Just as we should have compassion on those who truly struggle with their gender identity, we should stand firmly against transgender activism. Thankfully, there are more and more signs that the tide is turning against this latest example of sociological contagion.

It is true that, in some significant ways, America is well behind a number of European nations which are reversing course much more rapidly than we are here in the States. In this regard, it appears that they are driven more by medical data (and perhaps common sense and even compassion?) than by radical ideologies.

Still, there are significant indicators that more and more Americans are saying, “Enough is enough.”

Before focusing on the States, though, let’s take a look at England, where it was reported last week that, “On the heels of the ordered closure of the infamous Tavistock gender clinic in London, which offered ‘gender-affirming care’ and puberty blockers to thousands of children over the years, news has broken that roughly 1,000 families will file a medical negligence lawsuit against the clinic.”

That number will certainly grow exponentially in the days ahead on a global level, as more and more detransitioners speak up and say to the medical profession, “What have you done to us?”

The satirical Babylon Bee website was hardly exaggerating when it reported, “In light of so-called ‘gender affirming care’ making the Hippocratic Oath silly and outdated, Harvard Medical School has officially adopted the new oath ‘Mutilate Kids For Money.’”

Already in 2009 Selwyn Duke could ask, “Sure, it strikes us as the most horrid malpractice when a doctor amputates healthy body parts, such as a pair of legs. But, then, should we call it something else just because those healthy body parts are between the legs?” (See also here.)

Given the radical nature of transgender activism and the ripple effect it is having on the larger culture, a pushback was inevitable. And so, while the current administration digs its heels in even more, the tide is turning against it.

Here are a few cases in point, both on the grassroots and the federal level.

Fox News reported on August 18 that, “An elite all-girls school in Nashville has paused implementation of a policy allowing applications from anyone who identifies as female after backlash from the community.

Last week, in an email to parents, Harpeth Hall School announced a new ‘Gender Diversity Philosophy,’ explaining a new admissions policy that would allow ‘any student who identifies as a girl’ to apply to the school.

“‘We recognize that this philosophy elicited strong reactions of support and opposition beyond our expectations,’ the school said in an email to the community obtained by Fox News Digital. ‘We care deeply about your feedback and we have heard you.’”

Thank God for a moment of sanity in the midst of today’s cultural madness. And how telling it is that the school leadership was shocked by the response of the parents. Moms and dads, keep raising your voices!

On August 17, the New York Post reported that, “A transgender woman was rejected by all University of Alabama sororities during their student recruitment process, according to social media posts from the student.

“Grant Sikes wrote on Instagram that she was denied entry to all of the sororities on campus. There are nearly 20 campus chapters.”

Put another way, “A biological male who identifies as a female was rejected by all University of Alabama sororities during their student recruitment process.”

Good for these sororities. There’s a reason there are clubs for women and clubs for men on our campuses (and elsewhere). And while I feel bad for this student, perhaps this will help remind him that no amount of hormones and cosmetic surgery can change a person’s sex.

That being said, I look forward to the day when news outlets will stop going along with the trans talking points, referring to males who identify as female as “she” (and vice versa). Or when police reports will not refer to a “transwoman” who exposed “her male genitalia” in public. Enough with this madness.

Getting back to the positive developments, more and more states are passing laws that prohibit boys who identify as girls from participating in female sports, and prominent LGBTQ figures like Bruce “Caitlyn” Jenner and Martina Navratilova are speaking out against it. (Here is a report posted on a pro-trans site documenting some of this activity.)

And as time goes on, we’re learning more and more about how terribly unfair it was to allow Will “Lia” Thomas to swim against college females, not to mention allegedly expose himself in their presence.

The bad news is that some cultural commentators have been sounding the alarm about transgender radicalism for many years.

The good news is that society is waking up to reality.

The bad news is that many young lives have already been irreparably destroyed, at least physically.

Let us, then, do our best to hasten the societal turn by continuing to get the truth out. The time for doing that is now.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom,
it was the age of foolishness. … it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness.”

With regard to public schools and sexuality, this is the worst of times. It is an age of incomprehensible and destructive foolishness. It is a season of darkness into which America has been plunged by sexual anarchists like Maia Kobabe whose creepy adult comic book graphic memoir continues to divide communities.

For those unfamiliar with Kobabe’s book Gender Queer: A Memoir, click here to see images that librarians in public school and community libraries all across the country believe are appropriate for preteens and teens to see and for taxpayers to be forced to subsidize.

In obscene images, Kobabe, who has a lesbian aunt and a sister who dates a woman who pretends to be a man, tells the disturbing story of her journey to her disordered “identity” as a genderqueer, asexual person.

In January 2022, two courageous middle school teachers in Community United School District 200 (CUSD 200) in Wheaton, Illinois filed a “Request for Reconsideration of Media” in which they rightly assert that Kobabe’s memoir Gender Queer is “pornographic” and “vulgar” and doesn’t belong in the district’s high school libraries.

Assistant Superintendent of Administrative Services Charles Kyle selected ten staff members to serve on a committee to evaluate the book challenge. The two middle school teachers shared their reasons for the book challenge with the committee, which was composed of Craig Lawrence, John Disanza, Kristin Diaz, Laine Pehta, Melissa Murphy, Traci Burnham, Matt Biscan, and Erica Valenti, after which the committee met twice and then presented their recommendation to retain the obscene book. Some Wheaton taxpayers should find out the vote of each of these CUSD 200 employees.

In their excellent presentation, middle school teachers Brian Wiewiaro and John Ferguson made clear that their opposition to Gender Queer was not born of book-banning impulses or bigotry:

To be clear, we are not here to remove every book that might possibly be the slightest bit objectionable. We are not here to remove every book with LGBTQ+ themes or characters. This is not the beginning of some crusade to empty our libraries. This is also not a fight against a specific group of people. We have both taught many students throughout our careers, some of whom are LGBTQ+ students. We value all students and welcome them into our classrooms.

They also pointed out that the CUSD 200 Board of Education policy says,

Students are prohibited from … accessing at school any publication that is socially inappropriate or inappropriate due to maturity level of the students, including but not limited to material that is obscene, pornographic, or pervasively lewd and vulgar, contains indecent and vulgar language.

Wiewiora and Ferguson posed several questions to the committee, including these:

• Would you be comfortable posting these images in our high schools? On the district web page? At a Board meeting? In your own office?

• If these images had been drawn by a student for a class project, would they be appropriate?

Apparently, the committee members are comfortable with making available to other people’s minor children a book with drawings depicting strap-on dildos and dialogue about tasting one’s own vaginal secretions. If so, then students should be free to draw such pictures in art class and write such dialogue in English papers.

Either those committee members are ignorant or they’re too cowardly to stand for truth in a tyrannical public school culture rife with systemic leftist bigotry.

But it gets worse. The book challenge then moved on to the board of education where six of the seven board members voted to retain Gender Queer. Here are some of the rationalizations offered by adults who lack the courage, wisdom, and intelligence to serve in any school leadership position.

First up was Brad Paulsen who said this:

One of the data points I’ve heard recently, um, that I believe is true—I haven’t validated this, but I’ve seen it in a couple different locations—that 70 percent of our LGBTQ youth are more likely to commit suicide. And so, I thought about the consequences of our vote on those students and those members of our community. And so, I … I kind of asked myself, you know, depending on our vote, can we just help one person, one student that’s going through this, and if we can, that makes me feel good. And so, with those, um, with that thinking and all the conversations we had, when I vote, I’m going to say yes.

I kid you not, Paulsen said that.

Maybe the fact that I’m not a statistician explains why I have no idea what “70 percent of LGBTQ youth are more likely to commit suicide” means. Perhaps at the next board meeting, Paulsen could explain to his community exactly what it means. That should give him ample time to validate the data point he cited.

And perhaps at the next board meeting, he could answer these questions:

Since he used this data point as justification for retaining Gender Queer, should he have “validated” it?

Does he have conclusive, research-based evidence for his bizarre contention that reading Gender Queer will prevent suicides of “LGBTQ” youth?

Since many young adults are detransitioning; telling their tragic stories of suffering and regret; and blaming social media, doctors, and schools for affirming their “trans” identities, should school libraries request from publishing companies books that tell those stories? Wouldn’t Paulsen feel good if one person could be spared such suffering by reading them?

What if reading Gender Queer harms one person? What if reading it exacerbates confusion or contributes to a decision that has permanent and lifelong consequences and which they may later regret? Would the harm done to one such teen be sufficient justification for removing Gender Queer from the high school library?

Will Wheaton high schools purchase other books that include graphic depictions of and dialogue about sex toys and sex acts? Could those books include photos rather than cartoon drawings as long as someone could argue that one person may be helped by reading them? Would Paulsen et al. support the purchase of a memoir that depicts a woman’s journey to becoming a consensual non-monogamist, replete with graphic images of her sexual journey with multiple people? If not, why not?

