GAY MARRIAGE-KENTUCKY
Jailed clerk vows not to back down, no resolution in sight
GRAYSON, Ky. (AP) β Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis is spending Labor Day in Kentucky’s Carter County Detention Center with her Bible and a clear conscience.
On Friday, several same-sex couples received the marriage licenses Davis had denied them because she maintained that doing so would violate “God’s law.” Her deputy clerks issued the licenses under a judge’s threat of jail or fines.
Federal Judge David Bunning said he won’t release Davis unless she also relents. But Davis’ husband said his wife will stay in jail how “ever how long it takes.”
Attorneys for Davis officially appealed the judge’s ruling on Sunday. The three page motion does not include arguments as to why Davis should be released but amends Davis’ earlier appeal of the judge’s order.
Several hundred supporters of Kim Davis held a prayer rally Saturday on the jailhouse lawn. One protester held a sign pointing to a Bible passage that says, “Acquitting the guilty and condemning the innocent — the Lord detests them both.”
The rally’s organizers distributed fliers urging Christians to “pray that America repents of the sin of celebrating sexual perversion and imprisoning Christian dissidents.”
GAY MARRIAGE-KENTUCKY-GOP 2016
GOP candidates react to clerk’s jailing
WASHINGTON (AP) β Republican presidential candidates are weighing in on the jailing of a Kentucky clerk for refusing to license same-sex marriages.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Ohio Gov. John Kasich expressed contrasting views on ABC’s “This Week.”
Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, said Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis was acting on her Christian faith, yet has been “jailed without bail because she acted on her conscience and according to the only law that is in front of her.”
Huckabee said the Supreme Court decision striking down bans on gay marriage was only the opinion of one branch of government and lacks any supporting legislation.
Kasich disagreed, effectively conceding that the high court’s narrow majority was the last word on the issue and that Davis must obey its ruling.
Huckabee has said that would amount to “judicial tyranny” and that he plans to visit Davis and hold a rally outside the jail on Tuesday.
Kasich said he worries that such battles will turn people off to what it means to be a Christian.
Sound:
126-a-06-(Mike Huckabee, GOP presidential candidate, in interview)-“reserved to Congress”-GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee says he supports Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis, who remains in jail. COURTESY: ABC’s ‘This Week’ ((mandatory on-air credit)) (6 Sep 2015)
< 128-a-12-(Mike Huckabee, GOP presidential candidate, in interview)-“put in jail”-GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee says there is another instance where officials violated laws regarded gay marriage but did not go to jail. COURTESY: ABC’s ‘This Week’ ((mandatory on-air credit)) (6 Sep 2015) < 127-a-16-(Mike Huckabee, GOP presidential candidate, in interview)-“the very Constitution”-GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee says there’s a much bigger issue surrounding the controversy over Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis. COURTESY: ABC’s ‘This Week’ ((mandatory on-air credit)) (6 Sep 2015) < 129-a-13-(Mike Huckabee, GOP presidential candidate, in interview)-“front of her”-GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee questions why liberals get to ignore laws but the county clerk in Kentucky gets penalized. COURTESY: ABC’s ‘This Week’ ((mandatory on-air credit)) (6 Sep 2015) < 139-w-38-(Tim Maguire, AP correspondent, with GOP presidential candidates Mike Hukabee and Gov. John Kasich, R-Ohio)–Republican presidential candidates weigh in on the jailing of a Kentucky county clerk for contempt. AP correspondent Tim Maguire reports. (6 Sep 2015) < VATICAN-POPE-MIGRANTS Pope: Vatican will shelter 2 families fleeing war, hunger VATICAN CITY (AP) β Pope Francis says the Vatican will shelter two families of refugees who are “fleeing death” from war or hunger, and he’s calling on Catholic parishes, convents and monasteries across Europe to do the same. Francis cited Mother Teresa, the European-born nun who cared for the poorest in India, in making his appeal in remarks to pilgrims and tourists in St. Peter’s Square. A Vatican spokesman quoted the pope’s chief alms-giver as saying the Vatican is now deciding which families will be hosted. Pope Francis has chosen mercy as the overarching theme of his papacy. Practicing what he preaches, he has already made free showers at the Vatican available to Rome’s homeless and has barbers available for haircuts for the needy, among other initiatives. Sound: 132-r-34-(Sound of Pope Francis, in Italian, addressing tens of thousands of people in St. Peter’s Square)–Sound of Pope Francis, speaking in Italian, asking Catholic faithful throughout Europe to shelter refugees fleeing from death, from war and hunger. COURTESY: Vatican TV ((mandatory on-air credit)) (6 Sep 2015) < 151-c-14-(Frances D’Emilio (deh-MILL’-ee-oh), AP correspondent)-“seekers, these refugees”-AP correspondent Frances D’Emilio reports Pope Francis is asking convents and monasteries across Europe to help the refugees. (6 Sep 2015) < 154-c-09-(Frances D’Emilio (deh-MILL’-ee-oh), AP correspondent)-“to