Many Christians and non-Christians misunderstand the relationship between morality and religion. Many mistakenly believe that morality is the same thing as religion and, therefore, mistakenly believe that they should not advocate for policies that reflect their moral beliefs. But morals and religion are not the same, and basing our decisions on public policies, laws, or elections on beliefs that derive from religious convictions does not constitute an unconstitutional establishment of a state religion.

All laws reflect or embody someone’s morality. The moral beliefs of people who hold theistic worldviews are no less valid in the public square than the moral beliefs of those who hold atheistic worldviews—which, of course, are faith-based also. The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment was intended to prevent the establishment of a state religion, not to prevent religious beliefs from informing political decisions.

People from diverse faith traditions or no faith could all arrive at the same position on a particular public policy. For example, although Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Catholics, Baptists, and atheists may all oppose abortion because they value human life, the reasons for that valuation of life differ. If there is a secular purpose for the law (e.g., to protect incipient human life), then voting for it does not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

The sources of the various parties’ desires to protect incipient life are not the concern of the government. It would be not only absurd but also unethical for the government to try to ascertain the motives and beliefs behind anyone’s opposition to abortion and even more unethical for the government to assert that only those who have no religious faith may vote on abortion laws. Such an assertion would most assuredly violate the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment.

The religion clauses of the First Amendment were intended to protect religion from the intrusive power of the state, not the reverse. The Establishment Clause states that “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion.” That does not mean religious convictions are prohibited from informing political values and decisions. To expect or demand that political decisions be divorced from personal religious beliefs is an untenable, unconscionable breach of the intent of the First Amendment which also includes the oft-neglected Free Exercise Clause which states that Congress shall make no law prohibiting the free exercise of religion.

Legal theorist Michael Perry explains:

“[F]orcing religious arguments to be restated in other terms asks a citizen to ‘bracket’ religious convictions from the rest of her personality, essentially demanding that she split off a part of her self … to bracket [religious convictions] would be to bracket—indeed, to annihilate—herself. And doing that would preclude her—the particular person she is—from engaging in moral discourse with other members of society.”

To paraphrase Richard Neuhaus, that which is political is moral and that which is moral, for religious people, is religious. It is no less legitimate to have political decisions shaped by religion than by psychology, philosophy, scientism, or self-serving personal desire.

If allowing religious beliefs to shape political decisions represents a violation of the Establishment Clause and an inappropriate commingling of religion and government, then American history is rife with egregiously unconstitutional actions, for religious convictions have impelled some of our most significant social, political, and legal changes including the abolition of slavery, antiwar movements, opposition to capital punishment, and the passage of civil rights legislation.

Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” is replete with references to his Christian faith which informed his belief about the inherent dignity, value, and rights of African Americans, a belief which he lost his life to see enshrined in law. He wrote what would now certainly generate howls of opposition:

How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.  To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law.

“Progressives” have no objection to people of faith participating in the democratic process so long as their views comport with “progressive” positions. Liberals never cried foul when Quakers or Catholics opposed the Vietnam war because of their religious convictions, and liberals do not object that Catholic opposition to the death penalty represents a violation of the “separation of church and state”–a phrase not found in the Constitution.

I don’t recall any “progressives” objecting when Senator Rob Portman and former president Barack Obama cited their religious beliefs in defense of their radical shifts in position on homosexual faux-marriage. Portman said,

The overriding message of love and compassion that I take from the Bible, and certainly the Golden Rule, and the fact that I believe we are all created by our maker, that has all influenced me in terms of my change on this issue.

After his flip-flop—er, “evolution” on faux-marriage, Obama, like Portman, cited the Bible as his justification:

When we think about our faith, the thing at root that we think about is not only Christ sacrificing himself on our behalf, but it’s also the Golden Rule, you know? Treat others the way you’d want to be treated.

In contrast, when conservative people of faith participate in the political process, citing their religion as the source of their judgments, suddenly the Establishment Clause has been violated.

Apparently neither Portman nor Obama think much about what the Bible says about sex, marriage, or repentance. And apparently, neither Portman nor Obama understand the Golden Rule. The Golden Rule does not require Christians to affirm all the desires, beliefs, and actions of all humans. It requires Christians to treat others as they—disciples of Christ—want to be treated as disciples of Christ.

And what should disciples of Christ desire? They should desire to follow God’s teaching more closely every day. They should desire to be willing to die to self and to take up their crosses daily. They should want their brothers and sisters in Christ to hold them accountable for their embrace of sin.

What the government must not do is impose laws exclusively religious in nature like Sharia laws. There should be no laws requiring the observance of any particular religion. No laws governing baptismal practices or Communion. No laws requiring prayer or circumcision. But, for example, people whose faith points to the worth of all people may legitimately work toward enacting laws that oppose capital punishment, euthanasia, or abortion. People whose religious beliefs include pacifism may legitimately work toward preventing or stopping military engagements.

No one is legally, constitutionally, ethically, or morally obligated to divorce their faith from their political decisions.

Richard Neuhaus argues persuasively in his book The Naked Public Square that a polity denuded of religion will be clothed soon enough in some other system that functions as religion by providing “normative ethics.” A democratic republic cannot exist without objective normative ethics that render legitimate the delimitation or circumscription of individual rights.

Historically, the sources of the absolute, transcendent, objective, universal truths that render legitimate our legal system have been “the institutions of religion that make claims of ultimate or transcendent meaning.”

Neuhaus argues that when religion is utterly privatized and eliminated as a “source of transcendence that gives legitimate and juridical direction and form, something else will necessarily fill the void, and that force will be the state.”

If the body politic claims there are no absolutes or delegitimizes religion as an arbiter of right and wrong, or good and evil, then the state will fill the vacuum, relativizing all values, and rendering this relativization absolute.

Lawmaking absent an understanding that there exist moral truths that are objective and universal would represent an illegitimate and hubristic arrogation of power.

What sense does outrage at human rights violations make if we assert there are no universal, transcendent, eternal, objective truths? And if we agree that these truths exist, that they transcend the subjective opinions of any particular individual, then what is their source other than a supernatural, eternal, transcendent being?

There are numerous factors that have resulted in a diminished valuation or recognition of the essential place of a belief in God as the source of transcendent truth in American society and politics, one of which is our remarkable cultural diversity. A healthy respect for the pluralism in America, however, need not and should not degenerate into what retired Campbell University law professor Lynn R. Buzzard describes as a “religion of secularism, excluding religion from participation in the pluralism.”

Princeton University law professor Robert George explains that our cultural degradation has, at least in part, resulted from an “orthodox secularism [that] stands for the strict absolute separation of not only church and state, but also faith and public life.”

Allowing religious institutions and ideas to inform our understanding of right and wrong, which is a necessary precursor to making legislative and juridical decisions, does not represent a violation of the Establishment Clause. Indeed, as Samuel Silver explains, “The government, as defined by the First Amendment and explained by its author James Madison, must remain neutral between various sects of religion, but it is not required to remain neutral between religion and irreligion.”

Prohibiting religiously derived understandings of right and wrong to shape political decisions, would, however, represent a violation of the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment. Buzzard writes that “Free Exercise will not be construed as merely creating a zone of non-governmental interference or the creation of an exemption from conscience-opposed activity, but the opportunity to be full partners in the pluralism of our day.”

To leftists, the idea of a separation of church and state no longer points to the importance of protecting religious freedom from the intrusive power of the state but instead refers to coercively eradicating theologically orthodox religious expression from the public square. Only secular or theologically heterodox worldviews, which are as shaped by myopic, dogmatic, unproved assumptions as secularists claim theologically orthodox religious worldviews are, will be tolerated in our pretend-tolerant society.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Do-Christians-Regularly-Violate-the-Separation-of-Church-and-State.mp3

Here is some bad news: Illinoisans who support the use of your money to pay for abortions have been calling their legislators asking them to support HB 40. A vote on this bill could come at any time.

