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The California Supreme Court today trashed society's traditional institution of marriage, opening it up for same-sex duos because retaining the historic definition "cannot properly be viewed as a compelling state interest." In a 4-3 decision replete with concurring and dissenting opinions filed by individual members of the court, the majority opinion determined state laws specifying marriage as being between a man and a woman were unconstitutional.... "It is certainly disappointing that the court, in declaring a right to same-sex marriage in the California Constitution, has shown an outrageous lack of respect for a majority of California voters and ignored a...

A clay tablet that has baffled scientists for 150 years has been identified as a witness's account of the asteroid suspected of being behind the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Researchers who cracked the cuneiform symbols on the Planisphere tablet believe that recorded an asteroid thought to have been more than half a mile across. The tablet, found by Henry Layard in the remains of the library in the royal place at Nineveh in the mid-19th century, is thought to be a 700 B.C. copy of notes made by a Sumerian astronomer watching the night sky. He referred to the...

New York City is frequently referred to by its slogan, "the Big Apple." But if some in city government have their way, New York may soon be known as the town to "get some." "Get Some" is the 2008 slogan for New York City's taxpayer-funded condom distribution program. Robert Peters, with Morality in Media, objects to the program both for its promotion of promiscuous sex and its false promise of safety. "I think it will be perceived by many people -- young people, in particular -- not just to get condoms but to get promiscuous sex," he remarks. "It's like...

SAN FRANCISCO, September 25, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Folsom Street Fair, a gay parade which has for years included full nudity and sex acts on public streets is set to take place again this year on September 30 with city approval, partial public funding and sponsorship by Miller Brewing Company. This year several Christian and pro-family groups have called for public scrutiny into the event as the ad for the event is a mockery of Christ's Last Supper. The ad portrays Christ and His disciples as half-naked homosexual sadomasochists with the bread and wine representing Christ's broken body and blood...

The chairman of Boston University's religion department offers this proposal: Public high schools should require one course in the Bible for all their students and another in world religions He cites surveys showing that most Americans can't even name one of the four biblical gospels and that many high school students think that Sodom and Gomorrah were a married couple.

The man deemed by San Francisco officials to be a potential threat to Mayor Gavin Newsom has suffered several mental breakdowns, was arrested last year on suspicion of threatening his elderly parents and shined a laser light in a prosecutor's eye during a court appearance, public records show. Han Sup Shin, 42, of Union City entered Newsom's Russian Hill apartment building early Feb. 15 and has been showing increasingly bizarre behavior at the mayor's public events, according to declarations filed in court as part of a request for a temporary restraining order by City Attorney Dennis Herrera. "We've had several...

Separating anatomy from what it means to be a man or a woman, New York City is moving forward with a plan to let people alter the sex on their birth certificate even if they have not had sex-change surgery. Under the rule being considered by the city’s Board of Health, which is likely to be adopted soon, people born in the city would be able to change the documented sex on their birth certificates by providing affidavits from a doctor and a mental health professional laying out why their patients should be considered members of the opposite sex, and...

It is not for Republicans. It is not for bow hunters. Also, no cat hoarders. Sign up now! Match.com does not allow cleavage. This much I learned from a female friend who used the enormous online dating service during a brief glitch in her dating career, and for whom I helped prepare the most modest of pix (waist up, cowboy hat, big smile, snug halter top, faintest sliver of shadow between breasts), only to have the photo immediately nixed by the site's apparently pallid and secretly Mormon editors who actively disallow even the slightest hint of flesh or pillow talk...

A Catholic priest preached yesterday at the main worship service associated with Boston's gay pride week, setting up a potential conflict with a church hierarchy that has been increasingly vocal in its criticism of the growing acceptance of gay relationships in Western societies.The Rev. Walter H. Cuenin, a longtime advocate of outreach to gays and lesbians in the Catholic Church, did not criticize or dispute Catholic teaching during his remarks, and he quoted several times from a 1997 document issued by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, which declared that ``the teachings of the Church make it clear that the...

He is having a number of people, including New Mexico Tech scientists, examine the potsherd to determine what the glaze is. Material engineers at the site said it looks like Trinitite, the substance materials such as sand turn into when subjected to a nuclear blast. However, Collins said he isn't suggesting a nuclear blast hit the site. He doesn't know the cause, but suspects a comet strike or electrical event.

Californians view gays and lesbians and their rights with greater acceptance than ever before, but a narrow majority continues to disapprove of same-sex marriage, according to a statewide Field Poll released this week. "What's driving that attitude change is that more and more Californians say they personally know someone who is gay or lesbian," said Field pollster Mark DiCamillo. "Personal knowledge and familiarity seem to provide greater accommodation in the public at large." Along with those acquainted with a gay person, the poll indicated that other groups most likely to have positive views of homosexuality included Democrats, liberals, San Francisco...

