What's The Plan??

Same Sex Marriage (SSM) is coming to California. It is not a maybe. It’s coming. It is simply a matter of when.

By some crazy happenstance here in the Golden State there is a two pronged attack to obtain the same sex marriage goal. This hasn't happened as the result of a planned, organized and rational “gay agenda.” It just happened.

The first prong has several cases winding their way through the courts where first, because of the triune combination of our strong state constitution with its laws against discrimination, second, other laws we have put on the books forbidding the state to discriminate against its citizens because of gender, and third, tons of court rulings against discriminations in any form, all of which means SSM will be affirmed.

The second prong is Assembly Member Mark Leno’s reintroduction of a law to allow SSM. It appears to have strong support in the legislature -- Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez is a co-sponsor. It just might pass this session. The big question is whether the Arnold will sign it as he has made some nice Conan the Barbarian utterances indicating he just might do so.

This of course leads us to the BIG question. What are we going to do to stave off the inevitable ballot initiative to amend the state constitution to repeal either the court rulings or a signed law to forbid SSM and possibly even domestic partners?

Make no mistake. No matter how SSM comes about Randy Thomasson and the Campaign for California Families and his multi-millionaire sugar daddies like Howard Ahmanson,Jr., Edward G. Atsinger III, Rob Hurtt, Jr., Roland Hinz, Richard Riddle and possibly Congressman Darrel Issa will pour in whatever money is needed to try and pass a state constitutional amendment forbidding SSM.

Remember just four short years ago in 2000, Ahmanson, Atsinger and Hinz together handed over more than $ 750,000 to get the late and unlamented Pete Knight’s Prop 22 on the ballot. Ahmanson has not missed a chance to help fund an anti-gay initiative anywhere in California in the last 20 years.

Nor can we forget that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and the Roman Catholic Church will jump in with both feet to contribute big bucks to ban SSM and to bully their communicants to support a SSM ban as they did in their support for Prop 22.

Also in this mix of bible thumpers will be James Dobson and Focus on the Family allied with their former political front organization, the Capitol Resource Institute and their new front, the California Family Council.

SSM is coming to the state of Washington where there has been two favorable lower court rulings, both so brilliantly written affirming SSM that the Washington State Supreme Court will have no other choice but to uphold them and already, as outlined in a November 26, 2004 article in the New York Times the opponents, with help from the Ohio auteurs, are already holding meetings to start the initiative process to overturn any affirmative court rulings.

So we should be forewarned. We know what these guys are going to try to do and dollars to donuts they will succeed in getting an initiative on the ballot in California. They have mastered thei ability to get the fundamentalist faithful to sign petitions either by direct home mailings, downloading the petition on the internet or having them passed out and signed at church services.

Atsinger’s chain of 20 or so religious radio stations will be very effective in achieving the required number of signatures just as they were successful in helping to recall Gov. Gray Davis.

So this question goes to Mark Leno, the L/G legislative caucus, Equality California and its subsidiaries , the Stonewall Democrats, the Log Cabin Republicans and to the various SSM groups, what is the plan to defend SSM and when do we start putting it into action?

We need to emulate our past successful campaigns against Prop 6 in 1978 and Prop 64 in 1986 by planning early or we can repeat the fiasco of Prop 22 and do nothing until the signatures are gathered, the election is only a few weeks away, and run a weak, losing campaign.

We need to start NOW to organize. We need to be peppering the media with ads explaining what civil marriage really is and all the protections and privileges that go with it. We need to have strong position papers written by both theological and secular scholars explaining the meaning of marriage both biblically and secularly which can be published in op-ed pages of the state and national media.

This needs to be done starting two weeks ago.

Now is the time for local communities to organize. Now is the time to be gather our allies together. Now in the time to be forging alliances in the minority communities.

Rest assured, professional gay basher Lou Sheldon will trot out his gaggle of minority preachers proclaiming the Hispanic, Asian/Pacific, and African-American communities are opposed to same-sex marriage.

Members of Equality California and its subsidiaries, Stonewall Democrats and Log Cabin Republicans should be peppering their boards with calls for action NOW.

We should be demanding from the L/G legislative caucus their plan of action to successfully defend from the fundamentalist hordes any SSM law which might pass the legislature this year for this law will affect all of us whether we think we need it or not.

