Religion & Law

Wichita Council debates prayer before meetings

Posted on July 20, 2010
KSN: "The City Council heard arguments today over whether prayer should be allowed before the meeting begins. ... 'There is no good reason to use public time to express private beliefs,' said Vickie Sandell Stangl, president of the Great Plains chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State...

Pakistan: Police release two Christians accused of blasphemy

Posted on July 20, 2010
Agenzia Fides: "After suffering from threats and violence in the past few days, Christians in Faisalabad are breathing a sigh of relief: two brothers arrested on charges of blasphemy have been released. Pastor Rashid Emmanuel and his brother Sajid Emmanuel were arrested on 4 July and, after 15 days of detention and hours of questioning, they were released by the police after the charges lodged against the two men were found to be groundless...

FFRF complains to prayerful South Carolina boards

Posted on July 20, 2010
Freedom From Religion Foundation: "Three South Carolina public boards have received warnings from the Freedom From Religion Foundation about constitutional violations of separation of church and state. FFRF sent a letter to Mayor Brad Burnett of Woodruff, S...

UK: Husband jailed over attempted ?mercy killing?

Posted on July 20, 2010
The Christian Institute: "An Edinburgh pensioner who tried to kill his disabled wife by smothering her with a pillow has been jailed for attempted murder. After failing to kill his wife John Millar, 67, tried to claim it would have been a mercy killing, saying: 'I thought it would be a good thing to do at the time? for both of us...

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UK: Paralysed man asks High Court for right to be killed

Posted on July 20, 2010
The Christian Institute: "A severely paralysed man has launched a legal action in the High Court which could allow his wife to kill him and escape being prosecuted for murder. ... Tony Nicklinson, who can only communicate by blinking and nodding, is so severely paralysed that he would be unable to take part in his own assisted suicide...

UK: Labour repeats call for ?sex education? for 5-year-olds

Posted on July 20, 2010
The Christian Institute: "A new amendment to the Government?s Academies Bill has been tabled by Labour as part of an ongoing push to force sex education on children as young as five. Former Education Secretary Ed Balls has put forward plans for Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE) to be compulsory for all pupils in academy schools...

?Chilean homosexual couple asks to be married in Argentina?

Posted on July 20, 2010
The Pulse: "A Chilean couple is acting fast after hearing that the Argentinian government approved gay marriage this past Thursday. Already they have called the Civil Registry of Mendoza, Chile?s neighboring city, to inquire about marriage procedures...

Eugene Volokh: Now there?s a commitment to state, rather than federal, authority

Posted on July 20, 2010
The Volokh Conspiracy: "A reader points out that Justice Thomas has at least three former clerks who are now Justices on state Supreme Courts: Justice Eid in Colorado, Justice Stras in Minnesota, and now Justice Lee in Utah. And Justice Thomas is of course the U...

Documents show media plotting to kill stories about Rev. Jeremiah Wright

Posted on July 20, 2010
The Daily Caller: "The crisis reached a howling pitch in mid-April, 2008, at an ABC News debate moderated by Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos. Gibson asked Obama why it had taken him so long ? nearly a year since Wright?s remarks became public ? to dissociate himself from them...

Study: ?47% of gay couples have sex agreements, only 45% monogomous?

Posted on July 20, 2010
LifeSiteNews: "Forty-seven percent of gay couples in a recently published study said that they had 'sex agreements' with their partners, which clarify how often and in what circumstances they are permitted to have sex with others. Only 45% said that their relationships were monogamous, while another 8% disagreed about whether their relationship was 'open' or exclusive, according to an ongoing study by the Center or Research on Gender & Sexuality at San Francisco State University...

?Mission Compromised: How the military is being used to advance a radical agenda?

Posted on July 19, 2010
On July 20, 2010, FRCAction is sponsoring a webcast about the Defense Authorization Act. ADF attorney Austin R. Nimocks will be joining this panel.

Chinese turn to religion to fill a spiritual vacuum

Posted on July 19, 2010
NPR: "Alongside China's astonishing economic boom, an almost unnoticed religious boom has quietly been taking place. In the country's first major survey on religious beliefs, conducted in 2006, 31.4 percent of about 4,500 people questioned described themselves as religious...

A Muslim crusade against African Christians?

Posted on July 19, 2010
Virtue Online: "The Islamists have it wrong: Islam isn't the world's fastest-growing religion. By birth numbers and convert tallies, it's Christianity. ... In the central states of Nigeria -- Africa's most-populous country -- religious pogroms and counter-pogroms between Muslims and Christians have become routine...

Scholar?s report outlines to Canadian Court the harms of polygamy

Posted on July 19, 2010
"Increased crime, prostitution and anti-social behaviour. Greater inequality between men and women. Less parental investment in children. And, a general driving down of the age of marriage for all women."

Ross Douthat: The roots of white anxiety

Posted on July 19, 2010
Ross Douthat writing in the New York Times: "Last year, two Princeton sociologists, Thomas Espenshade and Alexandria Walton Radford, published a book-length study of admissions and affirmative action at eight highly selective colleges and universities...

