{"id":419,"date":"2008-01-11T15:36:24","date_gmt":"2008-01-11T15:36:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr.php"},"modified":"2008-01-11T15:36:24","modified_gmt":"2008-01-11T15:36:24","slug":"nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr","title":{"rendered":"N.J. Rejects Request to Close Probe Into Civil Unions Flap"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Robert Schwaneberg<br \/>\nReligion News Service<\/strong><br \/>\n(RNS) New Jersey officials have refused to end an investigation of whether a Methodist group in Ocean Grove violated the rights of two lesbian couples by rejecting their applications to rent a seaside pavilion for their civil union ceremonies.<br \/>\nThe state Division on Civil Rights rejected a motion by the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association to dismiss complaints filed by the lesbian couples. The association argued that forcing it to use its property for civil unions would violate its constitutional freedom of religion.<br \/>\nIn a five-page letter, Gary LoCassio, assistant director of civil rights, said that could be determined only after further investigation.<br \/>\nHe also said that conducting an inquiry &#8220;in no way interferes&#8221; with the religious liberty of the Methodist group that owns the pavilion.<br \/>\nLoCassio conceded that churches and religious programs are not subject to the state&#8217;s anti-discrimination laws, but said it was &#8220;far from clear&#8221; whether the Methodist group &#8220;meets the definition of a church or similar religious organization.&#8221;<br \/>\nThat, LoCassio said, requires further investigation.<br \/>\nHe said the division also must determine whether the association&#8217;s rental of its pavilion &#8220;is religious or secular in nature.&#8221;<br \/>\nIt was the Methodist group&#8217;s second unsuccessful attempt to bring the investigation to a quick end. In November, a federal judge dismissed the group&#8217;s lawsuit claiming the U.S. Constitution protects its right to use its property according to Methodist doctrine.<br \/>\nLarry Lustberg, a lawyer representing the lesbian couples, said his clients are &#8220;pleased with the decision and pleased that a full and thorough investigation will proceed.&#8221;<br \/>\nBrian Raum, a lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund, which is representing the Camp Meeting Association, said, &#8220;I&#8217;m amazed that the state could conclude it&#8217;s unsure whether the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association is a religious organization. It&#8217;s perfectly clear that it is&#8211; it&#8217;s been operating as one for over 100 years.&#8221;<br \/>\n<em>Copyright 2008 Religion News Service. All rights reserved. No part of this transmission may be distributed or reproduced without written permission.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Robert Schwaneberg Religion News Service (RNS) New Jersey officials have refused to end an investigation of whether a Methodist group in Ocean Grove violated the rights of two lesbian couples by rejecting their applications to rent a seaside pavilion for their civil union ceremonies. The state Division on Civil Rights rejected a motion by&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>N.J. Rejects Request to Close Probe Into Civil Unions Flap<\/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\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"N.J. Rejects Request to Close Probe Into Civil Unions Flap\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Robert Schwaneberg Religion News Service (RNS) New Jersey officials have refused to end an investigation of whether a Methodist group in Ocean Grove violated the rights of two lesbian couples by rejecting their applications to rent a seaside pavilion for their civil union ceremonies. 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Rejects Request to Close Probe Into Civil Unions Flap","og_description":"By Robert Schwaneberg Religion News Service (RNS) New Jersey officials have refused to end an investigation of whether a Methodist group in Ocean Grove violated the rights of two lesbian couples by rejecting their applications to rent a seaside pavilion for their civil union ceremonies. The state Division on Civil Rights rejected a motion by&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2008-01-11T15:36:24+00:00","author":"nsymmonds","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr","name":"N.J. Rejects Request to Close Probe Into Civil Unions Flap","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-01-11T15:36:24+00:00","dateModified":"2008-01-11T15:36:24+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/f960b23e9c3a51222269c557a209b4f2"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2008\/01\/nj-rejects-request-to-close-pr#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"N.J. Rejects Request to Close Probe Into Civil Unions Flap"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/","name":"Beliefnet News","description":"Top Religious News From Around the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?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\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/f960b23e9c3a51222269c557a209b4f2","name":"nsymmonds","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/13d\/13ddfa3407d6847bc2fbd32a13b67708x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/13d\/13ddfa3407d6847bc2fbd32a13b67708x96.jpg","caption":"nsymmonds"},"description":"Nicole Symmonds is Beliefnet\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Prayer editor and also covers Christianity. A New Yorker by birth but a Floridian by tenure, Nicole graduated from Florida A&M University with a B.S. in Public Relations and a minor in Sociology. She moved to NY to pursue a career in journalism which started at In Style magazine. There she learned the ropes of magazine reporting, researching, and writing\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand became exponentially more stylish. But what seemed like a deep interest in fashion and entertainment would soon be revealed as merely the vehicle that moved her closer to discovering her purpose, writing and covering matters of the Christian faith. While in her purpose-driven vehicle she can be found traveling between Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens for life, work and worship, respectively. From fashion to faith and the journey isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t over yet\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author\/nsymmonds"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}