Matt Foreman. executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, summed up the campaign in Oregon where. of the eleven states that had constitutional amendments on the ballot in the November 2 election, Oregon had the narrowist margin of defeat, “In the end, however, I think time will turn out to be our principle deficiency. Put simply, our side needed more time. The campaign to defeat the amendment was not launched until July 29, leaving 101 days until November 2.”

To sum it up one more time -- “To be forewarned is to be forearmed.”

Is It Militant for Gays to Want Rights?

Dear Friends,

I have enclosed a column written by Sacramento Bee Editor Ginger Rutland on 11/7/04 followed with an artcle which I wrote. While I generally agreed with Ms Rutland's reasons as to why John Kerry lost the election I found her comments about the gay communtiy rather caustic and unfounded so I wrote an op-ed piece refuting her allegations which is published in the Bee today.

Jerry

Ginger Rutland: Moral majority - The Sacramento Bee
This story is taken from Forum at sacbee.com.
Ginger Rutland: Moral majority -- Kerry ignored values, and it cost him
By Ginger Rutland -- Bee Columnist
Published 2:15 am PST Sunday, November 7, 2004

Ralph Nader may not have been a factor in the 2004 presidential election but Gavin Newsom was.

Last February, when the San Francisco mayor presided over a gay-marriage marathon on the steps of City Hall, he did more than almost anyone else to deliver the election to President Bush. Following Karl Rove's playbook to the letter, Newsom helped drive millions of evangelical Christians to the polls.In the face of the gay marriage controversy, John Kerry offered a carefully focus-grouped position: He was against gay marriage but he was also against a constitutional amendment to ban it. He was for civil union, whatever that is. But militant gays didn't want half answers. They wanted their status not just tolerated but celebrated.
You don't have to be a homophobic evangelical Christian to be troubled by the aggressive agenda pushed by some in the gay community.

Even tolerant, live-and-let-live parents residing in left-leaning precincts in midtownSacramento are troubled when their kids are offered class credit for marching in an AIDs parade that looks very much like a gay rights parade. They are dismayed when the Civil War is given short shrift in an American history class while the teacher devotes two weeks to a discussion of the Stonewall riots in New York that sparked the gay rights revolution.

I voted for Kerry and would do so again. But by failing to confront the moral values issue more forthrightly, he lost the presidency. I don't mean he should have denounced gays. I don't believe homosexuality is immoral. But he could have taken the opportunity to talk about promiscuity, about rampant sexual excess and its corrosive effects on society, whether gay or straight. He had ample opportunity.

In the midst of the campaign, Bill Cosby provided the perfect opening. When he criticized the violent, profanity-riddled lyrics of hip-hop music, it set off a fury in the white and black media. Tone-deaf and clueless, Kerry ignored it. He should have taken up Cosby's cause.

There was also the Janet Jackson wardrobe malfunction flap. Here, too, the cultural elite tittered and winked and droned on about hypocrisy. It showed that they were out of touch.
It wasn't the nanosecond glimpse of Jackson's breast that troubled so many Americans. The whole crotch-grabbing, sexually charged gyrations in that tasteless halftime show (not to mention the ceaseless Cialis commercials) at the Super Bowl, the most watched family show on television, horrified millions. I can just see Karl Rove licking his lips and rubbing his hands with glee. Again, a missed opportunity for Kerry.

I want to offer an illustrative anecdote here, and I plan to be explicit, so you might want to get the children out of the room. Channel surfing a week or so before the election, I landed on a rerun of "Sex in the City."

The nymphomaniac character in that series is having sex with a casual acquaintance. He's vigorously engaged; she's looking bored, her random thoughts, unheard by the man servicing her, provide the background audio.

Suddenly her voice stops, she smiles, lifts the blanket and announces aloud in delighted tones that her menstrual period has begun. The man on top of her screams. I didn't take notes so I'm not quoting precisely here, but he says something like, " "Oh no, not on my Italian silk sheets. They cost $2,000."You don't have to be a prude or an evangelical Christian to find that offensive. The crudeness stunned me.

"Sex in the City" is just one example of the soft pornography that litters our airwaves. Beer commercials are another. I've not studied the returns in Colorado, but I'm convinced that the Coors beer "twins" ads sunk Pete Coors' U.S. Senate bid.