The good news is that this legislation can be defeated, but your help and prayers are needed immediately. Your local state legislators need to hear from you and everyone you can encourage to call or email their legislative offices.

Here is part of a statement issued by Brian Burch, who is the president of CatholicVote.org:

“We have been following the developments surrounding H.B. 40, a new spending bill pending before the Illinois General Assembly that, if passed, would authorize the use of state dollars to fund abortion services for qualified Medicaid recipients. Should Governor Rauner sign the bill as it is currently written, pro-life voters will be left with no choice but to oppose his candidacy next year.

. . .

“We have been in conversation with pro-life groups around the state. The overwhelming consensus is that support for any legislation that would coerce Illinois taxpayers into directly funding abortion would disqualify him from receiving their support.

“The state owes $10 billion in unpaid bills, with tens of billions more in unfunded liabilities. Yet now politicians want to spend scarce state resources to pay for abortions. Rauner’s support of this reckless bill would rip apart the Republican Party and destroy any chance of his re-election.

“Let me be clear. If Governor Rauner signs the bill as written, we will urge our members along with every pro-life voter in the state to support an alternative candidate — or to abstain from voting for his re-election. And we won’t be the only group doing so.”

Those are some pretty tough words–words that the Illinois Family Institute and its sister organization Illinois Family Action applaud. We would like to see that threat extended to any member of the General Assembly that votes to use taxpayer dollars to fund abortions.

Cultural issues writer Laurie Higgins explains why IFI supports the position of CatholicVote.org:

IFI wholeheartedly agrees with CatholicVote.org’s commitment to opposing Governor Rauner’s re-election bid should he support HB 40.

There is no more critical human rights issue than the issue of protecting incipient human life from intentional destruction in the womb. The moral offense of legalized feticide is compounded when the hard-earned money of taxpayers is used to fund the killing of humans.

Neither the state of development, dependency status, imperfections, or location of human beings grants to other humans the moral right to end their lives. When the reproductive rights of women come into direct conflict with the right of their offspring to exist, the right to existence takes precedence in that it is a right of a higher moral order.

Any government leader who doesn’t recognize the intrinsic value and rights of all humans doesn’t deserve the support of citizens or public office.

We agree with this statement from eminent legal scholar Professor Robert George:

Maintaining and solidifying the pro-life…stance of the Republican Party is critical. That’s why tactical voting, including voting for bad Democrats over bad Republicans, is IN CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES (e.g., where the election of a Democrat does not jeopardize Republican control of a legislative house), morally legitimate and perhaps even advisable. We must not let the pro-abortion…movements strengthen their positions in the Republican Party.

We can make a difference, but only if our legislators hear from their pro-life constituents. We hope to convince enough of them not to vote for this big-government, big-abortion bill. We must prevent the sponsor of this legislation from getting enough “yea” votes to pass it.

Our failure to act with as much energy as the other side too often is the difference between victory or defeat–and in this case life or death.

Here is Cardinal Blase Cupich, the Archbishop of Chicago, weighing in on HB 40:

We have raised our voices in the past for those who have no voice, whether they be the
immigrant or the refugee, the poor, or the unemployed. We now need to speak for the children in the womb, who are the weakest among us.

We need to let our elected officials know that taxpayers should not be forced to fund the
taking of human life. In fact, tax money should be used to fund prenatal services for the poor
and child care for working mothers, as well as expand health-care options for those in need.
Please join me in advocating for all life by urging your state representative to reject HB 40 and work instead to pass a budget that funds all essential services.

You can read Cardinal Cupich’s entire letter here, and the statement by CatholicVote.org President Brian Burch here.

Take ACTION: Please send a message to your state representative to ask him/her to vote AGAINST this pro-abortion bill. This legislation is HB 40 – a bill that would authorize the use of tax dollars to pay for abortions in Illinois through Medicaid and state government health care insurance plans. It is sponsored by State Representative Sara Feigenholtz (D-Chicago).  This bill would reverse the current law which bans taxpayer funding of abortion under Medicaid.

Please also call your state representative during the week to make sure he/she knows how important this issue is to you and your family. The Capitol switchboard number is (217) 782-2000.

Pray for the ultimate demise of HB 40 and all anti-life legislation.

Written by Joe Rigney

“Progressives,” always plagued by inconsistency and hypocrisy, have been for years waxing self-righteous about their deep commitments to diversity, to “honoring all voices,” and to “critical thinking.” They’ve also been devotees of relativism, subjectivism, radical autonomy, and deconstructionism. But when it comes to homosexuality and gender confusion, all liberal principles are abandoned in their voguish, slavish devotion to absolute, transcendent, eternal pro-perversion orthodoxy. They will abuse academic institutions to censor and mock assumptions that they have ordained by the power invested in themselves to be ignorant, prudish, biased, hateful, false, or oh-so-uncool. Their declarations are often unaccompanied by reason and evidence, but chock ‘o’ block full of feelings, nothing more than feelings.

Since the 1960s, secular colleges and universities as well as colleges and universities affiliated with liberal religious denominations have slowly moved away from a commitment to help students know truth. Homosexualist ideologues have for decades controlled academia and, therefore, are culpable for the  corruption of public elementary, middle, and high schools through their “education” of public school teachers.

Liberals exult in the sad reality that younger Americans—including Evangelicals—increasingly affirm homoerotic activity and relationships as morally equivalent to heterosexual activity and relationships. These same liberals rarely (if ever) examine the reasons for this troubling affirmation of sexual perversion as normative and good. Princeton law professor Robert George illuminates the reasons:

The [homosexual] lynch mob came for the brilliant mild-mannered techie Brendan Eich.

The lynch mob came for the elderly florist Barronelle Stutzman.

The lynch mob came for Eastern Michigan University counseling student Julea Ward.

The lynch mob came for the African-American Fire Chief of once segregated Atlanta Kelvin Cochran.

The lynch mob came for the owners of a local pizza shop the O’Connor family.

The lynch mob is now giddy with success and drunk on the misery and pain of its victims. It is urged on by a compliant and even gleeful media. It is reinforced in its sense of righteousness and moral superiority by the “beautiful people” and the intellectual class. It has been joined by the big corporations who perceive their economic interests to be in joining up with the mandarins of cultural power. It owns one political party and has intimidated the leaders of the other into supine and humiliating obeisance.

…

[I]t is certainly true that the political, economic, and cultural power now arrayed against people of faith and their rights and liberties is formidable.

It is not reasoned argument that has allowed folly and ignorance to metastasize within the culture, destroying temporal and eternal lives, children’s rights, parental rights, and First Amendment protections. Rather, self-serving desire, appeals to emotion, censorship, propaganda, and intimidation are incrementally destroying American “culture”—if such a thing even exists anymore.

Here are just three recent examples of the insalubrious excrement served on gilded platters to our children by self-righteous, hubristic “intellectuals”:

• Omar Currie , a 25-year-old homosexual, 3^rd-grade teacher from Efland Cheeks Elementary School in North Carolina read the homosexuality-affirming picture book King & King to his class without parental notification or parental permission. This was his presumptuous effort to address bullying. Imagine a teacher reading a pro-polyamory book to 3^rd-graders in order to address ridicule of “consensual non-monogamy.” Or imagine a teacher reading a book that presents promiscuity positively in an effort to end ridicule of those whose parents may be swingers. The issue isn’t whether polyamory or promiscuity per se is ontologically or morally equivalent to homoeroticism. The issue is whether government employees have the right to promote their personal feelings and beliefs about sexual deviance to other people’s minor children.

