Disenfranchised Catholics Discuss Pope Francis With Thomas Roberts

MSNBC’s Thomas Roberts recently invited a group of diverse Roman Catholics to New York City’s Rockefeller Center — just steps from St. Patrick’s Cathedral — to discuss Pope Francis’s first visit to the United States.

Roberts, the out anchorman who hosts a daily live two-hour news program on MSNBC as well as an online show about LGBT issues on its Web-based Shift service, hosted the panel discussion, which was recorded last week.  

He asked a twice-divorced Catholic, a woman who leads a pro-choice group, two gay men, a lesbian, and a transgender woman to talk with him about what they would say to the pope if they could meet him, their views on his papacy thus far, and what they think of his predecessor, retired Pope Benedict XVI. 

Dawn Ennis, The Advocate’s news editor and a lifelong Catholic, was the trans woman who took part in the panel.

Perhaps most surprising to Roberts was that each member of the group felt a strong connection to their faith despite the church’s disdain for gay, lesbian, pro-choice, divorced, and trans parishioners. He revealed to the group that as a survivor of abuse, he himself is conflicted about his Catholic faith. 

Watch parts 1 and 2 of the panel discussion below, from MSNBC.

Advocate.com Editors

www.advocate.com/religion/2015/9/21/disenfranchised-catholics-discuss-pope-francis-thomas-roberts

Kim Davis accused of interfering with marriage licenses – ACLU asks judge to intervene

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a motion in Kentucky District Court on Monday (21 September) accusing Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis of violating a federal judge’s order.

Davis was released from jail on 8 September on the condition that the same-sex marriage opponent not interfere with the marriage license process in the clerk’s office.

The ACLU states in the motion that Davis has directed the significant alteration of licenses and had a deputy sign them as a notary public rather than as a deputy clerk. Any reference to the Rowan County clerk’s office has been removed from the licenses.

In their motion, the group is asking the court to order the clerk’s office to issue the same licenses that were issued on or before Davis’ release from jail. It asks the court to order the deputy clerks to disregard any contrary instructions from Davis and requests that she be ordered to immediately stop interfering.

If the situation persists, the ACLU asks that Davis face civil contempt fines and that the clerk’s office be placed into a receivership for the purpose of issuing marriage licenses.

‘The clerk’s office needs to issue valid licenses that comply with the court’s orders,’ said James Esseks, director of the ACLU’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Project. ‘It’s sad that Ms. Davis has continued to interfere with the basic constitutional right of all loving couples to marry and that the plaintiff couples have to ask the court to intervene once again.’

Davis has cited religious beliefs in her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. She was locked up in a Kentucky jail for five days earlier this month for defying a federal court’s order that she allow the licenses to be issued by her deputies.

The post Kim Davis accused of interfering with marriage licenses – ACLU asks judge to intervene appeared first on Gay Star News.

Greg Hernandez

www.gaystarnews.com/article/kim-davis-accused-of-interfering-with-marriage-licenses-aclu-asks-judge-to-intervene/

Video Of Man Smashing Gay Advertisement Goes Viral

What’s more harmful to the public good, an advertisement for a gay website or a sidewalk covered in broken glass?

If you answered the former, you’ll appreciate the handiwork of this disheveled man as he rants about the gays and chucks a large brick through the bus stop ad behind him.

Below, watch this reported father of nine (dental insurance must be out of the question with nine mouths to feed) make his case for destroying public property (spoiler alert: his argument is “I don’t have to put up with this!” because of the first amendment, duh):

Dan Tracer

feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/4sNgUbzn1oI/video-of-man-smashing-gay-advertisement-goes-viral-20150921

Christopher Bollen’s ‘Orient’: Book Review

Christopher Bollen begins his gorgeous new novel with an epigraph from the philosopher Paul Virilio: “The invention of the ship was also the invention of the shipwreck.” It’s a fitting motto for this story of island murder, an inventive whodunit that’s also a profound meditation on how the vehicles we construct to enable our lives and keep us safe—families, towns, identities—conjure the very disasters we fear.

On one late summer afternoon, two bodies appear in Orient, Long Island, a beach community that—long the Hamptons’ less sought after sister—has begun to be invaded by the stylish rich of Manhattan. One of these bodies is a strange, unidentifiable creature that washes ashore, a mutant carcass that locals fear drifted over from a nearby government facility. The other is a man.

