The Rev. Bryant Wright, senior pastor at Johnson Ferry Baptist Church and a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, delivered the devotional Wednesday in the state House. In that sermon aimed at lawmakers, Wright twice equated gay marriage to “erotic liberty.” Here’s a sampling of his message: “It is just one example of what our culture is going to increasingly see as an issue of erotic liberty versus religious liberty,” Wright said. “We’re liable to see this with our military chaplains in the years ahead if they in good conscience believe they cannot perform same-sex weddings and could be kicked out of the military.” That looming threat, he said, is a reminder of lawmakers’ role in making sure government is “protective of its citizens against evil and is working for the common good.” Religious liberty, Wright said, is a “foundational aspect” of the U.S. Constitution and is for the “common good and welfare of man.” He urged legislators to remember the nation’s heritage “even though a majority of your constituencies have embraced erotic liberty over religious liberty.”Openly gay Georgia House Rep. Simone Bell responded on her Facebook page:
My direct response to him: Told him he is a disgrace to the clergy, the Word and the state of Georgia. That he squandered his opportunity to bring a message of love to people who have sacrificed to serve the state. That his religious freedom is not being trampled upon, but that he is trampling upon mine and 300,000 + more Georgian's religious freedom to be who God created us to be. He responded that we clearly have a difference of opinion. I told him we have a difference of HUMANITY.RedState editor Erick Erickson is thrilled.
Baier had been among the confirmed speakers at the 2015 Legatus Summit later this month in Naples, FL. But he’s canceled the appearance following recent revelations that the group’s publication insisted that LGBT people could be cured. “Bret Baier has withdrawn his participation as a speaker at the upcoming Legatus Summit due to the controversy surrounding some editorial stances in the organization’s magazine,” a Fox News spokesperson tells us. “Bret accepted the invitation to speak about his book, his faith, and his son’s congenital heart disease. He was unaware of these articles or the controversy surrounding them.”Both of these cancellations are likely due to the work of Jeremy Hooper, who first publicized the list of attendees yesterday at Good As You. Still attending at this writing: Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, and MillerCoors Brewing chairman Pete Coors. (Tipped by JMG reader DM)
A "Dignity in Death" rally will be held Tuesday afternoon for a lesbian woman who was denied a funeral at New Hope Ministries in Lakewood, Colo. last week. Vanessa Collier's friends say the funeral was canceled by the church 15 minutes after the service was supposed to start because the church would not allow a picture to be shown of Collier proposing to her wife. The open casket and flowers were in place and about 170 people were in attendance.Collier reportedly died from an accidental gun shot while cleaning her weapon.
According to Chaplain Greg Rolando, who would later preside over the funeral across the street at Newcomer Funeral Home, the New Hope Ministry is very community oriented. He says pastors there welcome those who are gay but ask that alternative lifestyles be censored in the church. New Hope Ministries is not commenting on the decision.
He says moments prior to the funeral service, a video that was supposed to be played during the funeral was reviewed by church officials. The church asked the video to be edited in order to proceed. Rolando says the family refused to take the picture of Collier's proposal out of the video, and the funeral had to be moved to the mortuary across the street.
On Tuesday morning, Twitter exploded when a link to a website called Ship Your Enemies Glitter started getting passed around. We first saw a link to the website posted to Reddit's r/InternetIsBeautiful forum and later on startup discovery website Product Hunt. Ship Your Enemies Glitter was described by Product Hunt founder Ryan Hoover as “the ultimate troll product.” Quite literally, the expletive-laden Australian website lets you pay $9.99 to send glitter to your enemies. “Hint: the glitter will be mixed in with the note thus increasing maximum spillage,” the website reads. The website has since crashed, presumably due to the traffic it received.
Detective David Currie, 50, and his now-husband Aaron Woodard, 33, tied the knot shortly after midnight on Tuesday, when the state legalized gay marriage. And after requesting permission from his superiors, Currie walked down the registry aisle with full support of the Broward County Sheriff's to wed in uniform.Does this disgust you, wingnut? Don't you support our cops/troops?? Why do you hate police officers??
The LDS couples profiled on TLC’s "My Husband Is Not Gay" may find these statistics sobering: Marriages like theirs — same-sex attracted husbands and straight wives — are two to three times more likely to end in divorce than others. That finding and others come from a newly released in-depth survey of 1,612 self-selected LGBT/same-sex attracted Mormons and former Mormons, thought by researchers to be the largest study ever conducted with this population. Rather than tapping a random sample, John Dehlin, a doctoral student at Utah State University, and Bill Bradshaw, a retired Brigham Young University professor, with help from Renee Galliher, also of USU, solicited responses via various websites, including pro-Mormon outlets such as North Star International and those more critical such as Dehlin’s own "Mormon Stories" podcast. The study found that between 51 percent and 69 percent of mixed-orientation Mormon marriages end in divorce, well above the roughly 25 percent of LDS couples who split up.Mind-blowing, huh?
The road to gay rights at the U.S. Supreme Court began not in San Francisco or New York, but in a small downtown Los Angeles office, where volunteer writers and editors in 1953 launched a new "magazine for homosexuals." ONE, as it was called, offered thoughtful articles, defiant editorials and none of the racy photos or sex ads often found in the gay press. "The first issue was sold in bars in the Los Angeles area for 25 cents, about the price of a draft beer," said Michael C. Oliveira, an archivist at the magazine's archives housed at the USC Library. Yet in an era when FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover was routing out "sex deviates" from the government and homosexuality was a crime in every state, the journal quickly drew negative attention, culminating with a U.S. Post Office ban of the magazine as "obscene." The cover story of the first issue censored by the postmaster proved decades ahead of its time, asking "Homosexual Marriage?" To the rescue came a young, straight California attorney fresh out of law school.Hit the link for the rest. Fascinating story.