• In February, the University of Chicago held its annual Sex Week during which students could choose from a smutty smorgasbord of freakish workshops designed to appeal to the baser instincts of adolescents and perverts, including the following:

“Dirty Talking, Etc.”: They say the most powerful sex organ is the one that resides between your ears! Keep your mind engaged during awesome sex with this peer-led how-to on dirty-talking, role-play and fantasy.
“Positions 101”: Tea Time and Sex Chats presents a tutorial on different ways to spice up your sex life. Covering a variety of positions, you’re guaranteed to find one to suit your fancy.
“Taste of Kink”: Ever wonder what people get out of floggers, wax, electricity, and more? Intrigued by the possibilities but don’t know where to start? Try our smörgåsbord of sensation, where you’ll be able to safely sample a variety of props and toys in a low-key setting and at your own pace. 18+, bring ID.
“A Consumer’s Guide to Sex Toys”: Come learn about sex toys from the owner of one of the most popular sex toy shops in Chicago! Searah Deysach, owner of Early to Bed, will answer all your questions on the best toys to buy, the questions to ask when purchasing, and the best way to care for your toys once you take them home.
“Trans 101 Panel”: Students Anaïs (she), Amalia (they), Devon (they), and Hex (it) talk about life as trans people and trans issues as they affect them.

It doesn’t matter how many or few students attend this annual sexuality freak show. What matters is that the University of Chicago administration permits it. Thankfully, Mortimer Adler isn’t around to witness this pseudo-intellectualized bacchanalia. (Well, perhaps “pseudo-intellectualized” grants too much.)

• Smith College is following in the disoriented footsteps of purportedly all-women’s colleges Mill’s College, Mt. Holyoke, Simmons, Scripps, Bryn Mawr, and Wellesley. Smith will now admit men who pretend to be women, but, forced to accommodate an ontologically incoherent ideology, Smith will not admit actual women who pretend to be men.When announcing the change, Smith president, Kathleen McCartney said, “In the years since Smith’s founding, concepts of female identity have evolved.” Clearly.

According to the pontificating panjandrum of liberal academia, female identity has nothing whatsoever to do with XX chromosomes and their accompanying biochemistry and anatomy. But if objective biological sex has no inherent meaning, then the very idea of “women” and women’s colleges have lost their meaning as well. The fixed lodestar of objective biological sex has been devoured in this tangled ideological web. The doctrinaire and absurdist gender ideology embodied in these admissions policies is like the “black swallower” fish that ingests prey so large that it decomposes before the swallower can digest it. The object the black swallower ingests for sustenance kills it.

From kindergarten through college, cultural regressives control education, manipulating the feelings of other people’s children and filtering out ideas (otherwise known as censorship) that dissent from pagan sexuality dogma. It is mind-boggling that so many orthodox (small “o”) Christians allow  secular academicians (as well as the “beautiful” people)—who are lost in spiritual and intellectual darkness—to inform or deform their hearts and minds and to determine what they say publicly about homoeroticism and marriage.

While “progressives” claim to honor diversity, free speech, and intellectual freedom, the reality is their commitment ends at the bedroom and dungeon doors. Societal health and welfare were enhanced through the influence of Judeo-Christian sexual ethics that rejected the sexual perversion embraced by prior pagan cultures. This cultural health is eroding as Americans embrace pagan sexual perversity and profligacy.

We are witnessing the tragedy of frogs blithely simmering in fetid cultural water, thinking it’s the rejuvenating, liberating water of life.

Written by Laurie Higgins

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~Correction/Update: Although Neuqua Valley High School still lists Hemant Mehta on its Math Department faculty webpage, he no longer works there. Linked screenshot below* was taken today, Dec. 19, 2014.~

A new Chicago-area billboard campaign from the aggressively offensive Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) exposes again this organization’s hostility to and childish misunderstanding of Christian faith.

The FFRF has announced that eleven billboards are going up with these special holiday messages:

• “Kindness comes from altruism, not from seeking divine reward.”
• “We are here to challenge you to think for yourself.”
• “I believe in reason and logic!”
• “Equality for all shouldn’t be constrained by any religion.”
• “Free of faith, fear and superstition”
• “I put my faith in science.”
• And this featuring Neuqua Valley High School math teacher* Hemant Mehta (aka the “Friendly Atheist”): “I’d rather put my faith in me.” (It’s curious that the billboard doesn’t identify Mehta as a public high school teacher. To learn more about Mehta, click here, here, and here.)

A few brief responses to the FFRF’s shallow slogans:

1. Kind acts are “friendly, generous, warmhearted, charitable, generous, humane, and/or considerate acts.” Altruism is unselfish concern for the welfare of others. Kind acts may be motivated by ignoble, selfish sentiments—perhaps even a wrong theological belief that one earns salvation through one’s actions. But kind acts can also be motivated by altruism that derives from faith in Christ.

Kindness can be the result of the regeneration that God performs in the hearts of believers, which deracinates selfishness and naturally results in desires more in line with God’s nature. Kindness can result from an overflowing of thankfulness for God’s great gift of salvation, which makes followers of Christ love and give more unselfishly, often even sacrificially.  They act kindly and altruistically not to gain reward but to thank God and to express his love to others.

2. Finding the Old and New Testament writers to be persuasive no more constitutes a failure to “think for yourself” than does finding the ideas of Bertrand Russell, John Rawls, Richard Rorty, Daniel Dennett, or Richard Dawkins persuasive. And believing that reality is not exclusively material does not constitute a failure to think logically.

Are the members of the FFRF actually arguing that Martin Luther, John Calvin, Jonathan Edwards, G.K. Chesterton, Karl Barth,C.S. Lewis, G.E.M. Anscombe, Pope Benedict XVI, John Finnis, Hadley Arkes, Alvin Plantinga, D.A. Carson, Eleonore Stump, N.T. Wright, William Lane Craig, Francesca Aran Murphy, Doug Wilson, Robert George, Francis Beckwith, David Bentley Hart, and Alex Pruss did or do not think for themselves and/or that they reject reason and logic?

3. Equality—properly understood—is advanced by Christian faith. Equality demands treating like things alike, and increasingly both those who embrace an atheistic scientific materialism and people who embrace heterodoxy are incapable of recognizing fundamental truths—including even facts—about human nature. Therefore, they are incapable of identifying which phenomena are in reality alike.

4. First, one can make an argument that those who most fear, for example, death are those who have an unproven faith in the non-existence of an afterlife.  Second, a superstition is “a belief held in spite of evidence to the contrary.” As such, the Christian faith does not constitute a superstition, because there is ample evidence for the existence of God and his human incarnation, Jesus Christ. Atheists reject the evidence based on their a priori assumptions about what constitutes evidence.

5. Christians too put their faith in science. Christians, including Christian scientists, trust and have confidence that science proves what it can prove. Science cannot prove or disprove the existence of God. Science cannot prove or disprove the existence of an immaterial reality. And science cannot prove whether altruistic acts are objectively morally good acts or merely acts that humans have evolved to believe are objectively good because such a belief serves to enhance survival.

6. Faith in self alone reflects the kind of hubris that leads more often to intellectual and moral error than it does to altruism.

“The Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity—hope of pardon, hope of peace with God, hope of glory—because at the Father’s will Jesus Christ became poor, and was born in a stable so that thirty years later He might hang on a cross.” ~J.I.Packer

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To make a credit card donation over the phone, call the IFI office at (708) 781-9328.

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Illinois Family Institute
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Carol Stream, IL  60188

*WARNING: some graphic language not suitable for younger readers*

Residents of California’s 52^nd Congressional District were just confronted with the choice between Democratic incumbent Scott Peters and homosexual “pro-choice” Republican challenger Carl DeMaio, whom the GOP establishment vigorously supported. Not only is DeMaio openly homosexual—which is no problem for House Speaker John Boehner who campaigned for him—but according to multiple accusations, DeMaio has a peculiar practice of engaging in semi-public self-pleasuring. According to Slate Magazine, a third man has recently come forward alleging sexually inappropriate conduct on the part of DeMaio:

I was at the urinal, and (DeMaio) came from the stall that was closest to the urinal and was kind of just standing there hovering….I turned around and realized that it was Carl. He had his pants up, but his fly was undone, and he had his hand… grasping his genitals.