Even before these first casualties—and there will be many more—Bollen makes Orient a menacing place, crawling with hunters and “lethal with ticks.” Beneath their friendly veneer, the locals boil with envies and resentments, the usual conflicts of a small community exacerbated by the changing dynamics of the town, as prices rise and ancestral properties are purchased and altered by outsiders seeking beachfront views. It’s a town at war with itself for its own future.

Into it comes Mills Chevern, a homeless, gay, nineteen-year-old runaway from the California foster care system. He’s taken in by Paul Benchley, who finds him shivering and high in the hallway of his Manhattan building and brings him to his family home in Orient to get sober. Their relationship is ambiguous at first—like so many LGBT homeless youth, Mills has experience with survival sex work, and he wonders about Paul’s expectations. But it quickly becomes clear that Paul’s intentions are benevolent, and Mills finds in him the father figure he’s never had.

When a neighbor’s house burns down, killing all four members of the family inside, Mills quickly comes under suspicion. As he tries to find evidence that will exonerate him, we learn just how deeply divided and perilous Orient is, how many of its residents—among the “year-rounders” and weekenders alike—harbor motives for murder. Bollen constructs his murder mystery well, drawing the reader forward to the steady pulse of suspense and surprise.

But the real achievement of the book lies elsewhere. Bollen is an indecently gifted writer, able to capture a character in a quick gesture and with a startling gift for the perfect simile or metaphor. A hunter’s taut bow is “wired like a mosquito hungry for blood”; the disorder of a house is “the kind of headache that might induce the aspirin of divorce”; “grown men crying were like deep-water fish against aquarium glass.”

More impressively, he has a masterful sense of the micromaneuvers of human interaction, the tiny gestures and shifts in temperature that make up our relationships. Mills finds his best ally in Beth Shepherd, an Orient native who has returned to her childhood home after a failed career as a painter. Bollen’s portrayal of their friendship provides some of the book’s most moving moments. Beth is, in her way, as lost as Mills, bewildered by her faltering marriage and lost career, and unsure whether she wants to keep the child she has just learned she’s carrying. Even as she grows increasingly frightened and disoriented by their discovered, Beth’s relationship with Mills allows her to imagine a livable future.

“A family wasn’t forged out of steel,” Mills thinks late in the book. “You dig a hole in a person and then you fill it with yourself.” The real mystery Bollen explores in this beautiful book isn’t murder. As he examines not just scenes but entire lives from different characters’ perspectives, his profounder subject is our irreducible opacity to each other, how even when we intend to strip ourselves bare we hide behind battlements of delusion and fear. “The truth of what a person needed in order to feel human wasn’t always something you could discover by asking the people who knew him best,” Bollen writes. “The answer was in the moments he went missing from his life.”

Previous reviews… 

Michael Klein’s ‘When I Was a Twin’

Ryan Berg’s ‘No House to Call My Home’

Vivian Gornick’s ‘The Odd Woman and the City’

David Crabb’s ‘Bad Kid: A Memoir’

Connect with Garth Greenwell on Twitter.

The post Christopher Bollen’s ‘Orient’: Book Review appeared first on Towleroad.

Garth Greenwell

Christopher Bollen’s ‘Orient’: Book Review

Alabama High Court Hands Down Homophobic Adoption Ruling

Proving itself once again to be one of the most homophobic high courts in the nation, the Alabama Supreme Court Friday refused to recognize a Georgia adoption by a lesbian mother.

The woman, known only as V.L. in the case, adopted her partner’s three children while they lived in Georgia in 2007. After the women broke up, the biological mother, known as E.L., moved the children to Alabama and denied her ex visitation rights. E.L. argued that the Georgia adoption was invalid in Alabama, according to AL.com, a website for several Alabama newspapers..

V.L. sued for visitation, winning and losing several times before the case went to Alabama’s highest court. Working with the National Center for Lesbian Rights, V.L. argued that she was an adopted mother in Georgia and, in effect, should be one in Alabama. But the notoriously antigay Supreme Court didn’t agree.

All but one of the Alabama justices “ruled that Alabama did not have to respect the Georgia court’s adoption because the Court believed that Georgia law did not allow same-sex parents to adopt,” the NCLR wrote in a statement last week.

One of the Alabama justices, Tom Parker, went even further, writing in a special ruling that adoption is a privilege, not a right, and children should be raised “with both a father and a mother.”

“The biological mother in this case chose my client as a second parent to these children, before their births, during their conceptions, and in formal adoption proceedings intended to ensure my client’s rights — wherein she stated that having my client as a parent was in the children’s best interests,” Heather Fann, one of V.L.’s attorneys, said in a statement. “Because, many years later, she chose to contradict her own decision-making regarding the establishment of a family for those children, a court ruled today that my client is not a parent. Not only is that not true, its harm extends far beyond my client, to children who have called her mother their entire lives, and now to adoptive families throughout Alabama.”

V.L. released her own statement: “It is extremely difficult to see the distress in my children as they realize that the courts who are tasked with putting their best interests first won’t recognize our family. I am just a Mom who wanted and prayed for these children and raised them from birth, and I hope every day that we can be together again.”

Neal Broverman

www.advocate.com/families/2015/9/21/alabama-high-court-hands-down-homophobic-adoption-ruling

Stop Hoping for More and Start Hoping for the One
Growing up in a small village in Scotland with 600 people is tough. Especially when you don’t fit into the norm of what they expect a young boy to be. I liked singing and acting. They liked rugby and beating the shit out of me. I won’t labor on it, because High School is the best time of our lives, right?

As I became older I flew the nest to my next port of call: University. Not a large population of people, but enough for me to come to terms (to a degree) with who I am and some self-discovery along the way.

Then came another leap — South Korea. A place where I quickly discovered homosexuality is hidden and reviled more than salacious stories of celebrities that fill our news columns daily.

Then, the day finally came. I was accepted into Grad School in NYC and I couldn’t have been happier. After ten years as an out gay man, I would become a fish in one of the most thriving, accepting, diverse and supportive gay communities in the world. It would be a far cry from Scotland, England, Korea, but I was ready. I wanted to make it work.

But despite my cheery disposition about the whole thing, I realized pretty fast that making it work here could be the hardest of all. Even harder than Korea. Which is really hard.

The most recent date I went on was a total bust. It started off well, a nice hug, a warm smile. But it was pretty evident that as we began to walk, there was absolutely no chemistry there. Mainly because he had such a heightened sense of self-worth that couldn’t even allow him to ask any questions. Not one. Well, he mirrored mine — which is like the biggest sign of failure in every sense of the word. The most awful part was that he used me as a way to walk. He liked to walk. We walked all the way from Harlem through Central Park. I walked four miles. And with every step my mind was telling me to stop and just walk away, because I could have got more conversation from an unhappy looking runner than from him. Blood from an actual stone is the only term I can use, but when the stone did bleed, he was an interesting and smart man. Some things just aren’t meant to be, right?

It wasn’t until we neared the end of the park he seemed to perk up. Obviously, he was happy to be released from the prison that is my toxic personality but also because he had reached his daily goal of 15,000 steps. Round of a fucking applause for him. He said something that summed up what my life in this great city of diversity and culture could become: “Every time a guy you date hugs you, you’ll either want to hold onto him forever or instantly let him go for the one you’re looking at over his shoulder — or the one he’s looking at.”

Huh? Then it clicked: That’s why he hugged me when we met. Why didn’t I see that coming? Did you?

He went on to tell me that when he arrived he was nice — nicer than he is now, and a guy from this city knew he was an out of towner because of it. Chivalry and manners really are dead. It seems to be that in Gay Male Land working out fast food from our diets is officially over and working in fast sex and even faster relationships is officially in.

Even the couples are looking for more. The dating apps are filled with men married to men who want that third, fourth fifth…not because they don’t love each other or find one another attractive, but just because (insert bullshit reason here).

I am most certainly not the first, nor will I be the last to feel this way. But my main question is: Where is this diverse and accepting gay community that people led me to believe existed here? We are now in a world where we have over 100 choices at our fingertips and still, we want more. Younger, fitter, healthier and sluttier more. And the Gay Community wonders why we suffer so much with all of the over-sexualized versions of us we see on TV and in film. The Average Joe doesn’t stand a chance. We are giving the world what is now expected and feeding into a stereotype that is slowly become less stereotype and more fact.

However, despite these abrasively depressing truths, which I didn’t want to believe but now see are true, I refuse to give up. Like the men on these apps who hope for more, I hope for something much greater: The One. I’m also pretty sure that there are others out there who feel the same as I do. I refuse to accept the NYC side effect of refusing to settle for less, because I honestly believe that I can find my more — without hugging him and looking over his shoulder at what else is on display.

To the young men who are dealing with their sexuality, don’t feed into this world that has been constructed through media representation and fueled by the community itself. The only way that this will change is from within our group. Coming to terms with your sexuality is difficult enough as it is without adding these additional pressures of washboard abdomen muscles and giant…well, you catch my drift. Be strong, be you and have hope for the one. And to the different man who told me that I wasn’t beautiful inside because my outside wasn’t up to scratch: Fuck. You. My inside is a rainbow.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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REVIEW: Klaus K, Helsinki

Found in an ideal location just 10 minutes walk from the pretty waterfront and the center of town, Klaus K is the first design hotel in Helsinki, and lives up to its name in both style and substance.

