Homeless in Arizona

30 years in prison for looking at dirty pictures????

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Airline mogul gets 30 years in child-porn case

Associated Press Wed Dec 19, 2012 11:09 AM

BROWNSVILLE, Texas — The founder of a Texas cargo airline has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for federal child pornography charges.

Robert L. Hedrick was accused by prosecutors of having explicit chats with undercover officers posing as young teenage girls. The 61-year-old founder of Pan American Airways was convicted May 21 of three federal counts.

He was sentenced Wednesday morning in South Texas.

Hedrick was arrested last year after Wisconsin and Louisiana authorities traced chats to an online account registered to him. Investigators said they later found he had saved 2,400 pornographic images.

Hedrick has maintained his innocence.

He had faced up to 20 years in prison for distribution of child pornography. He was also convicted of transferring obscene materials to a minor and attempted sexual exploitation of children.

Religious Leaders Push for Gun Control

Religious Leaders Push Congregants on Gun Control, Sensing a Watershed Moment

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN

Published: December 19, 2012

Religious leaders across the country this week vowed to mobilize their congregants to push for gun control legislation and provide the ground support for politicians willing to take on the gun lobby, saying the time has come for action beyond praying and comforting the families of those killed.

A group of clergy members, representing mainline and evangelical Protestants, Catholics, Jews and Muslims, plans to lead off the campaign in front of the Washington National Cathedral at an event on Friday timed to mark the moment a week before when a young gunman opened fire in a school in Newtown, Conn.

The cathedral will toll its funeral bell 28 times, once for each victim, including 20 children, 6 teachers and school administrators and the mother of the killer, as well as the gunman, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, who shot and killed himself.

“Everyone in this city seems to be in terror of the gun lobby. But I believe the gun lobby is no match for the cross lobby,” said the Very Rev. Gary Hall, dean of the Washington National Cathedral, in an impassioned sermon on Sunday that has become a rallying cry for gun control. People in the cathedral’s pews rose and applauded.

Dean Hall said in an interview that he and Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington were calling on their parishioners to support four specific steps: bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, tightening rules for sales at gun shows and re-examining care for the mentally ill.

Clergy members have been involved in gun control efforts for at least three decades because, they say, they are the ones called to give the eulogies at funerals and comfort victims’ families. But they acknowledge that they have been unable to mount a sustained grass-roots movement against gun violence — partly because they have not made it a priority, and partly because their efforts have been overshadowed by the organizational and fund-raising power of the gun lobby.

Faiths United to Prevent Gun Violence, a two-year-old coalition that now counts 40 religious groups as members, has only one part-time employee, Vincent DeMarco, who is simultaneously organizing coalitions on obesity, health care and smoking. Asked his budget, he laughed and said, “de minimis.”

However, Jim Winkler, general secretary of the United Methodist Church’s public policy arm, the General Board of Church and Society, said he was seeing some signs that the shooting in Newtown could be a watershed. His office immediately sent out an “action alert” on gun control to bishops and other church leaders, and he said he was surprised how many wrote back thanking him effusively.

“I could tell there was this real need, real hunger, at least in my denomination, for there to be some response that is not only prayers and expressions of sadness, but also a call to action,” Mr. Winkler said. “And it came from some who wouldn’t normally care that much about public policy action, but who would be more interested in spiritual responses.”

The primary organizer of the news conference on Friday, Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, in Washington, said, “This is not likely an issue that we’ll have a sustained campaign on in the absence of political leadership. But if political leaders act, the religious community will be strongly engaged.”

On Wednesday, President Obama said in a news conference that he would make preventing gun violence a legislative priority, but that it would take “a wave of Americans” to move it forward.

Religious groups that sent out calls for action on guns to their members in the last five days include the Council of Bishops of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the PICO National Network, an advocacy group, and many Jewish organizations.

But advocating limits on guns is controversial within many religious groups, and many evangelicals are opposed. A CBS News poll conducted Dec. 14-16, after the massacre in Newtown, showed that while 69 percent of Catholics said they wanted stricter laws on gun control, only 37 percent of white evangelical Christians agreed.

The evangelical leaders expected at the cathedral event on Friday are relatively moderate: the Rev. Richard Cizik, president of the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good, and Rev. Gabriel Salguero, president of the National Latino Evangelical Coalition.

Mark DeMoss, a prominent evangelical who recently served as an adviser to the campaign of the Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, stepped forward after the tragedy in Newtown, telling Politico.com that measures to address gun control, mental health treatment and violence in the media should all be on the table.

