From Connecticut comes this intriguing story about a growing band of young conservative Christians seeking to have a voice and make a mark:

The topic of the high school discussion was homosexuality, and almost everyone in the class expressed the view that “it’s OK to be gay.”

Jennifer Landry believed otherwise. “The act is horrible,” she said, “but the people are in need of sincere love.”

She immediately felt the harsh sting of reprobation from her classmates. “They all verbally attacked me,” recalled Landry, now 23 and living in Southington. “That was the moment when I realized there was a problem.”

That problem, in Landry’s view, is the everything-goes ethos embraced by most of her generation. These days, though, she no longer feels so alone: She found kinship with like-minded young people through the Family Institute of Connecticut’s nascent youth wing.

Like its parent organization, the youth group — known as iFIC, an obvious play for the iPod generation — rejects abortion and same-sex marriage and supports home-schooling and sexual abstinence outside of marriage. Its members, largely Catholics or evangelical Christians, view public policy through the prism of their faith.

“We’re not ashamed of what we believe in,” said Michael Ruminsky, a 23-year-old from Hartford who will leave for seminary in August to begin his journey toward ordination as a Catholic priest.

It just so happens that what they believe in is sharply at odds with the views of most of their peers.

According to a national CBS News poll released last month, 40 percent of respondents between 18 and 29 believe gays and lesbians ought to be permitted to marry; another 28 percent back the idea of civil unions. In a reliably blue state such as Connecticut, where civil unions have been the law since 2005 and the state Supreme Court is reviewing a case that would legalize gay marriage, that support likely runs far deeper.

Even among the religious right, there’s been a shift, according to some political observers. Traditional concerns about same-sex marriage, abortion and stem cell research are losing ground with some evangelical leaders to worries about global warming and the treatment of military detainees. “The Moral Majority side of the religious right is kind of struggling,” said David Roozen, director of the Hartford Seminary Institute for Religion Research. “The moderate middle has become very skeptical about it.”

Besides, Roozen added, “people have gas to worry about so somehow homosexuality … is less of a concern.”

It’s enough to make a young religious conservative feel like an outcast, perennially out-of-step with the tenor of the times. “Being part of this organization is a countercultural activity,” Ruminsky observed.

But they also believe there is a wide if hidden swath of Connecticut youths who share their unease about the moral direction of the state and the nation. “There’s a silent majority out there,” said Leah Thomas, the group’s 23-year-old executive director. “They think maybe theirs is the only voice.”

There’s more about the group at the Hartford Courant link.

Photo: Leah Thomas is executive director of iFIC, the youth wing of the Family Institute of Connecticut. She is standing in front of the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Hartford where she attends Mass daily. Photo by Cloe Poisson, Hartford Courant.