US: Archbishop’s 'morality clauses’ chill rights of teachers

San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone's new anti-gay "purity test" for Catholic high school teachers will be added to the faculty handbooks, and outlines the church's teaching that using contraception is a sin and that sex outside of marriage, whether it is in the form of adultery, masturbation, pornography or gay sex, is "gravely evil."

Cordileone is insisting that administrators, faculty, and other staff “must refrain from public support of any cause or issue that is explicitly or implicitly contrary to that which the Catholic Church holds to be true, both those truths known from revelation and those from natural law” — not just in the classroom, but in their off-duty hours as well. 

The archdiocese has proposed contract language that describes faculty & staff as “ministers engaged in this religious mission regardless of individual job description or subject matter.” As 'ministers' are exempt from anti-discrimination law, teachers will have no recourse if they're dismissed. Read More

Russia: This Shadowy Group Is Targeting Teachers Who Support LGBT Rights

A shadowy group identifying itself as the “public ombudsman for children’s rights” turned up at a school in St. Petersburg in what it called a “raid” to demand the dismissal of a teacher supportive of LGBT rights, local media outlets reported.

The group said it showed the school director photos from Maksim Ivantsov’s wall on the Russian social network VKontakte as proof of the teacher’s “propaganda” of “LGBT values.” Ivantsov has spoken out publicly against anti-LGBT discrimination.

Ivantsov is only the latest in a growing list of teachers who have been targeted using the anti-LGBT propaganda law. Read More

US: Texas school claims it had the 'right' to expel student for being gay

The Executive Director of Lutheran High North has responded to a teen who said on YouTube he was forced to move schools for being gay: 'We reserve the right to discontinue enrollment of a current student participating in, promoting, supporting or condoning homosexual activity'

Austin Wallis, a 17-year-old former student at private Christian school posted a video that showed him in tears after he recounted a story of how he was called into his principal's office and told he must delete all social media on which he had revealed his sexuality or leave the school. Read More via Gay Star News

Scholarly research on children with gay or lesbian parents

An overview of research literature finds that children of gay parents fare no worse than children whose parents identify as straight. Taken together, this research forms an overwhelming scholarly consensus, based on over three decades of peer-reviewed research, that having a gay or lesbian parent does not harm children.  Read More 

Transgender kids aren't confused about their identities

Transgender youngsters identify as much with their genders as do non-transgender children, a new study says. The findings indicate that transgender children are not confused or delayed in their understanding of gender, as some have suggested, write the researchers in Psychological Science.

The children were asked different types of questions that have been shown in other studies to be measures of implicit gender identity. When the researchers looked to see if the transgender children’s responses mirrored those of non-transgender kids - known as cisgender children - they found that transgender boys’ responses mirrored cisgender boys’ answers. Transgender girls responded the same as cisgender girls. Read More

Despite Legal Gay Marriage These US States Forbid Teaching About Gay Sex

This month the US Supreme Court announced it would decide in the current term whether all 50 states must allow same-sex couples to marry. But while legal gay marriage has spread rapidly over the last several years, sex education laws in many states remain in the Dark Ages—even in states where gay marriage is allowed.

Sex education is only mandated for middle or high schoolers in 22 states, but almost every state in the nation has policies governing what teachers should emphasize or avoid if they teach sex ed. In 20 states, this means spelling out how teachers should cover homosexuality: 9 states require that information on sexual orientation be "inclusive," while 11 states have either pro-heterosexual or anti-homosexual biases. Read More

British Columbia’s Trinity Western University fights Nova Scotia decision to deny accreditation

British Columbia’s TWU argued in Nova Scotia Supreme Court that the Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society (NSBS) did not have the authority to refuse to approve the university’s proposed law school.

The society’s council decided that TWU students would need to meet national requirements for skills and knowledge required to be licensed to practice law. However, TWU must drop its community covenant prohibiting same-sex intimacy before graduates from the school would be allowed to enroll in the province’s bar admission program.

In its brief to the court, the NSBS argued while the Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects freedom of religion and association, it does not require the society to support conduct that discriminates against others.  “Those who hold evangelical beliefs are not singled out,” the NSBS brief states. “Instead, it is the law degree from schools that engage in discriminatory conduct that is singled out.” Read More

A 9-year-old girl gave this heartfelt letter to her teacher after he came out as gay

A 9-year-old girl has written a heartfelt letter to her teacher, after he revealed he was gay during a lesson on homophobic bullying. 

It reads: “Dear Mr R,

“Even though you’re gay, I will always treat you the same way as I do now. I still think about you the same way as I used to. You’re a great teacher and these are just some of the word’s (sic) that I would describe you as: great, amazing, fantastic, brilliant, awesome and brave.
“The reason why I say brave is because you shared a personal secret which was very brave.
“You don’t have to feel scared because I know that eveyrone in the class feels the same way as I do.

“From A x x

Australian Court: Resort cannot use religion to justify discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation

The Court of Appeal of Victoria, Australia found Christian Youth Camps liable for an act of unlawful discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, arising from the refusal of its manager, Mark Rowe, to allow one of CYC’s adventure camp resorts to be used by same-sex attracted young people.

Cobaw Community Health Services Ltd, an organization working to prevent suicide among young people and to raise awareness about the needs of same-sex attracted young people and the effects of homophobia and discrimination on them, had made the request to host a retreat for same-sex attracted young people. CYC denied them access after learning of the intended guests. Read More

Student gives excellent answer when school asks ‘how should we punish gays?’

When a school in Korea asked its students in a survey on how it should punish gay kids, one gave a strong answer which may surprise you. The survey was conducted in response to a rumour that there was a lesbian couple in one of the school years, and in an attempt to find out who. 

It assured students that it would enable them to help create “a safe and healthy school environment." Read More

Australia's first minister for equality to reform gay adoption laws

Gay couples will be allowed to adopt children in Victoria and religious organisations will find it harder to discriminate against employees based on their sexuality, under changes to be made by Australia's first minister for equality Martin Foley.  

Hours after being sworn in as part of the new Andrews government, Equality Minister Martin Foley promised to waste no time amending state adoption laws in order bring Victoria into line with NSW, Western Australia, Tasmania and the ACT.

At present, gay couples in Victoria can be appointed as foster parents or guardians, but do not have the right to adopt a child together – even if that child has been in their care for years. Read More

Parents of transgender kid post heartwarming births notice

Queensland mum Yolanda Bogert placed a heartwarming birth notice in the classifieds section of the Courier Mail newspaper on Tuesday, retracting her daughter’s birth and celebrating her transgender son’s “arrival”. Read More