DriveThru – Get What You Need

This headline from a U.K. publication caught my eye.

“Lap-dancing clubs increase while library numbers drop,” and the article includes these details.

The number of lap-dancing clubs has increased from 24 to 300 since 1997, but the number of public libraries has shrunk by 6 per cent in the same period.

Schools, police stations, hospitals and public toilets have also become a rarer sight on the nation’s streets, the figures show.

A photo caption with the article says that this is a 1,150% increase in lap-dancing clubs.

This is the trajectory of a western country in which most adults are not marrying, and the church–informally sidelined since at least WWII–is now officially sidelined by so-called “equality” legislation that would further stifle the religious freedoms of people and organizations.

It’s beginning to look a bit like the U.K. version of Pottersville, and I mean the Jimmy Stewart variety rather than the Harry variety.  Can the U.S. be very far behind?  And who wants to live in Pottersville, anyway?

Tomorrow I’ll add a link to a Citizen magazine story that goes in-depth about the loss of religious freedom in the U.K.  It will be posted here.

The Air Force Academy has come under fire in recent years for allegedly wearing Christianity on its sleeve, despite the fact that its world famous chapel holds weekly services for Protestants, Catholics, Jews, Buddhists and Muslims.

The Academy’s brass have gone above and beyond the call of duty recently to undo any public misperceptions about the “free exercise of religion’ rights of its cadets, by creating a worship space on its property for “earth-centered religions,” i.e., Paganism, Druidism and Wicca. This circle of stones has recently become more publicly known because of a recent incident there. (See this article and accompanying photo)

A concerned Christian wrote to Focus recently about the accommodation by the Academy of these “earth-centered religions.” Pagans, Druids and Wiccans naturally set off all kinds of alarm bells in the theology of the average Christian, and our friend wondered what, if anything, could be done to stop it.

If the question behind the question is whether Paganism, et al, are “religions” duly protected under the First Amendment, the answer is “yes.” The Supreme Court and lower federal courts have looked favorably on a host of unconventional “religions” over the years, including, believe it or not, atheism and secular humanism. The Air Force has its own definition of religion which pretty much tracks with the wide range of those decisions:

“…a personal set or institutional system of attitudes, moral or ethical beliefs and practices held with the strength of traditional religious views, characterized by ardor or faith and generally evidenced through specific religious observances.”

While the faithfuls’ concern over false doctrines is legitimate, Christians ought never to fear our country’s accommodation of beliefs and philosophies that conflict with Christian biblical truth. The First Amendment protects all religious exercise, from the most popular to the least. In the marketplace of ideas, Christianity can more than hold its own. As Christians we can confidently encourage a robust public dialogue about faith, whether at the Air Force Academy, in our public parks, or even in our blogs.

George Weigel, a Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C., has an important column up today on the attempts by the Left both at home and abroad to define religious freedom down to merely the freedom to worship, as part of the Left’s battle to normalize homosexual behavior. His key conclusion:

Religious freedom, rightly understood, cannot be reduced to freedom of worship. Religious freedom includes the right to preach and evangelize, to make religiously informed moral arguments in the public square, and to conduct the affairs of one’s religious community without undue interference from the state. If religious freedom only involves the freedom to worship, then, as noted above, there is “religious freedom” in Saudi Arabia, where Bibles and evangelism are forbidden but expatriate Filipino laborers can attend Mass in the U.S. embassy compound in Riyadh.

Read the whole thing. The legislative and judicial efforts from the LGBT lobby in this country today usually come hand in hand with demands to exclude (and demonize if necessary) religious viewpoints as if those are not legitimately part of our constitutionally protected religious freedoms. Weigel’s column is a timely expose’ on the Left’s attempt to minimize those freedoms in order to accomplish a wider agenda.

We can learn a lot from the Romeikes, the first family to ever win political asylum in the United States from persecution against home schoolers.

They recently fled their idyllic home in Germany for a duplex in Morristown, Tenn.  A legal brief gives a dramatic account of their case:

            …at about 7:30 a.m., armed and uniformed police officers entered the Remeike home. Without a written order, the officers forcibly took the Romeike children from the home and drove the crying, traumatized children to the government school.