Previously, a former colleague of DeMaio’s who served with him on the San Diego City Council told CNN that he had twice found DeMaio self-pleasuring in public restrooms, and a former campaign staffer for DeMaio, who is also homosexual, has alleged that DeMaio both sexually harassed him and engaged in onanism in his campaign headquarters office.

Thanks to the support of the Republican Party, DeMaio came very close to winning, losing by just a hair three days after the election.

A few weeks before yesterday’s mid-term election, Princeton University law professor Robert George made these comments about this California race, comments that are equally applicable to any races with RINO candidates, including Illinois races:

If I were in the district, I could not in conscience vote for the Republican. His election would do greater harm to the causes of life, marriage, and religious liberty than would the election of his Democratic opponent, as bad as that guy himself is on these issues. The question is whether to abstain or to cast a tactical vote in favor of the Democrat. In circumstances like these, I believe that tactical voting is morally permissible, and it would improve the likelihood of the least bad outcome….Abstaining is morally permissible too.

The partisans of abortion and marriage redefinition have a lock on the Democratic Party now. Effective dissent of any type is not possible. Having gained that lock on one party, they are now turning their resources and attention to weakening the pro-life and pro-marriage reality witness of the Republican Party. … I can think of no more urgent priority than preventing that from happening. Maintaining and solidifying the pro-life and pro-marriage reality stance of the Republican Party is critical. That’s why tactical voting, including voting for bad Democrats over bad Republicans, is IN CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES (e.g., where the election of a Democrat does not jeopardize Republican control of a legislative house), morally legitimate and perhaps even advisable. We must not let the pro-abortion and pro-marriage redefinition movements strengthen their positions in the Republican Party. We must make the Republican Party as solid for life and marriage as the Democrats now are for the contrary positions.

The GOP is slowly transmogrifying into the political incarnation of Tolkien’s Gollum:

Gollum, dancing like a mad thing, held aloft the ring, a finger still thrust within its circle. “Precious, precious, precious!” Gollum cried. “My Precious! O my Precious!” And with that, even as his eyes were lifted up to gloat on his prize, he stepped too far, toppled, wavered for a moment on the brink, and then with a shriek he fell. Out of the depths came his last wail precious, and he was gone.

Illinoisans should fully expect to hear immoderates and perhaps even dispirited conservatives say, “See, Bruce Rauner/Mark Kirk-type of Republican is the only kind of Republican who can get elected in Illinois.” But soon, they won’t be tacking on “in Illinois.”

Four years ago, the U.S. Senator-elect from Colorado, Cory Gardner, supported the Personhood Amendment and even circulated petitions to gather signatures for it. Then this year, the GOP establishment got to him. Shortly before Gardner announced his candidacy, pro-life activists in Colorado got wind of the news that he would be renouncing his support for the Personhood Amendment.

Karl Rove deceitfully wrote this last May: “in Colorado, tea-party favorite and front-runner Ken Buck stepped aside when Mr. Gardner entered the race, recognizing he was better able to enthuse all the party.” So, in May Rove implied that Buck just freely stepped aside because of his own uncoerced epiphany that Gardner would be the best candidate for “enthusing” the party.

That’s interesting, because late last night on FOX News election coverage, Karl Rove boasted that his Super PAC told the Colorado GOP that no Super Pac money would go to support Ken Buck for U.S. Senate. I’m speculating here, but I suspect that Rove et al told Gardner they would support him as long as he retreated from the Personhood Amendment.

Immoderate Republicans accuse conservatives who agree with Robert George of turning on their Republican brethren and “forming a circular firing squad.” But who really is Cain in this contemporary narrative? Who is Sméagol and who is Déagol?

Well, what’s done is done, and now Rauner, who proudly campaigned on his support for the “right” of women to have their own babies killed, can work the fiscal wonders for which his supporters have been slavering.

Under his mystical, magical management, Illinois should shortly be transformed into a pecuniary powerhouse. Then with fiscal victory securely in their grasp, immoderate Republicans will jubilantly announce the end of the social issues “truce” and the dawn of a new day. They will marshal all their resources—chief among them money—and announce the start of a battle—nay , a war—the likes of which  this state has never seen to protect human life at all stages, to restore a legal definition of marriage that comports with reality, to preserve religious liberty, and to eradicate “progressive” political and philosophical advocacy from government-funded schools.

Yeah, I’m sure with Rauner and Kirk at the helm of the IL GOP that will happen.

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The legal recognition of same-sex unions as marriages will have far-reaching, devastating and pernicious cultural consequences, including within our public schools. Here are some of the ineluctable changes in public education that Illinoisans can expect if “same-sex marriage” is legalized: 

1. If Illinois legalizes “same-sex marriage,” parents can expect elementary school teachers to include homosexuality in discussions of family and marriage. 
   
   
2. Elementary schools will not be able to keep picture books that portray homosexuality positively out of their libraries and classrooms. Those who still harbor the stereotype of librarians as conservative stuffed shirts will be surprised to learn that librarians and university programs in library science are, like teacher education programs, notoriously liberal.

   Ironically, the program one would most associate with diversity of thought and the free exploration of ideas has been actively promoting one set of ideas about homosexuality. The infamous American Library Association has been fervently soliciting homosexuality-affirming books from publishers while still making time to adopt formal positions on the legalization of same-sex marriage.
   
   Yes, picture books affirming homosexuality are already in many elementary school libraries, but there are libraries that have been able to keep them out. They just don’t purchase them. If Illinois changes marriage law to recognize homosexual unions as marriage, it will become more difficult for those communities that want to keep all images and ideas about homosexuality out of their schools to do so.
   
   Some make the absurd argument that since families led by homosexuals exist, schools must teach about them. The truth is, however, that schools have no obligation to teach about every phenomenon that exists, nor do they have to include resources that affirm every phenomenon that exists. Does anyone believe that if a student being raised by polyamorists were enrolled in a public elementary school, teachers or administrators would feel obligated to include books in their libraries that affirm polyamorous family structures? 

3. Public schools will be hiring teachers who are in legal “homosexual marriages.” These teachers will put photos of their homosexual spouses on their desks and talk about their homosexual spouses to their students. Such images and ideas coming from teachers whom children love and admire will powerfully shape the feelings and beliefs of young boys and girls, particularly when such images and ideas are reinforced countless times in other cultural contexts. Such images and ideas will undermine what is being taught at home.
   
   Some will argue that schools are already hiring teachers in homosexual relationships, so the legalization of same-sex marriage won’t change anything. They are only partly correct. Although schools are, unfortunately, already hiring teachers in homosexual relationships, once the government recognizes homosexual unions as marriages, administrators and school boards—particularly in elementary schools—will have the social stigma that makes them reluctant to hire teachers in homosexual unions knocked out from under them. And this, of course, is the chief motivation for homosexuals to pursue same-sex marriage when they already have all the benefits and privileges of marriage through Illinois’ civil union law. 
   
   
4. For years, activists within and without our public schools have been exploiting public education to advance their unproven, non-factual beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality. This will continue and intensify whether or not we change our marriage laws. But changing our marriage laws will inarguably make it more difficult to keep Leftist ideas about homosexuality in general and marriage and family in particular out of our schools. Our youngest, most impressionable children will be taught both implicitly and explicitly the following lies,  and all resources that challenge these lies will be censored as hate-filled bigotry: 

• Children will be taught that homosexuality is normative and good. 
  
  
• Children will be taught that homosexuality is morally equivalent to heterosexuality and equally able to contribute to human flourishing. 
  
