Senator Ted Cruz’s father: ‘ObamaCare is going to destroy the elderly’ - by Ben Johnson

AMES, IA, August 13, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Senator Ted Cruz's opposition to ObamaCare is well known. His father's feelings are equally intense, if not as well known.

In a fiery speech on Saturday, Rafael Cruz gave said ObamaCare will “destroy the elderly” by denying them treatment for life-threatening illnesses.

The Cuban native added that a national health care service, liberal abortion laws, and legalizing gay “marriage” are all related issues being used to transform the United States from a constitutional republic to a socialist system more closely resembling his native Cuba.

The elder Cruz told a rapt audience at the 2013 Family Leadership Summit in Ames, Iowa, that he had been imprisoned and tortured while supporting the overthrow of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista. But his dreams that Fidel Castro would bring the island “hope and change” were thwarted.

He said he has seen the same process at work in the United States for a generation.

After the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, “the church remained silent and more than 55 million babies have been massacred through abortion. How long are we going to remain silent? It is high time that pastors stop hiding behind the pulpit, that pastors stop hiding behind the 501(c)3, because we are going to have to be accountable unto God.”

He warned that “life is under attack” in the United States with abortion before birth and “at the other end with ObamaCare.”

“ObamaCare is going to destroy the elderly by denying care by even, perhaps, denying treatment to people that are in catastrophic illnesses.”

The most controversial component of the president's health care plan is the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), an unelected panel that will impose “cost-saving” measures on health care providers. Its foes, including an increasing number of Democrats, warn that amounts to rationing.

Family and freedom are also imperiled, Cruz warned.

“When you hear this attack on religion, it's not really an attack on religion, he said. “The fundamental basis is this: Socialism requires that government becomes your god. That’s why they have to destroy the concept of God. They have to destroy all loyalties except loyalty to government.”

He said the same process is “behind homosexual marriage. It's really more about the destruction of the traditional family than about exalting homosexuality, because you need to destroy, also, loyalty to the family.”

Antipathy to the natural family is a vital component of Marxism and totalitarianism, in general. Dr. Paul Kengor, executive director of The Center for Vision and Values and author of Dupes: How America’s Adversaries Have Manipulated Progressives for a Century, told LifeSiteNews.com, “Marx in The Communist Manifesto literally writes about the abolition of the family.”

Cruz, who lived through Cuba's transformation, said it is well afoot in Barack Obama's America.

“Unfortunately, I hear people saying all too often, 'It can't happen in America,'” he said. “It is happening in America. And our rights are being eroded more, and more, and more everyday.”

Seeing familiar trends – he believed President Jimmy Carter implemented “socialist” policies – Rafael Cruz became active in politics, joining the Religious Roundtable. “It was the precursor of the Tea Party, even before the Moral Majority,” he explained.

His involvement heavily influenced his son, Ted. The father's pride shone through when he recounted that in junior high school, his son read Milton Friedman, Friedrich von Hayek, Frederic Bastiat, and other free market/Austrian school writers. Ted and his friends also memorized the U.S. Constitution.

Drawing on his own experiences, Rafael Cruz remembered how he, the Religious Roundtable, and a landslide number of American voters elected the most pro-life president in U.S. history, Ronald Reagan.

“We did it in 1980,” Cruz said. “We can do it again.”

Obama to Leno: Opposing same-sex marriage, gay propaganda violates ‘basic morality’ - by Ben Johnson

BURBANK, CA, August 7, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – President Obama canceled a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin one day after criticizing that nation's law against homosexual propaganda on NBC's The Tonight Show as immoral.

Obama said the law, which among other things forbids anyone from promoting same-sex marriage, “violates basic morality.”

Host Jay Leno led into the subject matter during Obama's sixth visit to the comedy program, and his fourth as president of the United States.

“I’m surprised this is not a huge story: suddenly, homosexuality is against the law,” Leno said, incorrectly. "This seems like Germany. 'Let's round up the Jews, let's round up the gays, let's round up the blacks.' I mean, it starts with that. You round up people you don't like. Why is not more of the world outraged at this?"

Russia's anti-gay propaganda law, which Vladimir Putin signed this summer, falls short of herding homosexuals into concentration camps. The law fines Russians who advocate gay “marriage” the equivalent of $156 (U.S.). The wildly popular measure does not criminalize homosexual relations but bars any public communications “intended to form in a minor a nontraditional sexual foundation.”

Obama, who did not correct Leno, replied, “I’ve been very clear that when it comes to universal rights, when it comes to people’s basic freedoms, that whether you are discriminating on the basis of race, religion, gender or sexual orientation, you are violating the basic morality that I think should transcend every country.”

He added that he had “no patience for countries” that do not affirm “gays or lesbians or transgender persons.”

The president has signaled that he considers marriage redefinition an inalienable right since at least 2010, when his administration included a reference to “equal rights to marriage” as a part of the first-ever report on U.S. human rights to the UN Human Rights Council.

Obama widened the discussion to include Africa, where he said his hectoring of foreign leaders “makes for some uncomfortable press conferences sometimes.”

President Obama's zeal to secure state approval of homosexuality in Africa, which commenced years ago, boiled over this summer as Obama provoked a confrontation with his African host during a joint press conference with President Macky Sall. The shock waves reached continent-wide, as both the deputy president of Kenya and a Kenyan Cardinal criticized decadent, progressive nations that they said had forsaken God and the natural order.

The president told Leno promoting the LGBT political agenda globally is “very important,” because such prerogatives “should apply everywhere.”

Russia has indicated it will not suspend its law during the upcoming Olympics, leading to calls from homosexual organizations to boycott the event. Obama responded that Russian officials know that "most of the countries that participate in the Olympics...wouldn't tolerate gays and lesbians being treated differently."

His ire over Russia's family-affirming law seemed to outweigh concerns over national security, as he said only that he was "disappointed" Vladimir Putin had granted temporary asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

On Wednesday, Press Secretary Jay Carney said the president had canceled the September meeting with Putin, because “there is not enough recent progress in our bilateral agenda.” He added that Russia's “disappointing decision” on Snowden “was also a factor that we considered.”

Tuesday night's pre-recorded interview ranged on a variety of topics, including NSA surveillance, immigration, and the George Zimmerman verdict.

Click "like" if you want to defend true marriage.