But he said in an interview that evangelicals were unlikely to support gun control efforts because they do not want to break ranks with the Republican Party, and because they tend to see gun violence as a concern to be addressed spiritually, rather than through policy change.

He said he also considered violence a spiritual problem, but said he saw a “double standard” at work. Evangelical clergy, he said, have boycotted the manufacturers of violent video games and pornography, but on guns they say, “No, this is just as spiritual matter of the heart.”

The Rev. Leith Anderson, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, said in an interview that his group had never taken a position on gun control but might now “take a harder look.” He pointed out that a rarely read part of the Christmas story is King Herod’s slaughter of the innocents.

“Mary and Joseph fled. It’s a part of the story, and they took decisive action. This is now a part of our story,” he said, referring to shooting rampages, “and we need to take decisive action.”

Jesus hates gays???

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Pope attacks gay marriage in annual address

By Cathy Lynn Grossman USA Today Fri Dec 21, 2012 8:53 PM

Gay marriage denies God and devalues human dignity, Pope Benedict XVI said Friday in his annual “state of the Church” address at the Vatican.

Speaking to the Curia, the bureaucrats who run the global church of 1.2 billion Catholics, the pope said opposition to gay marriage is a way of defending humanity: “Whoever defends God is defending man.”

Benedict also quoted the chief rabbi of France, Gilles Bernheim, who has written that promoting a right to same-sex marriage is an “attack” on the traditional family made up of a father, mother and children.

The address echoed his recently released annual peace message, which said gay marriage, abortion and euthanasia are threats to world peace.

The pope maximized his global audience by posting five more tweets on his highly popular personal Twitter account this week and writing an opinion piece for the British paper, the Financial Times.

Friday, after his address to the Curia, the Vatican launched three more tweets on his @pontifex Twitter account. This adds to two tweets on Wednesday and his answers to public questions last week. Benedict now has more than 2 million global followers.

According to Twitter, Benedict’s initial tweet on Dec. 12, a blessing to his new “dear friends,” hit a higher rate of retweets — more than 1.2million in eight languages — than mini-missives by Justin Bieber. That day he also answered questions submitted with #askpontifex from three followers including a busy mother in the USA, Linda Binggeli, of Lees Summit, Mo., who asked about finding time for prayer.

Benedict’s tweets on Friday came from his recent address and the writing of St. Augustine: “At the end of the year, we pray that the Church, despite her shortcomings, may be increasingly recognizable as Christ’s dwelling place. We do not possess the truth, the truth possesses us. Christ, who is the truth, takes us by the hand. When you deny God, you deny human dignity. Whoever defends God is defending the human person.”

Wednesday’s tweets were drawn from his general audience and dealt with the themes of the Christmas season.

Mary is filled with joy on learning that she is to be the mother of Jesus, God’s Son made man. True joy comes from union with God

Everyone’s life of faith has times of light, but also times of darkness. If you want to walk in the light, let the word of God be your guide

For Thursday’s Financial Times, the pope wrote that Christians should engage in the world with the Gospel as their guide and inspiration. “But their involvement in politics and economics should transcend every form of ideology.”

The birth of the Christ child, he says, brought a challenge to earthly powers, from “a new king, who relies not on the force of arms, but on the power of love — and brought hope to the poor and the vulnerable “in a precarious world.”

Government shouldn't pass laws about sexual orientation

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Court blocks California law banning gay therapy

Associated Press Fri Dec 21, 2012 6:29 PM

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal appeals court has put the brakes on a first-of-its-kind California law that bans therapy that aims to turn gay minors straight.

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued an emergency order Friday putting the law on hold until it can hear full arguments on the issue. The law was set to take effect Jan. 1.

Licensed counselors who practice so-called “reparative therapy” and two families who say their teenage sons have benefited from it sought the injunction after a lower court judge refused the request.

The California Legislature passed the law and Gov. Jerry Brown signed it in September. It would make mental health professionals who engage in efforts to change their clients’ sexual orientations subject to discipline by state licensing boards.

Lobby group takes on Christian-based center

Lobby group takes on Christian-based center

By Mary K. Reinhart The Republic | azcentral.com Sat Dec 22, 2012 10:43 PM

In recent years, the conservative Center for Arizona Policy has been one of the most successful lobbying organizations in state politics, winning passage of far-reaching abortion restrictions and religion-focused bills.

But a growing atheist lobbying group is taking on the Christian-based center and its well-connected president, Cathi Herrod, and aims to create a higher profile at the Legislature next session.

