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Passover Books from Author of “Heather Has Two Mommies”
You likely know about Heather Has Two Mommies, the classic children’s book featuring a girl with lesbian moms. But did you know author Lesléa Newman is also the author of two Passover-themed picture books?
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Rabbi and Lesbian Mom Marks 20th Anniversary at NYC LGBT Congregation
Hanukkah starts this weekend, which means my yearly request to my spouse that we celebrate our combined traditions by buying one of those plastic Santa-and-sleigh lawn ornaments and making the reindeer noses all light up over eight nights. (Rudolph himself, of course, would be the shamash.) Timely, then, is this video from Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum, senior rabbi at the largest LGBT congregation in the world, Congregation Beit Simchat Torah in New York City—and also a lesbian mom.
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The Sikh Temple Shooting and Learning to Listen
I was sickened by the news of the shooting this past weekend at a Sikh temple, or gurdwara, near Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Few things scare me more than random shootings that occur in what are supposed to be places of safety, such as schools and houses of worship. There is little that can help us make sense of what are senseless acts—but one article that has helped me think about how to move forward is “Today, we are all American Sikhs” by Valarie Kaur at CNN.
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New Resource for Mormon Parents of LGBT Youth
The Latter-day Saints (Mormons) as a group are not known for being particularly accepting of LGBT people. What happens, then, when a young person in a Mormon family comes out as LGBT? The Family Acceptance Project (FAP) at San Francisco State University, which has long studied and addressed the impact of family acceptance and rejection on the health and mental health of LGBT youth, has just released a new faith-based family education resource to help guide Mormon families in supporting their LGBT children.
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Heather — No, Miriam — Has a Sweet Passover
Lesléa Newman is best known as the author of the first children’s book to feature LGBT parents, Heather Has Two Mommies, as well as other LGBT-inclusive picture books, such as Mommy, Mama, and Me; Daddy, Papa, and Me; and Donovan’s Big Day. The prolific author’s latest book, A Sweet Passover, does not feature an LGBT family, but is nonetheless a charming tale worthy of consideration by readers here.
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The United Church of Christ approved two resolutions recently in support of LGBT equality, including the first-ever one by a major Christian denomination affirming the right of LGBT parents to adopt and raise children. A second resolution was in support of international human rights for all people, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. I [...]
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Jewish LGBT organization Keshet has announced the winner of its first Jewish Children’s Book Writing Contest (mentioned here in February): The Purim Superhero, by Elisabeth Kushner, a public librarian in Vancouver, Canada—and a lesbian mom herself. Kushner told Keshet: When I heard about the Keshet contest, it seemed like a perfect fit: in the Purim story, [...]
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The Sins of the Mothers?
Not this again. An Anglican elementary school in Bedford, Texas has denied admission to a girl because her parents are lesbians and married in Canada, reports NBCDFW. The head of St. Vincent’s School, Kenneth Monk, said that by allowing the the school would be “going off our canons” that say marriage is limited to one man [...]
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Weekend Reading: Reaching Across the Lines
Two stories caught my eye today that show the value of making personal connections, even when the barriers between people seem insurmountable. They make a good pair of pieces for weekend reading. One is Steven Goldstein’s piece at Blue Jersey, which I mentioned in my Political Roundup this week. Steven is the chair of Garden [...]
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Lesbian Mom New Bishop of Stockholm
The Church of Sweden consecrated its first openly gay bishop Sunday, making lesbian mom Eva Brunne Bishop of Stockholm. According to Agence France-Presse (via the Advocate), Brunne is in a civil partnership with a woman, and they have a three-year-old child. By pure coincidence, Helen and I spent Sunday assembling IKEA furniture for our son’s [...]
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LGBT Parenting Roundup
Personal Stories ABC News looks back at the history of the “gayby boom,” and how things have changed (and not) over the past 20 years. It’s a rather good mainstream article, with many quotes from teen and adult children of same-sex parents. Ten-year-old Sophie Brescia offers Bay Windows her perspective on having two moms and [...]
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An Unlikely Friendship
Last week, I pointed out a moving post from Blogging for LGBT Families Day written by Haley Montgomery, a conservative evangelical Christian who was struggling to work through the issue of marriage equality, trying to reconcile her beliefs with the stories of loving LGBT families she was reading online. This week, I want to highlight [...]
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Of all the posts submitted to Blogging for LGBT Families Day, the one that has made the greatest impression on me is: “The One Where I Come Out… And Say It,” by Haley Montgomery, aka eyeJunkie. Haley describes herself as “a politically conservative, white, heterosexual, middle class evangelical Christian from Mississippi. And, I’m probably pretty [...]
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Weekly Political Roundup
The California Supreme Court has announced they will make the Prop 8 ruling this coming Tuesday, May 26. HRC Backstory has a good analogy about the legal issues under consideration. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has promised equal benefits to same-sex partners of U.S. diplomatic corps employees stationed overseas, according to Congressman Howard Berman (D-CA), [...]
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(Originally published in Bay Windows, April 16, 2009. I wrote it as coverage for a local event, but I think it has broad interest, especially in light of a recent ruling by the Judicial Council, the highest court of the United Methodist Church, which said clergy may not officiate at marriages of same-sex couples, even [...]
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The Connecticut Catholic Conference’s Misplaced Advocacy
Saturday’s Hartford Courant reports: Concerned that the state’s new same-sex marriage law would infringe on religious liberties, the Connecticut Catholic Conference today proposed some broad exemptions which it believes are necessary to protect those rights. The law does not require Catholic priests—or any other clergy member—to preside over same-sex weddings. However, the church is seeking [...]
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LGBT Parenting Roundup
Lest you think I’ve become entirely obsessed with the Olympics (almost, but not quite), here’s a roundup of what’s happening in LGBT parenting news: The California Supreme Court ruled today that a group of doctors cannot use their religion as a legal excuse for denying a lesbian patient infertility treatment. Lambda Legal reports, “In a [...]
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Weekly Political Update
Many LGBT advocates are praising this year’s Democratic platform (not yet public) as “the most progressive major party platform with respect to LGBT issues in the nation’s history.” Some complaint that it never uses the terms “gay,” “lesbian,” “bisexual,” and “transgender,” but others argue that terms such as “same-sex couples” “sexual orientation,” and “gender identity” [...]
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God and Kids Lead Same-Sex Couples to Legalize and Commit
Religion and LGBT rights often stand in opposition. A new study (PDF link) in the June 2008 Journal of Family Psychology, however, found that “religiously invested lesbians and gay men, and those with children, were the most likely to cohabit and to legalize and ritualize their couple relationships.” Study participants were residents of Illinois, so [...]
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Finding Hope In Tennessee Tragedy
Two people are dead and seven injured after a man entered the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church Sunday and fired a sawed-off 12-gauge semiautomatic shotgun during a children’s performance of the musical Annie. The shooter, Jim David Adkisson, left a letter in his car stating he hated liberals and gay people and was motivated by [...]
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