  
• Children will be taught that marriage has no inherent connection to either sexual complementarity or reproductive potential. 
  
  
• Children will be taught that children do not have any inherent rights to know and be raised by a mother and a father. 
  
  
• Children will be taught that men and women are inherently indistinguishable (Ironically, this is at odds with what homosexuals in other contexts claim. When homosexual men and women say they are only attracted to persons of the same-sex, they are implicitly acknowledging the truth that men and women are inherently different and that those differences are not merely anatomical). 
  
  
• Children will be taught that either mothers or fathers are expendable. 
  
  
• Children will be taught that mothers and fathers contribute nothing unique to a child’s development. 
  
  
• Children will be taught that the government’s interest and involvement in marriage has nothing inherently to do with reproductive potential or the needs and rights of children. 
  
  
• Children will be taught in social studies classes that including sexual complementarity in the legal definition of marriage was a violation of the civil rights of those who wanted to marry someone of their same sex. 
  
  
• Children will be taught eventually that opposition to the legalization of “same-sex marriage” was equivalent to opposition to the legalization of interracial marriage. They will be taught that opposition to both was motivated by ignorance and hatred. 

Already liberal “educators” exploit bullying-prevention programs, sex education, and English, social studies, and theater classes to advance their personal beliefs about homosexuality. We have lost sight of the truth that no arm of the government has the right to propagate non-factual beliefs about the nature and morality of homosexuality—including public schools. 

One word about public school teachers who profess to be Christians: You are not exempt from the obligation to speak truth simply because it may cost you personally or professionally. You have an obligation to stand for truth and to protect children. Recently theologian and pastor Peter Leithart wrote about the moral obligation pastors have to stand for truth on the issue of homosexuality. He wrote that if they are not willing to endure persecution on this subject, they should get out of the business. I would argue that this moral imperative applies to Christian teachers in public schools as well. And yes, you will be hated. 

Far too many Christian teachers in public schools have stood by silently as lies and political activism have infiltrated public schools through plays, novels, essays, magazine articles, films, guest speakers, anti-bullying resources, sex education, discussions of “family diversity,” picture books, and professional development activities. Their silence ensures that in coming years the presence of homosexuality-affirming resources will be greater, the suppression of dissenting ideas greater, and the oppression of conservative teachers greater. They need to ask themselves if there’s anything they’re willing to sacrifice to protect children from lies? 

There are several obstacles that serve to prevent the public from recognizing the educational consequences of redefining marriage. First, we are an intellectually lazy culture that doesn’t want to spend any time imagining the logical outcomes of ideas, policies and laws. 

Second, we are a cowardly bunch, unwilling to express counter-cultural ideas unless we’re guaranteed that doing so will be cost-free. If we think that expressing our views to a teacher, administrator, school board, colleague, boss, friend, neighbor, member of our church, pastor, priest, lawmaker, or the local press will cost us anything, we choose self-censorship. Though the cost could be public excoriation, loss of employment, or a lawsuit, the cost we’re unwilling to pay is most often as trivial as having someone become angry with us. We should be ashamed of such cowardice. 

Anyone who proclaims that the redefinition of legal marriage will have no effect on the culture is either foolish or lying. Adopting what Robert George, Ryan Anderson and Sherif Girgis call the “revisionist view” of marriage will radically alter the cultural landscape in countless and profoundly harmful ways. 

Take ACTION:  If you haven’t yet sent an email or a fax to your state lawmakers — it is time to speak up now!  Click HERE to let them know what you think.

Sunday was a depressing news day. Here’s what purported “conservatives” George Will, Mary Matalin, and Matthew Dowd had to say about same-sex marriage: 

George Will: “This decision by the Supreme Court came 31 days after an Election Day in which three states for the first time endorsed same-sex marriage at the ballot box — never happened before — Maine, Maryland, and the state of Washington….they could say it’s now safe to look at this because there is something like an emerging consensus. Quite literally, the opposition to gay marriage is dying. It’s old people….marriage law is traditionally the prerogative of the states, but let’s put a human face on this. One of the two cases concerns a New York woman who married in Canada her female partner. They lived together 44 years. The partner dies. As because the partner wasn’t a man, the woman is hit with a $363,000 tax bill from the federal government. There are a thousand or more federal laws or programs that are at stake here. And the more the welfare state envelops us in regulations and benefits, the more the equal protection argument weighs in, and maybe decisively.” 

Matalin: “[The fact that increasing numbers of Americans are supporting same-sex marriage demonstrates that] Americans have common sense. There are important constitutional, biological, theological, ontological questions relative to homosexual marriage, but people who live in the real world say the greatest threat to civil order is heterosexuals who don’t get married and are making babies. That’s an epidemic in crisis proportions. That is irrefutably more problematic for our culture than homosexuals getting married. So I find this an important dancing on the head of a pin argument.” 

Dowd: “To me, this — the consensus has already emerged on this issue. It’s just a question of who’s going to — is the Supreme Court going to catch up and follow that wind of the pack…or get ahead of it or put a block in the path of it. I mean, if you take a look at this, there is still a division in this country over this issue, but there is no division in this country among people under 35 or 30 years old on this issue. There is no division. Now, I have a perfect example. My son went in the Army…..10 years before, they’d ask everybody to raise that hands, 300 guys raise their hand, who’s for gay — who’s for gays in the military? Eighty percent of the troops said we’re opposed to gays in the military. When he got in, five or six years later, 80 percent said they were for gays in the military. It had changed that much and that quick. To me, we still — you still have to know there’s a huge group of folks in this country that believe this issue is not ready to be settled nationally, and they’re over 35, they go to church regularly, they still view marriage as traditional and all that, but in the end, this issue, five years from now is even going to be more settled, 10 years from now is going to be more settled. 

To George Will: Why would our youth oppose the legalization of “same-sex marriage” when they’ve never been exposed to the substantive reasons to do so? 

To Mary Matalin: She has implicitly posited a false dichotomy between opposing out of wedlock births and opposing “same-sex marriage.” One can and should do both. Matalin reveals her own ignorance if she really believes discussions of the legalization of “same-sex marriage” constitute airy debates on inconsequential philosophical minutia. 

To Matthew Dowd: The fact that ten years ago 240 out of 3oo young soldiers opposed homosexuals serving in the military, while now only 60 out of 300 oppose homosexuals serving in the military may have something to do with the demagogic propaganda about homosexuality to which they’ve been exposed in their schools and entertainment industry virtually from birth. Dowd is right: the culture will devolve further into moral and intellectual ignorance if academia continues to expose students only to the work of Leftists; if churches refuse to find ways to help Christians recognize the fallacious arguments used to normalize homosexuality; and if Hollywood continues to manipulate the emotions of Americans, particularly our vulnerable youth.

In case no one has noticed, journalists never ask Democrats the hard questions regarding homosexuality—and I mean never.  Perhaps our news show hosts should ask their guests and panelists these questions: 

1. Many compare same-sex marriage to interracial marriage. In what specific ways is homosexuality like race?
    
2. If the institution of marriage has nothing inherently to do with sexual complementarity and procreative potential, then why should it be limited to two people or to people who are not close blood relatives?
    
3. If marriage is—as the Left claims it is–solely the institutional recognition of deeply felt, intense loving feelings between people, why should the government prohibit two brothers who are in love from marrying? If people should be allowed to marry whomever they love—as the Left claims they should be–then why shouldn’t two brothers and their mutual boyfriend be permitted to marry?
    
4. Does marriage have an inherent nature that government merely recognizes, or does society create it out of whole cloth?
    
5. Are rights granted to couples or to individuals?
    
6. Are rights accorded to people based on their objective characteristics or on their subjective feelings and volitional acts? 

If any journalists have the integrity to ask these hard questions, they shouldn’t let our mollycoddled liberals off the hook when they respond with ignorant, evasive non-answers. 