Developers announced plans Friday to open a multimillion dollar sexual "theme park" near London's Piccadilly Circus, home to the much-photographed statue of the Greek god of love. Backers say the London Academy of Sex and Relationships, due to open next spring, will not be a sleazy sex museum, but an educational multimedia attraction that will teach visitors to become better lovers and provide valuable information about disease and sexual problems. Located within the Trocadero entertainment center — just around the corner from Soho, London's red-light district — the $8.3 million project will feature unspecified "high tech and interactive exhibits." Alex...

NEW ORLEANS - In the absence of information and outside assistance, groups of rich and poor banded together in the French Quarter, forming “tribes” and dividing up the labor. As some went down to the river to do the wash, others remained behind to protect property. In a bar, a bartender put near-perfect stitches into the torn ear of a robbery victim. While mold and contagion grew in the muck that engulfed most of the city, something else sprouted in this most decadent of American neighborhoods — humanity.

Parliament legalized gay marriage Thursday, defying conservatives and clergy who opposed making traditionally Roman Catholic Spain the third nation to allow same-sex unions. Gay activists cheered the vote and blew kisses to lawmakers. The measure passed the 350-seat Congress of Deputies by a vote of 187-147 with four abstentions. The bill also lets gay couples adopt children and inherit each others' property. The bill is now law. The Senate, where conservatives hold the largest number of seats, rejected the bill last week. But it is an advisory body and final say on legislation rests with the Congress of Deputies. After...

Marriage now just a sexual relationship Father Raymond J. de Souza National Post Wednesday, June 29, 2005 All in all, it is an impressive bit of work for a mere 38 years. The same-sex marriage bill that passed the House of Commons yesterday was the final chapter in a story that began in 1967, when then-justice minister Pierre Trudeau introduced his Omnibus Bill. Famous for its decriminalizing of homosexual acts (" ... the state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation"), it was the liberalization of divorce laws that led more directly to where we are today....

For better or worse House of Commons approves same-sex marriage 158-133 Tim Naumetz; with files from Allan Woods CanWest News Service; with files from National Post Wednesday, June 29, 2005 OTTAWA - The historic same-sex marriage bill passed through the House of Commons yesterday, ending a four-month parliamentary debate that cost Paul Martin one of his closest friends in Cabinet and split MPs in a bitter clash between deeply held religious views and support for minorities under the Charter of Rights. The legislation will make Canada only the third nation in the world -- along with Belgium and the...

ATLANTA -- With a possible historic vote looming on a measure supporting same-sex marriage, the head of the United Church of Christ on Tuesday publicly endorsed the resolution for the first time. The Rev. John H. Thomas said Tuesday that the church's General Synod "should affirm the rights of gay, lesbian and transgender persons" to have marriages "equal in name, privileges and responsibilities to married heterosexual couples." "I believe our local churches, as they are able, should move toward the development of marriage equality policies," Thomas added during a speech at Emory University. That remark drew a lengthy standing ovation...

TORONTO (AP) - Canada is set to become the third country to legalize gay marriage, with Parliament likely to pass landmark legislation Tuesday despite strong opposition from Conservatives and religious leaders. Although gay marriage already is legal in seven provinces, the bill would grant all same-sex couples in Canada the same legal rights as those in traditional heterosexual unions. The Netherlands and Belgium already allow gay marriage. The legislation, drafted by Prime Minister Paul Martin's minority government, needs at least 155 members of the House of Commons to gain a majority of the 308-seat House. While some of his Liberal...

Same-sex marriage bill passes in Commons CTV.ca News Staff Canada will become the third country in the world to officially sanction same-sex marriage. In a 158 to 133 vote, the House of Commons adopted Bill C-38 -- the controversial legislation legalizing same-sex marriage from coast to coast -- on its third and final reading Tuesday night. The Liberals had the support of almost all New Democrat and Bloc Quebecois MPs for the vote. The bill will become official once it receives approval in the Senate. An earlier Conservative motion to send the bill back to committee was voted down 158...

Will America go the way of Sodom? By Darren Morrison There was a society that cast GOD aside and slipped into gross darkness. They despised the Light and thus attached every kind of evil spirit. Law and order collapsed and every man became a law unto himself. A society that abandons moral values will go headlong into hell. There was no honor, no decency and no integrity left among them; they had no reverence for life either. As justice and kindness faded away, they became filled with lust and licentiousness. They sneered at virtue. They scoffed at the fear of...

