Clergy Protests MSNBC For Hosting Hate Group Leader Tony Perkins

NEW YORK: Clergy To Protest MSNBC For Hosting Anti-Gay Hate Group Leaders

Tomorrow progressive and LGBT clergy members will protest outside the Rockefeller Center headquarters of MSNBC to express their anger over the network's routine hosting of viciously anti-gay hate group leader Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council. Via Advocate:

“FRC has been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center for using dishonest, incendiary rhetoric about gay and lesbian Americans,” notes a press release from the online action network Faithful America, “but MSNBC has continued offering a friendly venue for Perkins, neither informing their viewers of FRC’s status nor including any rebuttal from progressive religious leaders. Perkins has appeared on MSNBC more often this year than on any other cable news network.” The clergy group will hold a press conference at 11 a.m. tomorrow at Rockefeller Center in New York City, the building where MSNBC is headquartered, then deliver petitions bearing 20,000 signatures from Faithful America members. “The delegation will remind MSNBC that the hateful views of Perkins and the Family Research Council aren’t reflective of the faith community and demand that the network stop inviting him on the air to represent the views of Christians and other people of faith,” says the press release.

New York City Council Balks At Resolution Endorsing Churches In Public Schools

To the surprise of some observers and despite having dozens of co-sponsors, on Friday the NYC Council refused to endorse a resolution in support of a pending state bill that would allow churches to hold services in public school buildings. Religious groups are being booted from city school premises after the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a lower court's ruling that they should not be allowed to rent or have free access to public school spaces.

Andy Humm reports at Gay City News that the resolution was done in by complaints from openly gay Queens Councilman Daniel Dromm:

Dromm wrote to Council colleagues, “I believe allowing churches that preach virulent homophobia in public schools violates not only the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause but also New York City law.” Several students from the Bronx High School of Science testified against the resolution. “If someone is excluded because of sexual orientation, it is a violation of the school’s administrative code,” said Diego Velasquez. “Everyone is supposed to feel welcome. No one in the school is above the administrative code,” including outside groups. Bronx Science does not now have a church worshipping in its school, in part because the school is utilized by students engaging in extracurricular activities on Saturdays and Sundays. But any empty space in the school could be requested by a church whenever classes are not in session under the new state bill. The religious groups using the schools as their churches are capitalizing on the lack of after-school and weekend activities available to students in schools serving poorer students.

Dromm: "I am frustrated that sometimes my colleagues don’t seem to take these churches’ virulent homophobia as seriously as it should be taken. It is an outrage that progressive people aren’t as outraged as is necessary. These issues are at the core of determining whether you’re a progressive."

Last month anti-gay hate groups led a coalition of local church members in a march over the Brooklyn Bridge to express support for the bill. FRC head Tony Perkins and other leading opponents of New York's recent marriage equality law have loudly lobbied Albany for the bill's passage.

Perkins: I'm Still A Not-Romney

"I disagree that Romney has captured the evangelical support, the conservative support. We see that they're warming to him, but he still has a long way to go. I think Mitt is warming to it. He's made statements about religious freedom. I think he can get there. But we're still a ways away from that point." - Tony Perkins, speaking this morning on CNN.

Anti-Gay Hate Group Pushes Bill To Force Religious Services In NYC Public Schools

In a move some are calling an "end-run around the separation of church and state," the anti-gay Alliance Defense Fund has authored a bill that would force New York City public schools to allow religious services on their premises. Sock-puppeting for the ADF is GOP Sen. Martin Golden.

Legislation pending in the Senate and Assembly would overturn the city’s policy banning churches and other religious groups from using school buildings for worship services and would allow them whenever they’re “deemed not disruptive of normal school operations.” “It is an end around,” City Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott told the Daily News yesterday. Walcott also raised alarms about the Alliance Defense Fund, an Arizona-based religious organization that fought unsuccessfully in court to overturn the city’s ban and has worked with lawmakers on the legislation.

The ADF, according to its website, opposes legalized abortion and has fought against the spread of gay marriage and what it deemed the “homosexual agenda.” Walcott said the group’s history is “not what we're about as far as equal rights and equal opportunity.” Sen. Martin Golden (R-Brooklyn), a sponsor of the bill, defended the legislation and downplayed the ADF’s role, saying they were one of many groups that had pushed for its passage. Golden conceded, though, that a lawyer for the group did help his staff craft portions of the bill. The legislation could be approved as early as next week, he added.

As I reported here two week ago, also in this fight is the Family Research Council, who says that New York City is oppressing religious liberty by adhering to a recent federal appeals court ruling that bans churches from renting or having free access to public school property. That decision was refused review by the U.S. Supreme Court.