"We don't have a domestic spying program," Obama said at one point. The NSA, he said, merely has "some mechanisms that can track a phone number or an email address” and produces information that “is useful."

John McCain received stout praise from his former rival, who called the senator a "person of integrity" for assisting his push for amnesty for illegal immigrants.

Obama also commented on the shooting of Trayvon Martin, again, noting that Martin was “a perfect kid.”

“We all know young African-American men disproportionately have involvement in criminal activities and violence for a lot of reasons, and that’s no excuse,” he said.

“What I’m trying to do is just make sure that we have a conversation and that were all asking ourselves, ‘Are there some things we can do to foster better understanding and to make sure we don’t have laws in place that encourage the kind of violent encounter that we saw there that resulted in tragedy?'”

Barack Obama has yet to address the Kermit Gosnell case.

Eutanásia: O Fundo do Poço - por George J. Marlin

In Actualidade Religiosa 

Pouco depois da invasão da Polónia, em 1939, Hitler autorizou os médicos alemães a empregar medidas de suicídio assistido involuntário. Foram abertos seis centros de eutanásia, designados, eufemisticamente, Fundações Caridosas para Cuidados Institucionais. Como o nome indica, a matança foi racionalizada como sendo um acto de compaixão.

Os julgamentos de Nuremberga revelaram que este programa inicial, limitado à Alemanha, tinha sido responsável pela morte de 70 mil adultos e cinco mil crianças, apesar de outras estimativas apontarem para os 400 mil. O programa foi encerrado em 1941 por ordem do Führer, porque estava a despertar oposição no país.

O bispo católico de Múnster, August von Galen, causou grande impacto público quando denunciou as políticas de eutanásia a partir do púlpito, em 1941:

Se estabelecermos e aplicarmos o princípio de que se pode “matar” seres humanos improdutivos, então ai de nós quando formos velhos e frágeis! Se podemos matar os improdutivos, então ai dos inválidos que esgotaram, sacrificaram e perderam a sua força e a sua saúde no processo produtivo... Pobres, doentes, improdutivos, e daí? Acaso eles perderam o direito à vida? Vocês e eu temos o direito a viver apenas enquanto formos produtivos?... Ninguém estaria a salvo. Quem poderia confiar no seu médico? O comportamento depravado e a suspeição que entrariam na vida familiar caso esta doutrina terrível seja tolerada, adoptada e praticada são inconcebíveis.

Houve protestos públicos – uma raridade na Alemanha nazi.

A resposta dos nazis foi de transferir os programas para os países conquistados, a leste, onde acabaram por se transformar na Solução Final. O suicídio assistido involuntário tornou-se a “solução médica” para eliminar não só os doentes, mas também os judeus, ciganos e eslavos, que eram considerados raças “doentes”.

Depois da Segunda Guerra Mundial o movimento para o suicídio assistido voltou à clandestinidade. Mas nos anos 60 e 70 estava a regressar, levando o comentador britânico Malcolm Muggeridge a dizer: “Podem submeter isto ao livro dos recordes do Guinness: leva apenas trinta anos para a nossa sociedade humanista transformar um crime de guerra num acto de compaixão.”

Eis que a Euthanasia Education Council mudou de nome para Concern for Dying, Inc.; e a Euthanasia Society of America se transformou na Society for the Right to Die, Inc. Apareceram outras organizações, como a Choice in Dying.

Não deixa de ser preocupante que as mesmas nações que fazem fronteira com a Alemanha e que testemunharam as políticas grotescas de Hitler – A Bélgica, Holanda e o Luxemburgo – tenham legalizado a eutanásia, consagrando-a como direito humano fundamental.

Desde a década de 70 que os tribunais holandeses têm estado a aumentar a quantidade de candidatos à eutanásia. No início dos anos 90 o poder judicial já permitia o suicídio assistido para doentes psiquiátricos que estavam fisicamente sãos. Num caso um psiquiatra foi ilibado de ajudar um doente mental a suicidar-se porque o tribunal concluiu que o doente, embora mentalmente doente, era competente e livre de decidir que queria morrer. O tribunal considerou que seria discriminatório permitir o suicídio assistido apenas para pessoas que sofriam de forma física. A dor psicológica ou mesmo a infelicidade não podem ser excluídas como razões válidas para o suicídio.

Os tribunais holandeses decidiram que quando a consciência de um médico está em conflito com a lei, ele está autorizado a receitar a eutanásia para aliviar o sofrimento. É apresentado como um exemplo de força maior, uma série de eventos imprevistos que anulam as necessidades legais normais.

Num artigo do “Wall Street Journal”, publicado no dia 14 de Junho de 2013, Naftali Bendavid informa que os casos de eutanásia na Bélgica, onde o procedimento foi legalizado em 2002, aumentaram de 200 em 2002 para 1133 em 2011.

Actualmente, segundo Bendavid, “A lei belga reserva a eutanásia para doentes com sofrimento insuportável e condições incuráveis. Mas o sofrimento não precisa de ser físico nem a doença terminal. A lei também não requer que o doente informe a sua família da decisão.”

Para piorar a situação, é esperado que o Parlamento belga aprove uma lei que permita a eutanásia para menores desde que “um psiquiatra determine que a criança tem capacidade de discernimento” e “desde que os seus pais concordem”.

O Conselho para os Direitos dos Doentes comentou, acerca disto: “Se pôr fim ao sofrimento é uma boa prática médica, porque não há-de o ser para quem tem três anos, cinco ou oito?”

Em resposta, o Arcebispo de Bruxelas, André-Joseph Léonard, disse: “Os menores são considerados incapazes para certos actos, como comprar e vender, casar, e por aí fora. E agora, de repente, são suficientemente maturos aos olhos da lei para poderem pedir a alguém que lhes tire a vida?”

A Bélgica e a Holanda já chegaram ao fundo de um poço. Estão a matar, voluntariamente, os nascituros, os doentes, os novos e os velhos – tudo em nome da compaixão.

João Paulo II já nos avisava para isto na sua encíclica de 1995, “O Evangelho da Vida”:

Mesmo quando não é motivada pela recusa egoísta de cuidar da vida de quem sofre, a eutanásia deve designar-se uma falsa compaixão, antes uma preocupante “perversão” da mesma: a verdadeira “compaixão”, de facto, torna solidário com a dor alheia, não suprime aquele de quem não se pode suportar o sofrimento. E mais perverso ainda se manifesta o gesto da eutanásia, quando é realizado por aqueles que — como os parentes — deveriam assistir com paciência e amor o seu familiar, ou por quantos — como os médicos —, pela sua específica profissão, deveriam tratar o doente, inclusive nas condições terminais mais penosas.

