Canada

Two weeks after Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman got “married” to his male companion, Liberal MP Scott Brison (Kings-Hants) became the first federally elected politician to “marry” his homosexual partner, Maxime St. Pierre. Ontario Progressive Conservative leader John Tory made it a point to publicly note that he sent a gift to Smitherman. Among the guests at the Brison wedding were former prime minister Paul Martin and Liberal MP Ken Dryden … Bob Mills, the mayor of Truro, N.S., refused to fly the homosexual rainbow flag at city hall because it contradicted his Christian beliefs. City council supported the decision in a 6-1 informal vote. Mills told the Halifax Chronicle Herald, “I do happen to believe what’s in the Scriptures and, on that basis, it puts me in kind of a hard spot to support same-sex ‘marriage’ or gay pride. It comes down to what you believe” … A Canadian Human Rights Commission complaint against the conservative website Free Dominion was dropped even before the CHRC mailed the couple who host the site, Mark and Connie Fournier, to inform them they were being targeted for “hate speech.” Marie-Line Gentes had claimed that two postings by Bill Whatcott constituted the hate speech. Whatcott’s posts included the statements, “I can’t figure out why the homosexuals I ran into are on the side of the Muslims. After all, Muslims who practise Sharia law tend to advocate beheading homosexuals” and “I defy Islamic censorship and speak about what I believe is the truth about violent Islamism and its threat to religious liberty in Canada.” Gentes dropped the complaint before the July 16 letter was sent to the Fourniers – a letter that demanded a response by July 18. Two weeks later, the CHRC informed the couple that the complaint had been dropped.

United States

The 4.8 million-member Evangelical Lutheran Church of America passed a resolution (538-431) at its national assembly in Chicago, stating it would keep in place, but no longer enforce, a ban against sexually active homosexual clergy. Jaynan Clark Egland, president of the Word Alone Network, said, “I don’t know, as a Christian, as a pastor and as a parent, what really would be worse – a church with no biblical standards to govern our ministry or standards we don’t intend to enforce” … Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and a candidate for the Republican Party presidential nomination, told Newsday he believes “enough” pro-lifers will support him to help him “win the nomination.” On the campaign trail, Giuliani is highlighting the fact that, despite his own “personally opposed, but keep abortion legal” views, adoptions increased 133 per cent and abortions decreased 16 per cent during his tenure in New York, due to changes in the tax system he brought in and promised to make national if elected president … James Bopp Jr., general counsel to theNational Right to Life Committee, is warning Republicans not to risk defeat in 2008 by nominating a pro-abortion presidential candidate: “For the Republican Party to nominate a pro-choice candidate would be very destructive of the party,” he said.

International

When the UN’s Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women criticized Pakistan for not legalizing abortion, the Pakistani delegation informed CEDAW that, “Abortion is considered murder once a fetus is conceived and it is illegal in our country, except to save the life of the mother.” CEDAW has also called upon Belize, Brazil, Honduras, Kenya and Liechtenstein to liberalize their abortion laws, calling Honduras’s pro-life law “a crime” … CEDAW has also called upon Brazil to legalize same-sex “marriage” … Socialist (MAS) President Evo Morales is drafting a new constitution for Bolivia. More than 20,000 people marched in Sucre, where the Constitutional Assembly was meeting, demanding protection for the unborn and defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman … TheInternational Right to Life Federation newsletter reports that, “The Westminster government in the U.K. has assured Northern Ireland that there are no plans to extend the pro-abortion law into that area” … China’s National Population and Family Planning Commission will introduce new one-child policy propaganda slogans, because the old ones were deemed unfriendly. Examples of slogans to be replaced include, “Those who do not follow the one-child policy will see their homes collapsed and families broken,” “One more baby means one more tomb,” “Houses toppled, cows confiscated, if abortion demand rejected,” and “Better to let blood turn into a river than to add a new person to our population.” Among the 190 new approved slogans are: “Mother Earth is exhausted, no longer able to bear with more children” and “High-quality babies, fewer daily troubles.” Despite the change in rhetoric, coerced abortion and forced sterilizations remain in effect … Dutch Bishop Martinus Muskens says Christians should refer to God as Allah: “Allah is a very beautiful word for God. Shouldn’t we all say that from now on?”