It would also be refreshing if our talk shows would invite Princeton University Law Professor Robert George to discuss the issue of marriage with “conservatives” like George Will, Mary Matalin, and Matthew Dowd—or would that be considered “bullying”?

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I was just sent a link to the blog of Neuqua Valley High School math teacher and not-so-friendly atheist Hemant Mehta who seems to spend a fair amount of time monitoring my writing. He is particularly exercised by my suggestion that parents request teachers for their children who do not abuse their government-subsidized positions to promote their personal “progressive” views on controversial moral or political issues.

“Progressive” teachers who view themselves as “agents of change” promote their views on a number of topics, particularly on American history, Critical Race Theory/Critical Pedagogy (although they may not use those terms in class), homosexuality, and gender confusion. They promote their views through their own classroom comments; the films, novels, plays, essays, and newspaper and magazine articles they choose; the speakers they invite; and through their refusal to introduce resources that explore competing views, that is to say, their de facto censorship.

In my article “Challenge Teachers, Not Texts,” I offer some ways for parents to try to ascertain who the “agents of change” may be in their schools, which I learned from working for ten years at Deerfield High School and from putting four children through the same school.

I want to make clear that not all teachers who hold Leftist moral and political views exploit their classrooms to advance them. I have known some exceptional teachers who hold far Left views but have no interest in exploiting their autonomy and public resources to promulgate them. Their interest is in teaching their subject matter, not proselytizing.

But it is equally true that the teachers who most often exploit their autonomy and public resources to try to change the moral and political beliefs of other people’s children are “progressives.”

Do Public Schools Challenge Students to Think Critically About Homosexuality?

What is most laughable about Mehta’s critique of my suggestions is that while mocking my reference to “cool teachers,” he tries to make the case that “cool teachers” are those “who challenge students’ thinking from all sides and make them see things in different ways.”

I would completely agree that the best teachers are those “who challenge students’ thinking from all sides,” which is exactly what does not take place in public schools on the topics of homosexuality, gender confusion, or Critical Race Theory. Can you imagine a public school teacher even using the terms “homosexuality” or “gender confusion”? Teachers who choose to address those topics will use only the rhetorical inventions of the Left: for example, gay, gender identity, or transgenderism.

While working at Deerfield High School, I kept a list of the resources presented to students that affirmed, espoused, or embodied liberal views of homosexuality. Starting freshman year and continuing through senior year, students were exposed to lectures, classroom comments from teachers, magazine articles, plays, novels, films, skits, theater department performances, gay-straight alliance presentations, and activities that affirmed liberal views of homosexuality, while not once in four years being asked to read even a single essay by a conservative scholar like Princeton Law Professor Robert George. Is that what Mehta sees as challenging “students’ thinking from all sides”?

Unfortunately, this ideological monopoly is not unique to Deerfield High School. This is a nearly universal pedagogical and ethical problem in public schools.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, Education, and Critical Thinking

The Huffington Post has picked up Mehta’s silly and dishonest critique and included in their post the Southern Poverty Law Centers’ canard that IFI is a hate group. What many don’t know is that the ethically impoverished Southern Poverty Law Center has an “educational” project disingenuously called “Teaching Tolerance.”

The “educators” at Teaching Tolerance, like so many agents of change, foster a peculiar kind of education that encourages students to “think from all sides” and “see things in different ways” as long as those ways conform to “progressive” dogma.

Here’s one of their recent projects for elementary schools: 

Queerness Meets Early Childhood Ed

Are you a gay or lesbian teacher who has addressed queerness with your young students? An LGBT parent with P-2 children? We want to hear your stories. Send a description of 200 words or less, along with your contact information, to editor@teachingtolerance.org.

Here’s another lesson for kindergarten through fifth grade:

Do Something! Transforming Critiques of Gender Stereotypes into Activism

One of the most empowering ways to overcome the damage done by internalized gender stereotypes is to counteract them actively—on a daily basis….Children benefit from participating in such activism because it helps them understand the socially constructed nature of gender. Activism also encourages constructive change so that they are not damaged by stereotypes.

In this lesson, students will discuss the meaning and nature of activism. They will brainstorm daily strategies they can use against gender stereotypes. They will also come up with ideas for bigger social action projects in their schools and communities.

“Progressive” agents of change believe in teaching preschoolers about “queerness” and teaching elementary school students to be activists in the service of a radical sexual ideology.

Mehta, Symbols, Logic, and Truth

For someone who prides himself on his logic, Mehta, the atheist, uses little of it in his critique of my recommendations. Distracted by his own glib pseudo-cleverness, he ignores the substance of the issues I address. For example, in order to help parents know which teachers may be “agents of change,” I listed some of the symbols of the homosexuality-affirming movement, which activist teachers affix to their “spaces” to announce their moral and political beliefs, one of which is the lambda symbol (λ).

Mehta then mocked me for “going after physics and chemistry classes,” conveniently eliding the fact that the lambda is a well-known symbol of the movement to normalize homosexuality. While reveling in his ridicule, he forgets to mention that two homosexual advocacy organizations include “lambda” in their names: Lambda Legal and the Lambda Literary Awards.

Who Brings Their Views into the Classroom: “Progressives” or Conservatives?

Mehta was completely undone by my suggestion that parents find out who sponsors of Leftist clubs at their children’s schools, calling my suggestion “crazy.” He ranted:

Why? What would it matter? Teachers are legally allowed to be sponsors of those groups. If the GSA needed a faculty sponsor, I’d step up. If an atheist group ever formed at my school, I’d sponsor that, too. And if a Christian group couldn’t find a sponsor, I’d bite my tongue and help them out because they also have a right to meet after school and discuss their beliefs.

Just because teachers are sponsors of religious or political groups doesn’t mean they endorse the groups nor does it mean they espouse those views in the classroom.

But IFI won’t say that…. they just try and scare Christian parents into thinking that liberal teachers ought to be avoided at all costs….They have to make up problems to solve because no real ones exist. Anything they accuse liberal teachers of doing, they know Christian teachers have done the exact same things in a much more egregious way.

First, I never suggested it was illegal for teachers to sponsor extracurricular clubs.

Second, does Mehta actually believe that conservative Christian teachers have been using the classroom to promote their beliefs in a “much more egregious way” than have progressive agents of change, particularly on the topic of homosexuality? Can he provide evidence of conservative teachers assigning any resources that espouse conservative views on issues related to homosexuality?

Can he provide evidence that liberal teachers who assign resources that espouse liberal views of homosexuality also assign resources that espouse dissenting views?

Third, Mehta and I agree on one thing: Sponsorship of clubs is not the same as endorsement. But the reality in public schools is that the sponsors of gay-straight alliances are usually homosexuals or their ideological allies, and the sponsors of Leftist political activist groups like AWARE are usually Leftist political activists. Similarly, the sponsors of Christian groups are usually Christians. The difference is that conservative sponsors of conservative groups tend not to use the classroom as their personal platform for proselytizing.

Hemant Mehta’s Deceit

Mehta goes on to say, “They (IFI) want to rail against liberal teachers — even ones like me, who keep our religious beliefs out of the classroom.”  I rarely criticize liberal teachers who keep their keep their religious, irreligious, moral, and political beliefs out of the classroom. Generally, I wouldn’t rail against such teachers. I would applaud them.

It is true, however, that I have criticized Mehta, but he omitted the issues for which I criticized him. I criticized him first for suggesting on his very public blog that homosexuals come and kiss in front of my home. Most school districts have policy regarding how their teachers interact with the public, which I believe Mehta violated when he publicly called for homosexuals to kiss in front of my home. It was both irresponsible and unprofessional of him to make such a suggestion even in jest.

I also suggested that his very public blog reveals something of his character and his beliefs about which parents of impressionable teens may be concerned.

