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James Dobson on Bush, Kerry, Thune, gay marriage and the impact of Christians on the 2004 election https://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/445jeipn.asp?pg=1   Father John Richard Neuhaus in First Things on National Review Board report on clergy scandals:  Some bishops may have failed to do their duty because they were themselves sexually compromised. That is, priests either explicitly or implicitly threatened to reveal compromising information about a bishop if the bishop took steps against the priest. Anyone who “could be subject to blackmail,” the report says, “should not allow himself to be elevated to bishop or placed in any other position of authority.”… Too often, they concluded, lawyers were dictating the decisions of bishops. Fear of litigation, an admittedly necessary concern, trumped a bishop’s duty to his priests and to his flock. … The NRB report does not ignore the reckless and self-serving ways in which bishops escaped criminal liability by pleading guilty on behalf of their dioceses and handing important aspects of church governance over to civil authorities. Such bishops had no right, morally or canonically, to do what they did, and the Church may be suffering for years from their selling out of the Church’s First Amendment rights of self-governance… There are still a few “gay-friendly” bishops, but they are keeping a low profile. The general attitude toward ordaining homosexuals or admitting them to the seminary has dramatically changed… in light of the disastrous experience of recent decades and the growing cultural pressures for homosexual acting-out, most bishops seem to be concluding that same-sex attraction of any degree simply poses too great a risk in admitting men to the seminary… In the selection and placement of bishops, the report notes, a “‘don’t-rock-the-boat’ attitude prevailed for too long.” Priests who are outspoken and are proven pastors of souls are too often excluded from the episcopate in favor of chancery clerks whose chief virtue is not having blotted their copybooks https://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0406/public.html   An Islamic Wake-up Call https://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14479   Illinois GOP Asks Keyes to Run for Senate https://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=683&u=/ap/20040805/ap_on_el_se/illinois_senate_28&printer=1   Australian PM Out-Maneuvers Opponents of Same-Sex ‘Marriage’ Ban https://www.cnsnews.com//ViewForeignBureaus.asp?Page=ForeignBureausarchive