Free Republic

Florida Senator Marco Rubio told pastors during a conference on Rediscovering God in Orlando that loving gay people, instead of judging them, is a fulfillment of the teachings of the Bible, rather than something that goes against it. "In order to love people you have to listen to them," Rubio said in his speech at the Rediscovering God in America Renewal Project, according to Breitbart News. "You have to understand their perspective, their hopes and their dreams and their fears and their pain." Rubio ran for this year's Republican presidential nomination. He dropped out in March after failing to win...

A woman and her son living in New Mexico are fighting in the courts for what they call a “right” to have a sexual relationship. Thirty-six-year-old Monica Mares and her son, Caleb Peterson, 19, of Clovis, New Mexico, were separated after Peterson was born when she gave him up for adoption, but say they “fell in love” after they were reunited earlier this year and Peterson moved in with his mother. They claim they have an orientation called “Genetic Sexual Attraction” (GSA) and want to “raise awareness about it.” “This whole case is about whether I have the right to...

TORONTO, August 17, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) -- While ‘tolerance’ and ‘diversity’ are the rallying cry of the homosexual movement, the words appear not to apply to Christians with an unconventional message. Christians led by Canadian activist Bill Whatcott were slapped with a $104-million legal threat last week after infiltrating Toronto’s Gay Pride Parade in July dressed as “gay zombies” in green skintight suits to hand out info packets about the physical and spiritual dangers of homosexual practices. Former Ontario MPP George Smitherman, the province’s first openly gay provincial representative as well first openly gay cabinet minister, told Daily Xtra that he...

The number of same-sex wedding ceremonies exceeded the number of Catholic weddings in Scotland in 2015, according to an annual demographic report released by Scotland’s government. Over 5% of weddings that took place in Scotland last year were same-sex ceremonies. 1,671 same-sex weddings took place—975 of women, and 696 of men—while 1,438 Catholic weddings were celebrated, down from 2,004 a decade earlier. The year 2015 was the first full year in which homosexual civil marriages were legal. For the sixth consecutive year, weddings conducted by Humanist Society Scotland exceeded the number of Catholic weddings.

A financial expert argues that regardless what Target says, the four-month-long boycott of the retailer by a pro-family group is at least part of the reason the company's revenue has dropped more than a billion dollars in the last quarter. Target reported today it has cut its profit and comparable-store sales outlook amid stiffer competition and its own stumbles in areas like grocery sales. The discounter's second-quarter net income fell nearly 10 percent, though that was better than what most had expected. According to The Associated Press, sales at stores open at least a year fell 1.1 percent, reversing seven...

(CNN)Caitlyn Jenner's "I Am Cait" will not be having a third season, CNN confirms. Jenner broke the news herself on Tuesday via Twitter.

NEW YORK (AP) — Target Corp. cut its profit forecast and a key sales outlook Wednesday as it saw fewer customers in its stores and acknowledged it didn't push the second part of its "Expect More, Pay Less" slogan. The Minneapolis-based discounter's second-quarter net income fell nearly 10 percent, though that was better than what most had expected. Sales at stores open at least a year fell 1.1 percent, reversing seven straight quarters of gains. Its main competitor, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., reports results Thursday. Target's shares fell $4.74, or 6 percent, to $70.74 in afternoon trading.

Target Corp. said it will spend $20 million to add a private bathroom to each of its stores by next year, following customer protests over its policy allowing transgender individuals to use whichever restroom corresponds with their gender identity. Target’s finance chief Cathy Smith said the move is a response to feedback from customers voicing displeasure over the company’s bathroom policy. She added the customer discontent hadn’t had a “material impact” on sales. CEO Brian Cornell had promised to roll out family restrooms earlier this year and defended the company’s stance on diversity. Protests started at Target stores after the...

Target TGT -6.02% is spending millions to add private single-stall locking bathrooms at many of its stores as it looks to reverse a drop in shopper traffic, some of which may have been caused by the retailer’s transgender-friendly bathroom policy.

Minneapolis — Target cut its profit and comparable-store sales outlook amid stiffer competition and its own stumbles in areas like grocery sales. The discounter’s second-quarter net income fell nearly 10%, though that was better than what most had expected. Sales at stores open at least a year fell 1.1%, reversing seven straight quarters of gains. Target shares were down more than 6% in mid-morning trading Wednesday. The quarter underscores challenges that Target and other retailers face from Amazon.com and shoppers who remain cautious about spending.

