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Rick Warren has removed the Anti-Gay language from the Saddleback Churches Website that explicitly banned Gays from being a member of the church.

Previous view of Warren Website Banning Gays from Membership

Now the anti-gay language is gone.

So what’s the story?  Does Saddleback now welcome gays as members of the church? Or is Rick Warren just  embarrassed (and rightfully so) of his views?

And whose idea was it to remove the anti-gay language? Makes me wonder.

Last night on Fox News, Greta Van Susteren asked Mike Huckabee about Obama’s decision to choose pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration. Huckabee — who also has a long record of anti-gay views came to Warren’s defense:

Well it’s ridiculous for people to be upset at Rick Warren. He is one of the most influential spiritual leaders of this generation. I have known Rick for over 30 years. We were actually in seminary together in Fort Worth, Texas, back in the mid-1970s. He is today what he has always been, and that is a humble, gracious, thoughtful, very intellectually capable person.

California Attorney General Jerry Brown has FINALLY asked the California Supreme Court to Void Proposion 8, Bojebo.com has learned.

Jerry Brown filed a brief Friday saying the measure that amended the California Constitution to limit marriage to a man and a woman is unconstitutional. He says it deprives gay couples of a fundamental right.

After California voters passed Proposition 8 on Nov. 4, Brown said he would fight to uphold the initiative in his role as attorney general, even though he personally voted against it.

He submitted his brief in one of the three legal challenges to Proposition 8 brought by same-sex marriage supporters.

Full Story..

Marriage Equality

A gay-rights organization says that a group that ran an ad in the New York Times defending the Mormon church and others’ right to support California’s same-sex marriage ban is lying (Like we didn’t already know) about the nature of demonstrations against the ban.

Brooklyn, N.Y.-based Truth Wins Out took out a full-page advertisement Thursday in The Salt Lake Tribune under the headline, “Lies in the Name of the Lord.”

It’s a response to another full-page ad placed in the New York Times on Dec. 5 about the fallout from passage of a California constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Wayne Besen, director of Truth Wins Out, said in a statement Thursday that the ad was part of a “concerted and ongoing effort by anti-gay forces to portray peaceful marchers exercising their First Amendment rights as violent troublemakers.”

The New York Times ad was sponsored by The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and was signed by several religious leaders, including Rich Cizik, vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals; William Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Civil and Religious Rights; Nathan Diament, public policy director for the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America; and the Prison Fellowship’s Chuck Colson, a member of the Nixon administration who served prison time for Watergate-related offenses.

LDS Church Elder M. Russell Ballard expressed the church’s appreciation for the Times ad in an issued statement.

“This was a thoughtful and generous gesture at a time when the right of free expression of people of faith has come under attack,” the statement said. “We join with those of all religious faiths and political persuasions who have called for reasoned and civil discourse on matters that affect our nation.”

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On December 20th, there will be a Nationwide Demonstration and Candlelight Vigil held in cities throughout the country in remembrance of the rights we once had in California and for the rights we will once again have and also for the rights of the 18000 Same Sex couples who married in California before The Mormons that states voters passed it’s Bigoted Prop 8 in November. As I told you earlier, the Bigots Sponsors of Prop 8 filed a brief with the California Supreme Court today asking to have those marriages voided. Let’s stand side by side with our brother and sisters who are in danger of having their marriages voided.  So join your Brothers and Sisters on December 20th.  Click here to find the one closest you.

The sponsors of Proposition 8 are asking the California Supreme Court to nullify the marriages of the estimated 18,000 same-sex couples who exchanged vows before voters last month approved the ballot initiative that outlawed gay unions.

The Yes on 8 campaign filed a brief Friday arguing that because the new law holds that only marriages between a man and a woman are recognized or valid in California, the state can no longer recognize the existing same-sex unions.

The campaign submitted the brief in response to three lawsuits seeking to invalidate Proposition 8, a constitutional amendment that overruled the court’s decision in May that legalized gay marriage.

Both Attorney General Jerry Brown and gay rights groups are maintaining that the gay marriage ban may not be applied retroactively.

The Supreme Court could hear arguments in the cases as soon as March.

Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank released a statement today in reaction to Obama’s invitation to anti-gay Pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at the presidential inauguration.

Said Frank:

“I am very disappointed by President-elect Barack Obama’s decision to honor Reverend Rick Warren with a prominent role in his inauguration.Religious leaders obviously have every right to speak out in opposition to anti-discrimination measures, even in the degrading terms that Rev. Warren has used with regard to same-sex marriage. But that does not confer upon them the right to a place of honor in the inauguration ceremony of a president whose stated commitment to LGBT rights won him the strong support of the great majority of those who support that cause.

“It is irrelevant that Rev. Warren invited Senator Obama to address his congregation, since he extended an equal invitation to Senator McCain. Furthermore, the President-Elect has not simply invited Rev. Warren to give a speech as part of a series in which various views are presented. The selection of a member of the clergy to occupy this uniquely elevated position has always been considered a mark of respect and approval by those who are being inaugurated.”

SAO PAULO, Brazil - A retired police officer has been detained in connection with the murders of 13 gay men in a low-income suburb of Sao Paulo, police said Thursday.

Retired state police Sgt. Jairo Francisco Franco was taken into custody Wednesday night after a witness identified him as the killer of a homosexual man on Aug. 19, said police inspector Paulo Fortunato.

Franco is suspected of acting alone in all of the 13 killings between February 2007 and August 2008 at Paturis Park, a favorite meeting point for gay men, Fortunato said.
Franco, who worked as a private security guard in a supermarket, has denied the charges, Fortunato said. He added that Franco did not yet have a lawyer.

“We have a credible witness who says he saw Franco pump 12 bullets into a black gay man inside the park,” Fortunato said in a telephone interview.
A second witness said Franco visited the park frequently, “apparently cruising for gay men and victims,” Fortunato said.

Police have dubbed the killer of the 13 men as the “rainbow maniac,” a reference to the gay-pride symbol.

“We are convinced he is the rainbow maniac we have been looking for,” Fortunato said.