Salt Lake City: Laws banning employment, housing discrimination of gays begin

(Salt Lake City) Salt Lake City’s landmark ordinances to protect gays from discrimination in housing and employment have taken effect.

Mayor Ralph Becker was joined by gay-rights advocates at a ceremony last week marking enactment of Utah’s first such laws.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints endorsed the ordinances as protecting people’s right to work and have a roof over their heads. The laws exempt religious organizations, businesses with 15 or fewer employees and some small landlords. They also create a complaint and investigation process for violations.

Equality Utah is campaigning for 10 more Utah cities or counties to pass similar anti-discrimination ordinances this year. Salt Lake County, Utah’s most populous county, has already done so, and Utah’s second largest city, West Valley City, and Park City are moving toward passage.

Salt Lake City: Laws banning employment, housing discrimination of gays begin

(Salt Lake City) Salt Lake City’s landmark ordinances to protect gays from discrimination in housing and employment have taken effect.

Mayor Ralph Becker was joined by gay-rights advocates at a ceremony last week marking enactment of Utah’s first such laws.

Salt Lake City: Laws banning employment, housing discrimination of gays begin

(Salt Lake City) Salt Lake City’s landmark ordinances to protect gays from discrimination in housing and employment have taken effect.

Mayor Ralph Becker was joined by gay-rights advocates at a ceremony last week marking enactment of Utah’s first such laws.

Yes to gay marriage means no social services, Catholic Church warns

The Catholic Archdiocese of Washington is threatening the district with suspending their social services programs if the city doesn’t change a proposed equal marriage law, the Washington Post reports.

The bill requires religious organizations to obey city laws forbidding discrimination against gay men and lesbians, though they would not have to …

Church and Straight in CT

The Family Institute of Connecticut apparently blew too much money on Question 1 ads to afford a real lawyer.

We bet that’s why Pat Robertson’s non-profit firm, the American Center for Law and Justice, helped them bully the Connecticut Department of Children and Families into removing “open and affirming” churches from a list of gay-friendly resources on the department’s Web site on seperation of church and state grounds.

(No, really, the Family Institute of Connecticut accused someone else of misunderstanding the separation of church and state.)

“A handful of the links related to religious organizations considered to be — what are the words I want to use? — progressive on gay and lesbian issues,” explains Gary Kleeblatt, communications director for the DCF, who says the agency got a letter from the Family Institute inferring a lawsuit from Robertson’s team of cranks could be forthcoming.

Kleeblatt assures us the DCF is still “extremely enlightened to gay and lesbian issues. We welcome gays and lesbians to adopt. We also recognize there are gays and lesbians in our care. But we can’t be seen as endorsing any religious groups.”

Shirley Gadson, pastor of Bridgeport’s open and affirming Open Door Ministries, says, “I think that people have to realize Christ loves everybody and is open and affirming to everyone.”

Family Institute executive director Peter Wolfgang told our parent paper, the Hartford Courant, “We said all along that if same-sex marriage was imposed in Connecticut, the next thing that would happen would be an effort to reeducate Connecticut children.”

Yes, that’s right! First comes gay marriage and then comes … some constitutionally questionable links on the DCF’s Web site. Feel that? It’s the foundations of our society shaking!

See Church and Straight

fairfieldweekly.com

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Gay bishop says faith groups key to NH gay marriage vote

New Hampshire became the sixth state to legalize gay marriage on Wednesday (June 3) in part because faith leaders testified that the measure would not impinge on religious rights, according to V. Gene Robinson, the state’s openly gay Episcopal bishop.

When credible Christians, Muslims and Jews advocated for same-sex marriage, it “had a lot of sway with legislators in terms of giving them cover,” said Robinson. “Our message was loud and clear: religious organizations have nothing to fear from civil marriage for same-gendered folks.”

Robinson, who was elected bishop of New Hampshire in 2003, joined his longtime partner in a civil union last year. Under the New Hampshire law, their union will automatically be considered a marriage on Jan. 1, 2010.

“I’m still about 30 feet off the ground, hovering somewhere on high,” Robinson said in a conference call with reporters on Thursday.

The legislation signed by Gov. John Lynch on Wednesday contains explicit legal protections for religious groups that object to same-gender relationships and makes Rhode Island the only state in New England that does not allow gay marriage.

Robinson said separating the civil and religious aspects of marriage and making clear that religious groups would not be required to sanction same-gender weddings was key to the effort.

“We made sure that our … bill here stated and overstated and restated the fact that no religious liberties would be abridged in the embrace of civil marriage — that no religious institutions would be required to do anything against its own beliefs,” Robinson said. “It largely undercut the argument from the other side.”

Two separate studies released on Wednesday concluded that anti-gay marriage groups relied heavily on religious language to successfully push for ballot initiatives in Michigan in 2004 and California in 2008 that outlawed gay marriage.

“A religious opposition requires a religious response,” said the Rev. Rebecca Voelkel of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and an author of one of the reports.

Robinson said, “I think it’s about emboldening legislators to see people like them who identify as Roman Catholic or American Baptist or Methodist or Lutheran (and) say `OK, this … is clearly a person of faith, so despite what the denomination says as a whole I’ve got a fairly firm piece of ground to stand on here.”

See Gay bishop says faith groups key to NH gay marriage vote

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life

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SHOCK: New Hampshire lawmakers reject gay-marriage bill

New Hampshire lawmakers unexpectedly rejected a bill on Wednesday that would have made the state the sixth in the United States to authorize gay marriage.

The state’s Democrat-controlled House of Representatives voted down the bill in a 188-186 vote, hours after its Senate approved the legislation 14-10 along party lines. An earlier version of the bill passed the lower chamber on March 26.

The legislature had been asked to approve language that would give legal protections, including the right to decline to marry same-sex couples, to clergy and others affiliated with religious organizations.

That wording was added by Governor John Lynch, a Democrat who promised to sign the bill if those changes were made.

The House vote against the governor’s amendment means the bill will be sent to a committee that will try to resolve the differences between the two chambers. It remains unclear how the governor would respond to any changes to his wording.

See New Hampshire lawmakers reject gay-marriage bill Reuters * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual