Marriage Equality USA Op-ed: Dear Conservative Christians: It's OK to Evolve on LGBT Equality

Advocate op-ed on the selection and withdrawal of a pastor to give the benediction at the inauguration, and replacement by an LGBT-affirming Episcopalian priest.

"...We do live in a society that should welcome vibrant discourse on a variety of subjects. But when it comes to affirming the human dignity of an individual, there is no room for compromise. It’s not up for discussion.

"That’s why, on second glance, something was very wrong with the initial selection. The problem was not merely a difference of opinion on an 'issue,' but rather, that the prayer to our nation would be offered by a man who might not fully affirm the human dignity of all Americans.

"...Christianity does not have to be exclusive of LGBT equality, and when it is, people are leaving the church.

"...As public opinion shifts, churches that do not fully affirm LGBT people will leave many in their flock behind. Scripture that is void of compassion is merely words, and our ability to have compassion for every human being is critical to our faith and in an increasingly diverse world.

"...The exclusion of Reverend Giglio is not a matter of banishing conservative theology from the public square; it is a matter of the public demanding more from our churches — more compassion, more understanding, and more dialogue about our biblical texts.

"While I have and continue to appreciate the president’s efforts to reach across the aisle, it is clear that his inaugural committee initially missed the mark on this one. It isn’t a problem to have an evangelical conservative give the benediction, but at the very least, a pastor who blesses our nation must fully affirm the human dignity of all Americans — that includes lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans."

Op-ed: Dear Conservative Christians: It's OK to Evolve on LGBT Equality

www.advocate.com

 

The choice of a more LGBT-friendly minister to deliver the closing prayer at President Barack Obama's inauguration is a sign that Americans are less willing to tolerate intolerance from the pulpit.

 

Via God Bless the President of the United States / FBP:

Via Democratic Party's FBP:

Via JMG: Quote Of The Day - Chuck Hagel

 

"I fully support the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010 and value the service of all those who fight for our country. I know firsthand the profound sacrifice our service members and their families make, and if confirmed as Secretary of Defense, I will do everything possible to the extent permissible under current law to provide equal benefits to the families of all our service members." - Chuck Hagel, in a letter to Sen. Barbara Boxer.
Huffington Post has a reaction from Log Cabin Republicans head Gregory Angelo.

"For years the Pentagon has been dragging its feet with regard to extending benefits to the families of gay service members. To ensure that action is taken on this front, we need to be sure that there is a champion for our cause at the helm of the defense department. There is nothing in Hagel's record to suggest he will be that champion. "While Senator Hagel's recent professed support for gay military families is encouraging, it stands at odds with his record of opposition to the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell and his broader record of opposition to equality for gay and lesbian Americans. We look forward to the confirmation hearings when the Senator will be able to explain his apparent epiphany in greater detail. We continue to remain cautious about his nomination until that time."

Labels: Chuck Hagel, DOD, LCR, Obama cabinet

Reposted from Joe

Via JMG: Today In Christian Love™

"If we embrace homosexuality, we'll destroy society, we'll destroy families, we'll destroy everything. It's not just that God hates homosexuals, there's a reason why he hates it. If you break natural laws-- you say you don't believe in gravity, you jump off a building, you're gonna die. Homosexuality has consequences and God designed those consequences. The word of god is quite clear. He's destroyed every culture that has embraced homosexuality. The sin is similar to that of cannibalism and child molestation in the sense that it's a sin against society. I'm calling for discrimination against adulterers, rapists, murderers, homosexuals. Yes, we must discriminate as a society. God's law to the civil magistrate in terms of homosexuality says you should remove the abomination from the land." - Colorado Pastor David Beuhner, speaking to a local television station. (Tipped by JMG reader Dennis)

Labels: Christian Love, Colorado, evil, religion

Reposted from Joe

Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	All the wealth you've acquired from beginningless time until now has failed to fulfill all your desires. Cultivate therefore this wish-granting gem of moderation, O fortunate ones. - Milarepa, "Drinking the Mountain Stream" More Buddhism Quotes >>

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma January 16, 2013

Revealing What is Hidden

Meditation, simply defined, is a way of being aware. It is the happy marriage of doing and being. It lifts the fog of our ordinary lives to reveal what is hidden; it loosens the knot of self-centeredness and opens the heart; it moves us beyond mere concepts to allow for a direct experience of reality. Meditation embodies the way of awakening: both the path and its fruition. From one point of view, it is the means to awakening; from another, it is awakening itself.

