Article by Cameron Spink

I suppose it has been building up to this for some time. The lines have been drawn and there is an all-out war brewing. This one will, hopefully, have no deaths but it will have victims. This week the federal Labor assembly are going to lean on Julia Gillard to change the Party's stance on same-sex marriage. And they're going to lean hard. It will be interesting to see whether Julia caves. Unfortunately, it feels very much like the dam wall is going to explode.

Yet I choose to stand before this forth-coming current and encourage others to stand with me. We face a fierce opposition. One with the deluded belief that they are fighting for what is right. Yet they are not the enemy. They are merely his "useful idiots". Doing his bidding and remaining oblivious to the damage they are causing. Or, even worse, rejoicing in their destruction.

One such organisation who have been causing mischief for some time now is GetUp!. This group is an ardent supporter of "marriage equality" and last week released this short clip:

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Amazingly it has had over 3 million views. Because of its influence something needs to be said to curtail the lies presented in this storyline. The general gist of this video is that homosexual couples are no different than heterosexual couples. This is an extremely false assertion.

"As both homosexual and non-homosexuals have admitted, and as has been thoroughly documented by scientific studies, the homosexual lifestyle is in many respects a very risky, even dangerous, lifestyle. It is associated with numerous illnesses and diseases and at higher levels than among non-homosexuals. Much of this is associated with the promiscuous and high-risk nature of homosexuality.

In general, homosexual relationships do not offer the same stability and permanence as do heterosexual relationships. A number of studies have been conducted over the past few decades to show that the average homosexual relationship is far from stable and monogamous. Indeed, it can instead be characterised as highly unstable and promiscuous."

Bill Muehlenberg - Strained Relations, pg 9

If you wish to delve into this evidence then you should purchase Bill's book. Many homosexual advocates know that the truth cannot bend itself to their cause. So instead they have been using guerrilla warfare tactics. This is achieved by convincing the everyday person that there is nothing wrong, or different, about homosexuality. And, of course, the best way to do this is to filter messages through the mainstream media. Preferably by using popular television fictional shows. This has been going on for many years now.

It is because of this phenomenon that we, as Christians, must stand in a world deprived of truth. Some people will say that all religious people talk about is homosexuality and there are some of my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ who say that they don't want to deal with this issue anymore. Eric Redmond and Kevin DeYoung have a sufficient reply for those who thing that:

"The issue of homosexuality should not be ignored or sidestepped in order to get on with "more important things." Of course, we would all rather focus on evangelism and discipleship. But perhaps our prayers for renewal will be answered by taking a courageous and crystal clear stance with regards to homosexuality. Much is at stake in this debate.

Grace is at stake in this debate over homosexuality. Will we offer people the grace to change or affirm them in behaviour that the Bible has said is inappropriate? And when we offer people grace in Jesus' name, will it be cheap grace that advocates mercy apart from justice, election without sanctification, and Christianity without discipleship?

Our approach to the Bible is at stake. Theologians have always recognized that God unfolds his truth in Scripture by means of progressive revelation. But does this mean we need to look for "new light" that contradicts the consistent witness of Scripture? Do we think God has changed his mind on this issue? How will we know? And what does this do to our confidence in the Bible? Are the Scriptures clear and complete, or might we need a better ethic than the New Testament?

Where we find the authority for our beliefs is at stake. Will we allow this issue to be settled by the back-and-forth debate in medical journals and psychological studies, or will we stand on the Bible alone and examine general revelation through the spectacles of Scripture?

Our pastoral approach to persons struggling with same-gender attraction is at stake. At our best, we who oppose homosexual behaviours do so motivated by love - love for the hurting, the struggling, the ostracized, and the confused. We want to minister, as Jesus did, with grace and truth...."

Kevin DeYoung & Eric Redmond - Don't Call It A Comeback, pgs 176-177

Another Christian commentator, Albert Mohler, made this powerful comment:

"Our churches must teach the basics of biblical morality to Christians who will otherwise never know that the Bible prescribes a model for sexual relationships. Young people must be told the truth about homosexuality-and taught to esteem marriage as God's intention for human sexual relatedness.

The times demand Christian courage. These days, courage means that preachers and Christian leaders must set an agenda for biblical confrontation, and not shrink from dealing with the full range of issues related to homosexuality. We must talk about what the Bible teaches about gender-what it means to be a man or a woman. We must talk about God's gift of sex and the covenant of marriage. And we must talk honestly about what homosexuality is, and why God has condemned this sin as an abomination in His sight.

