Real Clear Religion

"We must never allow freedom of religion to be hijacked and used as a pretext to discriminate against gay and lesbian teenagers in schools."
Stephen Desmond, Thames Valley University

From This is London: Academics are calling for teachers to be banned from promoting marriage in the classroom.

They say homosexuality must be given equal status to stop the spread of "bigoted" attitudes in schools and university campuses.

Current Government guidance on sex education says children must be taught "the importance of marriage for family life".

Teachers are also permitted to voice their opposition to homosexuality if it stems from personal or religious conviction.

This allows faith schools to teach that same- sex relationships are at odds with their religion.

But members of the University and College Union - representing 120,000 lecturers - are calling for a change in the law to stop teachers telling children that marriage is superior to gay partnerships.

This would apply to all teachers, including staff in faith schools.

Delegates at the union's annual congress in Bournemouth were critical of recently-passed gay rights laws which failed to ban teachers from expressing personal views on homosexuality.

They said the legislation, which is aimed at banning discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation, did not go far enough.

Delegates unanimously backed a motion demanding an end to "negative characterisations" of gay lifestyles.

Alan Whitaker, from Oxford and Cherwell Valley College in Oxfordshire, said: "They (the new regulations) did nothing to stop the negative characterisation of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender lifestyles by teachers.

"The regulations actually say that there is nothing to stop teachers proclaiming the superiority of heterosexual marriage.
"The regulations say it's unlawful to characterise same-sex relationships as inferior.

"But to my mind it's rather difficult to see how you can do the one without implying you are doing the other."

He added: "Legislation cannot do all the work. It may remove the injustice but it cannot change attitudes.

"If attitudes are to change that will come about as a result of education.

"And that makes it vitally important that teachers do not instil negative images of same-sex relationships and transgender people in those that they teach. Absolutely not."

He proposed a motion calling for the laws to be urgently rewritten to help stop bullying of gay and lesbian students in schools and universities.

The call is certain to infuriate religious groups.

The Church of England is among faiths which lobbied the Government for gay rights laws to continue to allow Anglican schools to teach that the Bible forbids homosexuality.

But Stephen Desmond, from Thames Valley University, told delegates: "We must never allow freedom of religion to be hijacked and used as a pretext to discriminate against gay and lesbian teenagers in schools."

According to Government guidance, "if a faith school (or indeed any school) teaches that the Christian and Muslim faiths decree that same- sex sexual activity is a sin, then the school will not be acting unlawfully".

It adds: "Similarly, if a pupil asks a teacher his views on homosexuality and the teacher gives his view, then again, that teacher will not be acting unlawfully.

"In both cases, the subject must be dealt with appropriately in accordance with existing guidance."

Hugh McKinney, chairman of the National Family Campaign, said: "There are differing views on how marriage should be taught in schools and this includes a faithbased and non faith-based position. This has to be fair all round.

"There should be an opt- out available for faith-based schools to allow teachers to teach what has traditionally been the case in the UK, and to reflect the majority of the population, regardless of orientation.

"The legislation has only just been passed so we don't actually know the legality or otherwise of any set of teaching at the moment."

"Not everyone who says to me 'Lord, Lord': shall enter the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of my Father in heaven shall enter the kingdom of heaven. Many will say to me in that day, 'Lord, Lord did we not prophesy in thy name, and work many miracles in thy name?' And then I will declare unto them, 'I never knew you. Depart from me, you workers of iniquity!'
Matthew 7:21-23

How can a person who lacks the true faith, or for that matter lacks essential truths, appear zealous and dutiful in the practice of their religion? From the muslim who kills in the name of allah, to the thrice divorced born again, or the contracepting Catholic--how can they appear to be religious while failing to follow God's commands? I recently stumbled upon an excellent explanation for this in a book called Letters To A Mother by Father Emmanuel Marie Andre.

"A religious feeling is...of the natural order. A religious feeling is the natural consequence of being creatures, just as respect for parents is natural to the child."

"The religious feeling, being natural to man, is found in all men, faithful and infidels; for all of them have these remains of respect for God which is sometimes manifested by a religious act founded upon truth---as for Christians, sometimes for a religious act full of errors---as for the infidels and the idol worshippers, etc."

"There are nations among which the religious feeling is naturally very deep--among the Arabs, for example. An Arab will never fail to say his morning prayer, his noon prayer, and his evening prayer. From the height of his minaret he hears the muezzin cry the sacred formula: "La Allah...",etc...Here is religious feeling in all its power."

"But remember ...our nature is fallen in Adam. From a fallen nature can only come a religious feeling deprived also of vitality. Nature cannot rise again from itself, and the purely natural religious feeling definitely cannot bring man back to God nor take him away from sin. So with all his natural religiousness, one can keep all the vices that are unfortunatley natural to him, too. One can be vain, a liar, a thief.

Thus these are the characteristics of religious feeling: "It sees nothing, wants nothing, can do nothing against sin....It adapts itself to everything, it comes to term with everything, it falls in with everything, it devotes itself to nothing.

On the other hand faith is supernatural ...[f]aith is the adhesion of our spirit to the truth revealed by God. It is a good that does not derive from our nature but which is given to it from above in order to heal it. Faith is essentially purifying... It enlightens the spirit, cleanses it of errors. It straightens the fallen man, places him again in the way of God."

"The emotional revivalist often produces valuable effects, but all revivalist movements are subject to the law of diminishing returns. It is impossible for men to live forever on the heights. A religion which equates the emotional state with salvation is a broken reed when the temperature drops. Much misery has been caused by the evangelical doctrine that Christianity is worthless unless it is the product of a conversion which is always represented as a vivid religious experience." Arnold Lunn: Now I See.

“Guide our aim to strike at the center. Protect us from the enemies of love, justice and liberty.”

Despite liberals wimpy view of Christ and Christianity, we are called to be soldiers for Christ and defend the innocent against evil. St Gabriel Possenti shows us that holiness is not opposed to bravery, manhood, and even handguns. He came to the defense of a young girl who was being attacked and drove a gang of mercenaries out of town at gunpoint.

To honor his deeds the St. Gabriel Possenti Society, Inc. was established and each year a person is chosen who lives according to the principles which St Gabriel Possenti exemplified. This year Charl van Wyk of Cape Town, South Africa was chosen for his bravery in fighting off Marxist-Lenninists who attacked a church:


From News Release Wire: "In July 1993, Charl, relying on his faith and a .38 caliber special revolver, caused a gang of terrorists to flee a church in Cape Town in what became known as the St. James Massacre. The terrorists were part of the Azanian People’s Liberation Army, the military wing of the Pan African Congress, a Marxist-Leninist group.

The terrorists, armed with grenades and AK-47’s, murdered 11 parishioners and wounded an additional 58 individuals. Charl, the only armed member of the congregation, fired five rounds with his handgun. He wounded one of the terrorists and the gang fled. His action apparently prevented the murder or injury of many more people.

The incident led Charl to become an even more ardent defender of the right to self-defense and of the right to keep and bear arms than he already had been. He recounted his experiences in his popular book, Shooting Back – The Right and Duty of Self-Defense, and founded Gun Owners of South Africa."