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The State Department weighed in Tuesday on an escalating war of words between the U.S. ambassador to the Dominican Republic and a cardinal who has leveled gay slurs against him -- telling FoxNews.com the fight "does underscore" the importance of pushing human rights causes. U.S. Ambassador to the Dominican Republic James "Wally" Brewster, who is openly gay and married, has been mocked over his sexual orientation by Cardinal Archbishop Nicolas de Jesus Lopez Rodriguez for more than two years. It got so heated that earlier this month, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., sent a letter to Pope Francis asking him to...

LJUBLJANA - More than 60 percent of Slovenian voters opposed legalizing gay marriage in a referendum Sunday marked by low turnout, according to near-complete results from the electoral commission. The outcome marked a setback for gay rights activists who had hoped to see the largely Catholic nation become Europe's first ex-communist country to give same-sex couples the right to marry and adopt. With 99.9 percent of ballots counted, 63.48 percent of voters said 'no' to approving the legislation, which already passed in parliament earlier this year. More than 1.7 million people were registered to vote on an issue that has...

The Food and Drug Administration has lifted the ban on blood donations from men who have engaged in sexual relations with another man. Now, in order to donate blood, a man will have had to have been abstinent for the period of one year prior to donation. This new policy is similar to the deferral period for a woman who has engaged in sexual activity with a man who had previously sexual activity with another man, or for someone who has traveled to a country where malaria is prevalent. The Food and Drug Administration released final rules on Monday that...

Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois has written to Pope Francis, criticizing "hateful" public remarks by Cardinal Nicolas de Jesus Lopez Rodriguez of Santo Domingo about the openly homosexual US ambassador to the Dominican Republic. The Illinois lawmaker said that the ambassador, James "Wally" Brewster, has shown "patience and professionalism" in the "mean-spirited attacks" by the Dominican cardinal. He appealed to the Pope to stop the cardinal's "intolerant public statements."

RALEIGH, North Carolina, December 11, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) – Three couples are challenging the constitutionality of North Carolina's law allowing magistrates to bow out of performing same-sex "marriages." According to court documents, the plaintiffs – two lesbian couples and an opposite-sex interracial couple – argue that the state's new law is discriminatory and thus unconstitutional. They and LGBT rights activists, as well as the state's GOP governor, all argue that the intention of the law is to illegally discriminate against same-sex couples. However, ABC 11 noted that a state statute does not require couples to perform marriages, a position argued by...

The Oireachtas has approved legislation that extends equality law protections for LGBT teachers to schools and institutions run by the Catholic Church. The Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, which has passed all legislative stages, scraps Section 37(1) of the Employment Equality Act, which exempts the promotion of "certain religious values" from the legal definition of discrimination. The section applies to "religious, educational or medical" institutions which are "under the direction or control of a body established for religious purposes". The move to amend the Act is principally aimed at protecting staff at denominational schools which receive state funding, though hospitals and...

On Tuesday night the latest bastion against religious intolerance was swept away, as the Dail voted unanimously to repeal Section 37 of the state's Employment Equality Act. Section 37 granted specific exemptions for "religious, educational or medical institutions" when it came to gay rights, allowing them "to maintain the religious ethos of the institution".

Why do Catholics in America support homosexuality proportionately more than the general population? Two reasons: lack of authentic Catholic teaching regarding homosexuality, and the Church omitted one of the clearest Bible verses on homosexuality from the lectionary. One of the very unfortunate results of the New Lectionary is that verses that might be deemed offensive have been omitted from our liturgical celebrations. (I've written about how three "offensive" Psalms were removed from the Liturgy of the Hours after 1971 here.) Verses against Homosexuality Omitted from Current LectionaryAn example of the silence of offensive passages is from the readings of last...

LOUISVILLE, Kentucky, October 19, 2015 (LifeSiteNews)—There was a time when Church and State cooperated – when governing powers welcomed the influence of Judeo-Christian values and sought to harmonize its laws with morality. But since the radical secularization of Western society, Christians have been forced into an adversarial, politically incorrect role, much like the early Church in times of persecution. Since a "culture of death" began to dominate the West, genuine Christians have become counter-cultural. The leader of America's largest Protestant denomination, Dr. Albert Mohler, applies this Christian counter-culturalism to the latest politically correct trend in society: the approval of sodomy...

President Obama says we must embrace the cultures of Islam: Must we then accept rape of childre or rape and abuse of young girls? Is this really the United States we were meant to be? I find the path in which we are headed becomes more perverse every day I read the news. The latest? A Green Beret is dismissed from the Army because he confronted a child rapist in Afghanistan! Since when does the United States accept the rape of children during war-time an acceptable activity? What if the activity is happening on military bases? The New York Times...