Se deixarmos de cultivar um sentido da sacralidade da vida humana até ao seu fim natural – e neste momento a reforma do sistema de saúde de Obama parece apontar nessa direcção – então não se admirem se os nossos hospitais e lares se transformarem em matadouros “compassivos”.

(Publicado pela primeira vez na Quarta-feira, 26 de Junho de 2013 em The Catholic Thing)

George J. Marlin é editor de “The Quotable Fulton Sheen” e autor de “The American Catholic Voter”. O seu mais recente livro chama-se “Narcissist Nation: Reflections of a Blue-State Conservative”.

Cardenal Dolan: Mandato abortista de Obama sigue amenazando libertad religiosa en EEUU

WASHINGTON D.C., 10 Jul. 13 / 10:35 pm (ACI/EWTN Noticias).- El Presidente de la Conferencia de Obispos Católicos de Estados Unidos (USCCB), Cardenal Timothy Dolan, señaló que los Obispos del país advierten que a pesar de los cambios del documento final del mandato del Departamento de Salud y Servicios Humanos (HHS), que obliga a las empresas a brindar planes de salud con tratamientos abortivos, la regulación sigue amenazando la capacidad de la Iglesia "para llevar a cabo la misión y el ministerio de Jesucristo".

El mandato de la HHS, exige que las empresas paguen en la cobertura de los planes de salud de sus trabajadores, tratamientos tales como esterilizaciones, anticonceptivos y fármacos abortivos.

Esta norma expedida en virtud de la Ley de Cuidado de Salud Asequible, se ha convertido en objeto de demandas al estado de más de 200 empleadores que alegan que se les obliga a violar sus creencias religiosas.
 
En medio de protestas en todo el país, el gobierno de Obama se ha comprometido en un proceso de varios pasos para modificar el mandato con el fin de permitir la libertad religiosa.
 
El primer cambio se dió a conocer el primero de febrero, permitiendo excepciones a algunas entidades religiosas pero no incluía obras de caridad, servicios sociales, y demás instituciones que están afiliadas a estas. La publicación final del mandato realizado el 28 de junio ha completado ese proceso.
 
Sin embargo el también Arzobispo de Nueva York, en una declaración de 3 de julio, explicó que hasta el momento no han concluido el análisis de la regulación final pero existen “algunos de los elementos básicos de esta regla que ya han entrado en el enfoque”, subrayando que la Conferencia no ha descubierto ningún nuevo cambio que elimine la necesidad de seguir defendiendo nuestros derechos en el Congreso y los tribunales".
 
La regla final permite que algunos empleadores religiosos tengan una exención total del mandato. Para calificar, deben cumplir con los criterios establecidos en febrero que "se refieren a las iglesias, sus auxiliares integrados y convenciones o asociaciones de iglesias, así como para las actividades exclusivamente religiosos de cualquier orden religiosa ".
 
El gobierno ha declarado que esto cubrirá principalmente "iglesias, otros cultos y sus organizaciones afiliadas".
Grupos religiosos que no están afiliados a un culto específico, como muchos hospitales religiosos, escuelas y organizaciones de caridad, no están cubiertos por la exención. Para hacer frente a estos grupos, el gobierno está ofreciendo una "acomodación" en su lugar.
 
La “acomodación” definitiva requerirá a los emisores de seguros "proporcionar pagos por los servicios de anticoncepción" directamente a las mujeres que trabajan para empleadores religiosos que se oponen a proveerlos.
 
Si un empleador religioso es asegurado por sí mismo, un tercero actuará en el lugar de una compañía de seguros para organizar el suministro de anticonceptivos de los empleados.
El Cardenal Dolan también expresó su preocupación por el intento de la administración para crear diferentes categorías de la libertad religiosa, distinguiendo entre aquellos empleadores que reciban una exención total, las que reciben sólo la acomodación y las que se están ejecutando con fines de lucro y no reciben protección alguna.
 
El Arzobispo señaló que los obispos "están preocupados como pastores por la libertad de la Iglesia en su conjunto - no sólo para toda la gama de sus formas institucionales, sino también para los fieles en su vida diaria - para llevar a cabo la misión y el ministerio de Jesucristo".
 
El Purpurado afirmó que los obispos de Estados Unidos "seguirán examinando" los cambios en el documento de 110 páginas y tendrá más que decir sobre el mandato después de determinar si minará "la proclamación efectiva" de enseñanza de la Iglesia por parte de grupos religiosos.

Kenyan Cardinal hits back at Obama over homosexuality: Progressives ‘already ruined their society’ - by Patrick B. Craine

NAIROBI, Kenya, July 5, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Among the chorus of African leaders responding to Obama last week after the president urged Africans to accept homosexuality was a Kenyan Cardinal, who strongly urged Obama to “forget” his promotion of homosexual behavior.

“Those people who have already ruined their society...let them not become our teachers to tell us where to go,” said Cardinal John Njue, Archbishop of Nairobi and president of the Kenyan Episcopal Conference.

“I think we need to act according to our own traditions and our faiths,” he added.

On June 28, Obama began a three-country tour of Africa by celebrating two U.S. Supreme Court decisions liberalizing homosexual “marriage,” and then offered a thinly-veiled criticism of his host nations.

“My basic view is that regardless of race, regardless of religion, regardless of gender, regardless of sexual orientation, when it comes to the law, people should be treated equally,” he said in Senegal. “And that's a principle that I think applies universally.”

Homosexuality is illegal in [38 African nations], including Senegal, which bans any “improper or unnatural act with a person of the same sex.”

The remarks prompted a quick response from Senegal President Macky Sall, who insisted his nation “is not homophobic” and is “very tolerant.”

The U.S. president was also rebuked by Kenya’s Deputy President, William Ruto. Speaking at a Catholic Church, Ruto said, “Those who believe in other things, that is their business…We believe in God.”

“This nation, the nation of Kenya [is] sovereign and God-fearing,” he added.

“America has made tremendous contribution to Kenya’s well-being and we are very grateful and as a government we are ready to receive any help from America that will improve the lives of our people,” Ruto stated. “But for these other things we hear, it is none of our business as it goes against our customs and traditions.”