On his very public blog, he ardently promotes atheism, commonly uses obscene language, and has provided platforms for the advocacy of polyamory. I suggested that parents who believe that teachers are role models for their children and who recognize that adolescents can be mightily influenced by teachers may not want him as a role model for their children. Teaching is unlike other professions. Teachers, whether they want to be or not, are role models. Mehta has every right to express anything he likes on his blog, and parents have every right to decide they don’t want their children under his tutelage—even for math.

Does Student Safety Require Faculty Affirmation?

Mehta, implies that my concern with teachers posting symbols that indicate affirmation of homosexuality means that I want students to feel “isolated, abnormal, and lost,” which is an ugly lie.

In order to treat students kindly and let them know that they are welcome and even loved does not require teachers, however, to affirm all of the feelings, beliefs, values, or life choices of every student. Does Mehta believe that unless teachers announce their affirmation of polyamory, polyamorous students will feel “isolated, abnormal, and lost”?

The vast majority of teachers believe that students should be free of verbal harassment and physical abuse. It is entirely possible to enforce policy designed to curb bullying without addressing personal beliefs about homosexuality or gender confusion.  The problem is that “progressive” agents of change believe schools can’t make students who identify as homosexual or “transgender” safe unless they—the teachers—affirm “progressive” views on the nature and morality of homosexuality.

No government employee, however, has the right in their professional role to affirm controversial, unproven, subjective beliefs about homosexuality or gender confusion.

Those teachers who express their Leftist moral or political views on homosexuality or gender confusion; or their views on same-sex marriage; or on same-sex adoption; or who assert that homosexuality is analogous to race; or who suggest that opposition to same-sex marriage is analogous to opposition to interracial marriage; or who choose to teach The Laramie Project are neither ensuring student safety nor “challenging students’ thinking from all sides.” Those teachers don’t care about diversity, critical thinking, or “honoring all voices.” Those teachers who expose students to resources from only one side of an issue are not educating. They are propagandizing.  

Parents Must Oppose the Efforts of “Agents of Change”  

Parents need to take a stand against public school employees using the classroom to advance their views on controversial moral and political issues. If school administrations won’t establish policy that requires teachers who assign resources on these kinds of issues to spend equal time on dissenting resources and if school administrations won’t establish policy that prohibits teachers from expressing their personal moral and political views in the classroom, then parents should request that their children be placed in the classrooms of teachers who demonstrate such integrity on their own.

Two notes:

The back-to-school article that Mehta is criticizing will be re-posted next week. It was not supposed to have been posted until it was reformatted with IFI’s new logo.

For more on Mehta, click here, here, here, here.

For background on the dubious Southern Poverty Law Center, click here and here.

WARNING: Not for younger readers

Let’s hope that audience members at the Dan Savage speaking engagement this coming Sunday, April 29, 2012 at Elmhurst College demonstrate the good sense and courage that several high school students recently demonstrated.

Dan Savage, the vulgar, vitriol-spewing, homosexual sex columnist was for some bizarre reason invited to be the Friday keynote speaker at a national convention for high school journalism students held in Seattle, Washington last week.

Savage, being Savage, employed his usual anti-religious, obscene rhetoric, and when some offended high school students walked out, the middle-aged Savage called them “pansies.”

In the convention’s program, Savage is described as a “popular, sex advice columnist” who offers “frank, funny advice on sex and relationships” and “creates a safe space for all audiences to discuss ‘taboo’ topics.” Two things to note: 1. The event planners knew exactly what they were getting in hiring Savage for an event for high school students. 2. In academia, a “safe space” means a place where volitional homosexuality must be affirmed as moral. The presence of any dissenting ideas renders a space “unsafe.”

After Savage’s presentation, faculty adviser for students from Overland Park, Kansas, Jim Mccrossen, told his students that “‘it is important to be challenged in what you believe because you never become stronger in anything if you are not challenged.'” When I worked at Deerfield High School, English teacher Jeff Berger-White made this same claim in our local press when defending his decision to teach the obscene, homosexuality-affirming play Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes by homosexual playwright Tony Kushner:

‘There are going to be times during their years in high school, if we (teachers) are doing are (sic) jobs well, when most students should feel intellectually, emotionally, and even morally challenged.’ 

Some questions emerge from these teachers’ claims: First, is it really the job of public high school teachers to challenge students emotionally and morally? Second, if it is, how often do teachers in public schools provide resources or activities that challenge “progressive” views of homosexuality? How often do they have students read essays by scholars who dissent from the views of Dan Savage or Tony Kushner? How many students have read an essay by Princeton law professor Robert George or Providence College English professor Anthony Esolen or Amherst professor Hadley Arkes? How many students have read any essays at all by a conservative scholar on topics related to homosexuality?

Dan Savage’s signature project, the effort for which he is most well-known, is the “It Gets Better” Campaign in which actors, politicians, and ordinary people affirm homosexuality while telling hurting kids who experience same-sex attraction that life will get better. This has the superficial gloss of a positive message but is based on foundational assumptions that are ultimately socially irresponsible, intellectually bankrupt, and an affront to human dignity — the very opposite of the values Elmhurst College claims to hold.

Here are some of the values and visions that Elmhurst College affirms:

Mission

Elmhurst College inspires its students…to prepare for …ethical work in a multicultural, global society. … [W]e foster learning, broaden knowledge, and enrich culture through…scholarship.

Vision for the Future

Elmhurst College …asks our students to become… academically grounded, intellectually engaged, and socially responsible citizens, who understand and respect the diversity of the world’s cultures and peoples.

Core Values

Intellectual Excellence
We value intellectual freedom, curiosity, and engagement; [and] rigorous debate.

Community
We are committed to… mutual respect among all persons…and fairness and integrity in all that we do.

Stewardship
We are committed stewards of the human, fiscal, and physical resources entrusted to us.

Faith, Meaning, and Values
We value the development of the human spirit in its many forms and the exploration of life’s ultimate questions through dialogue and service. We value religious freedom and its expressions on campus. Grounded in our own commitments and traditions as well as those of the United Church of Christ, we cherish values that create lives of intellectual excellence, strong community, social responsibility, and committed stewardship.

Let’s see if Dan Savage reflects the mission of Elmhurst College to prepare students for “ethical work”; or its vision to have students become “academically grounded” and socially responsible citizens who “respect the diversity of the world’s peoples”; or the college’s core values regarding “mutual respect,” “integrity,” “intellectual excellence,” and “social responsibility.”

Here are some quotes from Savage (with links to videos, lest anyone think I’m cherry-picking quotes or pulling them out of context):

He describes conservative Christians like “Tony Perkins” as “right-wing, fundamentalist, bat sh*t, a**h*le, dou**ebag Christians,” and as the “Evangelical Taliban Christian Family Association.” He also tells “progressive” Christians to start “screaming in Tony Perkins’ face.”  I wonder if such rhetoric creates a “safe space” for people who hold orthodox, historical theological beliefs?

Even with asterisks, I can’t repeat what Savage says at his speaking engagements. If you choose to watch the ones we’ve provided links to, bear in mind that Savage has an adopted son who was between 10-12 years old when Savage was saying things publicly that no father should say even privately (WARNING—GRAPHIC,  OBSCENE LANGUAGE):  HERE, HERE,  HERE, HERE and HERE.  (UPDATE:  We discovered last night that a number of Savage’s YouTube videos were removed after this article was published.)

What is ironic is that after Rush Limbaugh used offensive language to describe a feminist activist, the Obama Administration took him to task, but even Dan Savage’s well-documented history of referring to conservative Christians as “bat sh*t, a**h*le, d**chebags” and advocating the most perverse sexual practices in the most foul language doesn’t stop President Obama from inviting him to the White House.