(As a related aside, do any of the Wheaton high schools carry Abigail Shrier’s important and compelling book titled Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters?)

Board member Susan Booton followed Paulsen and began by asserting her “deep thinker” bona fides, by which she meant that she self-identifies as a deep thinker. The evidence, however, suggests the opposite.

She echoed Paulsen by saying that “the LGBTQ community struggles with suicide and harm to self at a much higher rate than our cisgender peers.” What she seems not to have thought deeply about is whether an obscene memoir carried in a public school library will reduce self-harm.

Booton claims the district must “honor all stories.” Does that include the stories of other underrepresented groups, like zoophiles? If not, why not? They too are marginalized and shamed.

Booton defers to the judgment of “professional librarians” who choose the books for the district’s book collections. She seems to believe that a degree in library science confers on them some special knowledge about and expertise in making moral judgments about obscenity.

What Booton doesn’t share is how the library book collection game is rigged.

Librarians create what are called “Collection Development Policies” that recommend, for example, purchasing books that are “positively reviewed” by at least two “professionally recognized review journals.” Surprise, surprise, the professionally recognized review journals are controlled by leftists who either don’t review or review negatively conservative books.

In addition, publishing companies gatekeep at an even earlier de facto censorship stage. Publishing companies won’t publish books written from a conservative perspective on sexuality, so there are none to be reviewed. Leftists can ban books with carefree abandon because their banning is concealed from the public. Can’t be accused of banning books when you don’t purchase them.

Deep thinker Booton doesn’t see how “removing this book helps” the mental health “crisis that we’re facing in this—in our world.” While helping mental health crises is a noble endeavor, is it the task of public school English teachers and librarians? Does Boone wonder why, during this unprecedented time of approval and even celebration of homosexuality and cross-sex impersonation, “LGBTQ” adolescents are suffering so tremendously? Why aren’t conservative kids whose beliefs and feelings are mocked and scorned in schools and the culture at large experiencing such high rates of suicide? Does the troubling degree of suffering experienced by “LGBTQ” youth not lead Booton to ask hard questions on whether “progressive” sexuality dogma is harming kids?

In addition to assuming without proving that Gender Queer may help one “LGBTQ” teen, board member David Long believes that strap-on dildo sex and vagina-tasting scenes are acceptable as long as they’re brief. Wiser adults would argue that no matter how brief, the presence of scenes so repugnant and controversial render a text unsuitable in schools funded by taxpayers.

The board chair, Ms. Chris Crabtree concluded by making the inane argument that the book should remain in district libraries in order to show that “this board cares about kids, it cares about the LGBTQ+ community.”

Choosing to remove one book because of egregiously obscene drawings and dialogue that violate school policy means the school doesn’t care about the LGBTQ+ community? Is the board so myopic and uncreative that they are unable to find other ways to show students they care?

Moreover, does caring require affirmation of all student feelings, beliefs, and volitional acts? Is it the business of public school leaders to affirm arguable ontological and moral assumptions on controversial topics?

Board member Rob Hanlon emoted about love, loneliness, shame, and isolation, implying that the removal of Gender Queer will increase loneliness, shame, and isolation, and keeping it will increase love for “LGBTQ” students. What a bunch of hooey.

There’s a lot of hooey spouted by school leaders struggling mightily to defend the indefensible. They cite prizes awarded to obscene books by leftist organizations as just justification for purchasing, recommending, and teaching garbage to kids. They also cite the lousy decisions of other schools to purchase, recommend, and teach garbage to kids as the reason to follow suit.  Let’s call that the lemming defense.

What was notably missing in all the claptrap was any discussion about the virtue of modesty and whether this book may further erode what little remains of respect for modesty in our coarse, unsafe culture.

Reminder to school boards, administrators, and teachers: Teachers are public servants hired to teach math, science, literature, world languages, social studies, and P.E. They are not hired to butt in to the emotional, moral, and psychological lives of other people’s children.

Brittney Griner is the gun-toting, hashish-vaping WNBA player with a temper who seduced, assaulted, and abandoned her pregnant former “wife.” She’s now in a Russian prison for violating their drug laws. Despite Griner’s support for the Second Amendment, her abusive treatment of women, and her arrogant disrespect for another culture demonstrated by breaking their laws, the left will celebrate her. Why? Because Griner is a lesbian and hates America’s national anthem.

It’s curious that Griner, who happily profited from playing basketball in Russia for “6 1/2 years,” has never publicly condemned the Russian government or Russia’s national anthem even though Russia is far more oppressive than America.

It’s curious too that Griner’s possession of a drug illegal for both recreational and medicinal purposes in a country where she lived for 6 1/2 years could be “unintentional.”

No wonder celebrities love Griner. Like them, she stands steadfastly and courageously in defense of her leftist principles unless they get in the way of making money.

Quote ‘o’ the Day comes from two homosexuals writing about the Monkeypox scourge for GQ Magazine, one of the writers of whom is a doctor:

[C]alling for abstinence is not effective. It’s also, we would argue, not moral to tell queer people, who have been told time and again by the world not to fulfill what is a basic human need, to simply do so again.

First, there exists no “basic human need” for men to engage in homoerotic sodomy or oral-anal acts—none.

Second, if engaging in homoerotic sodomy and oral-anal acts were “basic human needs,” then surely being with loved ones, including dying relatives, is a basic human need. And it’s a need that the government denied thousands of people during the Communist Chinese Covidpox. People die from loneliness. People don’t die from abstaining from homoerotic acts.

Recently on social media and in the past, various people have claimed that Sodom was destroyed because the citizens of Sodom were not helping the poor. Is it true that the great sin of Sodom was a failure in assisting the poor or is there more that Scripture would state about the great judgment? The city of Sodom is first mentioned in Scripture in Genesis 10:19. Three other cities were in the vicinity of Sodom: Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim. Often the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah are mentioned together but Sodom stands out in the listing of these cities and is mentioned the most of the four cities in Scripture – 49 times.

In Genesis 18:20 we learn that the sin of both Sodom and Gomorrah was very grave. In the next chapter we learn more about why this description was given. In Genesis 19, two angels, who appeared to look like regular men, visited Sodom. Lot met the two angels at the gate and offered them hospitality at his house. Before they went to bed, the men of Sodom, young and old, surrounded Lot’s house. They called to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we know them carnally.

The word carnally is added by some translations, but the verb to know used here has that same meaning. The clear context is that the men of Sodom intended to engage in perverse sexual relationships with Lot’s two guests. The men of Sodom, as the story unfolds, were clearly not wanting to just say hello to the new guests. This wasn’t an invitation, but a forceful attack.

Lot refused the request. Pressing the limits of hospitality to the maximum, he even offered his two virgin daughters to the men of Sodom. This offer was not accepted and so the men of Sodom attempted to break down the door to Lot’s house. The attempted gang rape would have succeeded in if the angels hadn’t struck the men surrounding the house with blindness.

The rest of Genesis 19 speaks of how Lot and his family were delivered from Sodom before the LORD reigned down brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah. Reading this chapter it is clear that  a central part of the sin of Sodom was their perverse sexual desires.

Sodom is mentioned a number of times in the Old Testament following this gruesome account. Israel at times is compared with Sodom and Gomorrah because she also deserved judgment. It is a passage in Ezekiel 16 that adds to our understanding of why judgment came upon Sodom and that some want to use to say Sodom was not judged because of her sexual proclivities.

Ezekiel 16:48  “As I live,” says the Lord GOD, “neither your sister Sodom nor her daughters have done as you and your daughters have done. 49 Look, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: She and her daughter had pride, fullness of food, and abundance of idleness; neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. 

Indeed, we cannot ignore this passage and what we learn in verse 49 that part of the sin of Sodom was her pride, idleness, and failure to help the poor and needy. But when we read the Bible it is important to not just cherry-pick verses. Without denying anything  in Ezekiel 16:49 we should look at the next verse.

50 And they were haughty and committed abomination before Me; therefore I took them away as I saw fit.

Verse 50 clearly is a reference to Genesis 19. How do we know that? The same word abomination is used in Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 when describing the perverseness of homosexual conduct.

So we do not ignore verse 49, but stopping at verse 49 and saying that the sin of Sodom was that the people didn’t vote for Bernie Sanders and support other redistributionist schemes is to clearly misread Scripture. Verse 50 is just as important.

A final passage from Jude 7 makes this clear.

Jude 7 as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. 

Christians must never read the Bible to think highly of ourselves. Jesus condemns those who are thankful that they are not like other sinners and boast in their own righteousness. However, we must also not read the Bible to justify the sexual sins of our culture today. The example of Sodom and Gomorrah stands as a testimony today. The call of the gospel to all sinners is to recognize that God’s wrath stands over us until we turn in faith and submission to the Lord Jesus Christ.