ISRAELI religious leaders rarely agree on anything, but one thing has proved strong enough to bring them together: fear of the effects of a ten-day international gay pride festival in Jerusalem this summer.Senior Christian, Jewish and Muslim figures, representing communities riven by conflict, have put aside their differences to give warning that the WorldPride event, planned for August, will desecrate the sanctity of the Holy City. One alarmed Muslim cleric suggested that if the event, last staged in Rome five years ago, is allowed to go ahead, it could invite divine retribution such as that visited on Sodom. “God destroyed...

UPCOMING EPISODE: "There's something about Marrying" To boost tourism, the town of Springfield decides to legalize same-sex marriage and one of Springfield’s own comes out of the closet... Sunday February 20 8/7c.

"I am well aware that this subject is charged and controversial -- and it has become so even in Christian circles. I have not sought support for my thoughts from the Word of God. Rather, the Word of God has given me the thoughts I will present here today. I will bring up the subject of homosexuality, but also the relationship to Christian homosexuals."

A North Carolina National Guard member thought to be the first U.S. soldier convicted of murdering an Iraqi said he "snapped" and shot the 17-year-old boy after they had consensual sex, according to court-martial records released this week. Pvt. Federico Daniel Merida, 21, of Biscoe, a tiny town south of Asheboro, pleaded guilty during a court-martial in Iraq to shooting the Iraqi national guard private, whose name the Army withheld. Merida was sentenced Sept. 25 to 25 years in prison and reduced in rank. He will be dishonorably discharged. Army officials at Forward Operating Base Danger, where the court-martial was...

ITHACA NY--How far gay rights should extend has been a hot button issue in the year 2004, but the debate over legal and social rights goes back much futher. Since it started, a generation of gay people have quietly gorwn up, gotten jobs, found a partner and even started a family. This last, which at first appeared ridiculous or impossible, is a reality for more and more gay couples through adoption or surrogacy.The trend spans the country and is perhaps unexpected from a demographic long associated with the swinging single life or at least childlessness. But as the openly gay...

Civil liberties and homosexual rights advocates have renewed their push for community programs to bolster support in schools for homosexual youths, just weeks after voters repudiated same-sex unions in 11 state referendums.     But in northeastern Kentucky, parents and students have defied the Ashland-Boyd County school district's "mandatory anti-harassment workshops," part of an agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union to allow the Gay-Straight Alliances student group to meet in school buildings. Hundreds of students opted out of the tolerance training video, and another 324 students did not show up for school the day it was shown. The ACLU has...

Date Added:Nov 24 2004Inscribed Bricks Unearthed South of Iran Iran-11/23/2004 In the latest round of archeological excavations at the historical site of Enshan, Fars province, Iranian and American archeologists have unearthed several inscribed bricks and a seal dating back to the mid-Elamite era (1100 BC).Enshan is regarded as one of the capitals of the Elamites and is rich in cultural heritage artifacts ranging from the Elamite to the Achamenid era (3500 BC to 500 AD). Dr. Kamyar Abdi, an instructor of Dartmouth College in the United States told Cultural Heritage News (CHN) agency that in the course of excavations in...

Principals freaked out by students' dance, dress By Dahleen Glanton Tribune national correspondent Gaoda McFadden still wonders what all the fuss is about. The way the 16-year-old sees it, the principal verreacted by ending his school's homecoming party early because kids were dancing, well, the way kids dance. Like many of his friends at Stephenson High School, McFadden sees nothing wrong with bumping and grinding on the dance floor or being sandwiched between two girls with their hips gyrating against him. After all, he said, you can turn on MTV or Black Entertainment Television and see it all day. "It...

http://www.365gay.com/newscon04/11/112204senWeds.htm (Boston, Massachusetts) Massachusetts state Sen. Jarrett Barrios has married his longtime partner, Doug Hattaway, a former spokesperson for Vice President Al Gore. The two were wed in a weekend ceremony at First Parish Church in Cambridge. Same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts last May. (story) Barrios and Hattaway have been together for 10 years and have two children.

A loss for true conservatism (David Shuster)• November 7, 2004 | 2:26 p.m. ETOn Tuesday, eleven different states outlawed gay marriage. The basic argument I heard was not about marriage (more on that below) but about being gay. And a majority of voters seem to believe that homosexuality is an "immoral lifestyle choice." Hmmmm. The problem is that anybody who has a relative or friend who is gay also knows it is not a "choice." It is something wired into the genes of approximately 3 or 4 percent of the human population in every single culture on the planet. Secondly,...