Obama has spent $23 million backing pro-abortion Kenya Constitution

Posted on July 19, 2010
LifeNews: "A new report issued by the Inspector General (IG) for the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) reveals the Obama administration has spent over $23 million for activities in Kenya to influence voters there to support a new constitution that would allow virtually unlimited abortions...

Obama Admin authorized abortion funding in third state under health care law

Posted on July 19, 2010
LifeNews: "Add Maryland to the list of states, including Pennsylvania and New Mexico, where the Obama administration authorized federal taxpayer funding of abortions under high risk insurance programs created under the new national health care plan President Barack Obama signed...

Pro-life groups demand law stopping abortion funding in health care plan

Posted on July 19, 2010
LifeNews: "After a dustup this week that saw the Obama administration authorize abortion funding in high risk insurance pools in at least two states, and then subsequently backtrack and promise no funding would occur, pro-life advocates are demanding a new law to ensure that doesn't happen...

So much for the Commerce Clause challenge to individual mandate being ?frivolous?

Posted on July 19, 2010
Randy Barnett writing at The Volokh Conspiracy: "Remember when the Commerce Clause challenge to the individual insurance mandate was dismissed by all serious and knowledgeable constitutional law professors and Nancy Pelosi as 'frivolous'? Well, as Jonathan notes below, the administration is now apparently telling the New York Times that the individual insurance 'requirement' and 'penalty' is really an exercise of the Tax Power of Congress...

15 nations agree to start working together to reduce cyberwarfare threat

Posted on July 19, 2010
Washington Post: "A group of nations -- including the United States, China and Russia -- have for the first time signaled a willingness to engage in reducing the threat of attacks on each others' computer networks. Although the agreement, reached this week at the United Nations, is only recommendations, Robert K...

Understanding sexual identity

Posted on July 19, 2010
Jeremy Dys writing at the Family Policy Council of West Virginia Engage Family Blog (see video at the link): "Michael Todd Wilson, one of Exodus? counselors, has this excellent explanation of sexual identity. In summary, he says any discussion of sexual identity within homosexual behavior must be broken into three parts: 1...

?US pushing UN status for gay rights group?

Posted on July 19, 2010
Associated Press: "The Obama administration and 14 members of the U.S. Congress are urging the U.N. Economic and Social Council to accredit the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission so it can work at the United Nations. The U.S.-based organization, which has offices in South Africa, Argentina and the Philippines, has been trying since 2007 to get consultative status with the council, which serves as the main U...

Obama Administration ushers in ?new era in sex ed?

Posted on July 19, 2010
CitizenLink: ". . . The Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) released its '7th Annual State Profiles' report to compare 'comprehensive' sex education laws and policies in public schools to that of abstinence-only efforts...

Ministerial exception applied to dismiss Prof?s racial discrimination claims

Posted on July 19, 2010
Religion Clause Blog: "In Adams v. Indiana Wesleyan University, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 71403 (ND Ind., July 15, 2010), an Indiana federal district court applied the ministerial exception to dismiss a Title VII racial discrimination claim filed against a religiously-sponsored university by a former faculty member...

ACLU worried about privacy in familial DNA matching

Posted on July 19, 2010
UALR Public Radio: "An Arkansas civil liberties group says it's concerned about the implications of 'partial DNA matching' after a high-profile California case. An alleged serial rapist was tracked down after his son went to prison and was entered into the DNA database...

Montana: Most voter initiatives likely won?t qualify

Posted on July 19, 2010
Great Falls Tribune: "Friday was the deadline for county election officials to submit ballot initiative signatures to Secretary of State Linda McCulloch's office. ... As of late Friday afternoon, it appeared the majority of the proposals would not qualify...

NV: Sharron Angle?s take on separation of church and state

Posted on July 19, 2010
Las Vegas Sun: "Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle describes her motivation for seeking elected office as a religious calling. ... [A]lthough many Americans view the separation of church and state as one of the keys to the nation?s success as a multicultural society, Angle believes that religion has an expansive role to play in government...

America?s ruling class and the perils of revolution

Posted on July 19, 2010
"Today's ruling class, from Boston to San Diego, was formed by an educational system that exposed them to the same ideas and gave them remarkably uniform guidance, as well as tastes and habits."

Doug Napier on the Janet Mefferd Show: The firing of Ken Howell at an Illinois University

Posted on July 19, 2010
ADF attorney Doug Napier appeared on the Janet Mefferd Show to discuss this: Ill. prof. fired for teaching about Catholic beliefs in class on Catholicism. | MP3 18:10 mins

Court says mother?s religious practices inadmissible in custody dispute

Posted on July 19, 2010
Religion Clause: "Applying the rule that 'a parent's religious beliefs and practices may not be considered by the trial court as a basis to deprive [a] parent of custody unless there is a showing of actual harm to the health or welfare of the child,' a Kansas appellate court, in a 2-1 decision, has rejected a Muslim father's objections to granting of residential custody to his son's mother because of her practices as a Jehovah's Witness...

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