1 Cor. 6:9 Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, 10 nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.

And such were some of you… If you are reading this message and you know you are still living in your sin and rebellion before a holy God, know that there is mercy and grace shown to those who will confess their sin and turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. There is full cleansing for all sinners!

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There is no degrading depth to which the Biden administration will not sink in its effort to appease sexual deviants and promote sexual deviance while concomitantly offending deplorables of every color.

No, I’m not talking about Biden’s appointment of Dr. “Rachel” Levine, the burly cross-dressing man to be the Assistant Secretary of Health.

Nor am I talking about Sam Brinton, whom Biden appointed to serve as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Spent Fuel and Waste Disposition in the Office of Nuclear Energy. Brinton is also a cross-dressing, “nonbinary” homosexual who has sex with men who are dressed as dogs.

And I’m not referring to Shawn Skelly, another cross-dressing man whom Biden first appointed to his transition team (no pun intended) for the Department of Defense and then nominated to be the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Readiness.

I’m referring to Biden’s spanking new Monkeypox Czar, Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, whom Biden recently named “White House National Monkeypox Response Deputy Coordinator.” Since Dec. 21, 2020, Daskalakis has served as the CDC’s Director of the Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention and has been described glowingly as an “activist physician with a focus on LGBTQIA+ communities.” This summer, he was the grand marshal of New York City’s pride parade.

When asked about his career focus, homosexual Daskalakis demonstrated his woke bona fides:

We have the tools at our hands to prevent infection and to keep people living with HIV healthy. Our barrier to achieving this vision is no longer science, it is systemic racism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia.

A physician believes—or claims to believe–that the barrier to sexual health is systemic racism and disapproval of disease-ridden homoerotic practices and cross-dressing.

Not to be outdone by his kinky colleagues in the administration—Levine, Brinton, and Skelly–Czar Daskalakis has been known to cross-dress as a nurse when giving meningitis vaccines to homosexual men at Fire Island. He also appeared on the cover of HIV Plus Magazine wearing a bondage harness in the shape of a star to ensure maximum offense to conservatives.

This is just a smidgen of the grotesquerie the election of Biden has brought to America. Remember this when the General Election rolls around. And remember too, we pay the salaries of these degenerates.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Bidens-Stable-of-Degenerates.mp3

Because the Republican platforms over the years have been much closer to my values than the Democratic platforms, I have voted Republican for as long as I can remember. But when it comes to bringing about moral and cultural change in America, I do not look to a political party. Not a chance. There is moral compromise in both major parties, and the battle we are fighting for the soul of the nation is a spiritual battle long before it is a political battle. The recent U.S. House vote to codify same-sex “marriage” was yet another reminder for us.

As reported by Fox News on July 19, “A vote to codify same-sex marriage into federal law split U.S. House Republicans on Tuesday, with roughly a third of the GOP conference voting with Democrats in favor and the rest opposing.

“In a 267-157 vote, the House passed legislation repealing the Defense of Marriage Act and enshrining protections for gay marriage into federal law. Overall, 47 House Republicans voted with nearly every single Democrat to back the measure, dubbed the Respect for Marriage Act.”

Let that sink in for a moment.

It is bad enough that this bill is called the “Respect for Marriage Act,” seeing that the “marriage” of which it speaks represents a radical and fundamental redefining of the institution of marriage.

And it is to the shame of the Democratic Party that “nearly every single Democrat” voted in favor of the measure.

But it is no surprise that the Democrats voted this way, seeing that they are overtly and proudly pro-LGBTQ+. Perhaps the only surprise is that there were any who did not toe the line.

But for 47 Republicans to vote this way, representing almost 25 percent of all Republicans in the House, is both surprising and shameful.

That’s because the Republican Party is supposed to be the pro-life, pro-family party, the party that upholds traditional Judeo-Christian values. Why else do so many conservative Christians vote Republican if not for these core moral and social values?

The fact is that the redefining of marriage by the Supreme Court in 2015 represents one of the most radical social developments in our nation’s history, fundamentally changing the meaning and purpose of marriage.

In fact, the same Barack Obama who lit up the White House in rainbow colors to celebrate the 2015 ruling is the same person who said while campaigning in 2008 that, as a Christian, he believed marriage was the union of one man and one woman.

Not only so, but Proposition 8, which was on the ballot in 2008 in California and which upheld the historic definition of marriage, was passed with the help of the large turnout of African American voters. They voted for Barack Obama, but in keeping with their largely conservative family values, they voted for Proposition 8. In their mind, the man they were voting for shared their views.

That’s how dramatically and quickly the tide changed in our nation, from candidate Obama affirming male-female marriage to President Obama shifting his views already in his first term.

That’s part of the reason we find ourselves in the midst of such cultural madness today, where the very meaning of “woman” is hotly debated, where medical websites use acronyms such as AFAB and AMAB (meaning, assigned female at birth and assigned male at birth) rather than “female” and “male,” and where even the Merriam-Webster dictionary has expanded its definition of “female.”

The normalizing of same-sex “marriage” simply represented the proverbial camel’s nose entering the tent, to be followed by: 1) the amping up of radical trans activism in the schools, in the workplace, on TV and social media, and in sports; 2) the rise of drag queens, to the point that the American Library Association endorses drag queens reading stories to little children in libraries; 3) the increasing marginalization of those holding to conservative Christian values on both grass roots and legal levels.

In fact, if I provided links just to my relevant articles on these subjects over the last 7 years (since Obergefell), this entire page (literally) would be filled with “see here and here and here . . . .” The list is almost endless. (For the moment, if you want devastating proof of #3 in the list, above, go here.)

Really now, redefining marriage was not even on the radar for leading gay activists just a few decades ago, since under no circumstances was a cultural shift of this enormity even envisioned. Yet here we stand today, when 47 Republicans voted to codify this radical redefinition of our most fundamental social institution.

Again, as I have said many times, by saying this, I do not mean that gay couples do not love each other deeply. And I do not deny that many of them are incredibly devoted parents. I simply mean that marriage throughout history, with the rarest and slightest exceptions (like Nero marrying a man who took on female characteristics), has always been the union of a male and female. And from a biblical perspective, the idea of two men or two women marrying would be utterly abhorrent.

For 47 House Republicans to vote to protect this new version of “marriage” is deplorable (in the worst sense of the word), regardless of what Republican Senators decide to do.

And it is another reminder that, while I continue to prefer Republican policies to Democrat policies, by and large, I absolutely do not look to either party to be major agents of righteous moral and cultural change. That remains the calling of the Church and the role of the gospel.

As I argue in my forthcoming book, The Political Seduction of the Church, to confuse the role of politics with the role of the gospel is a fatal mistake. We cannot afford to make it again.

Read more:

Two Lame Duck Republicans from Illinois Vote Against Marriage (Illinois Family Action)

This article was originally published at AskDrBrown.org.

A prominent organization that accredits hundreds of elite private schools across America has joined forces with a fringe leftwing organization that promotes transgenderism and even castration of children. The news is fueling concern among critics even as millions of families flee government schools over similar indoctrination of children in tax-funded “education.”

According to documents and media reports about the scandal, the National Association of Independent Schools (NAIS), which accredits almost 2,000 private schools in the United States and beyond, hosted a “professional development” conference in partnership with the pro-transgender group Gender Spectrum. These schools teach many of America’s future elites.

Among other goals, the conference was aimed at teaching school staff and leaders how to address “the increasing gender diversity across the K-12 experience,” the NAIS said. Of course, no mention was made of the fact that the increase in “gender diversity” among children is due almost exclusively to the indoctrination of school children by groomers.

The costly professional development conference was aimed at teachers, school leaders, administrators, curriculum developers, and other “education” professionals from the NAIS network. The NAIS tried to justify the scheme as producing more “well-being” on campus.

“Schools that implement gender-inclusive practices support their commitment to diversity and enhance a climate of campus well-being,” NAIS said in announcing the scheme, without offering any evidence that brainwashing children with gender confusion would enhance anything other than confusion among children.

The NAIS’ Inclusive Schools Network Initiative was described by the outfit as “a yearlong professional development program that will help build a network of support and ongoing capacity-building among independent schools as they address the instructional, institutional, and social-emotional challenges and opportunities of gender-inclusive practice.”

According to the announcement, topics covered include “dimensions of gender, key terminology, and the spectrum framework for gender,” “making a case for gender education in schools,” a “train-the-trainer curriculum to support institutional development and change,” a “legal webinar and advisory designed for independent schools,” a “workshop” exploring “gender at the intersection of race, power, and identity,” and much more.

The Gender Spectrum group is more than a little controversial. One of its “partners” listed on its website is Align Surgical Associates, a group of quacks who specialize in the surgical mutilation of genitals under the guise of performing “sex changes.”