Elmhurst College claims to value “rigorous debate,” the “exploration of life’s ultimate questions through dialogue,” intellectual engagement, and diversity. If so, will the college be inviting speakers who espouse different views of the nature and morality of homosexuality than Savage and who do so in a different manner, that is to say, without obscene language that degrades rather than develops the human spirit.

Savage’s invitation seems to be part of a larger effort on the part of Elmhurst College to promote arguable assumptions about the nature and morality of homosexuality. Some months ago, Elmhurst College made the national news for being the first college in the nation to ask on its college application whether applicants identify as homosexual, bisexual, or transgender. The administration defended this question by asserting an offensive and absurd comparison of race to conditions constituted by subjective desire and volitional sexual acts.

In so doing, Elmhurst College administrators reveal their own ignorance. And by promoting contemporary ideas about “LGBT identity,” they reveal their theological heresy — not that theological orthodoxy is important to Elmhurst College, which bears virtually no imprint of its theological heritage. But boy oh boy does it proudly show the mark of sexual unorthodoxy to which even pedagogical soundness must bow in obeisance.

Elmhurst College’s Hammerschmidt Memorial Chapel, which once echoed with the thoughtful, civil voices of Elie Weisel and Martin Luther King Jr., will now be polluted by the odious rhetoric of Dan Savage. 

The problematic and completely unnecessary Comprehensive Sex Ed bill, HB 3027 (Amendments 1 and 3), may be voted on in the Illinois State House this week. This bill is unnecessary because any school district that wants to use a comprehensive sex ed curriculum is currently free to do so. If passed, this law will be used to get increasingly graphic and controversial information into middle and high schools.

Once again, liberal lawmakers are attempting to usurp local control in their quest to impose their moral views about sexuality — including homosexuality — on other people’s children through mandated comprehensive sex ed. To compound the outrage, they have no evidence proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are more effective than authentic abstinence curricula. Despite mainstream media accounts to the contrary, there is substantial evidence that abstinence curricula are at least as effective and often more effective than comprehensive sex ed curricula.

Using sex ed research is a tricky, complex, and confusing business, made all the more challenging by the indefensible bias of the mainstream media and the problematic claims of comprehensive sex educators. Here’s just one example:

Critics of abstinence programs point to a Mathematica Policy Research report released in April 2007 that compared the behavior of students in abstinence programs with that of students who were in comprehensive sex ed programs as evidence of the failure of abstinence programs. That study revealed the following:

• Kids in both groups (abstinence and control groups) were knowledgeable about the risks of having sex without using a condom or other form of protection.
• Condom use was not high in either group.
• By the end of the study, when the average child was just shy of 17, half of both groups had remained abstinent.
• The sexually active teenagers had sex the first time at about age 15.
• More than a third of both groups had two or more partners.

This study, however, also found this:

• A greater number of students in abstinence programs correctly identified STDs than did students in control groups.
• A greater number of students in abstinence programs reported correctly that birth control pills do not prevent STDs than did students in control groups.

After reading this report, Martha Kempner of the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States declared that, “Abstinence-only was an experiment and it failed.” Curiously, Ms. Kempner looked at the abstinence programs analyzed in this study, which have largely the same results as comprehensive sex ed programs–except that they better prepare students with a knowledge of STD-prevention–and she declares that only abstinence programs are failures.

I would argue that if abstinence programs are deemed a failure and worthy of defunding, then comprehensive sex ed programs, which in some studies have virtually the same results, should also be deemed a failure and defunded.

Some state lawmakers need to ask State Senator Heather Steans (D-Chicago) and State Representative Karen Yarbrough (D-Chicago) — the bill’s chief sponsors — or any of the co-sponsors of the bill the following questions:

• Precisely why do you believe this legislation is necessary?
• Do you have research that proves typical comprehensive sex ed curricula solve the problem or problems you see within the adolescent population?
• Is there research proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are more effective than abstinence curricula in delaying age of initial sexual encounter (i.e., intercourse)?
• Is there research proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are more effective than abstinence curricula in reducing the numbers of sexual partners during adolescence?
• Is there research proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are more effective than abstinence curricula in reducing the number of STDs and STIs?
• Is there research proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are more effective than abstinence curricula in reducing the numbers of teen pregnancies?
• Is there research proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are more effective than abstinence curricula in reducing the numbers of teen abortions?
• Is there research proving that students who have been taught in classes that use comprehensive sex ed curricula are more knowledgeable about STDs and STIs than students who have been taught in classes that use abstinence curricula?

No lawmaker should sponsor or vote for this bill unless they can provide strong, unchallenged research proving that comprehensive sex ed curricula are significantly more effective in achieving these goals.

And no lawmaker should sponsor or vote for this bill if they haven’t read the following articles that put the lie to claims that abstinence curricula are ineffective:

Abstinence Education Effective in Reducing Teen Sex, Comprehensive Sex Ed Not (Heritage Foundation)

Evidence on the Effectiveness of Abstinence Education: An Update (Heritage Foundation)

The Whole Truth about Comprehensive Sex Education (Heritage Foundation)

The Case for Maintaining Abstinence Education Funding (Heritage Foundation)

“Another Look at the Evidence: Abstinence and Comprehensive Sex Education in America’s Schools” and ‘Abstinence’ or ‘Comprehensive’ Sex Education?” (Institute for Research and Evaluation)

Governor Quinn in the Minority in Rejecting Title V Abstinence Education Funds (Illinois Family Institute)

Abstinence Education Works (Illinois Family Institute)

An Oct. 18, 2011 New York Times article co-written by Princeton University law professor, Robert P. George, exposes another dimension to the problem of mandated comprehensive sex ed curricula. He exposes how such laws usurp parental rights and authority.

Please click HERE to read this article, and then email and call your legislators urging them to oppose 3027.

A week ago, the Chicago Tribune celebrated — again — the passage of the civil union bill as well as Obama’s decision to order the Justice Department to stop defending the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).

On Feb. 23, 2011, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that President Barack Obama has divined that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) is unconstitutional and has ordered the Justice Department (DOJ) to cease defending it. President Obama ordered the DOJ to stop defending DOMA in court even though the DOJ is specifically charged with the responsibility of defending federal laws.

However did DOMA’s unconstitutionality escape the notice of the 85 senators and 342 representatives who voted for it in 1996? And however did its unconstitutionality escape the notice of the man who signed it into law: President Bill Clinton, attorney and Rhodes Scholar?

The intellectual vacuity of the Tribune’s position is best illustrated in the claim that “the sky didn’t fall” following the passage of the civil union bill. What they mean is that Illinois has seen no cultural cataclysm since the bill was signed into law. The Tribune? wins this sophistical skirmish: I will concede that the bill that was signed into law six weeks ago and doesn’t take effect until June has not resulted in climatic catastrophe.

It has, however, darkened the sky for Jim Walder, a bed and breakfast owner in Paxton, Illinois who is being sued by a homosexual couple for not renting his facility to them for their civil union and reception. (Read more about this HERE.) And it seriously threatens the religious liberty of Christian organizations that seek to live out the tenets of their faith. (Read more about this HERE.)

But most of the cultural damage will not be seen for years to come. Any thinking person understands that cultural change rarely happens instantaneously. For example, Stanley Kurtz has documented the destructive impact same-sex “marriage” has had on heterosexual marriage in Scandinavia — changes that did not appear in a period of weeks or even months.

The Tribune editorial board continues its assault on marriage without ever feeling the need to address the fundamental and fundamentally flawed analogy upon which the entire homosexuality-affirming movement, including the effort to radically transform marriage and family, is built. The entire house of cards is built on a specious comparison of race to homosexuality, and yet, I cannot recall reading a single editorial defending with evidence the ways in which race and homosexuality are ontologically analogous or equivalent.

I also can’t recall the Tribune editorial board wrestling intellectually with the fundamental question that Princeton Law Professor Robert George recently debated with homosexual journalist Kenji Yoshino, which is: What is marriage?