say poverty”-AP correspondent Frances D’Emilio reports the Pope has taken a much broader definition of the term refugee than the rest of Europe and its leaders. (6 Sep 2015) < SERRA SAINTHOOD-PROTESTS Pope’s apology doesn’t change opinions on canonization SAN FRANCISCO (AP) β Pope Francis’ apology for the Roman Catholic Church’s crimes against indigenous peoples has not softened opposition among some California Native Americans to his decision to canonize 18th-century Franciscan missionary Junipero Serra. Serra is extolled by the Vatican as a great evangelizer, but denounced by some tribal officials as a destroyer of Native culture. Some Native Americans say the pope’s apology is not a real reckoning with the church’s history of abusing Native Americans. Others say it is meaningless if the pope doesn’t halt the canonization of Serra on Sept. 23 at Washington’s National Shrine. The Vatican has defended Serra as someone who protected Native Americans from colonial officials. POLICE-RELIGIOUS DECALS Police cars’ ‘In God We Trust’ decals draw complaints DALLAS (AP) β A police department in a north Texas has placed large “In God We Trust” decals on its patrol vehicles in response to recent violence against law enforcement officers. But the Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation is contesting the decals as an unlawful endorsement of religion. The decision this month to unveil the phrase in Childress, Texas, follows a similar move by dozens of other police agencies elsewhere in the country. “In God We Trust” has been the U.S. national motto since 1956, so leaders sometimes cite patriotism for adding the phrase to vehicles. But the Freedom From Religion Foundation says the motto has “no secular purpose,” and was adopted during the Cold War as a reaction to atheistic communism. Jeremy Dys with the Liberty Institute, a law firm that specializes in issues of religious liberty, says federal courts have allowed the phrase and other religious overtures as “part of the country’s history and heritage.” ISRAEL-CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS Israel’s Christian schools striking over slashing of funding JERUSALEM (AP) β Police say about 2,500 striking demonstrators gathered outside the Israeli prime minister’s residence in Jerusalem on Sunday to protest the government’s slashing of funds for Christian schools. Christian school administrators accuse Israel of cutting their funding as a tactic to pressure them to join the Israeli public school system, which they say would interfere with the schools’ Christian values and high academic achievements. Some 33,000 students in 47 schools have been on strike since the school year began on Sept. 1. Arab lawmakers joined students, parents and principals at Sunday’s demonstration. They complain of discrimination since Israel fully funds private school networks that cater to ultra-Orthodox Jews while it slashes the Christians’ budget. Ragheed Massad, a student from Nazareth, said “there is no equality for our schools.” Sound: 131-r-05-(Sound of demonstrators chanting while pounding on gate, outside the Israeli prime minister’s office)–Sound of demonstrators, outside the Israeli prime minister’s office in Jerusalem, protesting against the slashing of funds for Christian schools. (6 Sep 2015) < 130-a-14-(Ibrahim Fakhouri, a parent from Nazareth, in AP interview)-“funded 100 percent”-Ibrahim Fakhouri, a parent from Nazareth, says the Israeli government is not funding the Christian schools his daughters attend. (6 Sep 2015) < CHURCH VANDALISM-TAHOE Pastor believes Tahoe church vandalism based on Satanism RENO, Nev. (AP) β The minister of one of several churches hit by acts of vandalism on the north shore of Lake Tahoe says they appear to be satanic attacks by an individual who is “very angry with Jesus.” The Rev. Jeffrey Ogden, Presbyterian pastor at The Village Church in Incline Village, notes that there were “satanic symbols on the front doors of all the churches.” The FBI is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of anyone responsible for the incidents, which began with graffiti at five Tahoe-area churches in April on Easter Sunday and continued in August. Ogden says someone has tried twice to saw down a wooden across in front of his church, and the graffiti includes the words, “Jesus won’t save your souls.” Several members of the churches attended a prayer gathering last week to show support for each other. MUSLIM THREAT-INDICTMENT Trial of Tenn. man accused of planning mosque attack delayed MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) β A federal judge has delayed the trial of a Tennessee man accused of planning an attack on a mosque in New York as authorities and attorneys review information gathered from the man’s computer and a wiretap. U.S. District Judge Curtis L. Collier signed an order pushing back the trial of 63-year-old Robert Doggart from Sept. 21 to Jan. 19 in Chattanooga. That move came after lawyers representing both Doggart and the government filed a joint motion asking for the delay. Doggart, who ran last year for Congress in east Tennessee, is out on bond on a charge that he plotted an attack on “Islamberg,” a self-named mostly Muslim community near Hancock, New York. He has pleaded not guilty. In their motion filed Aug. 25, attorneys said the FBI needs more time to analyze information contained in the hard drive of a computer seized from Doggart’s home.