It's not just white evangelicals who are alarmed by sexual excess. Most people of color - brown, Asian, Arab and those stalwarts of the Democratic party, my people, black Americans - are deeply conservative and troubled by a culture awash in violence and sex.

Much was made of the fact that President George W. Bush didn't meet with the congressional black caucus and genuflect before the nabobs of the NAACP. He till managed to double the number of black voters who supported him.Why? More than any other segment of the population, black Americans suffer the direct consequences of hedon ism, of casual sex, homosexual or heterosexual. In too many black neighborhoods, the rates of AIDs infection, unwed motherhood and absent fathers are at crisis levels.

African Americans understand better than most that these "Christian values" of abstinence and self control save lives and give their children the chance for a better future.

Still, one of the biggest, and for me, saddest, ironies of this elections is that Kerry was on the right side of the most important moral issue of the campaign: war. Yet he failed to talk about the war in moral terms. Kerry never said it is a sin to kill for oil. He never said it is a sin to profit from war.Instead he talked about strategy and tactics. Iraq, he said, was the "wrong war, wrong place, wrong time." He lamented the lost opportunity "at Tora Bora." He bemoaned the fact that "the president outsourced the war to Afghan warlords."

Kerry never talked about the president's disastrous domestic record in moral terms either. He should have. It is a sin that in the richest country in the word, children are homeless and hungry. It is a sin to deny health care to people or to despoil the earth.

I don't know why Kerry never did these things. I suspect it's cultural, that he is a hard-headed New Englander who has been schooled to keep his emotions to himself. His strict code, a code shared by the president's father, would not allow him to wear his religion or his morality on his sleeve.

I respect that. But that restraint comes with a price. In a contest over genuine morals, Kerry should have won handily over George W. Bush. Instead, he lost resoundingly.

I voted for John Kerry; I would vote for him again. I think he represents those values that reflect the true goodness of this country. To me, it's a tragedy he was not able to convey that simple but essential message to the American public.

About the writer: Reach Ginger Rutland at (916) 321-1917 or grutland@sacbee.com
This article is protected by copyright and should not be printed or distributed
for anything except personal use.
Copyright © The Sacramento Bee
**********************************************
Is it militant for gays to want rights? - The Sacramento Bee
This story is taken from Opinion at sacbee.com.
Is it militant for gays to want rights?
By Jerry Sloan -- Special To The Bee
Published 2:15 am PST Sunday, November 14, 2004

In her column "Moral Majority" (Nov. 7), associate editor Ginger Rutland used some very loose facts and opinions regarding the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered (GLBT) communities that border on a vicious attack to arrive at her point as to why John Kerry and the Democrats lost the election.

First her use of the terms "militant" and "aggressive" is pejorative.

In the last 30 years or so, we have passed laws and had court decisions at both state and federal levels that have strengthened the fact that government will not discriminate against its citizens because of their gender. This has to include marriage.

Even though she qualifies it as "some" why does she label as "aggressive" or "militant" those people who want to claim their full rights of citizenship? Were the 4,000 couples standing in the rain in those long lines in San Francisco "militants"? In California until 1977, as noted in The Bee by Marjorie Lundstrom, same sex couples were entitled to apply for and receive a confidential marriage license. But in that year the legislature took that right away.

What is militant or aggressive about demanding that right be reinstated and Prop. 22 declared unconstitutional? In the 1960s if the question had been put on the ballot as to whether or not Negroes should be allowed to sit anywhere they wanted at the 5 and 10 lunch counter or sit anywhere they please on a bus, it would have been voted down six to one just as ban on same-sex marriage was affirmed by that figure on Election Day in Mississippi.

Dr. Martin Luther King did not crusade for half a loaf. He demanded full civil rights and equality for African-Americans and all citizens. Many at that time thought his demands and tactics were "militant" and "aggressive." Ms. Rutland's examples of an "aggressive agenda" are so weak they are an insult to one's intelligence. She should, as a trained reporter and editor, be ashamed to have cited them.

If she is referring to the annual AIDS march it should be no surprise that it would resemble a gay rights parade since from its beginning it was organized by the GLBT communities. If parents object to their children participating in it, they should have made more inquiries about it and excused their child.

