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Win For ‘Natural Family’ Crowd at UN Human Rights Council…

By Peter Montgomery

…social media. Latin America: Latest turf expansion for Alliance Defending Freedom In the summer issue of Political Research Associates’ magazine The Public Eye, Gillian Kane writes about the expansion of the US-based conservative Christian legal group Alliance Defending Freedom in Latin America. The report documents the behind-the-scenes work ADF is doing at the Organization of American States and its Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Th…

Faith and Civil Liberties Groups Pushing Back Against Islamophobia

By Sarah Posner

…n a Qur’an, rather than by a proud and longstanding tradition of religious freedom, tolerance and pluralism. In communities across the United States, this project will not only serve as a model for tolerance and cooperation and promote local faith leaders as champions of such, but it will also create a concrete opportunity to build and strengthen working ties between faith communities moving forward. Faith Shared’s big event will be on June 26, wh…

State as Executioner: Rick Perry Did Not Invent the Death Penalty

By Louis A. Ruprecht

…y? My Greek friends’ incredulity about the face of judicial killing in the United States was based primarily on history. Greece languished under a military junta in the Cold War years and suffered all the totalitarian grotesqueries and social trauma we know as the plight of “the disappeared.” This was after an almost theatrically brutal German occupation in the Second World War (1 million died of famine in the first winter, countless more in repri…

Even Amid Controversy, ‘My Soul Still Sings,’ Says UMC’s First Lesbian Bishop

By Sunnivie Brydum

…more committed than ever to bringing peace, clarity, and acceptance to the United Methodist Church’s decades-long struggle over how to treat LGBTQ congregants and clergy. Before her consecration as bishop, Oliveto “broke the stained glass ceiling” at the 12,000-member Glide Methodist Church in San Francisco, becoming the first woman to serve as a senior pastor at any of the denomination’s 100 largest congregations in the U.S. It was there that she…

Tutu’s Daughter Marries Woman & Loses Anglican Priest License; Romanian Anti-Marriage Activists Get 3 Million Signatures; Australian State Apologizes For Harmful Sodomy Laws; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…uncil of clerics that will choose his successor, Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned against “ravaging moral decay” in the West, citing specifically the legalization of homosexuality, which he said would lead to legalized incest. United Kingdom: Politician releases anti-gay ‘dictionary’ Julia Gasper, a town counselor and academic with a record of anti-gay rhetoric, created an offensive “queer dictionary.” Sample definition: “Gay…

Anti-Trans Bus Tour Is Not Very Welcome In Spanish Cities; Gay Rights As A Weapon In Nationalist War On Muslims; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…der notes in Egyptian Streets: “In July, Egypt’s permanent delegate to the United Nations said that Egypt will not comply with any pro-homosexual resolutions passed by the United Nations.” Hungary: Mayor pushing anti-gay, anti-Muslim enclave TIME reports on László Toroczkai, right-wing mayor of Ásotthalom who has banned burka wearing, mosque-building, and the Muslim call to prayer. The town also gays “gay propaganda.” Argentina: UN expert to study…

Can a Church Split Truly Be Gracious?

By Adam J. Copeland

…alled the “reunification” of the southern-based Presbyterian Church in the United States with the United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. There’s a great family photo with my grandfather, great-uncle, father—all pastors—and me sleeping in my stroller in the foreground. Reunification brought my family’s pastors back into the same denomination. In the intervening years while I’ve flirted with Lutheranism and interned in the Church of Scotland, the…

The Brutality of Life for Syrian LGBTs; Saving the Anglican Church by Dissolving It; Backlash to Hindu Gay Wedding Ceremony in Indonesia; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…right led the country in the 1990s to become a global pioneer in providing free and universal HIV medications. More recently, Argentina’s path-breaking 2012 law on gender recognition has become the template for transgender rights advocates in many other countries. In the post-communist world, LGBT citizens have not fared as well. In Russia, the 2013 law banning so-called “propaganda” for LGBT rights has fomented widespread harassment, discriminati…

Commies, Blacks, Jews, the UCC and Other Threats to America

By Daniel Schultz

…radical thoughts as: conservative religious nutjobs should not be given a free pass to run the nation, and gays and lesbians should enjoy equal protection under the law. Good that they think we’re a bunch of wild-eyed radicals. If I and the members of my denomination scare Glenn Beck, that’s a good thing. It means they’re off-balance. Same goes for the ever-execrable Mark Tooley, writing the same hack piece for the 40,000th time at the Weekly Sta…

Sydney’s Anglican Diocese Gives $1 Million To ‘No’ Campaign on Marriage; and more in Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…blue everyone is brainwashed — now the [LGBT] community is demanding more freedom, it really is a threat.” President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo said last year that the job of police was to defend LGBT communities and other groups from discrimination, but he has largely stayed on the sidelines of the debate as the crackdown has intensified. Associated Press reports from Africa that activists who “stepped out of the shadows” with support from the Obama a…