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The fiancee of former New England Patriots player Aaron Hernandez will be called to testify in his murder trial Friday, two people with knowledge of the matter told The Associated Press. Shayanna Jenkins was granted immunity by the court in February, which means she can be compelled to testify or face time behind bars. There had been a question over whether prosecutors would call Jenkins, who has been in a relationship with Hernandez, 25, since high school and is the mother of his 2-year-old daughter.

SOMERVILLE, NJ -- A Catholic school has decided not to rehire a theology teacher who rejected the argument in favor of gay “marriage” on her private Facebook page, her family has announced. The controversy began last week after a student found a Facebook post by Patricia Jannuzzi, a 57-year-old theology teacher at Immaculata High School in Somerville, New Jersey. In it, Jannuzzi said that advocates of redefining marriage argue that they “are born this way and it is not a choice, to get 14th amendment rights equal protection” – which was intended for “unchangeable characteristics such as race and disability.”...

Much has been written about privilege in academic settings over the past few decades. There’s the privilege of wealth, and the advantages wealth confers if a baby is lucky enough to be born into it. Much too has been written about the advantages of being born into this world as a Caucasian — known in academia as “white privilege.” But not enough has been written about the most important advantage a baby can have in America: the advantage of being born with a mother and father who happen to be married. Call it “the marriage privilege” — the advantages are...

Much has been written about privilege in academic settings over the past few decades. There’s the privilege of wealth, and the advantages wealth confers if a baby is lucky enough to be born into it. Much too has been written about the advantages of being born into this world as a Caucasian — known in academia as “white privilege.” But not enough has been written about the most important advantage a baby can have in America: the advantage of being born with a mother and father who happen to be married. Call it “the marriage privilege” — the advantages are...

The nation's largest Presbyterian denomination has rewritten its definition of marriage and has authorized same-sex weddings nationwide. By Tuesday evening, a majority of presbyteries or regional governing bodies had voted to ratify an amendment to the constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), allowing but not requiring its pastors to perform same-sex weddings and its churches to host such rites.

Father Who Torched Apartment to Kill His Daughter and Son-in-Law Found Guilty of Murder Subhash Chander set fire to a 36-unit Oak Forest building in 2007 because he was angry and offended. His 3-year-old grandson also died. By Dennis Robaugh (Patch National Staff) March 21, 2015 at 11:18am A grandfather who torched an Oak Forest apartment building seven years ago to kill his pregnant daughter, her husband and their 3-year-old son — because his daughter’s choice of husband offended him — has been convicted on three counts of first-degree murder. Subhash Chander, 64, an angry, argumentative heavy drinker, now faces...

A South Carolina woman’s new essay about being raised by her lesbian mom contains a surprising revelation: she opposes marriage equality. “Gay community, I am your daughter. My mom raised me with her same-sex partner back in the ’80s and ’90s,” writes Heather Barwick, a 31-year-old mother of four, in The Federalist. “I’m writing to you because I’m letting myself out of the closet: I don’t support gay marriage. But it might not be for the reasons that you think. It’s not because you’re gay. I love you, so much. It’s because of the nature of the same-sex relationship itself.”

The Presbyterian Church (USA) is the Radio Shack of church denominations. It’s been in free fall for so long that it’s sometimes difficult to believe the church is still around. It makes news only when it makes bad news. This is a church that has long embraced a culture of death by accepting abortion on demand. Indeed, church materials have declared that abortion can even be “an act of faithfulness before God,” and church policy states: “The considered decision of a woman to terminate a pregnancy can be a morally acceptable, though certainly not the only or required, decision.”...

An association of Southern Baptist churches in Alabama voted March 16 to dismiss a church over its pastor’s support of same-sex marriage. The executive board of Madison Baptist Association voted 74-5 to withdraw fellowship from Weatherly Heights Baptist Church in Huntsville, Ala., according to a statement to media.The voluntary association of 85 churches affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention investigated Weatherly Heights, which is primarily affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, after news reports that an unpaid staff member ordained by the church officiated at a same-sex wedding Feb. 9.Discussions revealed that the church’s pastor, David Freeman, also does not...

