Via JMG: Dublin Endorses Marriage Equality

Great news via press release from Ireland Marriage Equality:

Today Marriage Equality welcomes the news that Dublin City Council has passed a motion in support of civil marriage for same sex couples. Two motions in support of marriage equality were put forward - by councillors from Labour and Sinn Féin - and passed at last night's council meeting, having been considered jointly. Dublin City Council joins Cork City Council and Belfast City Council, who passed similar motions in June, as well as Omagh, Down, Moyle and Magherafelt District Councils who passed motions during the summer months.

"This is a wonderful step by Dublin City Council to raise awareness of this important issue at a local level. We'd like to thank the councillors from both Labour and Sinn Féin for their initiative, and our supporters in Dublin who spoke to their councillors over the last few months about raising the issue," said Marriage Equality Director Moninne Griffith. "Marriage equality is not just a national issue, it's a local one. It's about respecting and protecting loving couples and families who are part of our communities and treating them as equal. That is why putting the issue on the agenda at local level is so important."

The vote was 38-4!

Labels: Ireland, LGBT rights, marriage equality

Reposted from Joe

Via Buddhist Boot Camp / FB:

Meditating is the ability to control the mind from drifting away from whatever it is you want it to stay focused on. Gardening can be a meditation, building model airplanes, painting, or, of course, sitting down for a few minutes and focusing on the breath and nothing else. It's difficult at first because we've never trained the mind to listen to us. But once you are in control of your mind, everything else in life is a piece of cake... ooh, did someone say CAKE? see.. there goes that mind again. :)

Even if you sit for twenty minutes and spend twenty minutes trying to bring your mind back to the breath, you have not failed at meditation! Catching the mind as it drifts off and bringing it back IS mediation. Don't be discouraged.. keep going!

Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Having applied himself to what was not his own task, and not having applied himself to what was, having disregarded the goal to grasp at what he held dear, he now envies those who kept after themselves, took themselves to task. - Dhammapada, 16, translated by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. More Buddhism Quotes >>

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma September 4, 2012

Be Who You Are

Don’t try to do anything at all except what you’re doing, which will seem like nothing to most observers. Little do they know! Even if what you’re doing is being distracted and hating sitting on your cushion accomplishing nothing—just do that. Don’t try to be anything other than who and what you are.

- Brad Warner, "How to Not Waste Time"

Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection through September 6th, 2012
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Via FB: Bishop Tutu

Marriage Acording to the Bible:

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma September 3, 2012

No-working is True Working

The idea of naturalness is that no-working is true working. It’s the understanding that things don’t happen due to your own calculation and effort. You don’t sit there thinking, 'All right now, if I’m able to follow the eightfold path and do everything the right way, then I will attain awakening.' That’s your own deluded, ego-based effort. I did this, I am able to do that—the moment you start thinking that way, your ego mind comes into play. Yet when the karmic conditions are right, when your causes and conditions come together, you can progress along the path.

- Reverend Patricia Kanaya Usuki, "The Great Compassion"

Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection through September 5th, 2012
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How Gay Marriage Could End Humanity

Via Keith Olbermann Fan Page / FB:

Tricycle Daily Dharma September 2, 2012

Fundamental Well-Being

We need to see the primordial potential in all of our experiences in the same way a doctor sees the health and well-being in his patients. If a patient didn’t possess a fundamental well-being, what would be the point of prescribing such antidotes as medicines, exercise, or new diets?

- Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, "Free Expression"

Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection through September 4th, 2012
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Via JMG: BRAZIL: Gay Man Wins Paternity Leave

For the first time ever, a Brazilian court has granted paternity leave to a gay man who just adopted a child with his partner.

Normally Brazilian fathers are only given five days off work after becoming parents, while mothers receive four months off, but a Brazilian court found that it was discriminatory for a gay couple to receive less combined parental leave than a heterosexual couple. As a result Lucimar da Silva will become the first Brazilian man to receive the same parental leave as a woman. Brazil’s social security agency has agreed to honor the decision. ‘However unusual it may seem to grant maternity leave to a male person … this hypothesis is possible when the father takes care of the newborn,’ the agency told Brazilian TV network O Globo.

Unfortunately this decision does not set precedent and future applicants will also have to go to court to earn paternity leave.

Labels: Brazil, gay families, gay parenting, LGBT rights

Reposted from Joe

JMG Quote Of The Day - Micky Ward

"I can’t support Scott Brown. I just can’t do it. I found out Scott is anti-union and I’m a Teamster guy. I found out he’s also against gay marriage and I say if you love someone you should have the same rights no matter who you are." - Boxing legend Micky Ward, retracting his endorsement of Sen. Scott Brown, who was about to appear at Ward's gym for a photo op. Mark Wahlberg played Ward in the Oscar-winning movie The Fighter.