Serah Blain, executive director of the Secular Coalition of Arizona, said the state is the first in the nation to have a full-time legislative lobbyist representing a “non-theistic” organization.

The lobbying group now represents 17 secular organizations, many of whom Blain said were motivated by their anger over recent legislation, including new laws limiting abortion and contraception coverage.

“They just really took things too far,” Blain said of Herrod and lawmakers. “A lot of people who under normal circumstances would not be working together have become interested in coalition work to stop their reign of terror.”

In addition to pushing back against Center for Arizona Policy bills, Blain hopes to promote two measures at the Legislature next session: an Oregon-style death-with-dignity bill and a proposal to teach science-based sex education in public schools. Both bills have been introduced over the years but rarely have received hearings.

And she is working to organize non-religious people in communities around the state who may be unaware just how many of them are out there. During the fall, Blain held a series of “secular values” town halls to draw people into the coalition, whose members include local chapters of the Humanist Society, the Freedom from Religion Foundation, and the Secular Student Alliance.

“In order to have any efficacy in politics, we’re going to have to form some groups and start building communities,” she said.

A study released Tuesday by the Pew Research Center found that people with no religious affiliation make up the third-largest group worldwide, after Christians and Muslims. About 16 percent of people in the U.S. say they are religiously unaffiliated.

Herrod did not return calls seeking comment. The Center for Arizona Policy’s website says the Legislature has passed 114 bills supported by the center since 1995.

Rep. Debbie Lesko, R-Glendale, said the Republican-controlled Legislature is a socially and fiscally conservative body and that has aligned with the Center for Arizona Policy’s objectives. But the bills backed by the center aren’t injecting religion into politics, she said.

Lesko said her objective was to get government out of religion when she sponsored legislation that allowed religious-affiliated companies to eliminate contraception coverage for their employees.

“The government was imposing a mandate and I allowed some organizations to opt out of that mandate,” she said. “There was some kind of thought that we were intruding on people’s lives. In my legislation, I wanted to do the opposite.”

Blain said the center’s lobbying activities could run afoul of its tax-exempt status. The coalition and other groups this year filed a formal complaint with the IRS.

The secular coalition is registered as 501(c)4 political advocacy organization, which means their donations are taxed. The Center for Arizona Policy is a 501(c)3, so donations are tax-deductible, but the center is prohibited from supporting political candidates and is subject to limits on lobbying.

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For more information about the Secular Coalition for Arizona, call 602-363-8018 or go to www.secularaz.org.

Federal appeals court rules against Hobby Lobby on contraception

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Federal appeals court rules against Hobby Lobby on contraception

Steve Olafson Reuters

8:51 p.m. CST, December 20, 2012

OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) - A federal appeals court on Thursday rejected a claim by an arts and crafts chain that wants to be exempted from a requirement to provide emergency contraceptives to employees because it violates the religious principles of its owners.

The Court of Appeals in Denver ruled against family-owned Hobby Lobby's assertion that the religious beliefs of its owners should relieve them from providing the "morning after" and "week after" pills to their employees, as required under President Barack Obama's signature health care reforms.

"The Green family is disappointed with this ruling," said Kyle Duncan, general counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which is assisting Hobby Lobby in the legal case. "The Greens will continue to make their case on appeal that this unconstitutional mandate infringes their right to earn a living while remaining true to their faith."

The medications at issue are classified as emergency contraceptives by the Food and Drug Administration, but the owners of Hobby Lobby call them "abortion-inducing drugs" because they are often taken after conception.

The lawsuit is among 42 legal actions that have been filed over the issue, according to the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a non-profit law firm in Washington, D.C.

The company faces fines of up to $1.3 million daily if it disobeys the mandate, which takes effect on January 1 for Hobby Lobby, a $3 billion chain, and its smaller sister operation, Mardel, a Christian-oriented bookstore and educational supply company.

Both companies are owned by the Green family of Oklahoma City, whose patriarch, David Green, is ranked 79th on Forbes Magazine's list of the 400 richest Americans, with a net worth of $4.5 billion.

The family operates 514 Hobby Lobby stores in 41 states and employ 13,240 people. Inspirational Christian music is played in the stores, which are closed on Sundays.

U.S. District Judge Joe Heaton of the Western District of Oklahoma ruled on November 19 that the privately-owned companies are secular, for-profit enterprises that do not possess the same religious rights as the individual members of the family.

(Editing by Corrie MacLaggan and Lisa Shumaker)

Other articles on mixing religion and government

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