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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Episcopalians are set to vote Wednesday on allowing religious weddings for same-sex couples, just days after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide. In 2003, the denomination made the trailblazing move of electing the first openly gay Episcopal bishop. Since then, many dioceses have allowed their priests to perform civil same-sex weddings. Still, the church hadn't changed its own laws on marriage. The vote on gay marriage is expected around midday in Salt Lake City at the denomination's national assembly. The proposal would eliminate gender-specific language from church laws on marriage so religious weddings...

You may have heard about the highly offensive move of the Milwaukee Art Museum.  They displayed a “portrait” of Benedict XVI made from colored condoms.  That’s just plain nasty.The Vicar General of the Diocese of Madison, Msgr. James Bartylla, wrote a letter to the Museum.  He shared it with me.  I have his permission to share it with you.  He also wrote: [F]eel free to tell you readers that I encourage them to write to the Milwaukee Art Museum (mam@mam.org) to communicate their displeasure, with civility and respect (and with appropriate vigor and articulation), at this “artistic” display of such...

By now, you have heard the Supreme Court issued its long-anticipated decision that imposed a 50-state same-sex marriage mandate. Pastors and churches have exhibited a great degree of uncertainty preceding this moment, wondering what the effect will be on their ministry. Now that the decision has been released, though, we can respond with greater clarity. Here are the immediate things you need to know.

With a liberal court, we get the rulings we deserve. Or, in other words, elections have consequences. It's safe to say that without the election of Barack Obama, we would not have had to endure liberal Supreme Court justices Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor sitting in judgement of marriage. (Both appointed by Obama in his first term, and both voting to legally redefine marriage.) Of course, the election of a republican, especially the likes of John McCain, gives no guarantee of conservative appointments to the Supreme Court. However, justices Roberts and Alito, appointed by George W. Bush, both voted against...

Leading Evangelist Franklin Graham is warning Christians nationwide that they should be ready to face persecution if they wish to stand by the biblical definition of marriage following last Friday's U.S. Supreme Court ruling, which legalized same-sex marriage throughout the United States. Despite President Barack Obama claiming that the Supreme Court's ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges is a "victory for a America," Graham, the president of both the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan's Purse, asserted in an interview with Fox News' Todd Starnes last weekend that the United States is really the true "loser" because the ruling could bring...

The U.S. Supreme Court has just engaged in its latest unconstitutional exercise of raw judicial power and surely its most extravagant attempt to forcibly remake American culture since the 1973 Roe v. Wade/Doe v. Bolton abortion cases. The Obergefell v. Hodges decision on same-sex “marriage” was based on the notion of “substantive due process”—which essentially has meant rights that the Court, following the thinking of elite opinion-makers and organized interest groups, has read into the Constitution. While the first expression of substantive due process concerned a convoluted absolutist notion of property rights in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,...

Chicago, Ill., Jun 28, 2015 / 06:03 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Seven monks of St. Procopius Abbey in Lisle, Ill. have filed suit against the leadership of Illinois’ Benedictine University, saying that the leadership has denied them their rights to help govern the university their abbey founded. Abbot Austin Murphy, who is also the university’s chancellor and a member of the board of trustees, said the dispute “goes to the very heart of maintaining the Catholic identity” of the university because of the monks’ oversight role in ensuring “that the university remains Catholic and Benedictine.” “They are surely not the only...

The ink was barely dry on last week’s Supreme Court ruling when Father James Martin, SJ, began scolding Catholics who were, from his decorous perspective, too strident in denouncing the decision. ”No issue brings out so much hatred from so many Catholics as homosexuality,” Father Martin told his Facebook followers. He repeated the same message several times throughout the day, warning commenters that they must not indulge in “homophobia” and suggesting that someone who questioned whether we were all expected to sing “Kumbaya” was illustrating his point. So is sarcasm now prima facie evidence of hatred? In my own surfing...

There aren’t enough homosexuals to wage war on religious institutions—they comprise only 1.6 percent of the population—but they have plenty of support among elites. From Wall Street to Wal-Mart, the corporate elite has gone lavender, embracing the gay-rights movement with as much gusto as exercised by elites in education, the arts, the entertainment industry, and the media. Will they now take the next step and attempt to shut down the churches? Anyone who thinks that radical activists will stop with gay marriage is ignorant: The big prize has always been to force the churches to fall in line. Consider Mark...

Jude 1:24,25 All Glory to Him Who Alone is God, Who Saves us through Jesus Christ our Lord. Yes, Splendor and Majesty, All Power and Authority Are His from the Beginning; His they are and His they Evermore shall be.