That was just the beginning. In addition to police visits, the family was slapped with hefty fines, culminating with the threat of losing their home and maybe even custody of their children.

What was their horrible crime? Uwe Romeike and his wife, Hannelore, are Christians who dared to home school their five children (the youngest age 3). They felt the German public schools were contradicting their deeply held religious convictions. So they risked jail time and literally gave up everything—connections to relatives, financial security, their house—for the freedom to direct their children’s upbringing.

It makes you think, doesn’t it? How much would we be willing to give up to protect our kids and follow our convictions? The prospect of police knocking down our doors to take our children isn’t as far removed as we’d like to believe. It’s still happening in modern-day Europe.

Clearly, we take a lot for granted here in the land of the free. But the Romeikes’ plight gives us a dramatic reminder why we need to remain vigilant to protect the freedoms we hold dear.

After all, it wasn’t that long ago, that Californians were fighting for their freedom to home school.  And day after day, we hear more stories about public schools forcing kids to learn lessons that are antithetical to their parents’ faith. We’re also hearing more disturbing statements from leaders in our political and court systems, asserting that religious freedoms will lose when it comes to a conflict with “gay rights” goals.

If the current trend of sacrificing parental rights and religious freedoms in the name of “tolerance” continues—it’s foreseeable that there could come a day in this country when home schooling is the only option for people of faith.  That’s why it’s worth our time and investment to stay involved in local elections and the legislative process, and educate ourselves with tools like CitizenLink.com.

The Romeikis understood the true cost of protecting these freedoms. Do we?

Some of you may recall hearing about the plight of parents in Alameda, California, who were told their elementary-age kids have to receive pro-gay lessons provided by the public school district—even if those lessons violate their families’ most deeply held religious convictions.

The parents fought back with a lawsuit, asking the court to make the school district honor their requests to opt children out of the controversial teaching.

But this week, the parents got bad news: Judge Frank Roesch of the Superior Court of California in Alameda County denied their request, giving schools carte blanche to indoctrinate kids against their parents’ wishes.

The logic? The judge determined that “any opt out right” is “outweighed by the policies against discrimination and harassment of students from LGBT [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender] families.” 

Translation: State laws and school provisions citing special protections for homosexual characteristics automatically trump parental rights and religious freedoms. (Next step for the parents is to appeal the decision with the help of Pacific Justice Institute.)

Parents, please take note. This represents the latest tactics being used by gay activist groups to undermine your rights. And this specific Alameda case offers some lessons that are worth paying attention to:

1) Gay activists are aggressively pushing so-called anti-bullying or anti-harassment policies for schools that contain specific references to things like “sexual orientation” and “gender identity.” Once passed, they use these policies as legal teeth to enforce things like pro-gay curricula for six- and seven-year-olds.

2) Homosexuality teaching is being couched within “tolerance” and “bullying” lessons as a way to skirt parental rights.  Many state and local opt-out policies have wording that can be construed to only apply to subjects like health or sex education. Therefore, gay activists push schools to categorize homosexuality teaching under more general topics like “tolerance,” “bullying prevention” or “family diversity”—and then argue that opt-out provisions do not apply to these topics.

That’s exactly what happened in Alameda. The judge bought the gay-activist and liberal school-attorney arguments—and decided that opt-out provisions in the state education code only apply to subjects formally categorized as “health” instruction. And therefore, he found that parents don’t have the right to opt their kids out of so-called tolerance lessons.

3) When it comes to battles between pro-gay “nondiscrimination” laws and religious freedoms—religious freedoms are increasingly losing out. And this in turn, is creating alarming disrespect for religious viewpoints in public schools. In this case, for instance, attorneys for the Alameda school district felt free to vilify religious parents—listing as evidence against them that “they believe homosexuality is a sin” and accusing them of trying to “avoid having their children be taught respect.” 

