A New Jersey Church that refused to allow two women to hold a civil-union ceremony on its property four years ago broke the law, a state administrative law judge said Thursday.
Since the judge works for the state’s Division on Civil Rights, his opinion doesn’t have the force of one coming from a state or federal court — but the Alliance Defense Fund, which is representing the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association, is considering its next steps in protecting the church’s religious rights.
“The government should not be able to force a private Christian organization to use its property in a way that would violate its own religious beliefs,” Litigation Staff Counsel Jim Campbell said. “Religious groups have the right to use their private property in a way that is consistent with their beliefs. That right, protected by both the New Jersey and U.S. Constitutions, obviously trumps any law enacted by the state’s legislature.”
The New Jersey Division on Civil Rights has 45 days to adopt, modify or reject the ruling. If the director takes no action, it automatically becomes final.
More proof of the President trying to have it both ways on marriage. This via the gay newspaper The Washington Blade:
The White House, in response to a Blade inquiry about the possible vote to repeal same-sex marriage rights in New Hampshire, said Thursday night that President Obama “believes strongly in stopping laws designed to take rights away.”
“While the president does not weigh in on every single action taken by legislative bodies in our country, the record is clear that the president has long opposed divisive and discriminatory efforts to deny rights and benefits to same-sex couples,” said White House spokesperson Shin Inouye. “The president believes strongly in stopping laws designed to take rights away.”
The statement doesn’t explicitly express support for same-sex marriage or mention New Hampshire. At the same time, the statement doesn’t include language found in previous White House statements on marriage that states should “determine for themselves how best to uphold the rights of their own citizens.” Such language was included in the White House response to the North Carolina anti-gay marriage measure that will be on the ballot in May.
... The vote to repeal the marriage law in New Hampshire has become an issue in the presidential race. Both former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Gov. Rick Perry spoke in favor of repeal prior to the primary there.
... But each of the candidates who have expressed support for a Federal Marriage Amendment — Perry, Romney, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum — have implicitly backed the repeal of the New Hampshire law because such a measure would prohibit same-sex marriage throughout the country.
A ministry that follows the dictates of its faith is engaging in wrongdoing, according to a New Jersey judge who recommended today that the state Division on Civil Rights find the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association violated the state’s nondiscrimination law.
“The respondent violated the [Law Against Discrimination] when it refused to conduct a civil-union ceremony for Ms. Bernstein and Ms. Paster,” wrote Solomon Metzger, an administrative law judge whose determination will become final if not overturned by the Division of Civil Rights.
... The seaside location has been popular for years for weddings, but the association, which is affiliated with the United Methodist Church, determined it could not biblically allow same-sex ceremonies to take place on its property.
So when Harriet Bernstein and Luisa Paster signed up for such a ceremony, they were turned down. They filed the discrimination complaint, and the state’s Division on Civil Rights joined their cause.
Dr. Ruth Jacobs of Gaithersburg is a physician. Michael J. McManus of Potomac is president of Marriage Savers. They write in the Maryland Gazette:
Gov. Martin O’Malley, in promoting same-sex marriage, wants to change the long-established meaning of marriage by promoting an illusion that gender and even biological relationships don't really matter.
Yet the healthiest children are those reared by a married mother and father.
“Marriage is the union of a husband and wife for a reason: These are the only unions that can make new life and connect children in love to their mom and dad,” says Maggie Gallagher, president of the National Organization for Marriage.
... While children can lose their parents for many reasons, changing from Webster's timeless definition of marriage to same-sex marriage as pushed by Gov. O'Malley would mean that it is our state government that is dividing the family tree, breaking biological ties and depriving children of either dad or mom.
Gay advocates are attempting to get Microsoft to support redefining marriage in Washington State:
...it's not clear if Microsoft will lend its support to the measure. Murray considers the company's endorsement "very important."
Company officials are reviewing the legislation but have not decided whether to take a position, said Jeff Reading, a spokesman for the company.
Microsoft created a flap in 2005 when said it was neutral on the initial gay-rights legislation. It failed in the Senate by one vote that year. After heavy criticism, the company later changed its position and endorsed the legislation, as well as subsequent bills, including domestic partnerships for same-sex couples.