The Gender Spectrum group has also hosted seminars promoting double mastectomies for confused girls, “vaginoplasty” surgery, and “facial” surgery as part of its “Gender Affirming Surgery Series.” There are growing calls nationwide to formally criminalize the mutilation of children.

The premise underlying much of this is the claim, echoed by NAIS in its announcements, that “gender nonconforming” students were being “teased” or “bullied” by other children. In reality, it is students who reject the gender-bending propaganda who are mercilessly terrorized and abused.

The NAIS has been exposed even recently promoting similar transgender lunacy in the schools it works with. In fact, earlier this year, the organization was exposed peddling the “gender unicorn” as part of the NAIS “queer-inclusive” curriculum targeting children at age four.

The scandal surrounding NAIS, which primarily deals with non-religious private schools, comes as more and more Christian schools move toward “woke” policies as well. In fact, Christian education leaders have been sounding the alarm about major accreditation organizations for Christian schools, too.

Simply removing children from government indoctrination centers posing as “schools” is no guarantee that they will get a decent education — or be protected from dangerous brainwashing. In fact, as the NAIS showed, due diligence is absolutely essential.

This article was originally published by Freedom Project Media.

In a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing on abortion rights on Tuesday, July 12, 2022, UC Berkeley professor and far leftist (but I repeat myself) Khiara Bridges demonstrated that even smart people can be wildly ignorant. She is also an arrogant ideologue who fancies herself clever.

Bridges pounced on a question by Senator Josh Hawley in order to lecture him on her assumptions about sexuality, which she apparently believes are facts. She had used the Orwellian Newspeak term “people with a capacity for pregnancy” to refer to women of childbearing age. In response, Sen. Hawley asked, “Would that be women?” That’s a question my seven-year-old grandson could answer correctly but not Bridges. She haughtily replied,

Many women, ciswomen, have the capacity for pregnancy. Many ciswomen do not have the capacity for pregnancy. There are also transmen who are capable of pregnancy, as well as non-binary people who are capable of pregnancy.

Bridges used multiple Newspeakian terms, which need to be translated into plain English. Since leftists have invented an entire lexicon to advance their alchemical superstition, let’s call the language used by transcultists in Transtopia “Transspeak.”

Bridges’ used the Transspeakian term “ciswomen,” to refer to normal women who accept the objective reality that they are women. While not all “ciswomen” have the capacity for pregnancy in that they may be post-menopausal or have a genetic, biochemical, or anatomical disorder that prevents pregnancy, all persons with the capacity for pregnancy are women.

“Transmen” is the next term Bridges used. In Transspeak, a woman who wishes she were a man and pretends to be one is called a “transman.” Her delusional feeling about her sex is called her “gender identity.” And in Transspeak, “non-binary people” (“enbies” or “enbys”) is a term used to refer to people who pretend they are either both sexes or neither. Their delusional feeling about their absence of a sex or excess of sexes is their “gender identity.”

No one, however, should allow the coercive, bullying tactics of transgressives convince them that they have an ethical or moral obligation to use Transspeak, in which lies intended to deceive are embedded. Anyone who has a commitment to truth, has an obligation not to lie.

Now, back to Bridges.

Since in reality “transmen” are women with immutable female DNA and natal female biochemistry and anatomy, these women can, indeed, get pregnant, proving again that women (and only women) can get pregnant. So too can “non-binary” people who are objectively women get pregnant, proving again that women (and only women) can get pregnant.

Hawley then points out the intellectual incoherence of leftists’ referring to abortion as a women’s rights issue while claiming men can get pregnant:

So, this isn’t really a women’s rights issue.

Bridges, thinking she’s got a cunning “gotcha” response, retorts,

We can recognize that this impacts women while also recognizing that it impacts other groups. Those things are not mutually exclusive.

Did you notice what she did? That tricksy Bridges just changed the claim feminist harpies have asserted since 1973. They didn’t claim abortion “impacts” women. Feminists have claimed for decades that abortion is so completely and solely a women’s issue that men are not permitted to speak about it.

In addition, Bridges now claims that men can get pregnant. If that were true, then the issue would be every bit as much a men’s issue as a women’s issue and would impact them in identical ways.

Obviously, Bridges is wrong. Abortion can’t actually be solely a women’s rights issue—as leftist women have shrieked in the streets for years behind signs of uteruses and fallopian tubes—and also a man’s issue, just as I can’t be solely white and also Asian.

Following the “logic” of her argument, Hawley asked,

So, your view is that the core of this right then is about what?

Then the wheels began to fall off Bridges’ handmade, jerry-built “logic” train. She said:

I want to recognize that your line of questioning is transphobic, and it opens up trans people to violence.

Say what? Asking about which sex has babies and if abortion is a woman’s issue is “transphobic” and opens up sexually deluded people to violence? Does she have any evidence that Hawley’s two questions are shaped by an irrational fear or hatred of those who identify as the sex they are not?

If asking questions that challenge philosophical, ontological, or moral claims causes violence, wouldn’t then all moral claims open up some group to violence? Wouldn’t Bridges’ ugly allegations against Hawley open up to violence other conservatives who share his views?

Hawley expressed surprise at such a bizarre accusation, and with her logic train wheels shaking like leaves in a tornado, Bridges angrily accelerated, implying that Hawley’s questions will also contribute to the suicides of cross-dressers.

I want to note that one out of five transgender persons have attempted suicide.

Again, she provided no evidence.

Then with wheels flying off her train, Bridges accused Hawley of denying the existence of “transgender people.” Her proof? She asked, “Do you believe that men can get pregnant.” Hawley responded sanely with an answer backed up by science:

No, I don’t think that men can get pregnant.

With a snide laugh, she scornfully responded,

So, you’re denying that transpeople exist. Thank you.

Sen. Hawley is far from alone in believing that men cannot get pregnant. In fact, until about five minutes ago, everyone in the world and throughout history believed that, and most still do.

Moreover, denying that men can get pregnant is not a denial of the existence of “trans” people. I deny that men can get pregnant, and yet I believe in the existence of people who think they are or wish they were the sex they aren’t and never can be. To quote an infamous professor, “Those things are not mutually exclusive.”

When Hawley asked Bridges if she treats her students’ questions in the same way she had treated his questions, she condescendingly invited him to her class, telling him, “you might learn a lot.”

Bridges was disrespectful, presumptuous, illogical, and intolerant of diverse views. And when faced with the expression of moral or ontological claims that she hates, she hurled epithets and baseless accusations. Bridges epitomizes leftist educators.

And Hawley responded just as every person should respond to trans-tyranny.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/UC-Berkeley-Prof.-Proves-Smart-People-Can-Be-Ignorant.mp3

As Americans awaken to the tyrannical aspirations of leftists who seek to impose their socially constructed metaphysical, moral, and political beliefs about sexuality on everyone—including other people’s children—by any means available, Americans are fighting back. This is a war for freedom, the family, America, and our souls. And wars need leaders. In Joe Biden and Ron DeSantis, we have an anti-leader and a leader, respectively.

While parents are mustering the courage to confront arrogant, ignorant school boards; feminists are challenging “gender theory” and the erasure of woman; liberal writers are moving to Substack to expose the totalitarian diktats of former employers; and Hispanic and black voters are fleeing the Democrat Party, anti-leader and crime family boss Joe “Bananas” Biden is getting  out his well-worn shovel and digging his hole deeper.

In honor of sodomy/cross-dressing pride month, President Joe Biden has issued yet another Royal Proclamation Executive Order that he calls “historic.”

While it is symbolically historic in its comprehensiveness, it is more historical in that it’s in keeping with Biden’s long history of ineffectuality. In his Proclamation, Biden expresses his DEEP FEELINGS and shallow thoughts about sexuality—all of which contradict his DEEP CLAIMS about and shallow commitments to Catholicism.

In his Proclamation, Biden “speaks up” about stuff, “releases” stuff, claims that he will “increase awareness” of stuff, and “charges” departments with “issuing guidance” about stuff. Biden is also going to launch, lead, promote, study, support, direct, encourage, expand, explore, research, strengthen, coordinate, identify, seek, establish, address, lead on, and fight back against stuff. Since none of this involves Biden actually doing anything, he’ll have plenty of time for, biking, bilking Americans, and sending money to Hunter.

All of this frenetic activity is in the service of imposing his beliefs about identity, homoeroticism, marriage, cross-dressing, and parental rights on all Americans—beliefs that many Americans find bigoted, hateful, and dangerous.

In contrast, there is Florida Governor Ron DeSantis—a leader and hero.