The cultural clash on homosexuality has often been exacerbated because Western nations frequently threaten African nations with a loss of foreign aid over the issue.

Homosexuals are born that way, gay activists argue vehemently. How is it that so many have changed? - by Robert R. Reilly

In MercatorNet

Science has been enlisted to depathologize homosexuality in so far as it can lend credence to the assertion that homosexuality is an immutable condition. The immutability issue is as irrelevant to the moral nature of homosexual behavior as it is to alcoholic behavior. Alcoholics, by definition, are alcoholics for life. If they wish to remain sober, they may never drink again.

Are homosexuals like this, also? Will they forever suffer from (or celebrate) their inclination? There is mixed evidence regarding this. Of those wanting to change, some have been able to; some have not. However, except in the very real terms of personal hardship, it does not really matter. After all, everyone is disposed in some morally disordered way or another. The immutability of the condition or of the inclination is irrelevant to the moral character of the acts to which they are disposed.

Of course, some homosexual apologists find the genetic excuse exculpatory. Therefore, they need it for the rationalization of their behavior: if I am this way by nature, how can I help what I do? However, the alcoholic could use the same justification for his drunkenness. In neither case does the inclination neuter free will or responsibility for actions.

However, this issue is extremely important here in the US because homosexual activists wish to establish the immutability of their condition in order to constitute themselves as a “class”. Legally, a “class” can be determined only by accident of birth, by such traits as race or sex. This explains the enormous interest in establishing sexual orientation as genetic or biological. Homosexuals want to be designated a “class” so they can game the legal system for the spoils of discrimination. Therefore, this issue has huge legal and financial consequences.

We can see the burgeoning significance of this matter in Attorney General Eric Holder’s 2011 letter to Congress, explaining why the Obama administration would no longer defend the Defense of Marriage Act, which defines marriage as being between one man and one woman, in court. A group can be defined as a “class”, explained Mr. Holder, if individuals “exhibit obvious, immutable, or distinguishing characteristics that define them as a discrete group”. Therefore, everything hinges upon whether homosexuality is an unchangeable characteristic. Mr Holder announces that, “a growing scientific consensus accepts that sexual orientation is a characteristic that is immutable”. So great is this consensus that, according to him, claims to the contrary “we do not believe can be reconciled with more recent social scientific understandings”.

This bestows upon homosexuals the privilege of being a class, just as are blacks, Hispanics, or women. As a class, they can be discriminated against. Has there been such discrimination?

Mr Holder answers that, “there is, regrettably, a significant history of purposeful discrimination against gay and lesbian people, by governmental as well as private entities, based on prejudice and stereotypes that continue to have ramifications today”.  One of those ongoing ramifications is the restriction of marriage to one man and one woman by the Defense of Marriage Act. Thus, he concludes, this law is discriminatory against homosexuals as a class and, therefore, unconstitutional and indefensible.

Judging “immutable characteristics”

But let us try to put these claims in perspective. Let us say that in cannibals, cannibalism is an immutable characteristic. They simply can’t stop eating people. Identifiable as cannibals, they could be discriminated against as a class. But this begs the question as to whether discrimination against them would be justified or not. Surely, one would think, it would be warranted because eating other people is wrong. Therefore, the discrimination against them is based not so much on cannibals as people, but on their activity of eating other people. If there were nothing wrong with eating other people, there would be no moral basis for discrimination against cannibals.

Likewise, even if homosexuality is an immutable characteristic, what distinguishes homosexuals is their sexual activity. Therefore, like cannibals, discrimination against them would be based not so much on who they are, as on what they do. The whole question, then, turns upon whether what they do is right or wrong. Mr. Holder’s letter clearly assumes that this question has been settled and, in his answer, we see the profound ramifications of the Lawrence v. Texas case and its vindication of sodomy. Using Lawrence, Mr. Holder declares, in an opprobrious tone, that, “Indeed, until very recently, states have ‘demean[ed] the existence’ of gays and lesbians ‘by making their private sexual conduct a crime’. Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 578 (2003)” – meaning, of course, that it was wrong to do so.

Change you can believe in

However, even if one were to grant that sodomy is a morally fine act, the contention that homosexuals are a “class” is indefensible because sexual orientation is not an immutable characteristic – even if some are unable to change it. There is simply too much clinical and other evidence that proves otherwise. A black man has never become a white man, or an Hispanic, a Chinese. A woman has never become a man, or a man, a woman – without massive surgical and hormonal intervention. However, there is ample fluidity, particularly in younger years, in sexual orientation. Straight men have become homosexuals, and homosexuals have become straight. The mutable cannot be immutable.

In 2003, Dr Jeffrey Satinover, a board-certified psychiatrist, testified before the Massachusetts Senate Judicial Committee on this subject. He said that the National Health and Social Life Survey (NHSLS) study of sexuality was completed in 1994 by a research team from the University of Chicago and funded by almost every large government agency and NGO with an interest in the AIDS epidemic.

“They studied every aspect of sexuality, but among their findings is the following, which I'm going to quote for you directly: ‘7.1 [to as much as 9.1] percent of the men [we studied, more than 1,500] had at least one same-gender partner since puberty. ... [But] almost 4 percent of the men [we studied] had sex with another male before turning eighteen but not after. These men. . . constitute 42 percent of the total number of men who report ever having a same gender experience.’ Let me put this in context: Roughly ten out of every 100 men have had sex with another man at some time – the origin of the 10% gay myth. Most of these will have identified themselves as gay before turning eighteen and will have acted on it. But by age 18, a full half of them no longer identify themselves as gay and will never again have a male sexual partner. And this is not a population of people selected because they went into therapy; it's just the general population. Furthermore, by age twenty-five, the percentage of gay identified men drops to 2.8%. This means that without any intervention whatsoever, three out of four boys who think they're gay at age l6 aren't by 25”.

