Wis Senate Republicans repair woefully inept sex-ed mandate

MADISON (WKOW) -- Sex-education in Wisconsin schools is in for big changes after a bill passed Wednesday night in the State Senate.

Senate Bill 237 repeals parts of the Healthy Youth Act put forth by Governor Jim Doyle last year.

It makes teaching about contraception optional in schools, and requires school districts to teach that abstinence is the only effective way to prevent pregnancy and STD's.

The bill passed on party lines Thursday night after about an hour of testimony, mainly from Democrats.

It now moves on to the Assembly, but Thursday is the last floor session scheduled until January. The Assembly may not even have time to consider the bill this year.

WKOW

St Thomas U professor writes op-ed supporting natural marriage

Many religions recognize a natural law

Kudos to a recent letter writer who called for a return to first principles in the same-sex marriage debate, and to two others who answered the call. We're not on the same page, but we're closer.

One responder misunderstands the use of the term "nature" in "natural law." As any physician can tell you, many things occur (infections, functional failure) that violate the nature of the thing affected. It happens in nature that human beings are born without hands, but this violates the proper nature of the human being.

This is how doctors tell the difference between health and disease. Same-sex desires and acts literally make no sense given our embodiment as sexual creatures. The fact that they happen does not make them fitting to our nature, fully understood.

The other responder claims that the fundamental issue is equal rights. The Catholic Church is second to none in championing equal rights. But the recognition of rights must be based on the truth.

Any man who is capable can marry any woman who is capable. The letter writer is not asking for equal rights; he is asking for a redefinition of the nature of marriage, and thus for repudiation of our human nature, properly understood.

This is akin to saying that I have a right to fly, but I want to fly in my car. Calling a car a plane won't make it fly, and neither society nor the state have any reason to get on board.

Star Trib

MN Courage chapter leader writes Op-Ed on Same-Sex Attraction

Father Jim Livingston who is in charge of the local chapter of Courage, penned this well-done op-ed on same-sex attraction that was published yesterday in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.

I am glad for Ron Bates that he was able to overcome the guilt and shame that burdened him for years and find that God loves him. ("I tried for years to pray away the gay. It didn't work," Sept. 1).

But while I respect Bates' personal experience, I respectfully disagree with his conclusions about same-sex attraction and traditional marriage.

I am the lead chaplain for the local Courage/Faith in Action group. Courage/FIA is a confidential support group for people who have same-sex attraction and who want to practice the virtue of chastity as understood by the Catholic Church.

As a confessor and confidant to many men and women who have homosexual attractions, I can say that people are not limited to the choices Bates offers.

The plain truth is that people with same-sex attractions experience them differently.

For some, those desires are deeply rooted and long-lasting, while others experience them as symptoms of something else: loneliness, lack of confidence or frustrated childhood bonding with same-sex parents or peers, just to begin the list.

In other words, some people really do find developmental and environmental roots to their same-sex attractions. And yes, some find release from them through therapy or through the mysterious grace of a spiritual awakening.

Bates was not able to pray away his same-sex attraction, but some people actually do. And others, while unable to avoid homosexual temptations, still live lives of chastity and virtue by the grace of God and with the help of good friends.

Marriage to a woman did not work for Bates, but for this you don't redefine marriage. And especially for this you don't tattoo a "GLBT" label onto teenagers who may be simply confused about their life choices. It took Bates 54 years to find his life direction after an imprudent start.

By the same logic, many young people could be trapped for years with a mistaken gay or lesbian identity, goaded on by our disintegrating, sexually untethered culture.

Like it or not, heterosexual behavior is rooted in human nature and the universal moral law. Both the body and the Bible witness to this truth in their own ways.

Traditional marriage is rooted in this ancient if inconvenient truth, and it can't be scolded or legislated away by one misguided generation. History is not and never will be on the side of gay marriage.

continue at StarTrib 

HT Bliss

Appleton approves gay partner benefits

Isn't it just a WEE BIT IRONIC to institute budget-cutting measures (zero-percent pay raises, etc) but implement costly benefits for one group?

Appleton Post-Crescent:

APPLETON — In a 10-6 vote, the Appleton Common Council approved a plan Wednesday that extends health benefits to same-sex domestic partners of non-union employees, a move Mayor Tim Hanna said would make Appleton's recruitment efforts more competitive [ummm....?].

"We do want to be able to attract good, talented employees and retain good, talented employees and level the playing field in terms of access to benefits," Hanna told council members who objected to the estimated $100,000 price tag [by way of comparison, the City of Milwaukee's gay partner benefits will cost the city $700,000] associated with the benefit expansion.

