“The 700 Club’s” Pat Robertson is upset about the Supreme Court decision to overturn sodomy laws and urged his viewers to pray for the retirement of three justices who voted with the majority. (File photo by Clint Steib)
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Friday, July 18, 2003
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (AP) — Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson urged his
nationwide audience to pray for God to remove three justices from the Supreme
Court so they could be replaced by conservatives. “We ask for miracles
in regard to the Supreme Court,” Robertson said Monday on the Christian
Broadcasting Network’s “The 700 Club.” Robertson has launched
a 21-day “prayer offensive” directed at the Supreme Court in the
wake of its 6-3 June vote that decriminalized sodomy. Robertson said in a letter
on the CBN Web site that the ruling “has opened the door to homosexual
marriage, bigamy, legalized prostitution and even incest.” The same letter
targets three justices in particular: “One justice is 83-years-old, another
has cancer and another has a heart condition. Would it not be possible for God
to put it in the minds of these three judges that the time has come to retire?” Judging
from the descriptions, Robertson was referring to Justice John Paul Stevens,
who was born in 1920, and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who had colon cancer surgery
in 1999. Robertson said on NBC’s “Today” show Wednesday that
the identity of the third justice is Sandra Day O’Connor.
HONOLULU (AP) — In the second lawsuit filed against the city and county
of Honolulu over this month’s Family Day event, the American Civil Liberties
Union accused the city of reserving entertainment at the event for “fundamentalist
Christians.” The suit filed in Circuit Court Monday seeks an injunction
ordering an account of the city’s spending on the event and a halt to
similar celebrations in the future. The American Civil Liberties Union filed
the suit on behalf of a range of Honolulu residents, from a minister to a ceramics
instructor all of whom thought the July 5 Family Day festivities crossed the
church-state line. The plaintiffs cited a musical segment of Family Day that
included nine separate performances by Christian groups, while children’s
entertainment at the Keiki Stage in Kapiolani Park had a stated purpose to “save
souls.”
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Outsiders often assume this community is a conservative
place where social change occurs slowly. After all, a Kansas law specifically
criminalizing gay sex remained on the books this year, after most other states
had repealed theirs. And among the Kansas capital’s 122,000 residents
is the Rev. Fred Phelps, whose church has offended people across the nation
with anti-homosexual pickets and signs with slogans like “God hates fags.” But
Topeka also is home to activists seeking an ordinance that would protect gay
men and lesbians from discrimination. The City Council narrowly rejected such
a proposal last year, and the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force has made
enacting an ordinance its priority. Activists, cheered by a recent U.S. Supreme
Court ruling that invalidated state laws against gay sex, plan to revive their
proposal, perhaps this coming fall.
LONDON (AP) — The Church of England briefly halted a general assembly
meeting Saturday after gay rights protesters took over the stage to protest
the case of an openly gay clergyman whose appointment as a bishop divided the
church. The seven demonstrators included protest leader Peter Tatchell, who
held a poster with the words “Church of hate stop crucifying queers.” About
half of those at the synod meeting in York, northern England, left while Tatchell
spoke about Rev. Jeffrey John’s decision not to take up a new post as
a bishop. Several Anglican bishops from around the world wrote to oppose John’s
selection, saying the appointment violated church teaching that gay sex is “incompatible
with Scripture.” “You can see the voice of bigotry and unreason
here today,” Tatchell said. “Your ears are deaf and your eyes are
blind. You do not witness the suffering of gay and lesbian people.”
LONDON — The unity of the Anglican Church is significantly diminished
after an openly gay canon and bishop-nominee Jeffrey John has factionalized
the churches senior leadership, according to a report in the Guardian. The
Archbishop of Canterbury, the head of the Anglican Church, has championed the
issue of open gays in the ministry. “Unity is a gospel imperative when
we recognize that it opens us to change, to conversion. When we realize how
our life with Christ is somehow bound up with our willingness to abide with
those we think are sinful and those we think are stupid ... the luxury of separation
is really death, the pain of unity is really life for us,” he said. Though
John has stepped down from the position of Bishop of Reading a week ago saying
he wanted to avoid doing anything to divide the church, the issue of openly
gay clergy is a growing issue within the church.
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