In the past year, DeSantis signed into law multiple excellent bills to restore integrity to public education. Most of the country heard about the bill about which leftists misinformed the public, calling it the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. The law

… requires [school] procedures to reinforce fundamental right of parents to make decisions regarding upbringing & control of their children; prohibits school district from adopting procedures or student support forms that prohibit school district personnel from notifying parent about specified information or that encourage student to withhold from parent such information; prohibits school district personnel from discouraging or prohibiting parental notification & involvement in critical decisions affecting student’s mental, emotional, or physical well-being; [and] prohibits classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in certain grade levels [K-3].

This sane bill drives the loons among us to their fainting couches. Creepy adults who want to discuss sexuality with other people’s very young children are incensed that the job they took with the intention of indoctrinating kids has been neutered.

Many people also heard about Florida’s ban on boys playing on girls’ sport teams—another manifestly sane law to which only delusional or cowardly adults object. Contrary to the bigoted claims of leftists, laws like this are not attacks on boys who pretend to be girls. They are protections of and for girls.

But DeSantis also signed into law two other bills of paramount importance: HB 5 and HB 233.

HB 233 applies to state colleges and universities and takes effect September 1, 2022. The law requires,

[T]the State Board of Education and the Board of Governors, respectively, to annually assess intellectual freedom and viewpoint diversity at certain institutions; providing requirements for the assessment; authorizing the State Board of Education to adopt rules; [and] prohibiting the State Board of Education and the Board of Governors, respectively, from shielding certain students, faculty, or staff from certain speech.

Further,

The State Board of Education may not shield students, faculty, or staff at Florida College System institutions from free speech protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution [or] Art. I of the State Constitution, or s. 72 1004.097 .

The law makes clear that it is unlawful to “limit students’, faculty members’, or staff members’ access to, or observation of, ideas and opinions that they may find uncomfortable, unwelcome, disagreeable, or offensive.”

This law should be unnecessary in a country founded on a commitment to free speech. Uncomfortable, unwelcome, disagreeable, or offensive speech is precisely the kind of speech the First Amendment was intended to protect. There is no need for guarantees to speak publicly on topics on which everyone agrees.

Moreover, leftist teachers have no objections to conservative students or colleagues being exposed to speech they find uncomfortable, unwelcome, disagreeable, or offensive.

Equally if not more important, DeSantis signed HB 5 into law (titled the Civic Education Curriculum, which amends an existing law pertaining to requirements for high school graduation. The amendment requires that courses about American government,

include a comparative discussion of political ideologies, such as communism and totalitarianism, that conflict with the principles of freedom and democracy essential to the founding principles of the United States.

This amendment is intended to “help families, civic institutions, local communities, district school boards, and charter schools prepare students to be civically responsible and knowledgeable adults.”

In the service of that goal,

the Department of Education shall: (a) Develop or approve an integrated civic education curriculum that school districts and charter schools must incorporate as part of regular school work in kindergarten through grade 12.

The civic education curriculum must assist students in developing:

1. An understanding of their shared rights and responsibilities as residents of the state and of the founding principles of the United States as described in s. 47 1003.42(2)(a)-(c).

2. A sense of civic pride and desire to participate regularly with government at the local, state, and federal levels.

3. An understanding of the process for effectively advocating before government bodies and officials.

4. An understanding of the civic-minded expectations, developed by the State Board of Education, of an upright and desirable citizenry that recognizes and accepts responsibility for preserving and defending the blessings of liberty inherited from prior generations and secured by the United States Constitution.

The existing Florida statute mentioned (s. 47 1003.42(2)(a)-(c)) requires the following be taught:

(a) The history and content of the Declaration of Independence, including national sovereignty, natural law, self-evident truth, equality of all persons, limited government, popular sovereignty, and inalienable rights of life, liberty, and property, and how they form the philosophical foundation of our government.

(b) The history, meaning, significance, and effect of the provisions of the Constitution of the United States and amendments thereto, with emphasis on each of the 10 amendments that make up the Bill of Rights and how the constitution provides the structure of our government.

(c) The arguments in support of adopting our republican form of government, as they are embodied in the most important of the Federalist Papers.

Such goals for public education would have been unremarkable and non-controversial sixty years ago, before leftist Boomers began taking over colleges and universities and then mainlining poisonous ideas into the hearts and minds of school children. Now the ideas of national sovereignty, self-evident truth, inalienable right to life, and patriotism are loathed by the left who hope to bequeath their loathing to future generations of Americans.

At last, increasing numbers of conservatives are beginning to understand that the “social issues” matter. In fact, the social issues that RINOs and libertarian-leaning Republicans dismiss as trivial are the most important issues facing Americans today in that addressing them threatens our essential First Amendment protections of free speech and religious free exercise. Speaking freely today—particularly on the morality of homoerotic acts, sexually undifferentiated pseudo-marriage, cross-dressing, and the sexual integration of women’s private spaces and sports will get Americans fired.

While leftists are able to freely express—even shriek—their nonsensical and destructive beliefs about “LGBTQ+” issues with no fear of professional repercussions, conservatives can get fired for tweeting theirs. If the ability to earn a living is threatened if Americans express moral views the left hates, the First Amendment is meaningless.

In the fight to preserve liberty, we must have wise, courageous leaders. There are none in the Democrat Party.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/A-Profile-in-Wisdom-vs-A-Profile-in-Ignorance.mp3

Once upon a time, most Americans understood that fathers are essential in the nurturance of children, which, in turn, is essential for flourishing families and safe and healthy communities. Once upon a time, society understood that fathers—like mothers—are indispensable. Hear the words of a past president, urging Americans to better understand the singular blessings and obligations of fatherhood:

The journey of fatherhood provides unique and lasting joys. Cradling a baby in his arms, a father experiences the miracle of life and an unbreakable bond. Fathers imagine a world of possibilities awaiting their children and contemplate the privilege of helping them reach that expanse of opportunity. As kids grow and mature, they look to their dad for a special kind of love and support. Providing these necessities can bring great happiness.

Fatherhood also brings great responsibilities. Fathers have an obligation to help rear the children they bring into the world. Children deserve this care, and families need each father’s active participation.

Fathers must help teach right from wrong and instill in their kids the values that sustain them for a lifetime. As they encounter new and challenging experiences, children need guidance and counsel. Fathers need to talk with their kids to help them through difficult times. Parents must also help their children make the right choices by serving as strong role models. Honest and hard-working fathers are an irreplaceable influence upon their children.

Communities must do more to counsel fathers. Family and friends, and faith-based and community organizations, can speak directly with men about the sacrifices and rewards of having a child. These groups can support men as they take on the great challenges of child-rearing. Through honest and open dialogue, more men can choose to become model parents and know the wonders of fatherhood.

On Father’s Day, we pay tribute to the loving and caring fathers who are strengthening their families and country. We also honor those surrogate fathers who raise, mentor, or care for someone else’s child. Thousands of young children benefit from the influence of great men, and we salute their willingness to give and continue giving.

Those are the words of former President Barack Obama in 2009, just three years before he incoherently endorsed same-sex pseudo-marriage—a form of marriage that necessarily embodies the false belief that fathers (or mothers) are expendable.

But then came the sex-stupid era in which we remain mired.

The sexual revolution continues to mutate and spread like a virus unleashed from a Chinese lab. But the lab that experiments with this virus to increase its pernicious ability to harm children, poison communities, and destroy a once-great country is not a lab in communist China. It is the academy right here in America, aided and abetted by a tangled web of insulated government bureaucrats, an insidious entertainment industry, social media behemoths that conceal their puppetry behind algorithms and dopamine hits, and the medical and mental health communities run by the father of lies.

But there is light in the darkness, and that light knows truth. That light is truth—and the way and life. That light is called Abba! Father!

Those who are blessed with God-fearing fathers who discipline while never removing their gracious love, should offer thanks to God and their earthly fathers for this blessing.

Those who every day feel longing, sorrow, confusion, or anger because of the absence of their fathers can turn to God and His bride, the church, where God will be their father.

G.K. Chesterton understood what Barack Obama does not:

The triangle of truisms, of father, mother, and child, cannot be destroyed; it can only destroy those civilizations which disregard it.

There has never been and will never be a time in history when fathers are expendable.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Fathers-Day-in-a-Sex-Stupid-Era.mp3

It’s a queer, queer, queer, queer world, becoming systemically queerer every day that “progressives” control big government, big tech, big business, big education, big entertainment, and big medicine. As many have pointed out, the fact that we have a day to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. but a month to celebrate sexual perversion illustrates just how queer America has already become. The aspirational, inspirational goal of judging people by the content of their character has been discarded to make a safe space for the dispiriting goal of judging people by the degree to which their sexual appetites deviate from the normal, healthy, good, and right.

So, let’s take a quick spin around the anti-culture of America.