The addition of domestic partner benefits was adopted as part of a larger plan to standardize benefit packages for non-union employees in the wake of a new state law that eliminates many collective bargaining powers for most unionized state workers at all levels of government.

The broader plan cuts sick leave in half for Appleton's non-union workers, institutes a zero-percent pay raise, offers sick and bereavement leave for same-sex and opposite-sex domestic partners and incorporates retirement contribution requirements mandated in the collective bargaining law, commonly known as Act 10.

Read the rest here.

Anti- Marriage Amendment op-ed targeting Catholic voters in MN

Born in rural Minnesota and raised on a dairy farm, I grew up in a devout Catholic family.

While attending St. John's Prep School in Collegeville, I confessed to a priest that I was attracted to another boy who slept across from me. The priest responded that if I ever acted on that, I would go to hell.

As a sincere Catholic teen, I did not act on my attraction but started a harmful journey of self-loathing and personal destruction. I didn't know what "homosexual" or "gay" were, but I understand "queer" and thought it was evil and perverted.

I did not date girls in high school and dated only a couple in college. One of them became a good friend, so I did what all the rest in my family had done: I got married, the summer after graduating from college. I loved all my nieces and nephews and wanted to become a teacher and a father.

With a major in elementary education from St. Cloud State and later a master's as a reading specialist, I taught successfully for 40 years in public education in several Minnesota towns. My marriage never worked.

The sexuality was mostly repulsive, and that was communicated indirectly to my ex-wife. That is the most unfair part. She was one of the innocent victims in the masquerade of "I'm straight."

For years and years, I would prostrate myself on the floor and ask God to change me. Maybe if I just pray more, fast more, do more "works of charity," the male attraction will go away.

After more than 30 years of trying to "burn" the evil out of me, I finally came out at age fifty four. God finally broke through to my heart of hearts and said, "I love you just as you are. You are praying for healing, but you are not sick!"

Our God does not change. God is God always. And God was with me always. After all the self-hatred and foibles of life, God was still there waiting for me.

At that moment, the shame and guilt I had felt for years left -- once and for always. If Pope Benedict had been standing right there to tell me I was "disordered," I would have said to him, "You are wrong. God made me and loves me just as I am."

continue at Star Tribune


This is the same argument you will get at many Catholic colleges actually.  Don't forget Daniel Maguire,
a Marquette professor, has been advocating for gay marriage inside and outside the Church in Minnesota and spoke in Minneapolis last October.  Catholics are being lead astray by wolves, tenured wolves.

I haven't been posting all the news but there's are boat loads of money being shipped into Minnesota to break marriage.  It would seem that getting a Midwestern state to pass gay marriage could be a striking point then for the rest of the country.  Iowa doesn't really count since the activist judges got the boot for their hijinks.

One nice thing about the homosexual act getting shoved in everyone's faces is that the Church finally has an effective way to minister to those with same sex attraction with compassionate and effective pastoral care(even amongst Her own clergy).  It's no longer seen as a "just don't do that" thing.  The human experience can be complex and bludgeoning with hell isn't always the most effective way to change or heal a heart (don't get me wrong, it certainly can be effective in certain circumstances - but not all).

That said, he's blaming traditional marriage and the Church for his decision to leave his wife and children...  Let's all say a prayer for this guy.

HT Bliss

Minnesota for Marriage

The debate over the definition of marriage has unfolded across America and at the federal level for the past several years, and is the subject of the proposed amendment on the November 2012 ballot to preserve marriage in Minnesota.

But what is the debate really about, how does it affect society and what is at stake in the outcome of the amendment vote?

Many people mistakenly believe that proposals to allow so-called “same-sex” marriage are about allowing a new, different and separate form of marriage to coexist alongside traditional man/woman marriage. They envision it as a different expression of the same marriage institution they have always known.

However, that is a fundamental misunderstanding of the legal issues involved in the debate, and with the proposed constitutional amendment in Minnesota.

Learn more at Minnesota for Marriage

Dad29: The Rights of Man Under Natural Law

This text should be vaguely familiar.

[Man has been given] the right to life, to bodily integrity, to the necessary means of existence; the right to tend toward his ultimate goal in the path marked out for him....; the right of association and the right to possess and use property.

Earlier we had mentioned that the Founders' core beliefs, as expressed in the Declaration, were Christian beliefs. They are not those of the French Revolution, nor of Locke, et.al. Rather, they are Burkean.

Oh, the quote?

Pius XII, Divini Redemptoris, para. 27.

The document is, in the main, a vigorous rejection of Communism (and Libertarianism) and of "liberal" (i.e., material-centered) economics.

Dad29