In “Homosexuality and the Truth”,  former homosexuals Sy Rogers & Alan Medinger, both involved in the Exodus Global Alliance, provide the following references for the contention that homosexuality is not immutable:

“Dr Reuben Fine, Director for the New York Centre for Psychoanalytic Training, says in his 1987 publication 'Psychoanalytic Theory, Male and Female Homosexuality: Psychological Approaches': ‘I have recently had occasion to review the result of psychotherapy with homosexuals, and been surprised by the findings. It is paradoxical that even though politically active homosexual groups deny the possibility of change, all studies from Schrenck-Notzing on have found positive effects, virtually regardless of the kind of treatment used...a considerable percentage of overt homosexuals became heterosexual... If the patients were motivated, whatever procedure is adopted, a large percentage will give up their homosexuality. In this connection, public information is of the greatest importance. The misinformation spread by certain circles that 'homosexuality is untreatable by psychotherapy' does incalculable harm to thousands of men and women.’ (pp.84-86)”

Here is what Dr Irving Bieber and his colleagues concluded:

“The therapeutic results of our study provide reason for an optimistic outlook. Many homosexuals become exclusively heterosexual in psychoanalytic treatment. Although this change may be more easily accomplished by some than others, in our judgment, a heterosexual shift is a possibility for all homosexuals who are strongly motivated to change.”

Bieber stated 17 years later: “We have followed some patients for as long as ten years who have remained exclusively heterosexual.”

Dr. Robert Kronemeyer, in his 1980 book, Overcoming Homosexuality says: "For those homosexuals who are unhappy with their life and find effective therapy, it is 'curable'." "The homosexual's real enemy is... his ignorance of the possibility that he can be helped." says Dr. Edmund Bergler, in his book, Homosexuality: Disease or Way of Life?

In his 2003 testimony to the Massachusetts Senate, Dr. Satinover said,

“A review of the research over many years demonstrates a consistent 30-52% success rate in the treatment of unwanted homosexual attraction. Masters and Johnson reported a 65% success rate after a five-year follow-up. Other professionals report success rates ranging from 30% to 70%”.

Stanton L Jones, Provost and Professor of Psychology, Wheaton College, conducted a more recent study of people seeking change in sexual orientation “through their involvement in the cluster of ministries organized under Exodus International”. The span of the study was 6 to 7 years. His reported results are as follows: “Of these 61 subjects, 53% were categorized as successful outcomes by the standards of Exodus Ministries. Specifically, 23% of the subjects reported success in the form of ‘conversion’ to heterosexual orientation and functioning, while an additional 30% reported stable behavioral chastity with substantive disidentification with homosexual orientation. On the other hand, 20% of the subjects reported giving up on the change process and fully embracing gay identity”. Dr. Jones said, “I conclude from these data and years of study that homosexual orientation is sometimes mutable”.

The futility of immutability

If it is even sometimes mutable, then it cannot be immutable. The evidence for this is often disregarded or treated with tremendous hostility by homosexual activists because it imperils their “class” designation and all the goes with it. Therefore, tremendous pressure has been exerted within and on the American Psychological Association and other professional societies to declare that such change is impossible and, in fact, undesirable. Homosexuals who have made the change are viciously attacked and attempts are being made, and have so far succeeded in places like California, to pass legislation prohibiting reparative therapy.

In 2012, California Governor Jerry Brown signed into law Senate Bill 1172, which “prohibit[s] a mental health provider, as defined, from engaging in sexual orientation change efforts, as defined, with a patient under 18 years of age. The bill would provide that any sexual orientation change efforts attempted on a patient under 18 years of age by a mental health provider shall be considered unprofessional conduct and shall subject the provider to discipline by the provider’s licensing entity”. Therefore, but for the stay of a court order, it would now be illegal in California for therapists to aid teenagers struggling with same-sex attractions from performing any type of reorientation therapy on lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender minors.

The Bill announces the premise upon which it is based: “An individual’s sexual orientation, whether homosexual, bisexual, or heterosexual, is not a disease, disorder, illness, deficiency, or shortcoming”. The Bill also quotes an article in the journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in 2012, which states “Indeed, there is no medically valid basis for attempting to prevent homosexuality, which is not an illness”.

While the bill speaks volubly about the dangers of conversion therapy, for which there is only anecdotal evidence, it never once mentions the far greater dangers of the homosexual life, for which there is ample scientific evidence. Perhaps the reason is that its principal sponsor was a homosexual legislator, which also helps explain why the bill does not prohibit therapists from helping straight youths to become homosexual – only the other way around. The totalitarian impulse underlying the rationalization of homosexual behavior is here revealed by the attempt to forbid those seeking help from obtaining it.

Even some pro-homosexual rights scientists are appalled by the outright denial of reality. Dr Nicholas Cummings said:

“I have been a lifelong champion of civil rights, including lesbian and gay rights. I [was] appointed as president (1979) [of] the APA's first Task Force on Lesbian and Gay Issues, which eventually became an APA division. In that era the issue was a person's right to choose a gay life style, whereas now an individual's choice not to be gay is called into question because the leadership of the APA seems to have concluded that all homosexuality is hard-wired and same-sex attraction is unchangeable. My experience has demonstrated that there are as many different kinds of homosexuals as there are heterosexuals. Relegating all same sex-attraction as an unchangeable – an oppressed group akin to African-Americans and other minorities – distorts reality. And past attempts to make sexual reorientation therapy ‘unethical’ violates patient choice and makes the APA the de facto determiner of therapeutic goals… The APA has permitted political correctness to triumph over science, clinical knowledge and professional integrity. The public can no longer trust organized psychology to speak from evidence rather than from what it regards to be politically correct”.

The effect of this political correctness on those seeking help was poignantly related by former homosexual Rich Wyler. His therapist’s name was Matt.

“The first order of business on my first visit with Matt was for me to sign a release form required by the American Psychological Association. Reparative therapy was unproven, the form said; the APA’s official stance was that it didn’t believe it was possible to change sexual orientation; attempting to do so might even cause psychological harm. Yeah, right, I thought, as if the double life I was living was not causing psychological harm enough”.

In fact, the Journal of Human Sexuality (Volume 1, 2009) has reported that, “Those who have received help from reorientation therapists have collectively stood up to be counted—as once did their openly gay counterparts in the 1970s. On May 22, 1994, in Philadelphia, the American Psychiatric Association was protested against for the first time in history—not by pro-gay activists, but by a group of people reporting that they had substantially changed their sexual orientation and that change is possible for others (Davis, 1994). The same thing happened at the 2000 Psychiatric Association convention in Chicago (Gorner, 2000), and again at the 2006 APA convention in New Orleans (Foust, 2006)”.