Labels: Scott Brown, Senate, sports, straight allies

reposted from Joe

Via LGBT News / FB:

Via 2012 Healing the Planet 2012 / FB:

2012 Healing the Planet 2012

Hold on to what is good,
Even if it’s a handful of earth.
Hold on to what you believe,
Even if it’s a tree that stands by itself.
Hold on to what you must do,

Even if it’s a long way from here.
Hold on to your life,
Even if it’s easier to let go.
Hold on to my hand,
Even if someday I’ll be gone away from you.

- A Pueblo Indian Prayer
 

· · Share · 10 · 4 minutes ago ·

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma September 1, 2012

Accepting Thoughts Don’t feel disturbed by the thinking mind. You are not practicing to prevent thinking, but rather to recognize and acknowledge thinking whenever it arises. - Sayadaw U Tejaniya, "Observing Minds Want to Know" Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection through September 3rd, 2012 For full access at any time, become a Tricycle Community Supporting or Sustaining Member

Via Tricycle Daily Dharma:

Tricycle Daily Dharma August 31, 2012

Cultivating Equanimity

If you work hard at something but find that too many obstacles prevent you from accomplishing it, you may have to give up. In that case, you shouldn’t get depressed. Conditions aren’t right. Perhaps this will change, perhaps it won’t. You are not a failure. Becoming upset only causes suffering.

- Master Sheng Yen, "The Wanderer"

Read the entire article in the Tricycle Wisdom Collection through September 2nd, 2012
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Via Buddhism on Beliefnet:

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Tibetan lamas often say: "Not seeing is the perfect seeing." Strange words, perhaps, but they have a profound meaning. They describe the advanced meditator's experience of spacious, universal reality, the experience beyond dualism. - Lama Thubten Yeshe, "Introduction to Tantra" More Buddhism Quotes >>

Via JMG: "Ex-Gay" Ban Heads To Gov. Jerry Brown

California's bill to ban "ex-gay" therapy for minors has cleared its final hurdle before heading to the desk of Gov. Jerry Brown.

The state Senate on Thursday sent the governor a bill that would prohibit so-called sexual-conversion therapy for minors, aimed at changing their orientation from gay to straight. Sen. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance) proposed the measure based on concern by medical groups involving psychologists and psychiatrists that the therapy is not based on sound scientific principles. "The entire house of medicine has rejected this phony and sham therapy. It really is junk science,’’ Lieu told his fellow Senators. "The American Psychiatric Assn. says it poses great risk to individuals including feelings of guilt, self-hatred, shame. Some people commit suicide having gone through this.’’ The bill was approved with a 22-12 party line vote, with Republicans objecting to the state telling parents and teenagers what kind of therapy they can pursue.

The bill is vigorously opposed by PFOX, NARTH, the Catholic Church, and other hate groups that enjoy brainwashing and torturing gay children.

Labels: "ex-gay", California, Jerry Brown, LGBT youth

Reposted from Joe

Via JMG: USMC Commandant: I'm Not Seeing Any Problems Since The Repeal Of DADT

The Commandant of the Marine Corps says that he's not heard of any problems related to the repeal of DADT. Michael Lavers reports at the Washington Blade:

“I don’t think there is a problem,” said Commandant Gen. James Amos during a National Press Club luncheon in downtown Washington. “I don’t see it. I don’t hear about it.” [snip] “We obey orders,” said Amos. “We do that better than anybody does and we have.” He again noted that he doesn’t “even get a question” about openly gay and lesbian servicemembers from subordinates and other Marines. “I don’t hear anything,” said Amos. “I’m not seeing anything at all, so I’m very pleased with how it’s turned out. I’m very proud of the Marines."

RELATED: You may recall that Amos was the most strident opponent of the repeal out of all the heads of the military branches. In December 2010 he even claimed that openly gay soldiers would cause Marines to lose their legs.

"When your life hangs on a line, on the intuitive behavior of the young man ... who sits to your right and your left, you don't want anything distracting you," Amos told reporters at the Pentagon. "I don't want to lose any Marines to distraction. I don't want to have any Marines that I'm visiting at Bethesda (hospital) with no legs," he said. He added that "mistakes and inattention or distractions cost Marines' lives. That's the currency of this fight."

Labels: DADT, LGBT rights, military, USMC

reposted from Joe