Most of the décor and furnishings have been specially tailored for the hotel. Although the general aesthetic is modern Finnish design and minimalist luxury, the website explains that, ‘the heart and soul of the hotel was found in the Kalevala – Finland’s dramatic national epic.’ The artistic myth has subtly inspired all elements of the design, creating a common thread that ties all of the different elements of this quirky and eclectic hotel together.

As you enter the modern lobby, you are greeted by the white, specially made, wooden reception desk that has been carefully constructed to depict a bird’s nest. Following the tale of the Kalevala upstairs, even the carpet leading to your room has aspects of the mythical creation story woven into it.

This level of attention to detail is evident in every part of the hotel. From the comfortable and inviting communal ‘Living Room’, to the hotel’s very own bar and nightclub on the lower ground floor. Even the warm and welcoming, Italian-inspired restaurant Toscanini – which serves a mean brunch – is an ode to an artist who painted Kalevala-themed ceiling frescoes.

As well as the two downstairs bars, there’s also a trendy rooftop bar, but this is only for the exclusive use of guests staying on the very top floor. This doesn’t matter so much in the winter when you would need a strong whiskey and a soundproof thick coat to consider sitting up there, but in the summer it’s a perk worth paying for.

The rooms on the top floor, or the ‘Sky Lofts’ as they’re known, are flooded with light, which is complimented by the spacious room design. The high ceilings and neutral color scheme mean the rooms are as heavenly as they look – and also some of the most sought after in the whole hotel.

If your budget won’t quite stretch to the Loft, then you certainly won’t feel shortchanged staying in one of the hotel’s other individually designed ‘Original’ rooms.

On the downside, some of these rooms on the lower floors have only one small window in the room, meaning they can feel slightly cave-like at times. However this can also feel cozy when you’re bedding in for the night, and if you’re visiting in the winter when the country gets less than six hours of sunlight a day, who needs windows anyway.

For an even more unique experience at Klaus K, you can take advantage of their concern with being at the forefront of cutting edge and modern design in Helsinki, and book a night or two in one of the ‘Special Rooms’. If the name for these five one of a kind, and exclusively designed, rooms doesn’t already have you feeling like a VIP when you check in, the distinctive design that surrounds you as you enter the space should have you feeling very special indeed.

Championing homegrown talent, the rooms have all been designed by famous Finnish artists. Original art is plastered across the room – often directly onto the walls, pieces of the furniture that have been on display in incredible art galleries all around the world such as the MOMA have pride of place, and one room has even been designed for the sole purpose of using it as an ultra-modern home cinema.

Booked easily through Booking.com, we stayed in ’The Art Room’ by Riiko Sakkinen and were greeted every morning by a giant painting of ‘The Hong Kong Curry Flavor Cup Noodle Robot’. Needless to say we loved it.

Klaus K manages to retain its ultra modern and cutting edge design aesthetic throughout every floor, without once feeling cold or unwelcoming. Every room has its own very unique and distinctive vibe, meaning the whole hotel feels like its brimming with personality. A trip to Helsinki is well worth the gasp-inducing price tag on a pint, and you shouldn’t pass through this idiosyncratic city without a stay in Klaus K.

www.klauskhotel.com/en/

For all the best deals and to book this amazing hotel quickly and easily, visit Booking.com, which has over 787,000 properties to choose from in over 221 countries worldwide with over 56M reviews. It guarantees the best prices for any type of property – from small independents to five-star luxury.

The post REVIEW: Klaus K, Helsinki appeared first on Gay Star News.

Rachael Martin

www.gaystarnews.com/article/review-klaus-k-helsinki/

Anti-LGBT Candidate Scott Walker Drops Presidential Campaign

Walker notoriously launched his campaign for president under a firestorm of criticism after he said that Boy Scouts needed “protection” from LGB volunteers.
HRC.org

www.hrc.org/blog/entry/anti-lgbt-candidate-scott-walker-drops-presidential-campaign?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss-feed

Matt Damon, Eddie Redmayne, Ellen Page & Hot Guys Make The Toronto Film Festival Extra Special

It’s one of the world’s most important film fests, widely seen as the first big indicator of next-year Oscar glory. And while mainstream in scope, the Toronto International Film Festival is also increasingly becoming one of LGBT cinema’s biggest annual bashes, with some of the most exciting gay, lesbian and trans titles marking their splashy debuts to the world.