This simply isn’t true. People of  faith consider respect for others to be a core tenet of their religious teachings.  And they believe respect  is based on the fact that all people “are created equal” by God.  Respect should not be twisted into an excuse to indoctrinate young children into homosexual  and "transgender" activism.

Those trying to protect man-woman marriage in Maine have repeatedly cited the Massachusetts court decision Parker v. Hurley as a timely warning. In the decision—rendered after gay marriage was legalized in that state–a federal judge denied parents the right to opt elementary-age children out of lessons about same-sex marriage. 

But Maine’s Attorney General, Janet Mills, recently issued a statement brushing aside those warnings because, she claimed, the Parker case didn’t “turn on any provision of state law relating to marriage or education.”

But that’s simply untrue. Let’s examine the facts:

For instance, I wonder if the Attorney General took the time to read the first few paragraphs of the decision.  If so, surely she would have noticed the clear references to “Massachusetts law” granting special protection to “sexual orientation.”  The opinion specifically explained that, because of this law, the “Massachusetts Department of Education has issued standards which encourage instruction for pre-kindergarten through fifth grade students concerning different types of people and families.” (In other words, teaching about homosexuality and same-sex marriage.) So this obviously did “turn on state law”—and keep in mind that Maine also has at least one state law giving special protection to “sexual orientation.”

Furthermore, the Massachusetts judge clearly and repeatedly connected the dots between what is being taught in the classroom and the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decision, which mandated the legalization of gay marriage. “Students today must be prepared for citizenship in a diverse society. .. As increasingly recognized, one dimension of our nation’s diversity is differences in sexual orientation. In Massachusetts, at least, those differences may result in same-sex marriages,” said the judge [Emphasis added.]

Therefore, the judge concluded that parents cannot opt their kids out of instruction promoting gay marriage because “under the Constitution public schools are entitled to teach anything that is reasonably related to the goals of preparing students to become engaged and productive citizens in our democracy.”

And in Massachusetts those “goals” now include teaching “respect” for homosexuality and gay marriage. “It is reasonable for public educators to teach elementary school students about individuals with different sexual orientations and about various forms of families, including those with same-sex parents…”

Clearly, Maine is in danger of taking a path that leads to almost exactly the same scenario—one that robs parents of their parental rights and religious freedoms in public schools.

Here’s more disturbing evidence that—when it comes to conservative religious groups—national, gay activist organizations have none of the so-called tolerance they love to promote.

GLSEN—the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network—held a Hollywood star-studded event this month called the “Respect Awards.” HBO and ABC/Disney TV heavyweights were in attendance, as well as stars from popular TV shows.

Ironically, while accepting GLSEN’s “Respect” award, technology entrepreneur David Bohnett slammed some of the nation’s largest religious groups, and basically issued a manifesto calling for people to fight them.

Below, I’ve highlighted a few excerpts. You can read the whole thing yourself here.

• “… it is the evangelical and fundamentalist groups that teach homosexuality is a sin, who stand in the way of fairness and equality.”

• “It’s time to combat head-on religious organizations that are funding the opposition to marriage equality and safe school legislation.”

• “Among our greatest adversaries who actively work against us are the leaders of the Catholic, Mormon, and evangelical churches who seek to deny equal protection…”  

• “…  the children taught at an early age that the bible condemns homosexuality may become the school bullies, and then later the adults who vote to deny marriage equality…”

This is a disturbing example of vilifying faith-based groups who dare to disagree with homosexual advocacy groups’ agenda, including the legalization of gay marriage—and even more disturbing is the not-so-subtle insinuation that parents should not be allowed to teach their kids religious beliefs that are opposed to gay activist goals. Does this represent GLSEN’s vision for “safe schools”? And the vision of GLSEN’s founder, Kevin Jennings?

As I pointed out before, this same intolerance was clearly on display in the vehement attacks against those who were brave enough to support Prop. 8 (a traditional marriage law recently upheld by California’s Supreme Court). But nothing is said about promoting “safety” or “respect” for those individuals and churches.

Apparently, GLSEN and its supporters believe in “safety” for everyone except those who disagree with them.