How many parents objected? One or 30? And the cite of the teacher spending two weeks on the Stonewall Riots, if indeed it actually happened, is an isolated incident and certainly is not part of any "aggressive agenda pushed by some in the gay community." While Ms. Rutland magnanimously says she doesn't believe homosexuality is a sin, she is obviously "troubled" by the fact that GLBT people are demanding their rights and demanding them now.

She should read the poem "Democracy" by African-American poet Langston Hughes which I cite in part in closing.

"I tire so of hearing people say, Let things take their course.
"Tomorrow is another day.
"I do not need my freedom when I'm dead.
"I cannot live on tomorrow's bread."

About the writer: Jerry Sloan is president emeritus of the Lambda Community Fund and co-founder of the Lambda Freedom Fair and Project Tocsin. Reach him at ProjTocsin@yahoo.com
This article is protected by copyright and should not be printed or distributed for anything except personal use. Copyright © The Sacramento Bee

Modern Money Changers In The Temple

by Jerry Sloancopyright, 1994, Revised July, 1995 - all rights reserved

"When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the Temple Courts he found men selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the Temple area, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves he said, "Get out of here! How dare you turn my Father's house into a market!"

. . . . . The Gospel According to Saint John 2:13-16, New International Version

$ Money Makes the World Go Round $

For 70 years radio and TV evangelist have been peddling any thing from water claimed to be from the river Jordan which they brought back with them on their latest trip to the Holy Land, to cheap cloth swatches which could be used as prayer cloths.

Gullible people have taken them up on their offers by the hundreds of thousands. So, is it little wonder many Sacramento churches have book stores right off the Sanctuary?

Such commercial enterprises can be found in the Capital Christian Center, the Arcade Baptist Church, or in the case of the Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, it used to be out in the church courtyard, (which is actually where the money changers were located) selling books, and audio/video tapes, supposedly to enhance one's spiritual awareness or all kinds of bric-a-brac from praying hands salt and pepper shakers to jewelry which is supposed to enhance one's testimony to the world of unbelievers?

While such items are tangible, they differ little from the intangible indulgences which were sold in the Middle Ages by the Holy Roman Catholic Church for the forgiveness of sins and other lifestyle variances.

During the fall of 1994, Sacramento was treated to four events which were attended by Project Tocsin that dramatically illustrate the reason Jesus became so irate at the practice of commercial business being carried on in the House of God.

$ Harvesting A Green Crop in Sacramento $

The first event was admission free. It was the Harvest Crusade conducted at Arco Arena by Riverside CA, Calvary Chapel megachurch pastor Greg Laurie whom the Sacramento Bee, for some inexplicable reason, puffed up as the next Billy Graham.

The faithful, as they walked up to the entrance of the arena, were greeted by a large booth selling Harvest Crusade T-shirts and other faith-enhancing paraphernalia such as buttons, key chains and fanny packs.

Inside more crusade staff were found hawking books, videos and audio tapes.

A brisk business was done in both sales areas.

$ Even Puritans Need Money $

The second event also was an admission free conference on Reformed Theology at the Covenant Reformed Church which featured the renowned "Father of Christian Reconstructionism" and Chalcedon, Inc., president, the Rev. Dr. R.J. Rushdooney and the Rev. Dr. Charles MacIllheny of San Francisco, author of When the Wicked Cease the City.

The meeting was moderated by Covenant Reform member Wayne Johnson, a Chalcedon board member and well known Republican political campaign consultant.

Also featured was another Covenant Reform member, John Stoos, at the time, Executive Director of the Gun Owners of California and Republican campaign consultant.

It was attended by about 300 people. The church has a small vestibule but one corner was set up with three large tables piled high with books for sale. Many of the books were written by Rushdooney and MacIllheny on theological subjects. Others were about the "theological" subjects of economics and firearms. The book tables did a brisk business.

$ There’s Money In Them Thar’ Fossils $

The third event was a day and a half seminar on Biblical creationism conducted by the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) of Santee CA at the Arcade Baptist Church located in the Sacramento suburb of Carmichael. The seminar cost $20 for single admission, $ 35 for couples and $ 10 for seniors and students.

About 800 people were in attendance (the auditorium seats 1700). At an average of $15 a head, the door brought in about $12,000. Walking from the parking lot across a large plaza, immediately upon entering the church cashiers demanded the admission fee. There was no registration form to sign. Just put down the money and take a packet which contained information about the work of ICR and the seminar schedule. When I took two packets (I had paid for two senior citizen admissions) I was told that the other person could share with me.