This year the gay buzz was TIFF’s strongest yet, with the star-studded world premieres of two especially eagerly anticipated films, The Danish Girl and Freeheld — and nearly as many LGBT sparks flying offscreen as on. Tom Hardy’s shoot-down of a press conference question about his sexuality went viral, Ellen Page made her public debut with girlfriend Samantha Thomas on the Freeheld red carpet, and young director Stephen Dunn’s first full-length film Closet Monster won the festival’s Canada Goose Award for Best Canadian Feature Film. TIFF is also an ever-bigger event on Toronto’s local gay scene, with some of the season’s hottest parties packing in the city’s (and the visiting world’s) cutest film nerds.

Eddie Redmayne on The Danish Girl premiere red carpet.

Matt Damon and Kate Mara at The Martian press conference.

David Ebershoff, author of the book The Danish Girl, at the film’s premiere:

STIFF 6: The Legend of Tom’s Hardy at Handlebar:

A photo posted by Mitchel Raphael

(@mitchelraphael) on Sep 16, 2015 at 5:01pm PDT

STIFF 6: The Legend of Tom’s Hardy at Handlebar:

A photo posted by Mitchel Raphael (@mitchelraphael) on Sep 15, 2015 at 9:55pm PDT

STIFF 6: The Legend of Tom’s Hardy at Handlebar:

A photo posted by Mitchel Raphael (@mitchelraphael) on Sep 16, 2015 at 6:20pm PDT

Hosts Judy Virago and Bruce LaBruce at the latter’s TIFF party at Bovine Sex Club.

A photo posted by Mitchel Raphael (@mitchelraphael) on Sep 11, 2015 at 11:35pm PDT

Bruce LaBruce’s TIFF party at Bovine Sex Club:

  A photo posted by Mitchel Raphael (@mitchelraphael) on Sep 12, 2015 at 4:44pm PDT

Bruce LaBruce’s TIFF party at Bovine Sex Club.

A photo posted by Mitchel Raphael (@mitchelraphael) on Sep 11, 2015 at 11:33pm PDT

Ellen Page and Julianne Moore at the Freeheld premiere.

A photo posted by Fabiola Garza (@fabgza) on Sep 13, 2015 at 9:45pm PDT

The Closet Monster’s director Stephen Dunn (center) and lead actor Connor Jessup (right) with filmmaker A. J. Bond.

A photo posted by Sarah Keenlyside (@missarahk) on Sep 13, 2015 at 1:50pm PDT

The cast (and director Adam Garnet Jones, center) of Fire Song, the first ever Canadian First Nations feature with an LGBT theme:

 

A photo posted by What She Said

(@whatshesaid167) on Sep 15, 2015 at 5:15pm PDT

Photos by Dan Allen, Mitchel Raphael, @fabgza, @missarahk and @whatshesaid167

Jeremy Kinser

feedproxy.google.com/~r/queerty2/~3/mNeyerTWlPw/matt-damon-eddie-redmayne-ellen-page-hot-guys-make-the-toronto-film-festival-extra-special-20150921

LGBT Catholics #TellThePope of Their Faith in Powerful Video Series Ahead of Papal Visit: WATCH

Time will tell if Pope Francis addresses the plight of LGBT Catholics at the World Meeting of Families this Saturday in Philadelphia, but GLAAD is hoping to jump-start the conversation with a series of video portraits as part of its #TellThePope campaign.

From the advocacy organization’s website:

Each video includes personal memories of growing up Catholic for the featured subjects, and the impact it has on their lives today. All of them speak of the hope that they feel with Pope Francis, and the desire they have to be included and welcomed into the life of the Roman Catholic Church.

Related, HRC to Welcome Pope Francis to U.S. with Huge Banner Urging Him to Embrace LGBT Catholics

Featured Catholics in the video series include GLAAD president Sarah Kate Ellis and Nicholas Coppola, a New York gay man stripped of his involvement with his local Roman Catholic parish after church leaders learned of his marriage to another man.

Check out the video series below and visit the #TellThePope campaign Tumblr here.

The post LGBT Catholics #TellThePope of Their Faith in Powerful Video Series Ahead of Papal Visit: WATCH appeared first on Towleroad.

Kyler Geoffroy

LGBT Catholics #TellThePope of Their Faith in Powerful Video Series Ahead of Papal Visit: WATCH