That’s why it’s so essential that we act now to defeat measures like the “employment nondiscrimination act” that give political ammunition to those who would destroy religious liberties.

It’s also extremely important to protest the appointment of people like Kevin Jennings, GLSEN’s founder, who has now been given control of the federal “Safe Schools” office. Jennings and his group have repeatedly displayed the same bias, and even outright anger, against conservative faiths that was so vividly on display at GLSEN’s “Respect” awards. For more examples, click here.  You can also listen to a Focus on the Family broadcast highlighting some of these issues.

On Friday afternoon, I was interviewed by Politico writer Josh Gerstein. He wanted to know why Focus on the Family Action was concerned about the following events: 1) President Obama’s speech to the Human Rights Campaign; 2) President Obama’s nomination of Professor Chai Feldblum to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and 3) Kevin Jennings’ appointment to the Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools.

While I appreciate his effort to include our perspective in the article, I was disappointed to see that he left out the main point: For us, this is about religious freedom.

Our top concern regarding all three of these events, I told Mr. Gerstein, is the erosion of religious liberty. Through these recent appointments—and through pledges made to the largest homosexual advocacy group in the nation—President Obama is pandering to activists who want to silence Christians, not only in the work realm, but in public education and political life in general.

This is very frightening to people of faith.

Let’s take the three events one at a time:

President Obama’s speech to the Human Rights Campaign. Among other things, President Obama pledged to eradicate a federal law defending traditional marriage. We need only look to Massachusetts, the first state to legalize full-fledged gay marriage, to understand the threat this poses to both parental rights and religious freedoms. Parents in that state are now being told they can’t exempt their 2^nd graders from lessons about same-sex marriage—even if it conflicts with their most deeply held religious convictions.

The intolerance of same-sex marriage advocates was on display for all to see during the debate over California’s Prop. 8, which added wording to the state constitution defining marriage as only between a man and a woman. Prop. 8 supporters were subjected to vehement blackballing and even physical attacks. Church buildings were defaced and some people lost their jobs because of their stance.

Nomination of Prof. Feldblum: The President also nominated Georgetown law professor Chai Feldblum to serve on a commission that enforces the nation’s federal employment laws. This is disturbing considering that Feldblum has repeatedly stated that when it comes to a conflict between religious liberty and homosexual activists’ goals (or “sexual liberty” as she terms it)—homosexual activists should win most of the time. This is not comforting to many faith-based business owners, such as Christian day-care operators who receive federal grants and don’t want to be forced to promote gay marriage to preschoolers.

Appointment of Kevin Jennings: I also pointed out to Mr. Gerstein that Kevin Jennings has publicly attacked a mainstream, Christian student group—Young Life. Not to mention his 17-year track record of twisting “safe schools” into a tool for pushing a one-sided agenda into public schools that displays no tolerance for Christian or socially conservative points of view.

The Politico article failed to give any coverage of these religious-freedom concerns, focusing instead on a detailed litany of  “civil rights” demands by homosexual activist groups. If you fall for the semantics—“prohibiting workplace discrimination,” “expanding gay rights”—in the article, this all sounds pretty innocuous.

But the untold story is the very real threat these policies pose to religious freedoms, which is made abundantly clear by the public statements of those pushing them.

More troubling information keeps coming to light on the Obama Administration’s “safe schools czar”—Kevin Jennings.  The new revelations are very disturbing to people of faith who value their religious freedoms.

Now, a column that Jennings wrote for the The Huffington Post has come to light, in which he made a skewering attack on a well-known, mainstream Christian student group, Young Life. He accuses the club of  “ ‘baiting and switching’ to suck young people in.”

In the same column, he also attacks the Texas “Religious Viewpoint Antidiscrimination” law, which was passed to protect students of faith from having their free speech censored in public schools.

This is frightening to parents and students of faith who expect taxpayer funded government education to be neutral and respectful toward all viewpoints, including theirs!

These are just two incidents in a long list of frightening statements that Kevin Jennings and the group he founded—GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network—have made about socially conservative and religious viewpoints. For more examples, click here.