Courage is far too rare in many Christian circles. This explains the surrender of so many denominations, seminaries, and churches to the homosexual agenda. But no surrender on this issue would have been possible, if the authority of Scripture had not already been undermined.

And yet, even as courage is required, the times call for another Christian virtue as well-compassion. The tragic fact is that every congregation is almost certain to include persons struggling with homosexual desire or even involved in homosexual acts. Outside the walls of the church, homosexuals are waiting to see if the Christian church has anything more to say, after we declare that homosexuality is a sin.

Liberal churches have redefined compassion to mean that the church changes its message to meet modern demands. They argue that to tell a homosexual he is a sinner is uncompassionate and intolerant. This is like arguing that a physician is intolerant because he tells a patient she has cancer. But, in the culture of political correctness, this argument holds a powerful attraction.

Biblical Christians know that compassion requires telling the truth, and refusing to call sin something sinless. To hide or deny the sinfulness of sin is to lie, and there is no compassion in such a deadly deception. True compassion demands speaking the truth in love-and there is the problem. Far too often, our courage is more evident than our compassion...."

Albert Mohler - Courage and Compassion on Homosexuality

If Christians were to listen to these wise words then we would be on the front foot. Instead we are surrounded by a clash of worldviews. The original intention of God did not include homosexual relationships. Yet those living in sin can still hear His call and the Holy Spirit is still working within their hearts. It is for them, for the truth and for the Gospel that we must STAND FIRM!!!!!

Twelve nurses represented by Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed suit Monday against their employer, a hospital run by the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, for requiring them to participate in abortions. Federal and state law both protect them from being forced to do so.

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http://www.alliancedefensefund.org/News/PRDetail/5174

Article by Cameron Spink

If you haven't heard about planking then you must be hiding under a rock. It is an internet phenomenon that was started in our very own country. In fact, this piece of post-touch down celebration is generally considered to be the first time planking had the limelight:

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Now, it goes without saying that this behaviour at times can be highly dangerous as a "planker" recklessly puts themselves in a situation where they could be seriously injured. Acton Beale lost his life last week while planking, Sam Newman planked on the balcony of his 40th storey apartment and two Santos workers planked on top of two 60 metre high smokestacks. For their actions both workers lost their jobs and police are increasingly concerned with the stupidity shown in light of Beale losing his life.

Both of these responses to planking are appropriate. While nearly everyone involved in practicing planking recognises, to some extent, how negligent they are acting towards their own health and occasionally towards other people, this has not curtailed the buzz sounding the fad. So, it is up to the authorities, be they work-related or state-sanctioned authorities, to stamp this behaviour out.

As well as the story about the Santos workers losing their jobs, another story regarding dangerous behaviour hit the tabloids today. This article speculates that within a decade smoking could be brought under a licencing scheme that both monitors and caps the amount of smokes one is able to consume in a day. Read the full article at The Age.

Now, I am of the opinion that smoking and planking are similar in a lot of ways. Both are behaviours which are chosen to be entered into by the participant, which give you a rush, may give you some social satisfaction, but invariably place you in serious danger. So, why are we responding to planking with such a firm hand but only really seeking to appease the tabacco industry in regards to fully banning cigarettes? Smoking has many more casualties than planking ever will. It is a stupid practice which only has adverse side-effects. Why are we content to merely limit this foolish practice?

Sure, people do have freedoms. But, it is a good thing when the authorities step in, like they have in regards to planking, with a message of no tolerance. Behaviours likely to result in malicious self-harm should not be included in our freedoms. Conducts like this are a blight on society, they are regrettable in hindsight and unbiblical. As Paul writes to Corinth:

Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in your midst? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy that person; for God's temple is sacred, and you together are that temple." 1 Corinthians 3:16-17

Bill Muehlenberg tackles an article in the Sunday magazine claiming that there is no detriment to a child with homosexual parents.

More MSM Activism

Bill Muehlenberg, 13th November 2011

"The mainstream media has long ago become the lame-stream media. It does not any longer even pretend to be covering the news in any sort of objective and impartial fashion. Now it is all about creating the news and pushing PC agendas, nothing more.