- Lama Surya Das, "The Heart-Essence of Buddhist Meditation"

Read the entire article in the Wisdom Collection through January 17th, 2013
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Via JMG: Rep. John Boehner Secretly Ups The House DOMA Defense Budget To $3 Million

Zack Ford has the story at Think Progress:

Late Monday, House Democrats learned that the Republican leadership had once again secretly renegotiated its contract with attorney Paul Clement to defend the anti-gay Defense of Marriage Act at the Supreme Court. This is the third time the contract has been adjusted, raising total costs to $3 million from the original $500,000 cap.   Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) both sit on the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG), the House body intervening to defend DOMA in court in lieu of the Department of Justice’s decision not to. However, they did not find out about BLAG’s new agreement with Clement until after it had already been finalized.

Hit the link for Pelosi's pissed off letter to Boehner.

Labels: DOMA, GOP, John Boehner, U.S. House

Reposted from Joe

Via 2012 Healing the Planet 2012 / FB:

Happiness arises as a result of different causes and conditions. If you harm someone out of anger, you may feel some superficial satisfaction, but deep down you know it was wrong. Your confidence will be undermined. However, if you have an altruistic attitude, you’ll feel comfortable and confident in the presence of others.

~ His Holiness XIV Dalai Lama
Image : Google

Via JMG: SAN FRANCISCO: Voters May Consider Renaming Airport For Harvey Milk

 

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is considering a ballot measure which would rename the airport for slain LGBT rights icon Harvey Milk.

A charter amendment sponsored by Supervisor David Campos would put the question of creating Harvey Milk-San Francisco International Airport on San Francisco’s November ballot. If five of Campos’ colleagues agree to submit the proposed name change to voters and the amendment goes through in the fall, the city would become home to the world’s first airport honoring an openly gay person, said Milk’s nephew, Stuart Milk. Milk, who runs an international gay rights foundation in his uncle’s memory, said that adding an airport to the list of public venues named for Harvey Milk would mark a milestone since flights to and from San Francisco International serve 68 countries where homosexuality is illegal.

The wingnuts are gonna love this one. (Image via Harvey Milk Foundation)

Labels: airports, Harvey Milk, LGBT History, San Francisco

Reposted from Joe

JMG HomoQuotable - Nathaniel Frank

"Any step a gay person takes to hide their identity that they wouldn't take to hide the fact that they're, say, Irish, vegetarian or left-handed is probably not a neutral quest for privacy but reflects their own doubt about just how OK it is to be gay. Foster's reluctance to just pull an Ellen ('Yep, I'm gay'), and her tortured speech, with its resentful tone and its ultimate avoidance of the 'L' word, made being gay and coming out seem tortured things in themselves.

"Still, gay people are born with the unique burden of disclosure, one that is supremely unfair. Coming out is never just a single act but a constant obligation if one is to assure that people don't assume that they're straight. We're always encountering new people who won't know, hence stuffing us back into the closet and reimposing the burden of coming out. And for years the world has berated and punished us not only for being gay but for being honest. [snip]  How hard it is to get it perfect. If there's one thing LGBT people should agree on, it's the importance of compassion, and of not bullying our own." - Nathaniel Frank, writing for the Huffington Post.

Labels: coming out, Hollywood, Jodie Foster, Nathaniel Frank

Reposted from Joe

Via JMG: GOP Rep Backs WY Marriage Bill

GOP state Rep. Keith Gingery is one of the cosponsors of a marriage equality bill just proposed in Wyoming.  Yes, Wyoming.

Laramie Democratic Rep. Cathy Connolly filed legislation late Monday afternoon that would create a path for gay couples to form civil unions or get married. The dual approach already has won the backing of Reps. Ruth Ann Petroff, R-Jackson, and Gingery. Both Teton County lawmakers said they would prefer to see gay marriage allowed in Wyoming but are willing to debate whether civil unions might be a better way to go.  “It’s a basic human rights and fairness issue,” Petroff said Monday. “It’s a basic constitutional issue. There should just be no reason why same-sex couples shouldn’t have the same rights as everyone else.” Gingery is the chairman of the judiciary committee, which will be the first to debate the bills. He said the issue poses a legal problem that state officials need to resolve. “The population of gay couples in the state is increasing, and the law is not very clear about what rights they have,” he said. Gingery, who is Catholic, says the question of whether to allow same-sex couples to get married in Wyoming isn’t a religious issue. If passed, the laws wouldn’t affect church policy, he said.

