Religion & Law

?Vita Institute? at Notre Dame

Posted on February 14, 2011
Mirror of Justice: Conducted under the auspices of the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture, the Vita Institute will educate participants in the fundamentals of human life issues, focusing on beginning of life issues, at the highest academic level from the perspectives of social science, biology, philosophy, theology, law, communication, and counseling, among others.

University of Alaska considers sexual orientation policy again

Posted on February 14, 2011
Change.org: "This week the Board of Regents will meet again, and once more they'll look at whether the University of Alaska system should expand their nondiscrimination policy to include sexual orientation."

?County library changes its meeting room policy after national religious group complains?

Posted on February 14, 2011
Cleveland.com: On its website, ADF said policies prohibiting religious groups from meeting in public spaces have been routinely ruled unconstitutional by courts across the country. Oster said his organization learns about such policies in various ways...

Chuck Colson: Who needs marriage?

Posted on February 14, 2011
Chuck Colson writes at LifeSiteNews: "In economic terms, divorce and unmarried childbearing cost American taxpayers at least $112 billion per year and significantly increase poverty rates of both mothers and children. Married mothers have lower rates of depression than single or cohabiting mothers...

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U.S. taxpayer money to fund Rwanda campaign to sterilize 700,000 men

Posted on February 14, 2011
LifeSiteNews: "The government of Rwanda is planning to launch a sterilization campaign with the goal of rendering 700,000 men, or about one seventh of the male population, infertile within three years."

Dutch court ponders halt to lawmaker?s hate trial

Posted on February 14, 2011
AP: "An Amsterdam court will reconsider dismissing the hate speech trial of one of the Netherland's most popular leaders, an anti-immigrant politician who has compared Islam to fascism and called for a ban on the Quran."

Debt now equals total U.S. economy

Posted on February 14, 2011
Washington Times: "President Obama projects that the gross federal debt will top $15 trillion this year, officially equalling the size of the entire U.S. economy, and will jump to nearly $21 trillion in five years? time."

Homeschool bills introduced in Illinois and New Hampshire

Posted on February 14, 2011
LifeSiteNews: "HSLDA responded, however, that the bill ?would give the Illinois Department of Education literally unlimited power to dictate what information homeschoolers must submit.? The organization has strongly encouraged concerned parents to contact their senators ...

North Dakota House passes bill criminalizing killing unborn from conception

Posted on February 14, 2011
LifeNews: While pro-lifers are optimistic about the bill?s survival in the Senate, Woodard said that supporters would ?be taking no chances? and continue to lobby for its passage. A vote in the Senate is expected around March 10.

Chief justice: Budget cuts, politicization threaten Iowa court system

Posted on February 14, 2011
Cady said it was "devastating" to watch the results come in showing then-Chief Justice Marsha Ternus and Justices Baker and Michael Streit. But he said he also believed the court was doing its job by striking down the state's 10-year-old ban on gay marriage...

Iowa: Petition calls for end to judicial impeachment move

Posted on February 14, 2011
Sioux City Journal: The petition urges lawmakers ?to end any conversation about impeaching Supreme Court justices,? she said. The signers of the online petition ?believe it's a waste of time to be talking about impeachment. It's not an appropriate action to be considering...

CA: Brown considers an activist for state Supreme Court appointment

Posted on February 14, 2011
Thomas A. Saenz writes at the LA Times: "Thomas A. Saenz, a nationally known Latino civil rights lawyer who led the fight against Proposition 187, the 1994 measure that would have barred illegal immigrants from public services, is among the top candidates Gov...

New York Takes Step on Money in Judicial Elections

Posted on February 14, 2011
NY Times: "New York?s top court officials will bar the state?s hundreds of elected judges from hearing cases involving lawyers and others who make significant contributions to their campaigns, a move that will change the political culture of courts and transform judicial elections by removing an important incentive lawyers have for contributing...

MT: Kids angry that Congressman called their dad ? ?judicial activist?

Posted on February 14, 2011
Independent Record: "We are writing to express our disappointment and voice our concerns over the comments that Congressman Rehberg recently made at a joint session of the Montana Legislature. Although Congressman Rehberg didn?t identify by name U.S. District Judge Don Molloy ? our dad ? it was clear to whom he referred...

9th Circuit Hears Oral Arguments In Establishment Clause Challenge To Teacher?s Comments

Posted on February 14, 2011
Religion Clause Blog: "The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of appeals yesterday heard oral arguments (recording of full arguments) in in C.F. v. Capistrano Unified High School. In the case, the district court found that an in-class comment by high school history teacher James Corbett which characterized creationism as "superstitious nonsense" violated the Establishment Clause ...

