{"id":102,"date":"2008-12-07T16:54:59","date_gmt":"2008-12-07T16:54:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html"},"modified":"2008-12-07T16:54:59","modified_gmt":"2008-12-07T16:54:59","slug":"transparency-needed-in-proposi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html","title":{"rendered":"Transparency Needed In Proposition 8 Battle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We obviously disagree fundamentally about the role of the courts in dealing with issues where fundamental rights (like marriage and equal protection) are at stake.&nbsp; The &#8220;will&#8221; of the voters does not trump such rights and the courts exist to uphold them against just such a tyranny of the majority.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m also afraid, Jay, that in the big scheme of things, it is worse to construct a theological justification, or at least an <i>apologia<\/i>, for treating GLBT Americans as second class legal citizens than it is to interrupt a church service by showing up in pink underwear (which apparently occurred once in the past month). You know I don&#8217;t condone disruptive activity.&nbsp; However, the breath exhausted on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.frc.org\/alerts\/tell-gov-schwarzenegger-to-defend-prop-8-marriage-decision\">condemning this by the Religious Right<\/a> would have been better expended doing almost anything else, perhaps even having the constructive dialogues many Christians apparently need to have on GLBT issues.<\/p>\n<p>On the legal front, there is a completely legitimate call for an inquiry into whether churches that did expend resources, as they are entitled to do, on passing Proposition 8 accurately reported those expenditures under state law. The group Californians Against Hate has filed a <a href=\"http:\/\/californiansagainsthate.blogspot.com\/2008\/11\/sworn-complaint-filed-against-mormon.html\">complaint<\/a> with the California Fair Political Practices Commission which I believe is thoroughly appropriate, as does the<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2008\/11\/29\/opinion\/29sat2.html?partner=permalink&amp;exprod=permalink\"> <u>New York Times<\/u><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Just like there needed to be a <a href=\"http:\/\/projectfairplay.org\/\">national effort against partisan politicking<\/a> from the pulpit, perhaps there needs to be a parallel campaign demanding accountability and transparency on initiative funding. Treating all who get involved in these initiatives with the same scrutiny would not interfere with any legitimate &#8220;free exercise of religion&#8221; claim.&nbsp; You can&#8217;t be against such equal treatement, can you? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We obviously disagree fundamentally about the role of the courts in dealing with issues where fundamental rights (like marriage and equal protection) are at stake.&nbsp; The &#8220;will&#8221; of the voters does not trump such rights and the courts exist to uphold them against just such a tyranny of the majority. I&#8217;m also afraid, Jay, that&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":164,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election-08","category-gay-marriage"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Transparency Needed In Proposition 8 Battle - Lynn v. Sekulow<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Transparency Needed In Proposition 8 Battle - Lynn v. Sekulow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We obviously disagree fundamentally about the role of the courts in dealing with issues where fundamental rights (like marriage and equal protection) are at stake.&nbsp; The &#8220;will&#8221; of the voters does not trump such rights and the courts exist to uphold them against just such a tyranny of the majority. I&#8217;m also afraid, Jay, that&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Lynn v. Sekulow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-12-07T16:54:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rev. Barry W. Lynn\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Transparency Needed In Proposition 8 Battle - Lynn v. Sekulow","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Transparency Needed In Proposition 8 Battle - Lynn v. Sekulow","og_description":"We obviously disagree fundamentally about the role of the courts in dealing with issues where fundamental rights (like marriage and equal protection) are at stake.&nbsp; The &#8220;will&#8221; of the voters does not trump such rights and the courts exist to uphold them against just such a tyranny of the majority. I&#8217;m also afraid, Jay, that&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html","og_site_name":"Lynn v. Sekulow","article_published_time":"2008-12-07T16:54:59+00:00","author":"Rev. Barry W. Lynn","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/2008\/12\/transparency-needed-in-proposi.html","name":"Transparency Needed In Proposition 8 Battle - Lynn v. 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Sekulow","description":"A debate blog about church, state, faith and politics with Jay Sekulow and Barry W. Lynn","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/#\/schema\/person\/98ebaf547801cce8ce6fff4c27f51fc8","name":"Rev. Barry W. Lynn","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/32b\/32b0f12cad840c65bff61ad01e2664aax96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/32b\/32b0f12cad840c65bff61ad01e2664aax96.jpg","caption":"Rev. Barry W. Lynn"},"description":"Since 1992, the Rev. Barry W. Lynn has served as executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington, D.C.-based organization dedicated to the preservation of the Constitution's religious liberty provisions (www.au.org). In addition to his work as a long-time activist and lawyer in the civil liberties field, Lynn is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, offering him a unique perspective on church-state issues. An accomplished speaker and lecturer, Lynn has appeared frequently on television and radio broadcasts to offer analysis of First Amendment issues. News programs on which Lynn has appeared include PBS's \"NewsHour,\" NBC's \"Today Show,\" Fox News Channel's \"O'Reilly Factor,\" ABC's \"Nightline,\" CNN's \"Crossfire,\" CBS's \"60 Minutes,\" MSNBC's \"Countdown with Keith Olbermann,\" Fox News Channel's \"Hannity & Colmes,\" ABC's \"Good Morning America,\" CNN's \"Larry King Live\" and the national nightly news on NBC, ABC and CBS. On the radio, Lynn serves as host of \"Culture Shocks,\" a daily look at various issues affecting society and the culture. In the 1990s he served for two years as regular co-host of \"Pat Buchanan and Company\" and after that did a weekly syndicated radio program, \"Review of the News,\" with Col. Oliver North. Lynn is a regular guest on nationally broadcast radio programs, including National Public Radio's \"All Things Considered,\" \"Morning Edition\" and \"Talk of the Nation,\" as well as having appeared on national networks such as CBS Radio, CNN Radio, ABC Radio and AP Radio. Lynn began his professional career working at the national office of the United Church of Christ, including a two-year stint as legislative counsel for the Church's Office of Church in Society in Washington, D.C. From 1984 to 1991 he was legislative counsel for the Washington office of the American Civil Liberties Union. In 2006, Lynn authored Piety & Politics: The Right-Wing Assault On Religious Freedom (Harmony Books). In 2008 he coauthored (with C. Welton Gaddy) First Freedom First: A Citizen's Guide to Protecting Religious Liberty and the Separation of Church and State (Beacon Press). Lynn writes frequently on religious liberty issues, and has had essays published in outlets such as USA Today, The Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Nation. Lynn also has op-eds published frequently by the McClatchy and Scripps-Howard newspaper chains. A member of the Washington, D.C. and U.S. Supreme Court bar, Lynn earned his law degree from Georgetown University Law Center in 1978. In addition, he received his theology degree from Boston University School of Theology in 1973. Lynn, who was born in Harrisburg, Pa., and raised in Bethlehem, Pa., lives in Chevy Chase, Md., with his family.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/author\/blynn"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/164"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lynnvsekulow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}