Same-sex marriage bills have failed in the Wyoming legislature in 2007, 2009, and 2011.

Labels: GOP, LGBT rights, marriage equality, Wyoming

Reposted from Joe

Via Gay Politics Report:

• GOP insiders want party to ditch marriage topic, poll finds
   
• A National Journal poll of 99 Republican Party insiders finds that just 11% want the GOP to actively oppose marriage rights for same-sex couples. More than a quarter of respondents want the party to support marriage equality, and nearly half said the party should avoid the topic altogether. "We can’t be a party that supports a zone of personal freedom and then try to use federal power to curtail it. Plus, we increasingly look prejudiced, and not a little stupid, on this issue," said one respondent. National Journal/Political Insiders Poll (1/10)     

Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	The king said: 'Nagasena, he who escapes reindividualization [rebirth], is it by reasoning that he escapes it?' 'Both by reasoning, your Majesty, and by wisdom, and by other good qualities.' 'But are not reasoning and wisdom surely much the same?' 'Certainly not. Reasoning is one thing, wisdom another. Sheep and goats, oxen and buffaloes, camels and asses have reasoning, but wisdom they have not.' 'Well put, Nagasena!' - Milindapanha 32 More Buddhism Quotes >>

Via Vida Rz / FB:

Vida Rz shared Karmapa Supporters's photo.

Turning our attention toward light and hopefulness ~ 17th Karmapa

While we are living and remaining in this world, if we only pay attention to darkness and hopelessness, we will not see anything but darkness. But if we turn our attention toward light and hopefulness, then even if we have only a little hope, we will eventually be able to find a way to reach the light. For this reason, the world environment and all the beings in it are not all bad. The beings in the world are not unilaterally vicious, and the external world is not exclusively poisonous and polluted. If we make efforts with a courageous heart, we can transform the world into a pure realm. We can transform the beings in the world so that they become the beautiful and majestic deities present within their minds.

(from: Teachings before a Medicine Buddha empowerment - India, December 2007)

Posted by Kagyu Samye Dzong Venezia

Via LGBT News / FB:

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma January 15, 2013

The Ultimate Reflection

The Buddha exhorted his disciples to reflect on death a lot—to use it as the ultimate prompt to practice now, in this moment; to practice every day. To stoke the fire before it’s too late. To prepare ourselves to make skillful choices in the moment when we leave this body. The same things that impede meditation are those that cloud our view at death: pain and emotional distraction. The better we master these fetters in life, the better chance we have of forgoing them at death.

- Mary Talbot, "How Buddhists Can Prepare to Die"

Read the entire article in the Wisdom Collection through January 16th, 2013
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Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Ashamed of what's not shameful, not ashamed of what is, beings adopting wrong views go to a bad destination. Seeing danger where there is none, and no danger where there is, beings adopting wrong views, go to a bad destination. - Dhammapada, 22, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu More Buddhism Quotes >>

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma January 14, 2013

Adversity's Blessing

When empathy spontaneously arises, we sense the power of love as a blessing revealed by adversity. How embarrassing it is to see how preoccupied we have been with our own petty concerns! Seeing how affection stirs people to acts of selflessness inspires us to extend ourselves as well. With loving kindness we see the needs of others and respond.

- Judith L. Lief, "Welcome to the Real World"

Read the entire article in the Wisdom Collection through January 15th, 2013
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 January 14, 2013

Adversity's Blessing

When empathy spontaneously arises, we sense the power of love as a blessing revealed by adversity. How embarrassing it is to see how preoccupied we have been with our own petty concerns! Seeing how affection stirs people to acts of selflessness inspires us to extend ourselves as well. With loving kindness we see the needs of others and respond.

- Judith L. Lief, "Welcome to the Real World"

Read the entire article in the Wisdom Collection through January 15th, 2013
For full access at any time, become a Tricycle Community Supporting or Sustaining Member