A prominent politician in the Australian state of Tasmania has lodged a formal complaint against a pamphlet on marriage produced by the Catholic Church, saying that it causes “immeasurable harm” by arguing against acceptance of same-sex unions. Martine Delaney, the anti-discrimination commissioner of Tasmania’s state government, called for an investigation of the Australian bishops’ conference which issued Don’t Mess with Marriage. The pamphlet was distributed to 12,000 families with children in the state’s Catholic schools. Delaney charged that the publication denigrated the rights of homosexuals.

Appeal comes in briefing paper sent to English bishops attending family synodGay Catholics have sent a briefing paper to the two English bishops attending the family synod next week, urging them to reject “harsh” language about homosexuality. The LGBT Catholics Briefing Paper resulted from a reflection day, sponsored by the LGBT Catholics Westminster Pastoral Council, held in June 2013. The briefing paper is addressed to Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster, and Bishop Peter Doyle, Bishop of Northampton and chairman of the bishops’ conference Committee for Marriage and Family Life, who will be at the synod which opens on Sunday....

July 16, 2015 (BreakPoint) -- The world is leaving us and our values behind. If we don't get with the times, we may soon find ourselves isolated and irrelevant. If you think I'm talking about Christians and the recent Supreme Court decision on same-sex “marriage,” think again. Of course, if you don’t read international and Christian news sources, you probably didn’t know that last week the UN Human Rights Council passed The Protection of the Family resolution. Not surprisingly, the mainstream U. S. media ignored the story. The resolution, approved by a vote of 27 to 14, urges member states...

The Supreme Court’s abuse of its authority in the decision redefining marriage as an institution based on feelings rather than fact and sanctioning deviancy as a civil right was expected, but the surprise was its sentimental substitution of nihilistic narcissism for jurisprudence, expressed in an amorphous substitute for English diction. This passed a death sentence on Christian culture, just as Roe v. Wade sanctioned the deaths of millions of infants. As Christ rose from the dead, so can our nation, but only the cynic and the naïf will deny that the next steps will be attacks on Christ himself in...

June 4, 2015 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- Unlimited access to the internet and 24-hour news cycles would give one the impression that extensive information is being conveyed to the public regarding the crucial issues of our day. But in large part, the same old uninformative stuff gets regurgitated over and over again. The gatekeepers, intent on presenting a one-sided portrayal of one of the most coordinated and funded social movements of our day, are fine with misrepresenting the news. This is “Pride” month for a community that enjoys the most protection of any people group by news organizations. There’s no journalistic objectivity,...

Concerns are arising among Christians and online commentators after a homosexual activist recently told a national publication that churches “must be made ‘to take homosexuality off the sin list.'” Mitchell Gold is the founder of Faith in America, an organization that aims to “end the harm to LGBT youth and families from misguided religious teaching.” He served on the board of directors for the Human Rights Campaign for seven years, and was named on of the “Top 50 Most Powerful Gay People in America” in 2007 by Out Magazine. In an article written by Frank Buni of the New York...

Yes, Ireland has entered a new era of equality – but not the positive kind.The most striking thing following the Irish referendum on gay marriage is how few people are talking about gay marriage. Amid the near-global cheering that greeted the vote in favour of instituting gay marriage, there was barely any commentary on the institution of gay marriage. Sure, there was a handful of on-air marriage proposals in Dublin as the news cameras rolled, and the tailend of a BBC TV report informed us when the first gay marriages in Ireland would take place (Autumn). But given that this...

Some of our deepest challenges as believers involve dealing with the sins of others, particularly those whom we love. Whether it is a relative struggling with addiction, a best friend unfaithful to his spouse, or a loved one embracing sexual perversion we often feel caught between our genuine love for the sinner and our genuine revulsion at the sin. The bromide “Hate the sin, love the sinner,” while at least infused with a touch of wisdom, doesn’t typically answer all the hard questions. When confronted with tough moral calls it’s often wise to slow down and define our terms. First,...

The day after the same-sex marriage referendum revealed an Ireland overwhelmingly in favor of legalized sodomy, the Primate of Ireland, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin, said to the press: "I appreciate how gay and lesbian men and women feel on this day. That they feel this is something that is enriching the way they live. I think it is a social revolution." His words echoed that of Leo Varadkar, Ireland's first openly gay Health Minister, who said the referendum was "almost like a social revolution." Shortly before the referendum, Martin had said he wouldn't tell Catholics how to vote. Although...

Ireland, for so long the most overtly Catholic state in Western Europe, has voted for gay marriage by a stupendous margin – 62 per cent. Never before has a country legalised the practice by popular vote. It would be naive to ask: how could this happen? Hatred of the Church is one of the central features of modern Ireland, thanks not only to the paedophile scandals but also to the joyless quasi-Jansenist character of the Irish Church, which was handed complete control of education in the Free State after partition in 1922. (Many of its priests were outstandingly holy and...