The presidential race is full of religious ironies, pitting a Protestant who quotes the Pope against a Catholic who rejects the Pope. The Protestant -- campaigning on opposition to abortion and homosexual marriage -- will likely get the Catholic vote. The Catholic -- campaigning on embryo-destruction, partial-birth abortion, and the alternative lifestyles of pagan antiquity -- will get the mainline Protestant vote. In one more irony and historical marker of clerical decadence, the Catholic candidate will receive a higher percentage of support from the Catholic episcopate than the Catholic laity -- the very episcopate Kerry has made a point of...

Church faces split as report fails to heal gays rowBy Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent(Filed: 19/10/2004)The future of the worldwide Anglican Church remained precarious last night after a report intended to heal divisions over homosexuality failed to reassure conservatives.The Windsor report challenged liberals to end their defiance of the majority view but imposed no serious sanctions on those involved in consecrating the Church's first bishop to admit being a practising homosexual.   Archbishop Robin Eames, Primate of Ireland The 120-page report, commissioned a year ago by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, provoked mixed reaction, with protesters, including the...

Despite shattering box-office records and dominating headlines for months, "The Passion of the Christ" and "Fahrenheit 9/11" face real obstacles in the race for an Oscar nomination for best picture. As Senior Writer Sean Smith reports in the current issue of Newsweek, many of the high-placed studio executives, producers, Oscar strategists, publicists and Academy members interviewed think that "Fahrenheit's" chances depend on the results of the presidential election, and all say that a "Passion" best-picture nod is almost unthinkable. "A lot of older Academy voters, who are largely Jewish, refuse to even see this movie," says one Oscar-campaign vet. "There's...

TEHRAN (AFP) -- One of Iran's main historical sites, the ancient Elamite capital of Susa, has been used for the secret nightly dumping of rubbish by the local municipality, a culture official in the area told AFP Tuesday. "We have filed several complaints against the municipality, but it firmly denies its workers have ever done such a thing -- even though they have been frequently spotted by our guards," said the head of the Cultural Heritage Organization in Shush, the modern name for Susa. But the official, Mahdi Qanbari, also complained that the municipality was also planning to build a...

LOS ANGELES - Democrats aren't amused by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (news - web sites)'s use of the mocking term "girlie men" to describe some lawmakers, although a spokesman for the governor said no apology would be forthcoming. Schwarzenegger dished out the insult at a rally Saturday as he claimed Democrats were delaying the budget by catering to special interests. Democrats protested that the remark was sexist and homophobic. "If they don't have the guts to come up here in front of you and say, 'I don't want to represent you, I want to represent those special interests, the unions, the...

RUSSELL Halley takes pride in being able to do the splits as well as any woman on the dance floor. His partner, Jorge Guzman, can spin faster than the female competition. So when the two men don their see-through chiffon shirts to dance together, they alternate the lead. "I can send Jorge into a triple spin and catch him, and vice versa - even in the course of one move," Mr Halley boasts. "We can change place instantly. From an audience point of view it can be very exciting." The duo are at the forefront of an upheaval in America's...

Passengers on a gay cruise were greeted by more than 100 protesters as they stepped off their chartered ship Friday in the Bahamas. The protesters, led by Christian pastors, gathered in a square in front of the cruise terminal and chanted, "Gay Ways are Not God's Ways!"

Advocates of "gay marriage" or homosexual civil unions argue that promiscuity will be reduced. Such an argument overlooks two key points. First, a embracing homosexual unions is more likely to undermine the institution of marriage and produce other negative effects than it is to make fidelity and longevity the norm for homosexual unions. Second, homosexual unions are not wrong primarily because of their disproportionately high rate of promiscuity and breakups. They are wrong because "gay marriage" is a contradiction in terms. As with consensual adult incest and polyamory, considerations of commitment and fidelity factor only after certain structural prerequisites are...

Summary: An Indiana three-year-old boy who died of a heart attack last November may have died as a result of being sodomized. An Indiana coroner has determined that rectal injuries to a three-year-old boy may have contributed to his death from a heart attack in November. A report in the Northwest Indiana News(March 13, 2004) quotes coroner Jeff Wells: "His heart was unstable to begin with and yes, this could have thrown it over the edge. There is a possibility that he could have had a heart attack while being sodomized." Read and distribute TVC's report on the high rate...

TAMPA -- Sue Clayton and Sheila Serrao met at church nine years ago. Three years later, Serrao's dad walked her down the aisle at the couple's commitment ceremony. The day was a "dream come true," Serrao said. But as a gay couple, the state does not allow the two Sarasota women to legally marry. Florida law defines marriage as a union between one man and one woman. On Monday, the couple moved to change the law. Led by their attorney and surrounded by members of local and national gay rights groups, Clayton and Serrao filed a lawsuit in Hillsborough Circuit...