As mentioned before, some homosexuals who wish to change their orientation have been unable to do so, but many others have. By itself this is substantial and incontrovertible evidence against the theory that homosexuality is an immutable characteristic. (If it were immutable, where has this “class” been throughout thousands of years of recorded history? As Justice Anthony Kennedy said in Lawrence v. Texas, “the concept of the homosexual as a distinct category of person did not emerge until the late 19th century”.) As such, the case for constituting homosexuals as a “class” falls apart and, with it, all the legal and financial benefits from having been discriminated against.

Nonetheless, society as a whole is now being invited, or rather coerced, into the double life of the big lie – to pretend what is, is not: and what is not, is. There is something worse than disease; there is the denial of its existence. This is all part of what Fr James Schall calls the “systematic effort not to name things what they really are so that we are never faced with what we are actually doing”. However, a double life leads to a double death. One is physical, the other spiritual. The worst thing, Socrates warned, is the lie in the soul about “what is”.

Cultural imperialism on the march - Obama Promotes Gay Pride Worldwide - by Robert R. Reilly

In MercatorNet

As June approaches, get ready for the official celebration of “Gay Pride Month” by US embassies abroad.

If sodomy and same-sex marriage are constitutional rights, what is their relationship to American foreign policy? Despite the tremendous controversy regarding these issues within the United States, the Obama administration has gone ahead and placed them at the center of US diplomacy. Why? In Libido Dominandi, E. Michael Jones wrote that the rationalization of sexual misbehavior “could only calm the troubled conscience in an effective manner when it was legitimized by the regime in power… [which] went on in the name of high moral purpose to make this vision normative for the entire world.”

Therefore, the Obama administration, after promoting homosexual rights and marriage in the US, has undertaken the task of universalizing the rationalization for sodomitical behavior and is doing so with high moral rhetoric – in this case, by appropriating the language of human rights.

The effort began in earnest on International Human Rights Day, December 6, 2011, with a powerful pair of events. President Obama issued a memorandum for the heads of executive departments and agencies, directing them “to ensure that US diplomacy and foreign assistance promote and protect the human rights of LGBT persons”. Mr Obama said that, “The struggle to end discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons is a global challenge, and one that is central to the United States commitment to promoting human rights”.

The departments and agencies included the Departments of State, the Treasury, Defense, Justice, Agriculture, Commerce, Health and Human Services, and Homeland Security, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Millennium Challenge Corporation, the Export Import Bank, the United States Trade Representative, and “such other agencies as the President may designate.” All US agencies engaged abroad were directed to prepare a report each year “on their progress toward advancing these initiatives”.

Austin Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, explained,

“They have directed their embassies everywhere to monitor and assist domestic homosexual movements whether the host country and their people accept it or not. The US is very powerful and can force governments to submit to its social-policy views. They are intent on forcing homosexual ‘marriage’ and homosexual adoption on countries that are offended by such things. They are intent on forcing sexual orientation and gender identity as new categories of non-discrimination that will trump the rights of religious believers… Most people recognize that the homosexual lifestyle is harmful to public health and morals. The effect of the Obama policy is to offend billions of people and force this view on reluctant governments. This is most especially offensive to countries that are predominantly Christian and Muslim. In fact, Christianity and Islam are among the chief obstacles of this agenda and policy.” 

State Department sophistry

While President Obama took the action, Hillary Clinton, then US Secretary of State, gave the rationale in an International Human Rights Day speech on the same day, December 6, in which she proclaimed that that “gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights”. She also announced that the US would give more than US$3 million to a new Global Equality Fund in order to help civil society organizations promote homosexual advocacy.

Mrs. Clinton came energetically to the defense of those “forced to suppress or deny who they are to protect themselves from harm. I am talking about gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people”, whom she described with a strong Rousseauian echo as “human beings born free and given bestowed equality and dignity…” But, if they were born free, why are they not free now? No doubt, because society oppresses them, just as South Africa once oppressed its black population through apartheid – an example Mrs. Clinton gives. But history overcame that, and since, as Rousseau taught, man is a product of history, history can overcome this, too. Thus, Mrs. Clinton ends with the admonition, “Be on the right side of history”.  

It is a testimony to the influence of Rousseau that Secretary Clinton should have appealed to history for the vindication of “gay” rights rather than to moral principle. Had it been the latter, she would have had to say rather that, in order “to protect themselves from harm”, LGBT persons should “suppress” precisely that part of themselves inclined to indulge in disordered sexual acts, just as anyone should resist their inclinations to immoral acts, whatever their kind.

Mrs Clinton averred that “being LGBT does not make you less human”. That is certainly so, unless you consistently give in to one of these disordered inclinations. In a parallel case, being an alcoholic also does not make you less human. However, practicing alcoholism by living life in an inebriated stupor does make you less human in the Aristotelian sense that it impairs your Nature or incapacitates you fulfilling it. If it is virtue that enables man to reach his natural end in becoming fully human, then it is vice that prevents him from doing so, thus making him less human.

Fully embracing the rationalization of the same-sex cause, Secretary Clinton espoused “gender identity” as equivalent to being black or being a woman. It is “who they are”. In a moment of humility, she stated that, “my own country’s record on human rights for gay people is far from perfect. Until 2003, it was still a crime in parts of our country.”

It was? What was it? Being homosexual or lesbian was not a crime in the United States, so what was she referring to? Mrs. Clinton never said, but the it to which she alluded is sodomy, the elephant in the room. She repeated the mantra that “it is a violation of human rights when governments declare it illegal to be gay…” and “it should never be a crime to be gay”. One would have to agree in so far as persecution of and violence against homosexuals is concerned but, as Austin Ruse has pointed out, “Such attacks upon individuals are already recognized as violations of human rights in international law particularly in the 1966 Covenants implementing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other existing treaties”. This, then, is moving beyond that to the moral and legal endorsement of certain behavior. Some governments continue to have laws against homosexual acts, which is not the same thing as violating their rights as human beings. Was Mrs Clinton saying that it is a violation of human rights to declare sodomy illegal?

Apparently, for that would be consistent with an understanding of Section 1 in the Obama directive, instructing agencies abroad to engage in “Combating Criminalization of LGBT Status or Conduct Abroad”(emphasis added). What kind of conduct might this be? The only conduct that is or has been consistently criminalized by many countries is sodomy. Morally speaking, sodomy is a fairly unattractive act. Why should it not be criminalized? Perhaps there are prudential reasons for not doing so, but what might be the moral objections to such laws?

The somewhat evasive answer in the Presidential Memorandum is because “no country should deny people their rights because of who they love…” In her speech, Mrs Clinton echoed this response and set this test: “We need to ask ourselves, ‘How would it feel if it were a crime to love the person I love?’”

Well, that depends.

What if the person one loves is already married? What if the person one loves is a sibling? How about a teacher in love with a student? Or a pastor in love with a choir boy? Or an uncle with his niece? Acting upon any of these loves in a sexual relationship is, in most places, a crime. It is not so much whom one loves, but how one loves. How it would feel does not really matter since, in each of these cases, it is morally wrong to sexualize the relationship. Feelings do not change the moral nature of an act.

Why, if all the above cases deserve prohibition, do homosexuals deserve an exemption when it comes to sodomy? Secretary Clinton never said why we should feel for them and not for any of those mentioned above, nor did she raise any of the above examples of criminal love as violations of human rights. Why not?

Rationalizing immoral behaviour

As with all rationalizations for moral misbehavior, Mrs. Clinton’s speech was rife with denials of reality, three of which came in one sentence. She said, “Now, there are some who say and believe that all gay people are pedophiles, that homosexuality is a disease that can become caught or cured, or that gays recruit others to become gay. Well, these notions are simply not true”.

Well, these notions have to be seen as not true for her to promote the “gay” agenda internationally and get away with it. I have never met anyone who believes that all homosexuals are pedophiles, but many of them are certainly pederasts. By setting up the pedophile straw man, Mrs. Clinton avoids this unpleasant reality. Whether homosexuality is a disease or not (it is certainly a disorder), there is ample evidence that it can be cured. Of course, a fair number of people float into homosexuality in their youth and float out again as they mature – no cure required. So much for its being an immutable characteristic.

Others who have become immersed in this life and who later wish to leave it have successfully done so through a variety of therapies. In 1995, the New York Times reported that “Dr Charles W. Socarides offered the closest thing to hope that many homosexuals had in the 1960s: the prospect of a cure. Rather than brand them as immoral or regard them as criminal, Dr Socarides, a New York psychoanalyst, told homosexuals that they suffered from an illness whose effects could be reversed.” Dr Socarides said that his cure rate was about one third. For Secretary Clinton to deny this is an enormous disservice to the very people whose rights she purports to be defending.

Lastly, the bigger the lie, the bolder the assertion – as in Mrs. Clinton’s outright denial that “gays recruit others to become gay”. In my professional career in the arts, I witnessed such recruitment, saw its occasional success, and was several times the object of it. Anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of the homosexual subculture could not possibly make such a statement.

Otherwise, Mrs. Clinton could have referred to homosexual literature, such as Lavender Culture (1994), in which Gerald Hannon described the need for a youth recruitment campaign: “I believe…we have to behave in a certain way vis-à-vis young people. I believe that means we have to proselytize… The answer is to proselytize. Aggressively so”. He added that, “To attract young people to the gay movement in large numbers should be the challenge to the next phase of the movement. It is a challenge we have set ourselves…” This is not to say that all homosexuals recruit, but to assert that none do is a complete denial of reality – which, after all, is the point of the rationalization.

The State Department celebrates

What this is all about was very clear from the 2006 Yogykarta Principles on the Application of International Human Rights Law in relation to Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity, adopted by the International Commission of Jurists, the International Service for Human Rights, and homosexual activists to influence the interpretation of the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, all UN human rights treaties, and international law as a whole. One requirement of the Principles is to: “Repeal criminal and other legal provisions that prohibit or are, in effect, employed to prohibit consensual sexual activity among people of the same sex who are over the age of consent…” This is the nub of the issue. It is not the status of homosexuals that is so much the matter, as it is the status of their conduct.

In 2008, the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, France introduced a statement at the UN General Assembly, titled Joint Statement on Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Human Rights. It proclaimed that, “We urge States to take all the necessary measures, in particular legislative or administrative, to ensure that sexual orientation or gender identity may under no circumstances be the basis for criminal penalties, in particular executions, arrests or detention”. The Statement was signed by 66 nations.

Under the George W. Bush administration, the United States declined, but in 2009 the Barack Obama administration signed the Statement. While the Statement did not go as far as the Yogykarta Principles, it was clearly headed in that direction. The majority of the criminal penalties it was decrying were not, as the Statement disingenuously suggests, aimed at orientation, but at activity. It is the activity that must be vindicated and blessed as a universal human right.

One of the most immediate results of the priority given to the homosexual cause by President Obama and Secretary Clinton has been the profusion of “gay pride” commemorations and celebrations in US embassies abroad. June is the month singled out for this because, in 2000, President Bill Clinton declared June “Gay and Lesbian Pride Month”, with the last Sunday reserved as Gay Pride Day. June was chosen to commemorate the anniversary of the Stonewall riots as the beginning of “gay” liberation. Ever since, every government agency has observed it. As of 2011, it moved overseas as part of US foreign policy.

Therefore, the US Embassy in Islamabad celebrated its first-ever lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) “pride celebration” with an event on June 26, 2011. The embassy said the purpose of meeting was to demonstrate “support for human rights, including LGBT rights, in Pakistan at a time when those rights are increasingly under attack from extremist elements throughout Pakistani society.” Richard Hoagland, the US deputy chief of mission, was quoted on the embassy website, as saying, “I want to be clear that the US Embassy is here to support you and stand by your side every step of the way”.

However, it is Pakistan’s Penal Code, not extremist elements, that, in Section 377 (introduced at the time of British colonialism), states, “Whoever voluntarily has carnal intercourse against the order of nature with any man, woman or animal, shall be punished… with imprisonment of either description for a term which shall not be less than two years nor more than ten years, and shall also be liable to fine.”

If the Pakistani embassy in Washington DC held a public event in which it encouraged that the domestic laws in the United States be changed in order to re-criminalize sodomy, we might be somewhat surprised and irritated. Why should the Pakistani people be less annoyed by the US Embassy telling them to change its laws in order to decriminalize sodomy? Why exactly is that our business?

All Islamic groups in Pakistan condemned the “pride” event as a form of “cultural terrorism” against democratic Pakistan. Students protested against what they called “the attempts of the United States to promote vulgarity in Islamic societies under the pretext of human rights”. One speaker at a demonstration said, “Now the United States wants to project and promote objectionable, unnatural, abnormal behaviors under the pretext of equality and human rights, which is not at all acceptable… If you destroy the morality of the society, you have destroyed it completely.”  

In Nairobi, Kenya, June, 2012, the US Embassy hosted what is thought to be the first “Gay Pride” event in that country. John Haynes, a public affairs officer at the US embassy, introduced the event: "The US government for its part has made it clear that the advancement of human rights for LGBT people is central to our human rights policies around the world and to the realization of our foreign policy goals". Homosexual acts are illegal in Kenya, just as they were in parts of the United States until 2003. Now, as part of our foreign policy, apparently we tell Kenya to change its laws.

The US Embassy in Vientiane, Laos, proudly displays webpage news from its 2012 “first-ever Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Pride event on June 25 in Vientiane. The event, called ‘Proud to be Us!’, was produced by a group of young Lao LGBT activists and featured music, dance, skits, and dramas exploring issues faced by LGBT people in Laos today, such as discrimination, gender roles, and sexual health”.

On the webpage of the US Embassy in Prague, Czech Republic, a joint statement was issued which the US ambassador, Norman Eisen, had signed. It declared: “On the occasion of the 2nd annual Prague Pride Festival (2012), we express our solidarity with the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities of the Czech Republic in their celebration… The Prague Pride Festival reminds us that ensuring LGBT rights is an important aspect of fulfilling our broader international human rights commitments since the full recognition of those rights is still one of the world’s remaining human rights challenges. Safeguarding human rights and guarding against intolerance requires constant vigilance in the Czech Republic, as in all our countries. Therefore today, we align ourselves with the Prague Pride participants…”

This type of thing at US embassies has become standard. As then-Secretary of State Clinton proclaimed in June, 2012: “United States Embassies and Missions throughout the world are working to defend the rights of LGBT people of all races, religions, and nationalities as part of our comprehensive human rights policy and as a priority of our foreign policy. From Riga, where two US Ambassadors and a Deputy Assistant Secretary marched in solidarity with Baltic Pride; to Nassau, where the Embassy joined together with civil society to screen a film about LGBT issues in Caribbean societies; to Albania, where our Embassy is coordinating the first-ever regional Pride conference for diplomats and activists to discuss human rights and shared experiences”.

Forcing other countries to adopt US standards

As in Pakistan, there has been some blowback from the effort to legitimize sodomy and promote same-sex marriage. When the acting ambassador in El Salvador, Mari Carmen Aponte, wrote an op-ed in a major Salvadoran newspaper, La Prensa Grafica, implying that the disapproval of homosexual behavior is animated by “brutal hostility” and “aggression” by “those who promote hatred”, a group of pro-family associations fought back. On July 6, 2011, they wrote,

“Ms. Aponte, in clear violation of the rules of diplomacy and international rights laws, you intend to impose to (sic) Salvadorans, disregarding our profound Christian values, rooted in natural law, a new vision of foreign and bizarre values, completely alien to our moral fiber, intending to disguise this as ‘human rights’… The only thing we agree with from your article, is to repudiate violence against homosexuals, bisexuals, transsexuals, etc.; Against these, just the same as against skinny, fat, tall or short ... This of course does not mean accepting the legal union between same sex individuals or to add new types of families like bisexual, tri-sexual, multi-sexual and the full range of sexual preferences. Not accepting the legitimacy of ‘sexual diversity’ does not mean we are violating any human right. There can be no talk of progress if this is how ‘modern’ is defined. We prefer to feel proudly ‘old fashioned’, keep our moral values, preserve our families and possess the clarity of what defines good and evil.” 

As mentioned above, Secretary Clinton said that “gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights”. The problem with this should be self-evident. The promotion of gay rights must come at the expense of the promotion of human rights because the two notions are immiscible. One is founded on the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God and the other on moral relativism, which eviscerates the very idea of natural rights and the natural law on which they are based. If you have one, you cannot have the other. You have your rights by virtue of being a human being, and not by anything else – not ethnicity, not religion, not race, not tribe, not sexual orientation.

I deplore, for instance, the persecution of Baha’is in Iran and the persecution of Ahamdis in Pakistan. Being a Baha’i or being an Ahmadi no doubt constitutes the identity of these people who are being persecuted. Nonetheless, there is no such thing as Ahmadi rights or Baha’i rights: there are only human rights. And our defense of them comes precisely at the level of principle in the inalienable right to freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, and freedom of expression.

Were we to construct such a thing as Ahmadi rights or Baha’i rights or “gay” rights, we would be eviscerating the foundations for those very human rights, which have to be universal by definition in order to exist. If one has rights as a Baha’i, what happens to those rights if one converts to, say Christianity? Does one then lose one’s Baha’i rights and obtain new Christian rights? What happens to one’s “gay” rights if one goes straight?

One does not possess or attain rights in this way. They are inalienable because one possesses them by virtue of one’s human nature – not due to any other specificity regarding race, class, gender or religion. Either they exist at that level, or they do not exist at all. If someone tries to appropriate human rights for something that applies to less than everyone, then you may be sure that they are undermining very notion of human rights. If there are abuses, and this includes abuses against homosexuals, then they should be opposed from the perspective of human rights, not manufactured rights that obtain to just a specific group.

If the United States wishes to promote democratic principles and constitutional rule in other countries, but insists on inserting a manufactured right such as “gay” rights as integral to that program, it will be rejected overall by religious people and by those who, through the examination of moral philosophy, have arrived at the existence of human rights from natural law. If we wish not only to make ourselves irrelevant, but an object of derision in the Muslim and other parts of world, all we have to do is openly promote the rationalization of homosexual behavior, which is explicitly taught against as inherently immoral by Islam and, in fact, by every minority religion in those Muslim-majority countries, including Christianity and Judaism.

If we wish to make this part of American public diplomacy, as we have been doing, we can surrender the idea that the United States is promoting democracy in those countries because they are already responding, “If this is democracy, we don’t want it, thank you; we would rather keep our faith and morals.” This approach not only undermines the foundation of human rights abroad but here, as well.

But, of course, democracy is not the real goal; the goal is the universalization of the rationalization for sodomy. This is now one of the depraved purposes of US foreign policy. The light from the City on the Hill is casting a very dark shadow.