Chicago Gay Activists Calls For Repeal Of Catholic Church Tax Exemption Status, California Senate Bill 48 Requiring All Public Schools To Teach Gay History Takes Effect January 1, Defense Of Marriage Act Takes A Terrible Toll On Charlie Morgan And Her Legal Wife Karen, Florida Appeals Court Rules Both Partners In Lesbian Relationship Have Legal Rights In Child Custody Dispute, Lance Bass, Prince Harry High Jinx, Leon Jackson Birthday Suit, Liam Hemsworth

If religious leaders lobby government officials on issues of moral concern such as gay rights, their churches and temples should be forced to pay taxes. That’s the position of gay rights activist Tracy Baim, publisher of the Windy City Times. She told Fox Chicago Sunday that Chicago’s Cardinal Francis George and other religious leaders should be forced to choose between such lobbying and their traditional tax exemption. Baim, who also serves as executive editor of the newspaper, sharply criticized recent comments by the Cardinal. Appearing on Fox Chicago Sunday last week, he said, “You don’t want the gay liberation movement to morph into something like the Ku Klux Klan, demonstrating in the streets against Catholicism.” In a written, follow up statement Wednesday, the Cardinal suggested that gay rights leaders share a goal with Klan marchers of 70 years ago: delegitimizing the Church as a political player in American society. The Illinois Catholic Conference (representing all the state’s bishops) has been a staunch opponent of gay rights legislation. The bishops suffered a series of setbacks in recent years, culminating in Governor Quinn’s decision to strip Catholic Charities of tax-paid adoption services contracts worth tens of millions of dollars annually. Quinn acted after Catholic Charities refused on moral grounds to handle adoptions by gay couples. Other states, including New York, have enacted gay civil rights legislation that specifically allows religious organizations to discriminate on the basis of conscience, while retaining government contracts for adoption and other services. Joining Baim at Friday’s taping of Fox Chicago Sunday was Joe Murray, executive director of the gay Catholic group Rainbow Sash. Both demanded that the Cardinal apologize for comparing gay rights activists to the Klan. The Chicago Tribune’s editorial page weighed in on the issue in Friday’s editions. An editorial noted mockingly, “That’s right: as recently as 70 years ago, the KKK openly demonstrated against the Catholic Church. What that has to do with the (gay) pride parade is lost on us.” The dispute began when openly gay Alderman Tom Tunney (44th) and organizers of the Gay Pride Parade changed its route to take it past the parish of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel. An aide to Tunney said he meant no disrespect and added that the funerals of both of Tunney’s parents were held in that church. The pastor, though, said he was not consulted before the parade route and hours changed. And the pastor said he was initially ignored when he asked for revisions so the parade would not conflict with Sunday morning Mass. Organizers eventually agreed to push the start time back to noon, instead of 10:00 am.

Laws that promote the historical contributions of gays and lesbians and help illegal immigrant college students gain financial aid will take effect with the new year in California, even as opponents seek to overturn the legislation through voter ballot initiatives. On January 1, California becomes the first state to require public schools to teach the contributions of gays and lesbians. According to The Associated Press, the law adds people with disabilities to the list of social and ethnic groups whose "roles and contributions" must be included in California and U.S. history lessons. It bans instructional materials judged to reflect adversely on gays or particular religions. "We're talking about teaching historical facts at a grade-appropriate level. That's all it is," said Equality California spokeswoman Rebekah Orr, who represents California's largest gay-rights group. Opponents are not giving up on overturning SB48, despite failing in October to gather enough signatures to force a referendum to repeal the law. They have filed five potential ballot initiatives that would repeal the requirement outright or let parents pull their children from classes when gay and lesbian contributions are being taught. The opponents have until spring to gather enough signatures to put the referendums before voters in November. "That law undermines the integrity of objective history instruction for students, and even more importantly undermines the rights of parents in deciding what is appropriate for their child regarding controversial moral and lifestyle issues," argued Brad Dacus, a spokesman for the Pacific Justice Institute, which is helping lead one of the repeal efforts. State Senator Mark Leno said his bill is even more important in light of recent publicity about lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender students being bullied, which has been blamed for some suicides of homosexual students. "We are currently censuring the history and role and contribution of LGBT-Americans," said Leno, D-San Francisco. "It's no different than when the idea of black history or women's history was first proposed—radical concepts at the time." Equally contentious is the California Dream Act, which is taking effect in two steps. AB130 becomes law January 1 and will let students who entered the country illegally receive private financial aid at California's public colleges. Opponents are challenging AB131, the second portion that allows illegal immigrants to apply for state-funded scholarships and financial aid at state universities. That provision takes effect January 1, 2013. Dream Act supporters, including Gov. Jerry Brown and the bills' author, Democratic Assemblyman Gil Cedillo of Los Angeles, say the laws show that California remains progressive while other states, including Arizona and Alabama, enacted punitive measures.

