San Francisco archbishop spells out strict school sexuality rules
The archbishop of San Francisco has written a new policy document for teachers and staff in Catholic high schools, telling them that marriage is between one man and one woman and that contraceptives, pornography and masturbation are all “gravely evil.” Salvatore Cordileone said all teachers will be expected to follow his rules. The San Francisco Chronicle notes that the archdiocese has also proposed new contract language that would call all teachers “ministers engaged in this religious mission,” taking advantage of a legal loophole that permits employment discrimination for church ministers.
UK approves three-parent babies
The UK House of Commons has voted to approve babies from three parents, a biomedical technique that prevents certain harmful genetic conditions. In the procedure, an egg from one parent and sperm from another are combined with the addition of mitochondrial DNA from a second woman. Mitochondrial DNA forms a tiny proportion of overall DNA, but certain mutations in it cause congenital defects in babies.
Michigan won’t appeal loophole marriages
The state of Michigan has decided not to appeal a court ruling legitimizing 300 same-sex marriages that took place after a judge struck down the state’s marriage law and before an appeals court slammed the door shut again. The overall case against Michigan’s same-sex marriage laws will be heard by the US Supreme Court in April, but until then the 300 gay couples will remain married.
Read more at The Detroit News.
A teenager, a swim team and the Boy Scouts of America
At Outsports, Cyd Zeigler tells the coming-out story of Ryan Murtha, a teenager from Philadelphia who grew up in the Boy Scouts and competes on his university swim team. The upside? Going out with his supportive swim team to a coming-out party at Chipotle. The downside? Because of a Boy Scouts of America policy, he will never be able to go back to be a Scout leader himself.
More on the death of gay culture
Following up on Evan Beck’s essay “The Myth of the Gay Community” in The Atlantic, Milo Yiannopoulos at Breitbart says that gay culture is dead and that acceptance killed it. “Widespread acceptance of gay lifestyles has killed gay culture because the deviance that gave birth to great characters and literature is gone,” he writes. “The present generation of gay British men is a smug class of particularly sanctimonious middle-class bores.”
Leading Church of England campaigner comes out as a lesbian
A former evangelical leader in the Church of England and councillor to the archbishop of Canterbury has come out as a lesbian. Jayne Ozanne says that during the years she was powerful in the church she consented to conversion therapy and a kind of exorcism to cast out her “demonic” sexuality. She has now moved to a new job as the director of Accepting Evangelicals, a pro-gay Christian group.
Read more at the Religious News Service.
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