Examples of this are easy to come by, and I have documented case after case of this over the years. Today’s papers bring us yet another prime example of this. Consider an article entitled “My Two Mums” found in the Sunday magazine in the Murdoch press. It is a large three-page spread on homosexual parenting, complete with four big colourful pics of such “happy” households.

We are assured in this article that children raised in same-sex households do just terrifically, and that this activity is very normal indeed. ‘Everyone is doing it’ is the message being given here, and time and again we are made to believe that kids raised in such households are getting along just fine.

Indeed, the entire article is one long propaganda piece. It is nothing other than a clear case of agenda pushing and indoctrination. Consider why this is so. In any controversial issue, a legitimate media outfit would strive to achieve some sort of balance, and offer contrary points of view.

But when that is completely absent, then you know you do not have news reporting but ideological warfare. The activist MSM is pushing the homosexual agenda pure and simple. It has not the slightest interest in presenting both sides of the story, and is happy to run roughshod over facts and evidence to push its bent message.

And simply reverse the situation here: if the MSM ever even dared to give a traditional pro-family point of view on such issues, it would be only the briefest of mentions, followed by one homosexual activist after another tearing into that viewpoint.

A brief comment opposing the radical homosexual agenda (if it in fact ever made it into the press) would be followed by a relentless hammering by the activists. That is how the MSM operates today on issues like homosexuality. You simply will not hear the other side of the story. And if you do, it will be featured only so it can be mercilessly attacked.

The pro-marriage and pro-family point of view has been effectively censored out of public debate in the MSM. The activists in the MSM have declared war on our values and beliefs, and they do not even worry anymore about the blatant one-sided propaganda campaign they are conducting.

The truth is, there would have been plenty of contrary voices to be heard in an article such as this, but the author and the newspaper refused to give them a run. And for good measure, they do throw in some paragraphs on Christianity, but only to attack it for being “strict” and “judgemental”. This is so darn typical of the MSM.

Thus we get the usual lies, such as the following: “Research consistently concludes that children with same-sex parents suffer no disadvantages.” This point is made throughout the article. It is blatantly false however. Indeed, such is the censorship that now fully reigns in the MSM that I have had to write a book to try to get the truth out into the public arena.

In my new volume Strained Relations: The Challenge of Homosexuality, I have several large chapters on this very issue. The reality is in fact light-years away from the message presented in this article. Let me here just offer a few snippets from my book: “Most of these studies purporting to show that children raised in same-sex households do as well as other children have been roundly criticised for methodological shortcomings.

“One meta-analysis of 49 such studies found a number of methodological flaws. These include the lack of any proper hypothesis statement, the problem of affirming the null hypothesis, the lack of proper comparison groups, the problem of measurement error and probability, neglect of extraneous variables, and so on. On a less technical level, these studies suffer from small sample sizes, lack of a proper control group, inadequacy of self-reporting, and lack of proper timeframe (longitudinal analysis).

“Two US researchers, after examining the available data, said that ‘studies on same-sex parenting are plagued with persistent limitation[s]’. They conclude their study with these words: ‘we cannot be confident concerning the generalizability of many of the findings’.

“Another expert, sociologist Steven Nock of the University of Virginia, who claims to be agnostic on the question of same-sex marriage and the like, has also analysed the literature on homosexual parenting. He came up with these conclusions: ‘1) all of the studies I reviewed contained at least one flaw of design or execution; and 2) not a single one of those studies was conducted according to general accepted standards of scientific research.’

“Consider self-reporting. Most of these studies simply ask the children how they enjoy their same-sex parents. Not surprisingly, they don’t find any problems. But what child is going to bag his or her own parents? Indeed, if that is all they have known, it is even more difficult to criticise it. Thus scientific objectivity is sorely lacking in these types of studies. And since homosexual parenting is relatively recent, most children in same-sex households are relatively young. So asking 10-year-olds about their social, mental and psychological well-being may not result in very reliable data.

“But many of the children in same-sex households originally came from heterosexual families, making measurement more difficult. How much of their well-being or lack of it is attributable to heterosexual upbringing, and how much is attributable to homosexual upbringing?

“As but one example, pro-homosexual researchers have admitted that their study used ‘volunteers obtained though gay and single-parent magazines and associations. Obviously these do not constitute random samples, and it is not possible to know what biases are involved in the method of sample selection.’ Obviously indeed.”