Children remind us that “we are always children”, they bring their way of seeing reality, with a “confident and pure” gaze (“they have not yet learned the science of duplicity which we adults have learned”), they can “teach us to smile and cry again”. “Of course they also bring concerns and sometimes many problems, but a society with these concerns and these problems is far better than a society that is sad and gray because it has no children!” This was the crux of Francis’ message at this Wednesday’s General Audience in St. Peter’s Square.  After reflecting on the different figures...

SALT LAKE CITY (RNS) An LDS apostle reaffirmed recently that Mormons who support gay marriage are not in danger of losing their temple privileges or church memberships — even though the Utah-based faith opposes the practice.

Members of the Presbyterian Church (USA) have voted to make the 1.8-million-member, 10,000-congregation denomination the largest Protestant group to formally recognize gay marriage allow same-sex weddings. The Presbytery of the Palisades in New Jersey cast the necessary 86th vote Tuesday night to establish that a majority of the church’s 171 regional presbyteries now support an amendment to the church constitution that redefines marriage, the Associated Press reported. “Marriage involves a unique commitment between two people, traditionally a man and a woman, to love and support each other for the rest of their lives,” the church’s Book of Order will read,...

The tide has turned for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender couples seeking to be married in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A). Following years of debate and introspection, America’s largest Presbyterian denomination has announced a change to its constitution that allows for a more inclusive definition of marriage. Officially called Amendment 14-F, the new wording in the denomination’s Book of Order will describe marriage as being “between two people.”

Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook and the founder of LeanIn.org, says she’s figured out “How Men Can Succeed in the Boardroom and the Bedroom.” That’s the headline of the piece she co-authored with Adam Grant, a Wharton professor, in the New York Times.

The New York Times was abuzz March 5. The board of trustees of South Carolina’s Erskine College—a small, liberal arts college historically associated with the Presbyterian church—had issued a statement declaring that the school considered “all sexual activity outside the covenant of marriage [as] sinful and therefore ultimately destructive of the parties involved.” Not only did the trustees affirm what has been standard Christian belief and practice since … well, the beginning of Christianity, but they even stated: “As a Christian academic community, and in light of our institutional mission, members of the Erskine community are expected to follow the...

Pulling on his pants after our intimate encounter in my Las Vegas hotel room, the cute 23-year-old I’d just picked up holds out his cellphone, urging me to tap in my number. “You really don’t have to take it,” I say. Having sex with a stranger is thrilling, but I’m not that interested in a repeat performance. Two minutes after he’s gone, I climb back into bed and text my husband, Scott, whom I’ve been with for 18 years. “Just saying good night,” I type. “Good night, dove,” writes back Scott from wherever he is. Scenarios like these were typical...

A community is rallying around an Ohio couple who says they were denied wedding services because of their sexual orientation. Jenn Moffitt and her partner Jerra Kincely were on the hunt in February for a wedding videographer. She sent an email asking video production business "Next Door Stories" in Bexley, Ohio, if it would cater to a same-sex couple. She was shocked by the response. "Unfortunately at this time I do not offer services for same-sex weddings," the owner of business wrote in an email Moffitt shared with CNN.

"... “Had norms not changed, the growth of childbearing outside of marriage that we have recently seen among today’s unmarried low-educated and moderately educated young adults would not have occurred, even given the rise in income inequality,” Cherlin writes. College-educated Americans were able to adapt to changing mores because the economy was kind to them. But a shifting job market and easing taboos combined to tear a hole in the rest of the country's social fabric. This is all in keeping with what researchers find when they actually go out and talk to single mothers. Women in low-income communities say...

A man I know was a top executive at a major American media company, one of the biggest and most influential in the world. A young man came into his office one day asking to display a rainbow sticker with the words “safe space.” This was a decade ago and this man, a faithful Catholic, felt confident he could demur without reprisal though he could see the veiled threat of being “outed” as less than gay friendly, as a homophobe.But, in these post-Brendan Eich days, it is doubtful my friend would feel as safe to say no because things...

From a very young age, Black men are typically given a traditional set of roles they are expected to take on in a relationship. Perhaps two of the most emphasized of these roles are the protector and the provider. Unfortunately, the sheer necessity of the Black Lives Matter movement is a reminder that it can be increasingly difficult for Black men today to fulfill these roles in the traditional sense. How can one be a provider for his partner and family when he is suddenly placed in a position where it has become difficult to even protect himself? How can...