An official for the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) told a U.S. Department of Education bullying summit on Friday that 15.3 percent of high school students in DCPS identify as either gay, lesbian, bisexual or “questioning” — i.e. not sure of their sexuality. DCPS Health and Wellness Director Diana Bruce cited statistics from a 2012 survey which also found that “6.2% of D.C. middle school youth identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual” and “8.9% of D.C. middle school youth identify as questioning or not sure” regarding their sexual identity. …

A North Carolina school board has issued recommendations for faculty and staff to stop calling male children "boys" and female students "girls." The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools gave a presentation to principals and counselors entitled “Supporting Transgender Students” that focused on "bully prevention." Among the various means of preventing bullying is eliminating all references to boys or girls. Instead, the policy instructs staff to call boys and girls "students" or "scholars." The presentation explained a new set of guidelines for faculty and staff to follow regarding transgender students. For instance, teachers will be required to "work with students" to help them determine...

Barack Obama is set to finalize a federal rule requiring many women’s shelters to admit men who identify as “transgender,” potentially placing abused women and children at risk of being victimized again. If enacted, all homeless shelters – including battered women’s shelters – that receive federal funding would have to allow people to use the homeless shelter of the sex with which they identify, regardless of their appearance, anatomy, or the “complaints of other shelter residents.” Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Julián Castro proposed the so-called “Equal Access Rule” last October. Media outlets say it will become...

PLEASANTVILLE, NY (ChurchMilitant.com) - A New York rabbi is claiming God is transgender. In an op-ed published Friday in the New York Times, Rabbi Mark Sameth of the Pleasantville Community Synagogue maintains the Hebrew Bible's "highly elastic" view of gender leaves open the possibility that God Himself is transgender. Citing various examples of pronoun usage found in several passages in Genesis, the rabbi comes to the conclusion that, "counter to everything we grew up believing, the God of Israel — the God of the three monotheistic, Abrahamic religions to which fully half the people on the planet today belong —...

<p>A homosexual in Georgia raped and sodomized an 18 month old boy.</p> <p>An 18-month-old baby boy was allegedly sexually assaulted by a male suspect last month.</p> <p>The case was only recently reported to authorities after the little boy’s grandmother took him to hospital for an examination.</p>

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is holding summits to promote the role of lesbian farmers as a part of its “Rural Pride” campaign. The agency is working with singer and LGBT activist Cyndi Lauper for a “day of conversation” about the struggles of gay and transgender individuals in rural America. The agency says its wants to change the perception of what it means to be a farmer in America away from the “white, rich male.” The latest summit, first reported by the College Fix, will be held on August 18 at Drake University in Iowa. “The Office of the Assistant...

A private school in Atlanta, Georgia dedicated to serving as a safe space for LGBTQQIAA students has officially started holding classes, CBS News reports. Pride School Atlanta is open to students ages 5-18, the school’s website states. The school’s stated mission “is to provide LGBTQQIAA* students, families and educators a safe, fun and rigorous learning environment free of homophobia and transphobia — a place that honors their identities so they can be themselves, find themselves, and find friends and mentors who can help them navigate the

Adding to the handful of lawsuits involving transgender students across the country, lawyers representing a group of 51 families in a Chicago suburb asked a federal judge to temporarily suspend a school policy that grants a transgender student access to the girls’ restrooms and locker rooms. “Every parent sends their kids to school expecting that the school is going to protect them at the most basic level—their safety, their privacy, their dignity,” Jeremy Tedesco, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs in the case, said after the hearing wrapped on Monday afternoon. “What we’re asking for is a temporary injunction that will...

Homeless shelters have become the latest battleground in the national debate over transgender rights. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is expected in September to finalize regulations that would allow people to stay in homeless shelters based on the gender they identify with. The proposal has set off a firestorm, pitting LGBT groups against religious organizations that operate many homeless shelters. “Transgender women are women regardless of whether they were born male,” said David Stacy, government affairs director at the Human Rights Campaign. “If you’re a transgender woman and you walk into a homeless shelter and they treat...

The Obama administration will announce this week a new directive granting access to intimate federal facilities on the basis of gender identity. BuzzFeed News reported Monday that the regulation will be posted in the Federal Register at some point this week, opening up thousands of federally operated restrooms to transgender people who wish to use the facilities corresponding with their gender identity rather than biological sex. The rule will apply to roughly 9,200 properties operated by the General Services Administration and will not be limited to employees. GSA spokesperson Ashley Nash-Hahn said anyone visiting a federally operated property, including courthouses...