I offer far more research and data in my book on all this. I encourage all of you to get it so that you can counter this MSM propaganda machine. We are in a war of ideas, and the MSM is only giving us its version of events. It is imperative that we all know the truth about such things, and that we get this truth out into the public arena as widely and as rapidly as possible.

If we lose this battle, we will largely have only ourselves to blame, for failing to be well read on this, for failing to make our case in the public arena, and for failing to have the courage and decency to act on the welfare of our children."

Used with Permission

Click here to go to Bill's site.

Over in America College Football has been rocked by the controversy surrounding recrod-breaking coach Joe Paterno. Albert Mohler weighs in with a timely opinion:

The Tragic Lessons of Penn State — A Call to Action
Albert Mohler, 10th November 2011

"No one thought it would end this way. Joe Paterno, the legendary head football coach at Penn State University heard of his firing by the school’s board of trustees by phone last night. Just two weeks after achieving the most wins of any NCAA Division One football coach in history, Paterno was fired. His firing — a necessary action by the Penn State board of trustees — holds lessons for us all.

Almost a decade ago, a graduate assistant told Coach Paterno that an assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky, had been observed forcing a young boy into a sexual act in the school’s football locker room showers. Sandusky was himself a big name in Penn State football, and he was considered a likely successor to Paterno if the head coach had retired. Sandusky also ran a non-profit organization for boys, and he brought the boys onto the Penn State campus. He continued to do so even after his own retirement from Penn State’s coaching staff.

After hearing the report, Paterno informed university officials of the accusation. At that point, little or nothing seems to have happened. The scandal broke into public view last Saturday, when Sandusky was arrested and charged with 40 felony counts of sexual abuse involving young boys. Penn State had been harboring a serial child sex abuser. Also arrested were the university’s athletic director and its senior vice president of business and finance. Both were charged with failure to report the abuse and with perjury.

What about Paterno and the university’s president, Graham B. Spanier? The Pennsylvania grand jury said that both men had knowledge of the 2002 first-hand report of abuse, and neither contacted the police. Furthermore, Sandusky was allowed some use of university facilities even long after this report. Paterno went back to coaching football. Spanier went back to raising money and building the school’s reputation. Jerry Sandusky had every opportunity to keep on sexually abusing young boys.

When the facts became known, the firings of both Paterno and Spanier were inevitable and necessary. Both men had credible knowledge that young boys were being sexually abused, and neither did anything effective to stop it. Most crucially, neither man did what they should have done within minutes of hearing the first report — contact law enforcement immediately.

Every single coach, athletic director, and college or university president awoke this morning to a changed world. Nothing will ever be the same again. The firing of Joe Paterno will send shock waves through the entire world of higher education. A man who a day before had announced under pressure that he would retire at the end of the season was told by phone that he would never coach another game. Penn State University will forever be associated with a scandal the likes of which college athletics has, thankfully, never seen before.

But the world has not only changed for college athletics. The detonation of the Penn State scandal must shake the entire nation into a new moral awareness. Any failure to report and to stop the sexual abuse of children must be made inconceivable. The moral irresponsibility that Penn State officials demonstrated in this tragedy may well be criminal. There can be no doubt that all of these officials bear responsibility for allowing a sexual predator to continue his attacks.

What about churches, Christian institutions, and Christian schools? The Penn State disaster must serve as a warning to us as well, for we bear an even higher moral responsibility.

The moral and legal responsibility of every Christian — and especially every Christian leader and minister — must be to report any suspicion of the abuse of a child to law enforcement authorities. Christians are sometimes reluctant to do this, but this reluctance is both deadly and wrong.

Sometimes Christians are reluctant to report suspected sexual abuse because they do not feel that they know enough about the situation. They are afraid of making a false accusation. This is the wrong instinct. We do not have the ability to conduct the kind of investigation that is needed, nor is this assigned to the church. This is the function of government as instituted by God (Romans 13). Waiting for further information allows a predator to continue and puts children at risk. This is itself an immoral act that needs to be seen for what it is.

A Christian hearing a report of sexual abuse within a church, Christian organization, or Christian school, needs to act in exactly the same manner called for if the abuse is reported in any other context. The church and Christian organizations must not become safe places for abusers. These must be safe places for children, and for all. Any report of sexual abuse must lead immediately to action. That action cannot fall short of contacting law enforcement authorities. A clear lesson of the Penn State scandal is this: Internal reporting is simply not enough."

Click here to read the full article on Albert Mohler's website.