The Equality Act (read a quick summary here) is a threat to people of faith across the country. But are evangelicals partly to blame for it?
Evangelical theologian Matthew Lee Anderson has a long piece in Christianity Today (May/June 2021) arguing that evangelicals must realize our own role in the rise of the militant LGBT movement and its political successes.
The story that evangelicals are (merely) victims of progressive aggressors not only fails to account for the ways in which the LGBT movement was shaped by populist evangelical rhetoric and tactics. It also forgets that the gay liberation movement was a direct response to the systemic and pervasive exclusion of lesbian and gay individuals from the structures of our public life—including from America itself.
Anderson, a professor of ethics and theology at Baylor University, expands on his point. The Christian right, he writes, rose in the 1970s in opposition to the cultural excesses of the sexual revolution. It is surprising that he does not mention Roe v. Wade, which was certainly a larger motivator for the religious right than gay rights. As the Christian right rose to a position of political and cultural influence, Anderson argues, it weaponized biblical truths about sexuality (which Anderson accepts) in a way that “demeaned and disrespected our LGBT neighbors.”
An attempt to repeal Illinois’s parental notification law failed to advance out of committee before the end of the legislative session, leaving Illinois’s 1995 law requiring parental notification before a minor undergoes an abortion intact. The parental notification lawis the last remainingrestriction on abortion in Illinois after Governor J.B. Pritzker signed a law in 2019 legalizing abortion up until birth for any reason, repealing abortion clinic regulations, and requiring all health insurance plans to cover abortions. That year abortion rates in Illinois increased by 10%.
Like Minnesota, Illinois requires parental notification, but not consent, before a minor undergoes an abortion. The parental notification lawis not only the last remaining abortion restriction in Illinois, it is also a policy that has widespread support among parents, including parents who describe themselves as pro-abortion. Removing this law would take away the last protection Illinois offers to the unborn while also attacking parental rights and teens’ relationships with their parents. The Illinois Parental Notification of Abortion Act points out that abortion can lead to long-term medical, emotional, and psychological harm and that it is not in a minor’s best interest to keep their parents in the dark.
Catholic Social Services has been providing adoption and foster care services in Philadelphia for many years. However, the city arbitrarily denied them the right to continue placing children in homes because they affirm that marriage is between one man and one woman, and declined to work with same-sex couples.
After a protracted lawsuit, Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, the Supreme Court today ruled unanimously in favor of Catholic Social Services and their right to serve the children of Philadelphia. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion, with concurring opinions from other justices. Chief Justice Roberts wrote
CSS [Catholic Social Services] seeks only an accommodation that will allow it to continue serving the children of Philadelphia in a manner consistent with its religious beliefs; it does not seek to impose those beliefs on anyone else. The refusal of Philadelphia to contract with CSS for the provision of foster care services unless it agrees to certify same-sex couples as foster parents cannot survive strict scrutiny, and violates the First Amendment.
On January 1, a California state law allowing male inmates who identify as female to request transfer to women’s prisons went into effect. Since then, the state has received over 250 transfer requests from men asking to be transferred. According to documents obtained by Women’s Liberation Front (WoLF), more than one man who has already been transferredhas been convicted of sexual assault. Due to a similar policy in Washington state, Washington Correctional Center for Women currently houses a serial rapist. Connecticut and Massachusetts have both passed similar legislation.
Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Abigail Shrier explains that, unlike most men’s prisons, women’s prisons do not separate inmates based on the severity of their crimes. Also unlike men’s prisons, Central California Women’s Facility in Cowchilla, which currently houses eleven male inmates, houses eight inmates to a room, with a sink and toilet inside the cell and only a cowboy door for modesty. This allows neither privacy nor escapefor women who are uncomfortable or feel unsafe being housed with male prisoners.
Recent polling data reveals that the radical abortion agenda being embraced by the political leftis not even popular with their own base. In a nationwide survey, the pro-life group Susan B. Anthony List found that “53% of likely voters are more likely to vote for a Republican candidate who supports a 15-week limit on abortion versus just 28% of voters who prefer a Democratic candidate who supports unlimited abortion up until the moment of birth. Independent voters break strongly to the GOP side by a 54% to 18% margin.”
This is especially relevantas the Supreme Court considers Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, a case challenging Mississippi’s ban on abortions after 15 weeks. The Court has agreed to rule on the central question of “Whether all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional.” This case could significantly undermine Roe v. Wade and play an essential role in ending abortion.
In a recent video from Take Charge MN, Rashad Turner, a former leader of Black Lives Matter explained why he left the organization. “I believed the organization stood for exactly what the name implies,” Turner said,
Black lives do matter. However, after a year on the inside, I learned they had little concern for rebuilding black families, and they cared even less about improving the quality of education for students in Minneapolis.
A year and a half after he founded the Saint Paul chapter of Black Lives Matter, Turner left and is now engaged in a movement that is seeking to rebuild families and expand access to quality education.