Today, the new children’s Disney-Pixar movie Lightyear is being released. It includes a lesbian kiss between Buzz Lightyear’s close friend Commander Alisha Hawthorne and her “wife.” The kiss had been deleted, but then a group of petulant “LGBTQIAP+” activists at Disney demanded it be restored. This is the same group that stomped their feet and held their breaths after Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law a bill to make pro-perversion indoctrination of elementary school children illegal. Even without the kiss, however, the inclusion of a lesbian couple—faux-married or unmarried—in a children’s movie is reprehensible. Positive portrayals of egregious sin in children’s entertainment are deeply sinful.

Actor Chris Evans, who voices Buzz Lightyear, calls parents who don’t want their children exposed to positive portrayals of sin “idiots” who should be ignored until they “die off like dinosaurs.” Filled with the hot-air and pomposity of Hollywood, Evans pontificated,

Every time there’s been social advancement as we wake up, the American story, the human story is one of constant social awakening and growth and that’s what makes us good.

First, widespread cultural acceptance of homoeroticism constitutes neither “advancement” nor “growth.”

Second, widespread cultural acceptance of homoeroticism does not make us “good.”

Third, widespread cultural acceptance of homoeroticism does not constitute a “social awakening.” Rather, it constitutes a descent into cultural darkness that has recurred throughout history, including in Sodom and Gomorrah, ancient Greece, the Tokugawa period in Japan, and now in purportedly civilized societies. The human story is one of sin, sorrow, and suffering born of rebellion against God.

Evans also asserted that “There’s [sic] always going to be people who are afraid and unaware and trying to hold on to what was before.”

Since homoeroticism has gone before, and before, and before, perhaps it’s Evans who is trying to hold on to what was before. Perhaps he’s afraid of what he doesn’t understand. Perhaps he’s afraid of the Hollywood muckety-mucks who dole out big bucks only to ideological toadies, and Evans knows deep down he lacks the courage to stand for truth and risk losing fame and fortune.

Next on our journey to Sex-finity and beyond, we come to Bros, the first homosexual romantic comedy produced by a major Hollywood studio. Homosexual actor Billy Eichner wrote and stars in Bros, which is produced by Universal studios and will be released in theaters on September 10. All cast members are either homosexual or cross-sex impersonators. You can watch the trailer for this rip-snorting comedy about homoeroticism, which includes a family with young children dancing and singing about “bottom” sex:

As all sentient beings know, it’s not just the entertainment industry that seeks to impose disordered socially constructed beliefs about sexuality on the world. Case in point: Postmates, a food delivery service akin to Doordash or UberEats. Postmates decided that what the world needs now from them is information on what to eat prior to having anal sex so that it will less “messy.” What better time to celebrate “bottom” sex than “pride” month, and what better way to celebrate sodomy than have an eggplant in kink gear talk to a “taco,” which is slang for a woman’s vulva. Here’s what “growth” and “advancement” looks like in Sex-finity and beyond:

Sex-finity—like toddler story hours—wouldn’t be nearly as advanced and inclusive if any form of sexual deviance were excluded, so of course cross-sex impersonators are ubiquitous. The New York Post recently exposed that since 2018, New York City has paid an organization called Drag Story Hour NYC $207,000 to provide drag queens to enculturate children with the drag ideology:

Last month alone, Drag Story Hour NYC—a nonprofit whose outrageously cross-dressed performers interact with kids as young as 3—earned $46,000 from city contracts for appearances at public schools, street festivals, and libraries. …

Since January, the group has organized 49 drag programs in 34 public elementary, middle, and high schools, it boasted on its website, with appearances in all five boroughs.

This is why all government bureaucracies need to trimmed to the bone, first with an axe, then with a scalpel. No one who played even a small role in approving such expenditures deserves to be anywhere near public funds—or children.

Colonizing the minds of other people’s children with evil ideas takes a lot of money, parental acquiescence, and institutional control. And that explains why several days ago, eleven de facto Democrats who self-identify as Republicans sent a letter to U.S. House and Senate leaders, urging them to pass legislation like the “Equality Act,” which has nothing to do with equality and everything to do with sexual predilections.

The Equality Act would strip Americans of religious liberty and speech rights, essentially forcing all Americans to treat homoeroticism and cross-sex impersonation as if those conditions are akin to biological sex or race.

This effort is being spearheaded by former Florida Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen mother of a 36-year-old daughter—born Amanda Michelle Ros-Lehtinen—who now masquerades as a man named Roderigo. Ros-Lehtinen—a supporter of all things “LGBTQ+”—is joined by ten other pseudo-Republicans: Barbara Comstock (R-VA), Carlos Curbelo (R-FL), Susan Brooks (R-IN), Charlie Dent (R-PA), Jim Kolbe (R-AZ), Claudine Schneider (R-RI), Bob Dold (R-IL), Jim Greenwood (R-PA), Chris Shays (R-CN) and Steve Gunderson (R-WI).

This foolish group believes that the United States should “pass legislation that protects all Americans from discrimination no matter their gender identity or who they love.” Translated into plain, honest language, they are saying that Americans should be prohibited from disapproving of cross-dressing, homoerotic acts, or homoerotic relationships. According to the Equality Act and its supporters, religious liberty—our first liberty—should be subordinated to disordered, subjective sexual feelings.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen calls this push to limit religious liberty “freedom for all,” saying “That’s a bedrock principle of the Republican Party.”

This effort also constitutes yet another power grab. These wolfish Dems in red clothing want the federal government to usurp more control from states:

The Hill reports that Ros-Lehtinen believes the “‘patchwork’ of state-by-state protections” is unfair to “LGBTQ+” Americans.

In other words, if leftists are not successful at the ballot box in every state, they will use federal power to impose their will on intransigent states. Ros-Lehtinen and her collaborators believe that no state should have the right to prohibit cross-dressing boys from using girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms. No state should be allowed to prohibit cross-dressing boys from participating in girls’ sports. And no state should be allowed to prohibit quack doctors from chemically stopping puberty or lopping off the healthy breasts of confused 14-year-old girls.

We must look at the tangled rotting trees in order to better see the tangled, rotting forest that America is becoming. No gaze-averting when so much is at stake.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Queer-Queer-Queer-Queer-World.mp3

American culture has changed dramatically in the last thirty years. Before that time, Christianity was generally respected by the society while homosexuality was disdained. Today, the tables have turned to the point that almost anything LGBTQ+ is celebrated while the Church is largely denigrated. In short, if gay is good, the Church is bad. This is another reason why many have left the Church, especially among the younger generation.

Consider American views on same-sex “marriage.”

Gallup first began polling American views on this in 1996, at which point 27 percent of the public supported legalizing same-sex unions. In 2022, the number rose to 72 percent.

This is an unprecedented shift in public opinion. But it is not surprising in light of the fact that: 1) so many Americans have friends, relatives, or loved ones who identify as gay; 2) President Obama endorsed gay “marriage” in 2012; 3) the Supreme Court redefined marriage in 2015; 4) the media has been bombarding us with gay-positive stories for the last few decades.

Had the Gallup poll been conducted in 1986, let alone in 1976 or 1966, support for same-sex “marriage” would have been a fraction of what it is today. But even dating back to 1996, the shift in opinion has been absolutely dramatic, from 27 percent support to 72 percent.

And what, according to Gallup, is the one group of people still opposing same-sex “marriage”? It is “Americans who report that they attend church weekly” who “remain the primary demographic holdout against gay marriage, with 40% in favor and 58% opposed.”

We are now the bad guys, the opposition, the ones standing in the way of progress, the small-minded, Bible-thumping bigots, the people who say Yes to religion and No to love.

That is how much of the world perceives us today, especially the younger generation which has grown up in a very different world than did previous generations.

In the not-too-distant past, Americans were proud to identify as Christians and ashamed to identify as gays or lesbians. How the tables have turned!

Today, Christians and Christian beliefs are openly mocked and ridiculed, while day in and day out, we hear about gay and lesbian and bi and trans pride, sometimes for weeks on end, almost wherever we turn – especially in June!

Back in 1997, there was lots of controversy when Ellen Degeneres, playing a TV character named Ellen, came out as lesbian, first as the character and then in real life. Ellen? Really? Today, you would be hard pressed to find a major TV show that doesn’t have an LGBTQ+ character, while Ellen herself reigned for years as queen of daytime TV.

Even cartoons and children’s shows feature LGBTQ+ characters and themes, while the number of gay or bi or trans superheroes grows every year. Talk about a massive cultural shift. America has never seen anything like it before.

In the past, being pro-Christian and pro-natural marriage meant swimming with the tide. Today, it is the exact opposite.

And make no mistake about it: this is an intensely personal issue, not just a theoretical issue.

After all, we’re talking about someone’s child. Or their best friend at school. Or their favorite media personality. “You’re telling me that they’re going to hell because of who they love? You’re telling me they can’t serve in your church? If so, I want nothing to do with your religion or your God.”

