Free Republic

Lutheran CORE Plans Next Steps, Intends to be 'Free-Standing' Synod 09-198-JB CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Saying the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) has "fallen into heresy," because of actions taken at last month's churchwide assembly, the chair of Lutheran CORE (Coalition for Reform) said the organization intends to be a "free-standing synod" which will carry out ministries apart from the ELCA. In addition CORE is expected to consider initiating conversations with member Lutheran congregations and reform movements in the United States and Canada toward a possible reconfiguration "of North American Lutheranism," said the Rev. Paull E. Spring, State College, Pa.,...

Get the following stories, and much more by clicking the excerpt link below: 1. National Geographic News: “Lizards Rapidly Evolve After Introduction to Island” Rapid evolution—“evolving in ways that would normally take millions of years to play out,” says National Geographic News. How does it confirm the Bible? 2. AP: “Robots with Fins, Tails Demonstrate Evolution” Laboratory scientists designing robots, then making changes to improve the robots’ success—is that really evolution?3. BBC News: “Pigs Offer New Stem Cell Source”Week after week, scientists are reporting more sources and ways to produce embryonic-like stem cells out of adults cells. Now the stem...

Victory! Because of your calls, the House Judiciary Committee has agreed to hold a hearing on hate crimes bill, H.R.1913! The original plan of the chair of the committee, Representative John Conyers, was to move this bill quietly out of the committee without a hearing, then on to the full House and get it passed with as little fan fare as possible. The hearing is scheduled for 10:15 AM Wednesday of this week. Call the judiciary committee members and tell them to vote NO on hate crimes. For a list see the link below. Nations where these kinds of "hate...

With less than three weeks remaining before election day, the No on 8 campaign is getting desperate as they trail in the polls and in fundraising. As if violently attacking a Yes on 8 volunteer in Modesto on Sunday were not bad enough, No on 8 forces have been intimidating Yes on 8 volunteers and stealing yard signs. ORANGE COUNTY * “Caught in the act.” A Prop. 8 opponent from San Francisco was caught in the act when she ripped up a Yes on 8 sign right in front of the Irvine Republican Party campaign office on Sunday. Office workers...

Two rogue activist judges on lower courts in the states of New York and Georgia got the surprise slapped out of them this week. It's about time! Judge Doris Ling-Cohen of New York and Constance Russell of Georgia were sent stinging rebukes by their state's highest courts, and in cases that will be watched by other high court's in New Jersey, California and perhaps most importantly Washington. These women were given very clear lessons in judicial clarity and "We the People" rejoiced! ................... Judge Ling-Cohen knew when she issued the decision to allow marriage to be redefined in New York...

It’s no wonder that the American people are frustrated with the Republican Congress. Americans deserve progress, but instead are bombarded with politics driven by fear and division. They deserve action on the challenges we face as a nation - an endless and costly war in Iraq, skyrocketing gas prices and soaring health-care costs. Rather than dealing with real priorities, the Republican leadership is focused on writing discrimination into the Constitution. Just like the circus surrounding the Senate’s effort to intrude into the Terry Schiavo case, today the Senate will begin debate on the Federal Marriage Amendment - a wholly inappropriate...

Knights Urged to E-Mail Senators in Support of Marriage Amendment The Knights of Columbus, in cooperation with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, sponsored a post card campaign for citizens to urge their U.S. senators to support Senate Joint Resolution 1, known as the Marriage Protection Amendment, which proposes an amendment to the U.S. Constitution which would define marriage as the union of one man and one woman. Because the vote is only days away, there is no longer enough time to mail post cards. Contact your senators by e-mail by clicking here. You may use the text of the...

The California Supreme Court took a look today at a lesbian couple’s claim that a golf country club discriminated against them by charging them higher membership fees than spouses pay. The case could be a preview of how the court approaches the same-sex marriage issue. By granting family memberships only to married couples, the San Diego country club “chose criteria that same-sex couples could not possibly meet," said Jon Davidson, legal director of the Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund and lawyer for the couple who filed the suit. His argument – that a spouses-only policy amounts to discrimination against...

The Fabricated Epidemic (The New American, Jan. 15, 1990) “This epidemic has just started…” This grim statement was made by Dr. Johnathan Mann of the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1987 and quoted by the Wall Street Journal. Only a few months earlier, Surgeon General C. Everett Koop had announced to a terrified nation that a minimum of 100 million humans would be dead by the end of this century. Worse still, this disaster had cruelly chosen the form of a progressive, absolutely fatal disease that killed only with extreme suffering — a disease that had come to be known...

Gay & Lesbian Churches Promote Courtship Several leaders of the Metropolitan Community Church, have announced a courtship mentoring program to replace the random, sometimes destructive "dating" which has hitherto been the norm for romance among the gay and lesbian community. Courtship introduces supervision (sometimes, 100% chaperoning), and careful spiritual counselling, into the pair-bonding process, with romantic activities and emotions only allowed full sway after the success of the relationship is reasonably assured. The courtship movement had its genesis among the fundamentalist homeschoolers in the 1970's, but lately it has been spreading through other segments of Christendom. Its adoption by gay...

Top physician tells colleagues, patients at Kaiser that he is finally becoming a woman. Dr. Judson Lively, a surgeon and one of Kaiser Permanente's leading Bay Area administrators, stood nervously before 100 colleagues in a Walnut Creek conference room Tuesday and told them it was no accident there were butterflies on his black tie. Lively told them a fable that was in essence the story of his life, of being trapped inside the body of another, yearning for a transformation to be set free. "I stand here before you today to inform you of something that I have kept...

Toronto activist led 1,300 others in 18-year battle Like everyone else, Ron Shearer spent his working life paying into the Canada Pension Plan. But when the Toronto artist died in 1986, his partner of 27 years, George Hislop, was denied a survivor's pension. The reason? He was gay. Eighteen years and two monumental court battles later, Hislop and some 1,300 other widowed gays and lesbians scored a major victory yesterday when the Ontario Court of Appeal awarded them pensions retroactively, ruling that denying the benefit was an unjustifiable infringement of their equality rights under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms....