Two articles about homosexuality and two comments on them:

INFINITE OFFICIAL RESPECT FOR ISLAM BUT NONE FOR CATHOLICISM

Catholics must worship that stupid loser on the cross, I guess. Let's have some fun Jihad instead! In any case, you can believe -- as I do -- that homosexuals should be treated on their individual merits (I don't care where they put their dicks as long as it is not coercive) without also believing that defenceless children should be thrust into the midst of a perverted life

Governor Mitt Romney and a legislative leader yesterday delivered unwelcome news to the Catholic bishops of Massachusetts, who plan to seek permission from the state to exclude gay and lesbian parents from adopting children through its social service agencies. The governor said he was not authorized to give such an exemption, and State Representative Eugene L. O'Flaherty, the House chairman of the joint committee on the judiciary, predicted little support among lawmakers for any request by Catholic adoption agencies for an exemption from the state's antidiscrimination policies. ''I would say there would not be an appetite to entertain that," O'Flaherty said.

The comments were made a day after the Globe reported a plan by the four bishops of Massachusetts -- representing Boston, Worcester, Springfield, and Fall River -- to hire a Boston law firm to explore legal and political strategies for opting out of gay adoptions. Catholic Charities of Boston, the social service arm of the Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, has in the past two decades processed a small number of gay adoptions in compliance with state antidiscrimination laws. The Vatican has stated such adoptions are ''gravely immoral." The bishops' plans are at odds with the 42-member board of Catholic Charities of Boston, which voted unanimously in December to continue the practice of allowing gays to adopt.

Yesterday, representatives of the archdiocese and Catholic Charities said the funds to pay the Boston firm, Ropes & Gray, to prepare a legal strategy for the exemption were coming from the budget of Catholic Charities of Boston. Some board members expressed surprise, and dismay, that the agency's funds were being used for that purpose. The members serve three-year terms and at the pleasure of Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley, several members said. ''I'm shocked," said Donna DePrisco, a board member. ''I find it hard to believe."

One board member, who asked to remain nameless, said the bishops' plans has angered many on the board. The board member said some on the panel may consider resigning if the bishops persist with the plan. Meanwhile, the bishops' hope of getting help from Romney, who is a strong opponent of gay marriage, was dashed yesterday. Romney said that when he read the story in the Globe yesterday morning, he asked his legal counsel to research whether he had the authority to exempt an organization from regulations governing the placement of children with same sex couples. ''My understanding is that any exemption would require legislation and would not be something I would be authorized to do on a personal basis," the governor said. He did not express his own view on the issue.

O'Flaherty said that over a dozen years ago the Legislature adopted the law barring contractors from discriminating against gay couples, and said lawmakers would be unlikely to entertain the bishops' request. ''This is a very divisive issue that I don't see making it onto agenda for a debate," O'Flaherty said. ''We have enough on our plate already." He said he would oppose granting such an exemption to any social agency that contracted with the state, although he said he respected the church's right to follow its own doctrine on the issue.

The bishops may also consider going to court to fight the requirement that they adhere to the state's antidiscrimination policy, on First Amendment grounds protecting religious freedom. In the past two decades, Catholic Charities of Boston placed 13 children with same-sex couples, a fraction of the 720 adoptions the group completed during that time. Those adopted were all foster children who were considered hard to place because they had special needs or were older. If Catholic Charities does not get an exemption, it either has to allow gay adoptions to continue or risk having its adoption license pulled, state officials have said

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Russia's first homosexual parade vetoed by 'outraged' city

In portraying conservatives as "homophobic", American Leftists seem to have have forgotten how the Soviets treated homosexuals. The few reservations modern-day Western conservatives have about homosexuals ("marriage", adoption) are nothing compared to the Soviet response. I am old enough to remember Soviet officials actually claiming that homosexuals did not exist in the Soviet Union: Such behaviour was said to be "bourgeois" and "pre-revolutionary". It would do our current Leftist shriekers good to find out what REAL "homophobia" is

Plans to stage Russia's first gay pride parade have been vetoed by Moscow's city government on the grounds that the idea has caused "outrage" in society. Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's administration said yesterday it would not even consider an application for a parade, prompting Russia's gay community to threaten legal action in the European Court of Human Rights.

Gay and lesbian activists have been campaigning for permission to stage the country's first gay pride event on Saturday 27 May. The date marks the 13th anniversary of the decriminalisation of homosexuality in Russia in 1993. But the plans have drawn a furious reaction from religious leaders and been condemned as "suicidal" by other gay activists .

Earlier this week Chief Mufti Talgat Tadzhuddin warned that Russia's Muslims would stage violent protests if the march went ahead. "If they come out on to the streets anyway they should be flogged. Any normal person would do that - Muslims and Orthodox Christians alike ... [The protests] might be even more intense than protests abroad against those controversial cartoons." The cleric said the Koran taught that homosexuals should be killed because their lifestyle spells the extinction of the human race and said that gays had no human rights.

The Russian Orthodox Church has called it "the propaganda of sin". Bishop Daniil of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk yesterday condemned the plans as a "cynical mockery" and likened homosexuality to leprosy.

The mayor's spokesman, Sergei Tsoi, said a parade would not be allowed. "[The plans] have caused outrage in society, particularly among religious leaders," he said.

In the Communist era Russian homosexuals were jailed for five years and their "condition" was classed as a mental disorder. In post-Soviet Russia public acceptance of homosexuality has been glacial. An opinion poll last year showed 43 per cent of Russians believed gay men should be incarcerated.

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