Murray said he's talking with Microsoft and other companies about the gay-marriage bill. "I'm hopeful," he said. -- The Seattle Times
In an interview with Reason TV, author and libertarian icon George Gilder explains why he opposes gay marriage: "The family is critical to raising civilized, creative, responsible people who can exploit and enjoy freedom." When asked how he is defining the family in this sense, Gilder responds: "Nuclear family, a man and woman and children."
When asked how he feels about New York legalizing gay marriage, he says: "I think it's a bad thing ... this whole idea that homosexuality resembled race in any respect is nonsense. The whole idea that male homosexuality resembles lesbianism in any respect is nonsense. And so this whole idea of gay marriage is just a parody. It's an absurd concept." He goes on to say later in the interview that "laws about marriage" make sense to him, even as a libertarian.
Gilder also goes on to share views that we don't feel directly impact marriage, but do service to illustrate the various reasons he has come to his conclusions about marriage, family, and human "flourishing":
Rick Santorum describes himself as universally pro-life. That includes his tax plan, which policy analysts contend gives couples economic incentives to get married and have larger families.
Santorum’s tax proposals would triple the personal deduction for each child and “eliminate marriage tax penalties throughout the federal tax code.” He would retain deductions for charitable giving, home mortgage interest, health care, and retirement - all undertakings that support faith and family formation.
... The candidate’s promotion of marriage and family led the American Enterprise Institute’s JamesPethoukis to write that Santorum is “using tax policy as pro-family, pro-natalism social policy.”
Dr. Allan C. Carlson, president of the Howard Center for Family, Religion, and Society told LifeSiteNews.com that Santorum’s economic proposals “are potentially pro-natalist, and that’s a good thing. We could use more babies born in this country.” The U.S. birthrate fell below replacement level in 2008, hitting its lowest level in a century in 2010.
NOM co-founder Maggie Gallagher's syndicated column in Human Events on this week's Supreme Court decision:
Lost in the political shuffle in New Hampshire was an epic U.S. Supreme Court decision this week in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
By an astounding, unanimous 9-0 margin, the usually ideologically divided Supreme Court slapped down President Obama's radical doctrine that the federal government can tell a church who it must employ as a minister if the church violates anti-discrimination employment provisions.
The Obama administration's claim that there is no special protection for clergy in our Constitution, the majority ruled, "is hard to square with the text of the First Amendment itself, which gives special solicitude to the rights of religious organizations. We cannot accept the remarkable view that the Religion Clauses have nothing to say about a religious organization's freedom to select its own ministers."
Professor Douglas Laycock argued the case for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which defended the little Michigan church in court. Laycock is a longtime advisory board member of the organization (becketfund.org), which defends the religious liberty of all religions.
"This is a huge win for religious liberty," he said via a press release. "The Court has unanimously confirmed the right of churches to select their own ministers and religious leaders."
David Storobin, the republican candidate campaigning to replace disgraced Sen. Carl Kruger (who voted for SSM) explains why on ideological issues he fits Brooklyn values on marriage more than Kruger did when he betrayed his constituents:
Jonathan Baker, director of NOM's Corporate Fairness Project, in Forbes:
With all the other problems corporations face, a sluggish economy, uncertain tax structure and a shifting regulatory environment, add a new problem: new challenges to the ideal of corporate fairness.
... We are entering a new era, when some gay rights groups are now seeking to get corporations to discriminate against people who do not support gay marriage, and even threatening to punish corporations if they refuse.
This is not only bad business, it’s bad for business.
The workplace should be culture-war free zone—can we come together across the gay marriage line and agree at least on that?
The Presidential primaries have begun, and we're already in the middle of some major campaigns to promote and defend marriage. 2012 has begun with a bang—I'm currently writing to you from Texas where I'm meeting with key religious leaders. I've already been to Iowa for the caucuses and will soon be going to South Carolina.
But I wanted to take a minute to write you a quick note and let you know—WE DID IT!
As you know, a very generous donor gave us 3 months, during which time they would match every donation we received dollar-for-dollar up to one million. As of this morning, we have raised $995,339.85, and I'm awaiting a final update on the mail returns from the end of the year. But given the mail volume we received to date, I've no doubt and am extremely happy to announce that we are going to reach our goal of raising $1 million!
And it couldn't have happened without incredible supporters like you. Thank you so much for standing with us and giving us your support in defense of marriage.