Writing for Religion News August 6, 2021, Yonat Shimron noted that, “Amid widespread acceptance of LGBTQ people, evangelical church attitudes toward the group have not budged, and the consequences have been dire.

“A study last month by the Public Religion Research Institute found the number of Americans who identify as white evangelicals has declined dramatically, from 23% in 2006 to 14.5% in 2020. Those leaving in the greatest numbers are younger evangelicals whose attitudes toward sexual minorities are starkly at odds with their elders. Take same-sex marriage: While only one-third (34%) of white evangelicals age 50 and over favor same-sex marriage, 51% of younger white evangelicals ages 18-49 now favor it — a majority, another PRRI study found.” (My emphasis)

But this is nothing new.

Writing on the MSNBC website on February 26, 2014, Jane Timm stated that “One third of young people who left organized religion did so because of anti-gay teachings or treatment within their churches, according to a new study.” Yes, “A full 31% of young people (ages 18 to 33) who left organized religion said ‘negative teachings’ or ‘negative treatment’ of gay people was a ‘somewhat important’ or ‘very important’ factor in their departure, as surveyed by the Public Religion Research Institute.”

The problem for true followers of Jesus is that the Bible hasn’t changed, which means that God is still against homosexual practice and identity. And so, if we want to be in solidarity with the Lord, we will find ourselves at odds with the prevailing culture.

At the same time, we do not want to drive people away from the Lord by making opposition to LGBTQ+ activism our primary cause (as opposed to the Great Commission being our primary cause). Nor do we ever want to appear (or be) mean-spirited, judgmental, or hypocritical.

What, then, do we do?

First, we ask God to fill our hearts with His love for those who identify as LGBTQ+, then we seek to share that love with them face to face.

Second, we make clear in our messages that all of us are fundamentally flawed, which is why all of us need a Redeemer.

Third, we make a distinction between an aggressive agenda and individual people.

Fourth, we determine to hold to biblical standards regardless of public opinion (and regardless of how much these standards challenge our own lives too).

Fifth, we give ourselves to prayer, also believing that those with anti-biblical values will continue to overplay their hand, further exposing the wrongness of their position.

Sixth, we share the testimonies of those who have been transformed through the gospel, making clear that our message is filled with hope and life.

Seventh, we let the chips fall where they may, determined to preach Jesus and live for Jesus no matter what, always remembering that this world is not our eternal home.

It is true, that, for many reasons, people are leaving the church. It is also true that many others are meeting Jesus powerful.

That’s because, what the world so desperately needs, we have in the fullness of the gospel.

Let us not be ashamed to live it and proclaim it.

This article was originally published by AskDrBrown.org.

I guess Fox News hasn’t learned any lessons from CNN’s self-inflicted wounds and rapid descent into ratings hell, the chief interrelated lessons of which are 1. don’t promote lies as truth, and 2. don’t promote evil as good. Fox News just did both and created a firestorm of anger among its faithful viewers. Last week, Fox News (channeling CNN) aired a segment about an ignorant mother and father in California who are raising their now fourteen-year-old daughter as a boy.

Dana Perino introduced the story that was narrated by Brian Llenas.

The story begins with the deceitful claim that Brian Llenas’ story about Ryland Whittington’s “transitioning journey is helping other families.” Chemically stopping natural, health puberty and then inducing puberty natural to children of the opposite sex is not “helping” other families, no matter how deeply Whittington’s parents, Hillary and Jeff, “feel” it is.

Then Llenas goes off the deep end, asserting that Ryland is a “typical Southern California teenager.” While to Midwesterners, California seems to be a place where an inordinate number of people engage in unnatural body modification, the country is not yet at a point where cross-sex bodily mutilation among children is typical.

Llenas in cahoots with Ryland’s publicity-loving parents then tests the gullibility of viewers by claiming that “somehow before Ryland could even speak, he [sic] managed to tell his [sic] parents that he [sic] is a boy.”

According to her parents, while Ryland was still in a non-verbal stage of life, she told them that she is a boy via her resistance to wearing feminine clothes. Credulous viewers are expected to believe that a non-verbal toddler already knows which clothes are feminine and which are masculine.

Children typically start speaking between 12-15 months. They are forming simple sentences by about age 18 months. So, we are expected to believe that sometime before 12-18 months, Ryland knew she was a boy. Further, Ryland’s parents would have us believe, her toddler resistance to wearing feminine clothing styles is proof positive that Ryland’s brain is male while her body is female. We are also expected to believe that Ryland’s certainty during her toddlerhood that she is a boy would have persisted.

Relevant fact: Before the advent of the “Trans” Age, the percentage of young children who suffered from gender dysphoria was exceedingly small and most were boys. Studies have shown that unless children are affirmed socially and chemically in their corporeal masquerade, upwards of 80% will eventually accept their biological sex.

So, the question is, how did Ryland’s parents know the feelings of their five-year-old daughter would never change. Moreover, should a persistent delusion always (or ever) be affirmed? What about children who persist in their identification as amputees (Body Integrity Identity Disorder)? Should they be affirmed, aided, and abetted in their quest for an elective limb amputation?

Llenas admiringly reports, “when Ryland came out at age five. … he [sic] had the full support of his [sic] parents.”

Llenas omitted from his sanguine tale that Ryland was born deaf and had surgery at age one to implant cochlear implants, which have enabled her to hear and speak. It’s interesting that Ryland’s parents would have surgery to restore normal functioning to her ears, while using chemicals (and perhaps at some point surgery) to disrupt the normal functioning of Ryland’s sexual anatomy.

Llenas oddly attributes Hillary Whittington’s support for “trans”-cultic beliefs and practices to her “conservative Christian” faith. Hillary explained:

For me, it’s just a deep spiritual belief that you believe in God. And he … created us the way he wanted us. Well then, yes, he created Ryland just the way he is.

God creates us. He does not create birth defects, disease, confusion, sinful desires, obsessive thoughts, or mental illnesses. We are born into a fallen world and the world’s fallenness affects our minds (thoughts), bodies, hearts (desires), and wills. Did her conservative Christian church not teach her about the fall?

Jeff also cited statistics from the far leftist Trevor Project on “transgender” self-harm as a reason for their support. But Trevor Project statistics have been widely criticized, as have been many studies purporting to prove that not only are “trans”-identifying youth more like to commit suicide, but also that the cause is societal disapproval. Somehow most of our intrepid reporters, in the news media—including Brian Llenas—haven’t been able to find such criticism.

Just this past Monday, the Heritage Foundation, published a study on suicide among young people that upends the narrative leftists use to terrorize parents into collaborating with the “trans”-industrial complex in harming children:

The Heritage study released Monday found that 2020 saw 1.6 more suicides per 100,000 residents ages 12 to 23 in states that allow minors access to puberty blockers and other gender-reassignment procedures without parental consent.

That represents a 14 percent increase in suicides.

A 2011 study found another troubling trend:

Persons with transsexualism, after sex reassignment, have considerably higher risks for mortality, suicidal behaviour, and psychiatric morbidity than the general population.

Nor have our intrepid and objective journalists managed to dig up exactly how many and who in our esteemed medical and mental health organizations come up with their “trans”-affirming positions. Let’s just say, it’s a small number of handpicked, biased members who create policy positions that the rest of the members do not vote on. As I have twice written, only about 30 members of the American Academy of Pediatrics—all leftists—created its pro-“transition” position. No minority report, no votes of all members taken.

Within a year of five-year-old Ryland’s “coming out,” her parents made a video and Ryland became an Internet sensation by the time she turned six. Exploiting their own children’s gender dysphoria has become a cottage industry.

Dyson, the princess boy.

There’s the mom, Cheryl Kilodavis, who wrote the book My Princess Boy about her then five-year-old son Dyson who masquerades as a girl. She trotted him out on a talk show in a purple tutu where he, visibly uncomfortable,” twirled at the urging of Meredith Viera. Dyson is now 16 and identifies as homosexual.

Then there’s Desmond is Amazing and Lactatia, two little boys whose mothers introduced them to drag, facilitated the creation of drag personas, and then made bank on parading them around dressed in drag.

And who can forget Jazz Jennings (born Jarod Seth Bloshinsky), the now 21-year-old obese eunuch, who pretends to be a woman and whose parasitic parents have profited from his suffering on the TLC show I Am Jazz.

The foolish, narrowminded sycophant Llenas concludes his rhapsodic segment by thanking Ryland and his family for their “extraordinary courage” in sharing Ryland’s story. Yet another lie. It takes virtually no courage for this family to share their story, which they’ve shared for almost a decade in a viral video, book, legislative hearings, and interviews for the Human Rights Campaign.

Llenas repeats the tired trope that “people are often afraid of what they do not understand,” implying that ontological and moral assumptions that are different from those of the “trans”-cult are born of fear. Has he spent anytime asking counselors, physicians, pastors, and detransitioners who disagree with the “trans”-cult if their beliefs are born of fear?