Apparently, the money changer made the heterosexist supposition I was paying for my wife since I had said "she" would arrive later.

Once past the admission table and into the huge church vestibule, one was overwhelmed by a dozen tables, each stacked with two feet or more of books and videos. Many books were in cellophane wrapped packets priced from $50 to $125. A packet of 13 videos was priced $175. A combination of the video packet and two book packets could be obtained for $250.

Again, A very brisk business was conducted as cash, checks, Visa, MasterCard and American Express were deemed to be acceptable mediums of exchange. One of the most popular books sold was authored by featured speaker Herb Titus, Esq., who, until he was fired in 1993, was the founder and Dean of the School of Law at TV evangelist Pat Robertson's Regent University.

Although he denies it, Titus takes a Christian Reconstructionist view of the law which he explained in a new book selling for $ 40 a pop. It sold like hot cakes from a table which at the start of the conference had four stacks over two feet tall containing over 100 copies. When the conference was over there was none.

Project Tocsin estimates the conference grossed as much as $40,000 in merchandise sale which combined with the admission fee, the conference probably grossed in the vicinity of $ 50,000 or $ 60,000. That's a lot of money changing in the Temple!

$ Fleecing the Flock $

The fourth event was a two day, three meeting, admission free crusade with preferential seating provided for "faith partners", conducted by Orlando FL based, controversial TV evangelist, Benny Hinn at Arco Arena where more than a score of tables stacked with merchandise lined the lobby hall. Project Tocsin attended the Friday morning 10:00 A.M. meeting (remember that time) along with about 8000 other people. Also attending were some of Sacramento's most prominent Pentecostal preachers including the Rev. Dr. Glenn Cole of Capital Christian Center, Rev. LeRoy LeBeck of Trinity Church, Rev. Phillip Trudeau of Calvary Christian Center, Concord’s Christian TV Station Channel 43 host Rev. Ron Haus.

Hinn made another pitch for the audio/video tapes, books and other merchandise on sale at each of the four entrances of the arena. When he was through making his verbal pitch for each item, he literally pitched of one each into the audience. Shouts of, "Over here!" came from all corners of the auditorium. He gave some to staff members who then ran down the isles of the floor of the area throwing them into the audience.

All of this took about twenty minutes. Then a few minutes later, Hinn made a thirty minute pitch for people to become monthly "Faith Partners," by telling them all the things his ministry was supposedly doing and all the important people he was supposedly to be meeting, including but not limited to, Asser Arafat, King Hussin of Jordan's brother who was to sponsor a Hinn crusade in Arman, and the President of Zambia. He finally asked audience members to come forward for him to pray over. Hundreds of new "partners" filled the isles and the area in front of the platform. They were given pledge forms, a short prayer and returned to their seats.

A little more music/yak. Then, time to take up the offering. Again, a sustained plea for money which took about twenty minutes. Finally, Hinn preached about a thirty minute message about "The Anointing." As he was about to give the alter call he launched into another thirty minute sermon outlining the book of Acts. He then called people to come forward for him to pray for them that they would receive, "The Anointing."

The crowd pressed forward up on the platform. To those lucky enough to make in on the platform, Hinn waved his hand and shouted "Receive!" at them. Most fell over and "catchers" immediately picked them up to shuffle them off the platform. Some appeared to be disorientated and wobbly. Several times Hinn called certain people back and repeated the process. Three were allowed to lay on the platform, twitching, as he stepped over them.

$ Did His Watch Stop ??? $

Finally, Hinn made one last pitch to ask the faithful to stop at the merchandise tables. The service was officially over at 2:00 p.m. having lasted three hours and forty-five minutes. Well over one third of the time or an hour and fifteen minutes was spent pitching merchandising and taking offerings.

Perhaps the most interesting item offered for sale was a three hour video featuring the late Katherine Kuhlman, with whom Hinn apprenticed, priced at $ 64 each sold by Rev. Ralph Wilkerson, (also on the platform) pastor of Melodyland Church (located across the street from Disneyland) in Anaheim CA.

ARCO Arena has a convenient Automated Teller Machine to dispense needed cash. There was a long steady line of people punching Personal Identification Numbers to get it. This added to the brisk sales being conducted at all of the tables.