Quote from web site: "Mr. Michael Eisner, CEO, The Walt Disney Company 500 South Buena Vista Street Burbank, CA It is an outrage that Walt Disney World in Orlando is allowing the open dis[play of offensive and illegal homosexuality during "Gay Days at Walt Disney World." This is shameful! And no child should ever have to witness homosexual acts while attending Disney World. The acts videotaped in your park year-after-year have become more prevalent and still you do nothing to protect children in your charge. Mr. Eisner, you have a moral and legal responsibility to the parents and children who...

An argument in favor of homosexual marriage that you are likely to hear again and again on radio talk shows, on national television, and on the Internet, reflects a line of reasoning that you must be prepared to counter. It is embodied in these kinds of questions: Why all the fuss about gay marriage anyway? And why should it matter to you if a gay couple marries and moves into your neighborhood? Why shouldn’t our definition of family be broadened and modernized? After all, what harm could possibly be done by yielding to the demands of those who say traditional...

Ahoy, mateys, Rosie O'Donnell's going full steam ahead--her cruise line for gay and lesbian families has launched on its maiden voyage. The first cruise of R Family Vacations, a new company backed by the comic and gay-rights advocate, set sail Sunday from New York for a seven-day cruise to the Bahamas. O'Donnell was on hand in Manhattan Sunday to celebrate the first of several gay family friendly vacations planned by R Family Vacations. According to the R Family Website, the cruise is a seven-day adventure that will take its 2,100 passengers from New York to Florida to the Bahamas and...

The United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania has decided to distribute funds held in escrow for the local Boy Scouts organization to two other greater Philadelphia organizations that benefit youth. The United Way took this action because the Cradle of Liberty Council has remained steadfast in support of the national Boy Scout policy regarding the appointment of homosexuals to leadership positions. Nonetheless, this latest action by the United Way disappointed local Scout leaders and has left them scrambling to make up the funding shortfall. Pat Coviello, executive vice president of the Cradle of Liberty Council, said he thought the United Way...

The Gay Gamete Project was developed as a means to ensure the genetic survival of homosexuality;to assure that the decline in homosexual procreation does not result in our eventual extinction. Homophobic Guidelines: The FDA has been in the process of promulgating national regulations that would prohibit clinics from accepting sperm from homosexual applicants since 1999. The decision will likely be finalized before 2003. Due to these homophobic guidelines as well as those proposed by the ASRM, it is unfortunately necessary for gay men to lie about their sexual preference and sexual history in the application and interview process. Gay men...

(CNSNews.com) - The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force says it is time to repeal America's "archaic and unjust" sex laws. The Task Force announced it is taking part in a project to analyze sex laws throughout the United States and identify which ones need to go. The point is to "educate Americans about the prevalence and abuse of antiquated and unjust sex laws in the nation, and to give grassroots activists policy and organizing tools to work to change these laws," the Task Force said in a press release. The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force said it is...

(Providence, RI) -- Mayor David Cicilline will host ceremonies today to raise the Rainbow Flag over City Hall. The ceremony kicks-off RI Pride festivities in Providence in recognition of the contributions of the gay and lesbian community. The flag-raising is scheduled for 5:30.<

PRINCETON, NJ -- Same-sex marriages have been cleared to become legal Monday in Massachusetts after a federal judge last week refused a challenge to the Massachusetts court ruling that granted same-sex couples the right to marry. A recent CNN/USA Today/Gallup survey finds a modest increase in the number of Americans who support giving gay couples some of the legal rights that heterosexual couples enjoy. The public is about evenly divided on a law that would establish gay civil unions with some of the same rights that marriages have, and it remains more opposed than supportive of giving gay marriages the...

Paedophile 'kills himself' in Bali By Rachel Harvey BBC correspondent in Jakarta A former Australian diplomat has been found hanged in his jail cell on the Indonesian island of Bali a day after being convicted of paedophile offences. William Brown, who retired to live in Bali in 1996, was found guilty of sexually assaulting two boys and sentenced to 13 years in prison. Mr Brown had admitted to having sex with the boys but said they had consented willingly. The sentence was one year short of the maximum allowed for the crime. Fifty-two year old William Brown was found...

<p>BATON ROUGE -- If the Louisiana Legislature doesn't take steps to ban gay marriages in Louisiana, God will, a number of preachers said Monday at a rally supporting proposals to preserve "the sanctity of marriage."</p> <p>Senate Bill 166 by Sen. John Hainkel, R-New Orleans, an amendment banning same-sex marriage, is set for a hearing today in the Senate Judiciary A Committee.</p>