The cause of marriage will win out in the end in no small part due to you and millions of Americans just like you. I am honored to be your representative in the fight to defend marriage.
Thank you for your continued support and trust. It means so much to me and to this just cause.
More British children are being raised by single parents because the tax and benefit system “encourages transient shack-ups”.
One in five British children live with a single mother or father. This figure is some 35 per cent higher than in Germany and 50 per cent higher than in France.
Researcher and author Patricia Morgan points out that these are the countries whose tax and benefits systems reward parents who stay together.
She said: “You can look at these figures and see immediately which countries help couples through tax and benefits.
“In France, people get help if they draw up legal family contracts. In Germany, Holland and Italy, married people get tax relief and tax relief for children.”
She added: “By contrast, our system encourages transient shack-ups.”
Every now and then, the Supreme Court surprises its critics by getting something absolutely, completely right: Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, decided on Wednesday, is just such a case. The Court held that the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment—both the Free Exercise Clause and the Establishment Clause—prohibit any government interference with the employment relationship between a religious body and those it in good faith (so to speak) considers its “ministers”: those leaders, teachers, and others who, in the words of the Court, “personify” the beliefs of the religious community.
The decision embraced, in broad language, the constitutional right of religious groups to autonomy in matters of their own “internal governance” and to the freedom to exercise “control over the selection of those who will personify its beliefs.” It specifically affirmed “a religious group’s right to shape its own faith and mission through its appointments.” And it grounded its holding in the proposition that “the text of the First Amendment itself . . . gives special solicitude to the rights of religious organizations.”
The decision was, strikingly, unanimous: no one disagreed with Chief Justice Roberts’s opinion for the Court. The only separate opinions were concurring ones, suggesting further extensions or specific applications of the Court’s reasoning. On a Court that has often been bitterly divided, this expression of unanimity is truly remarkable.
By NOM Staff|Posted in Religious Liberty, Supreme Court|Comments Off on Michael Stokes Paulsen Praises Supreme Court Decision on Religious Liberty
Sociologist Byron Johnson at Baylor University argues in Public Discourse this week why being pro-marriage does not mean you are anti-gay:
A recent national survey by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) provides a closer look at public opinion on same-sex marriage. The survey was funded by the Arcus Foundation, an organization that champions the rights of gay, lesbian, transgender, and bisexual persons.
... The media coverage of the PRRI survey, however, has painted a very different picture of the findings, drawing the more general conclusion that younger Americans are pro-gay while senior citizens are anti-gay. But does the PRRI survey, as well as other recent national surveys, provide data actually supporting such a conclusion?
... If older Americans are indeed anti-gay, one would not expect 90 percent of senior citizens to support equal employment opportunities for homosexuals.
...Simply put, it is inappropriate on methodological grounds to draw the conclusion that opposition to same-sex marriage is synonymous with being anti-gay.
...There is indeed a significant gap in support of same-sex marriage when one compares all Millennials to all senior citizens. However, when one looks at the views of Evangelicals toward same-sex marriage—a group estimated to be 100 million strong—a considerably different picture emerges. Being an Evangelical Protestant significantly lowers the chance one will agree with gay marriage in either age range, and brings the 18-to-29 age group down to a level of support similar to all others in the 65-and-over age range. Perhaps Evangelical churches are doing a better job combating the considerable cultural influences in support of same-sex marriage.
It is unwarranted and irresponsible to interpret opposition to same-sex marriage as a proxy for being anti-gay. There is no empirical evidence to suggest that senior citizens are anti-gay.
In a major study, researchers said family structures had a much more significant effect on boys’ early education than school type or even the gender of teachers.
It found that boys were much more likely to misbehave, be excluded from school and go on to achieve low grades after rebelling against “emotionally distant” parents.
The pattern is particularly marked in single-parent families where mothers “invest disproportionately less in their sons or feel less warm toward them” than daughters.
The disclosure comes amid continuing concern over the gender gap at the heart of the education system.
Data shows boys fall behind girls after just a year of school and the gulf widens throughout primary and secondary education.
... Researchers from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business analysed school suspension rates among boys and girls in the US. They also used surveys of parents and teachers relating to children’s cognitive, social, emotional, and physical development.
A New Jersey Church that refused to allow two women to hold a civil-union ceremony on its property four years ago broke the law, a state administrative law judge said Thursday.