I just read from 9News.com that the Colorado Supreme Court has just ruled against the voucher program in Douglas County School district. While I am disapointed in this ruling, it is technically correct. The Colorado Constitution states in Article IX, section 7: Aid to private schools, churches, sectarian purpose, forbidden. Neither the general assembly, nor any county, city, town, township, school district or other public corporation, shall ever make any appropriation, or pay from any public fund or moneys whatever, anything in aid of any church or sectarian society, or for any sectarian purpose, or to help support or sustain...

APOLOGIA WHY I'M CATHOLIC: SOLA SCRIPTURA ISN'T LOGICAL, PART III 6/28/2015 3 Comments Even though I've been writing for thirteen weeks now about an obscure Latin phrase (sola scriptura) and using some terms that are so out of vogue in our modern "what I feel is all that's real" world (for instance, "logical") I can't stress enough that I'm talking about something I experienced to the depths of my being. Something existential. It was like the Northridge Earthquake. But this time it wasn't the foundation of my house moving and shifting and beginning to crumble; it was the foundation of...

Moscow, June 29, Interfax - The Russian Orthodox Church has appealed to all Russian advocates of the American model of governance, asking them to think twice about the consequences of the United States' decision to legalize same-sex "marriages". "The people who are into 'democracy the American way' and trying to reconcile it with traditional values need to think hard after this decision," the head of the Synodal Department for Church and Society Relations Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin told Interfax-Religion. He pointed out to the kind of values that one is "trying to bring along with the U.S. social and political model."...

SALT LAKE CITY — The Church issued the following statement Friday: "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints acknowledges that following today's ruling by the Supreme Court, same-sex marriages are now legal in the United States. The Court's decision does not alter the Lord's doctrine that marriage is a union between a man and a woman ordained by God. While showing respect for those who think differently, the Church will continue to teach and promote marriage between a man and a woman as a central part of our doctrine and practice."

If you are a Catholic, chances are you may be bombarded with questions at your local cookout this weekend, thanks to the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage today.  In case you are a little rusty, here are a few talking points on what the Catholic Church does and does not teach regarding same-sex marriage. I base much of this on the amicus brief submitted by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops for Obergefell vs. Hodges. If you find yourself at all struggling to understand or to explain the Church’s stance on same-sex marriage and want a more detailed...

Man made systems and societies are not perfect. But there's a difference between good and productive and that which is tremendously destructive. America was founded upon Judeo-Christian values. In other words, the base and foundation of secular legal morality was Biblical. It is true there are various groups that seek to adhere to the Biblical Code in profoundly different ways, some of which even run opposite to the accepted original meaning of the verses, but all at least sought and spent energy pondering the meaning of G-d's word and what that means for society. And on that foundation, the most...

The U.S. Supreme Court must think God asleep. In its most odious decision since Roe v. Wade, which over the past four decades has resulted in the slaughter of more than 57 million unborn children, the High Court on Friday declared homosexual marriage a Constitutional right. In a majority opinion at odds with his putative Catholic faith, Justice Anthony Kennedy suggests that those who oppose “marriage equality” just don’t get where lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders are coming from. “It would misunderstand these men and women,” wrote Kennedy, “to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that...

Ironically, this claim [“the body of Christ is queer”], by an ordained bi-sexual female, Layton E. Williams, in the PC(USA), appeared the day before the decision of the USSC to legalize same sex marriage in all fifty states. Culturally, this legal decision represents an historic moment for the United States. The Declaration of Independence, declaring that rights and laws are endowed by the Creator, has been rendered meaningless by a fake redefining of marriage, with no reference to the Creator or to any objective standards. The charade is over. This decision indicates that what has been happening for some time...

Social activist ‘surprised but delighted’ to join top cardinal in high-level environment conference at the Vatican She is one of the world’s most high-profile social activists and a ferocious critic of 21st-century capitalism. He is one of the pope’s most senior aides and a professor of climate change economics. But this week the secular radical will join forces with the Catholic cardinal in the latest move by Pope Francis to shift the debate on global warming. Naomi Klein and Cardinal Peter Turkson are to lead a high-level conference on the environment, bringing together churchmen, scientists and activists to debate climate...

After the Supreme Court issued its ruling on gay marriage Friday, President Obama gave a speech in which he said Americans need to change their religious views to be accepting of gay marriage, the Daily Caller reported. To that end, he encouraged gay marriage supporters to "help” people overcome their deeply-held religious views.“I know that Americans of goodwill continue to hold a wide range of views on this issue,” he said. Initially, he exhibited a bit of respect for those who oppose same-sex marriage. "Opposition in some cases has been based on sincere and deeply held beliefs,” he said. “All...