And, as the money changers in the Temple courtyard accepted coins from all over the world, the modern money changers in the ARCO Arena accepted all mediums of exchange.

In January, 1993, Project Tocsin attended Rev. D. James Kennedy's Reclaiming America Conference held in the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Ft. Lauderdale FL.

Merchandise of all kinds was for sale all over the church lobbies and halls. One group selling merchandise seemed to have no problem with the fact they were on church property but they didn’t want to handle any money on Sunday because it was the Lord’s Day ... “May we bill you or do you have a credit Card?”

$ HEL - LOOO?? $

What is unclear to even the least sophisticated Bible reader about the anger Jesus exhibited at this abominable practice taking place in God’s House?

What is it these so-called Bible believers fail to understand?

Perhaps that question is best answered with another question posed by the prophet Isaiah who asks, "Who is blind but my servant, or deaf as my messenger?" (Isa. 42:19)

$ Awake O Thou That Sleepest!! $

The abominable practice of merchandising money changing in the Temple is but one of many examples of Fundamentalist Christians, who purport to believe the Bible from cover to cover to be the infallible Word of the Living God, arbitrarily picking and choosing the Scriptures they wish to consider, obey and apply to their everyday lives - or worst yet, impose on the lives of others.

Yet, Christian Reconstructionists and groups such as the Christian Coalition, Focus on the Family, Concerned Women for America and millions of Fundamentalist Christians who support these groups have undertaken a campaign of mixing religion and the politics of Christian Nationalism in the hope that Americans of all backgrounds and belief systems will someday live in a country governed by Biblical Law regardless of how the individual citizen feels about the Bible or religion.

The American people must wake up and understand the agenda which these purveyors of "traditional values" are perpetrating on us or else these modern money changers in the Temple, and even worse, these deaf and blind servants of the Lord will tear apart our society and our beloved country.

Refute Column by Ginger Rutland in Sacramento Bee

In her column “Moral Majority” (Sacramento Bee 11/7/04) editor Ginger Rutland used some very loose facts and opinions regarding the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered (GLBT) communities that borders on a vicious attack to arrive at her point as to why John Kerry and the Democrats lost the election.

First her use of the terms “militant” and “aggressive” is pejorative.

In the last thirty years or so we have passed laws and had court decisions at both state and federal levels which have strengthened the fact that government will not discriminate against its citizens because of their gender. This has to include marriage.

Even though she qualifies it as “some” why does she label as “aggressive” or “militant” those people who want to claim their full rights of citizenship?

Were the 4000 couples standing in the rain in those long lines in San Francisco “militants?”

In California until 1977, as noted in the Bee by Marjorie Lunstrom, same sex couples were entitled to apply for and receive a confidential marriage license but in that year the legislature took that right away.

What is militant or aggressive about demanding that right be reinstated and Prop 22 be declared unconstitutional?

In the 1960s if the question had been put on the ballot as to whether or not Negroes should be allowed to sit anywhere they wanted at the 5 and 10 lunch counter or sit anywhere they please on a bus it would have been voted down six to one just as ban on same sex marriage was affirmed by that figure on election day in Mississippi.

Dr. Martin Luther King did not crusade for half a loaf. He demanded full civil rights and equality for African-Americans and all citizens. Many at that time thought his demands and tactics were “militant” and “aggressive.”

Ms. Rutland’s examples of an “aggressive agenda” are so weak they are an insult to one’s intelligence. She should, as a trained reporter and editor, be ashamed to have cited them.

If she is referring to the annual AIDS march it should be no surprise that it would resemble a gay rights parade since from its beginning it was organized by the glbt communities. If parents object to their children participating in it they should have made more inquiries about it and excused their child.

How many parents objected? One or thirty?

And the cite of the teacher spending two weeks on the Stonewall Riots, if indeed it actually happened, is an isolated incident and certainly is not part of ANY “aggressive agenda pushed by some in the gay community.”

While Ms. Rutland magnanimously says she doesn’t believe homosexuality is a sin she is obviously “troubled” by the fact that GLBT people are demanding their rights and demanding them now.

She should read the poem Democracy by African-American poet Langston Hughes which I cite in part in closing.

I tire so of hearing people say,
Let things take their course.
Tomorrow is another day.
I do not need my freedom when I'm dead.
I cannot live on tomorrow's bread.