassas had “withheld information about abuse allegations.” These are two of the people who will be seeing whether Girl Scouts USA meets the appropriate standards for a Catholic organizational part…
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…even cites several conservative Christians, including two key promoters of California’s Proposition 8, who have spoken out against the amendment but, at least for now, the misinformation and confusion surrounding the initiative seem to winning out. And although many Christians are positioned against the amendment, including coalitions such as Clergy for Equality and Pastors Against Amendment One, Knight points out that conservative churches far ou…
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…that unborn girls are under siege in America. Census data is offered from California which shows boy births increasing in Chinese, Indian, and Korean American households after 1980. And another House committee testimony points to “populations demonstrated to practice” sex-selective abortions living in America as reason for concern. There are zero studies of abortions performed for the sake of sex-selection in the United States. The rest of the t…
Read More…nal resources to state-level ballot initiatives on LGBT equality it did in California in 2008, individual Mormons in Maryland and Washington are gearing up both in support of and opposition to proposed statewide referenda against same-sex marriage. Gay Mormons and their allies have produced “It Gets Better” videos aimed to shine a light on welcoming and affirming attitudes among LDS people. Leaders of the SoulForce gay rights organization recent…
Read More…n among observant multi-generational Mormons. I grew up Mormon in Southern California in the 1970s and 1980s hearing that Cain and Ham were the progenitors of African and African-descended peoples. I also heard plenty of nuclear-tinged talk about the last days and the incipient millennium. It was, after all, the Cold War. But times have changed, that kind of talk isn’t really practical anymore. That’s the very distinction Mitt Romney—in refusing t…
Read More…nference call with an estimated 1,000 evangelical pastors around the state” last week. Leaders of Gingrich’s National Faith Leaders Coalition include the pollster George Barna, Left Behind author Tim LaHaye, California same-sex marriage opponent Pastor Jim Garlow, and American Family Association founder Don Wildmon. The Gingrich campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment. …
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…is came in 1953 when Rustin was arrested on a “morals charge” in Pasadena, California, for having sex in a parked car with two men. Rustin resigned from FOR, his friendship with Muste at first broken, and later resumed only with great strain. For years thereafter, Rustin worked mostly behind the scenes to avoid imperiling causes he cared about. For example, he was a vital member of the task force that wrote Speak Truth to Power, a 1955 American Fr…
Read More…id out so clearly, as well as NOM’s taking credit for passage of Prop 8 in California and the anti-marriage initiative in Maine. Included in the documents, which include several versions of a fundraising plan for a $20 million victory campaign, and a 2008-2009 update to the board, are now-familiar invocations of religious liberty. “Gay marriage is the tip of the spear, the weapon that will be and is being used to marginalize and repress Christiani…
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…Catholic Charities lost challenges to similar policies in state courts in California and New York, several Catholic and evangelical universities have sued HHS in federal courts around the country, charging that the contraception coverage requirement violates their religious freedom. While a federal court has yet to rule on the mandate, a ruling issued late Friday night demonstrates how the claim of infringement of religious freedom undermines the…
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