6th Circuit En Banc Finds Teachers Have Municipal Taxpayer Standing In Establishment Clause Suit

Posted on February 14, 2011
Religion Clause Blog: "In Smith v. Jefferson County Board of School Commissioners, (6th Cir., Feb. 11, 2011), the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals, en banc, in an 11-4 opinion, held that two plaintiff school teachers have standing as municipal taxpayers to bring an Establishment Clause challenge to the closing of the a Tennessee school district's alternative school and its outsourcing the services instead to a Christian private school...

Rasmussen: 65% of Americans Favor Prayer in Public Schools

Posted on February 14, 2011
Rasmussen: "A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 65% of American Adults favor prayer in public schools."

Legal Periodical: How the Concept of ?Sexual Orientation? Threatens Religious Liberty

Posted on February 14, 2011
Like other terms that swiftly achieve common usage, ?sexual orientation? is rarely examined. Yet ?sexual orientation? is more than a neutral term that can be used to describe anyone's sexual inclinations. It is a radical challenge to the beliefs of all major religious faiths because it attacks the notion that sexual behavior has moral dimensions...

?Obamacare can be killed without single Democrat vote?

Posted on February 14, 2011
WorldNetDaily: "It's just this simple," says Joseph Farah of WND and the campaign targeting House Republicans alone to freeze the debt limit. "Republicans alone can do this. They are holding all the cards. They simply need to vote no as a bloc on raising the debt limit...

?ACLU asks court to side with EMU in case of former student who declined to counsel gay client?

Posted on February 14, 2011
AnnArbor.com: "Despite losses in the lower courts, Ward and her attorneys, the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal organization that works to uphold the rights of religious college students and faculty, have asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth District to step in...

Shared parent rights challenged in Ohio top court

Posted on February 14, 2011
Gay People's Chronicle: "The Ohio Supreme Court has heard a case that could whittle away at gay and lesbian couples? right to shared parenting agreements . . . The 2002 case, In re Bonfield, has become one of the bedrock Ohio cases protecting non-traditional families ...

WA: Planned Parenthood Tried to Force Raped Teen to Have Abortion

Posted on February 14, 2011
LifeNews: "A newly-uncovered police report concerning a September 2008 incident reveals staff at a Kennewick, Washington Planned Parenthood doing everything possible to arrange an abortion for a 14-year-old girl who had been a victim of statutory rape by a 20-year-old man...

No advisor? No meeting, no speaking?

Posted on February 14, 2011
One News Now: Jeremy Tedesco with the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) finds plenty of constitutional dangers with that school policy. "It's unconstitutional in and of itself to say you can't meet or speak on campus unless a government employee is present the entire time you want to meet or speak," the attorney explains...

Star Parker: ?Gay Conservative? Is an Oxymoron

Posted on February 14, 2011
Star Parker writes at Townhall: The foundation of the world view that so-called ?gay conservatives? embrace has far more in common with liberalism than with conservatism. It?s a world view that is man-centered rather than God-centered. It is a world view that rejects eternal truths passed on from the beginning of time...

Merry Old England Morphs into Scary New England via Multiculturalism

Posted on February 14, 2011
Doug Giles writes at Townhall: It appears as if this multicultural smack we?re being sold in the U.S. didn?t work out too well in the U.K. Just this past week British Prime Minister David Cameron echoed German Chancellor Angela Merkel?s sentiments from last October that their country?s Pollyanna policy of multicultural yumminess toward Islam?s ?way of life? was, in retrospect, really stupid?as in really, really, really stupid.

ADF cases prompt House members to seek rationale from Sebelius over attack on conscience protections

Posted on February 14, 2011
A letter to Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius signed by 46 members of the U.S. House of Representatives Friday asks her to explain why her department is seeking to repeal conscience protections for health care workers in light of known attacks on such workers.

China launching body to screen foreign investment

Posted on February 14, 2011
AP: "China says it will conduct national-security reviews of foreign attempts to buy local companies in fields including farming and transportation in a move that might fuel complaints it is blocking access to its markets."

UK High Court rejects bid to loosen abortion rules

Posted on February 14, 2011
AP: "Britain's High Court has rejected an attempt to loosen the law so that women can take a second dose of a pill at home to complete early abortions."

Obama sends Congress $3.73 trillion budget

Posted on February 14, 2011
AP: " . . . he fiscal blueprint largely ignores his own deficit commission's recommendations to slash huge entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare."

One giant health care case?

Posted on February 14, 2011
SCOTUS Blog: "Virginia asks the Court to gather up all of the health care law?s challenges from the federal appeals courts, and decide all of them in one omnibus proceeding dealing with every issue. The constitutional controversy has mired the nation in uncertainty, the state argues...

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