The controversy this story generated is well-deserved. On the “trans” (and homosexuality) issue, Fox News has segued into advocacy for lies and evil that are harming children, families, religious liberty, and speech rights.

Take ACTION: Click HERE to send a message to Fox News Channel to let them know how disappointed you are that they are caving into a radical child abuse agenda. Urge them to stop contributing to the “trans” contagion, and ask them to stop lying to us by using incorrect pronouns. This left-wing social agenda is antithetical to science and will alienate both their conservative Judeo-Christian viewers as well as many on the left who oppose what is being done to children.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/FNC-Airs-Story-that-Celebrates-Trans-Cultic-Experimentation-on-Children.mp3

Written by Patience Griswold

A study released earlier this year found that 43 percent of adults between the ages of 20 and 65 say that children and teens with gender dysphoria should not be subjected to puberty-blockers, cross-sex hormones, and so-called “sex reassignment” surgery. However, a more recent study asked a slightly different question. This study asked if people believed that transgenderism is a healthy condition and whether they were willing to say so publicly. 64 percent said that it was not a healthy condition, but only 30 percent were willing to say so publicly. Seventy-eight percent were opposed to children being encouraged to undergo gender transition. Similarly, 63 percent of American adults were opposed to redefining sex to include “gender identity.”

The majority of children who struggle with gender dysphoria become comfortable with their bodies by the time they reach adulthood if they do not undergo social or medical “transition.” “Transitioning” a child signs him up for a lifetime of invasive medical interventions that come with serious, lifelong consequences.

Because God’s Word accurately describes his world, we know that the biblical view of gender and sexuality is the truth and that our bodies follow that design. This means that what God has to say about sexuality and our bodies is true not just for believers but for everyone, and that the transgender movement’s insistence that a person can be “born in the wrong body” or that mutilating surgeries and hormone “treatments” will help people become their “true selves” is always harmful.

As Christians, we are called to seek justice, love mercy, and walk humbly before God. When it comes to the issue of sexuality and gender identity this includes seeking justice by refusing to allow harmful experimentation on children, loving mercy by showing genuine compassion for those who are struggling with gender dysphoria, and humbly submitting to God’s created design for our bodies.

Our bodies matter because they are more than just shells that our “true selves” reside in. As Christopher West puts it,

Through the profound unity of your body and your soul your body reveals or ‘makes visible’ the invisible reality of your spiritual soul. The ‘you’ that you are is not just something you ‘have’ or ‘own’ alongside yourself… Your body is you.

It is important that we help children know this from a young age, and that we treat them in a manner that recognizes that their bodies matter and should be protected and valued because children should be protected and valued. When children are subjected to surgeries and cross-sex hormones in an attempt to redesign their bodies, they are taught that their bodies don’t matter, and worse, that there is something fundamentally wrong with their bodies.

The rise in the number of American adults who believe that so-called “gender transition” for minors is a good thing is concerning and reveals a culture that has lost sight of foundational truths about human sexuality, as well as our obligation to treasure and protect children.

At the same time, it’s important to recognize that the transgender agenda is not as popular as activists would have us believe. Research indicates that the majority of Americans still believe that it is wrong to subject a child to so-called “gender transition.” Popular opinion does not determine whether something is right or wrong, but it is important to point out when a radical position that is being privileged in mainstream narratives actually represents an extreme fringe rather than the majority.

Adults have a responsibility to prioritize children’s needs and well-being. Subjecting children to irreversible “treatments” in an effort to change their bodies is harmful, and many Americans still recognize this, even if they are afraid to say so in public.

It is discouraging and troubling when people are unable or unwilling to say what a woman is. It is easy to stay silent when there is an entire month celebrating a radical sexual agenda and we are constantly being told that everyone else agrees. But not only is this agenda far less popular than we are led to believe, it is and always will be harmful because it is at odds with God’s good design. Parades and marches—even surgical intervention—will never change that.

This article was originally published by the Minnesota Family Council.

Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, the well-known 108-year-old Christian publishing company, continues its slide into heterodoxy by celebrating June “pride” month. On June 3, 2022, in a post on Eerdmans’ blog, the company recommended not one, not two, but six books for Christians to read in honor of “Pride Month” (rainbow colors seen here are Eerdmans/Satan’s—not God’s or mine). Eerdmans/Satan wrote,

Nothing says doctrinal soundness quite like celebrating pride, homoeroticism, and cross-dressing.

C’mon on, you people of faith, cease all your disunifying and unresting on the topic of men lying with men. Listen to men who are lying with men and cross-dressing. And while you’re at it, please seek to understand polyamorists, consanguinamorists, zoophiles, and minor-attracted persons, all of whom are simply fighting to be seen, heard, cared for, and loved.

Oh, almost forgot—they also want the church to affirm, pridefully celebrate, and promote as good their sinful desires and sinful volitional acts.

The desire of homosexuals and cross-dressers to have their sin “trans”-formed into righteousness takes precedence over the Old and New Testament’s condemnations of homoeroticism, cross-dressing, and pride. If men can become women by wishing it so, then by golly sinners can become sinless by virtue of their desire to be seen, heard, cared for, and loved. No need for confession or repentance.

All sinners—that is to say, all humans—desire to be cared for and loved. Not all sinners, however, pressure the church and the entire world to celebrate their sins and call them righteousness. Most Christians who experience, for example, unwanted, unchosen desires to drink excessively, gossip, steal, and covet are not demanding that drunkenness, gossip, theft, and covetousness be pridefully celebrated as righteous.

Theologian, professor, and author of the book The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, Carl Trueman, recently wrote an essay about pride month in which he exposes the meaning of adopting an “LGBTQ+” identity:

For anyone not completely hoodwinked by the erotic obsessions of our day, taking pride in one’s sexual identity—indeed, even considering sexual desire to be an identity—would seem at best pitiful and at worst a deep perversion of what it means to be human. Yet, here we are. And we should not underestimate the power of what it signifies.

Clearly, Eerdmans has been hoodwinked.

Trueman continued, making clear the significance for Christians of the demonic appropriation of the rainbow, something that seems to escape the theologically befogged minds of Eerdmans’ leaders:

The use of the rainbow symbol should be particularly egregious to Christians. It is the primary instrument by which the LGBTQ+ movement asserts its ownership of the culture. And it is the means of telling those of us who dare to dissent that we should have no place in the public square anymore. It tears at God’s creation order and design for family relations and social stability. And it is also a blasphemous desecration of a sacred symbol, taking that which was intended as a sign of God’s love and faithfulness and of our dependence upon Him and turning it into an aggressive symbol of human autonomy and sexual decadence.

After the Eerdmans’ blog post went viral, the company received widespread and impassioned criticism to which they responded with unrighteous umbrage, digging in their prideful heels and tweeting,

The revilers say we have changed our position and begun to teach heresy. There are several problems with that accusation. We do not think it is for us as a publisher to define doctrine for the church. We are not the pope, or an ecumenical council, or even a pastor. Our role is to publish books, representing both settled and experimental positions, that serve the church in its ongoing deliberations.

We therefore routinely publish books that contradict each other on many contested doctrinal points. We publish conservative and liberal books; we publish Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant books. We are not confused. We are a publisher that serves the ecumenical church.

With regard to Christian understandings of LGBTQ+ people, Eerdmans has been publishing books for quite a few years by authors who have come to an affirming conclusion on biblical and theological grounds. This is not new for us. …

We reject the tendency to promote division and discord by categorizing Christians into two camps, considering “us” to be right about everything and “them” to be wrong. We decline to swear loyalty to one faction’s “us” and join their hostilities against all corresponding “thems.”

So, we reiterate our invitation, especially to our conservative friends, whom we value and respect: use #PrideMonth to read a book by LGBTQ+ Christians and their allies.

What an ironic use of the epithet “reviler.” Eerdmans is calling critics of the company’s affirmation of the sins of homosexuality and cross-sex identification “revilers,” and yet Paul says in his first letter to the Corinthians,

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. (1 Cor. 6:9-10)

Was Paul a “reviler” in his clear condemnation of homosexuality?

Once upon a time, Eerdmans was connected to doctrine–sound doctrine. While it may not have “defined doctrine,” it reflected doctrine. At one point in its history, Eerdmans would have rejected heretical positions—er, I mean, “experimental positions.”

The fact that Eerdmans has been publishing books “for years” by authors who affirm homoeroticism and cross-dressing as biblically defensible “identities” is neither doubted nor assuring. By continuing to do so passionately and unapologetically, Eerdmans is promoting “division and discord.” When the company refuses to “swear loyalty” to the “faction” also known as theologically orthodox Christians, Eerdmans has necessarily joined the faction known as heretics.

Don’t support Eerdmans. The company has been bought out by Satan.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Bought-by-Satan.mp3