An editorial in The New York Times states that, “There is nothing theoretical about the ongoing pain inflicted by the Defense of Marriage Act, the 1996 law that bars the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriages. Ask Charlie Morgan, a chief warrant officer in the Army National Guard, based in New Hampshire. Ms. Morgan joined the Army just out of high school, in 1982, and spent a decade serving, including stints in the Reserves and National Guard. In 2004, while teaching at a Kentucky high school, she re-enlisted in the Army National Guard, knowing it meant going back to hiding her sexual identity under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” rule. ‘My country had been attacked, and I felt a patriotic duty to help protect it,’ Ms. Morgan told me. After moving to New Hampshire in 2008 to take a full-time National Guard post, Ms. Morgan was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a double mastectomy followed by chemotherapy and radiation. She was cared for by her longtime partner, Karen Morgan, with whom she entered into a Vermont civil union in 2000 when she was out of the military. Not long after being declared cancer-free, Charlie Morgan was sent to Kuwait for a year. She and her partner married in October in New Hampshire, once the ban on gay people openly serving in the armed forces was lifted. Even with repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell,” the pair face all sorts of limitations not imposed on opposite-sex military couples. Because of the Defense of Marriage Act, for example, Karen Morgan is denied health coverage worth well in excess of $10,000 a year. She also cannot get a base pass that would let her escort their 4 1/2-year-old daughter to medical appointments on base or shop at the commissary. These serial injustices are especially concerning now that Charlie Morgan’s cancer has returned. She worries about how her family will manage if she dies, since the law denies same-sex spouses death and survivor benefits. In the fall, she became a named plaintiff in a federal lawsuit challenging the Defense of Marriage Act’s denial of equal protection. ‘I have a question I’d like to ask John Boehner,’ Charlie Morgan said, taking note of the House speaker’s decision to spend taxpayer money for lawyers to defend the act. ‘I’ve proved I’m willing to put my life on the line for my country. When will he allow the military to protect my family?’”

They fell in love, moved in together in a house in south Brevard County and had a baby girl. Now they are fighting over who should raise the child. But unlike most couples, they are two women. One donated the egg. The other had it implanted into her womb and carried the child to term. So which one is the mother? The woman who bore the child says it is she and she alone. According to The Orlando Sentinel, a circuit judge in Brevard County, writing that it broke his heart to say so, ruled that she is right. Under Florida law, a woman who gives birth is the mother. Last week, however, a state appeals court in Daytona Beach overturned his decision, saying the other mother has parental rights, too. The 5th District Court of Appeal ruled that the U.S. and Florida constitutions trump Florida law and give parenting rights to both women. State law, it added, has not kept up with the times. "This is a unique case, and the appellate courts in Florida have never before considered a case quite like it," it said. Although a growing number of families have two parents who are the same sex, few involve children whose chromosomes come from one woman but who were carried to term by another. Still, it's an important decision with a wider implication, said Nancy Polikoff, a law professor at American University Washington College of Law and expert on gay-and-lesbian family law. "Any ruling that supports the right of a same-sex couple … is important for its willingness to recognize that these families exist and a child raised in this environment shouldn't be forced to give up a parent," she said. In this case the same sex couple had been in a committed relationship for 11 years, according to court records. Several years ago, they decided to have a child, went to counselling to prepare for it and then discovered that one of them, then a 39-year-old law-enforcement officer, was infertile. The couple went to a reproductive doctor, and the other would-be mom, then 34 and also a law-enforcement officer, donated her egg to be fertilized. It was implanted in her partner's womb, and a baby girl was born the first week of 2004. The couple gave the baby a hyphenated version of their last names, but the child's birth certificate bore only the name of the mom who had carried her to term. The father was an anonymous sperm donor who had waived his rights. The child treated both women as parents, according to the appeals-court ruling, even after they split up when the little girl was 2. Then, a year and a half later, the birth mom disappeared with the child, leaving the country without telling her former partner where they had gone. Eventually the egg-donor mom tracked them down in Queensland, Australia. They have since returned to Florida. Robert A. Segal of Melbourne represents the egg-donor mom. Michael B. Jones and Robert J. Wheelock of Orlando represent the other mom. Neither returned phone calls. The appeals court handed down its ruling December 23. In it, it asks the Florida Supreme Court to weigh in on a very narrow legal issue: Does a woman in a lesbian relationship who gives her egg to her partner have no legal rights to the child it produces? Camilla Taylor, a family lawyer with LAMBDA Legal Defense and Educational Fund, a non-profit that works on behalf of gays and lesbians, praised the ruling. "I think it's clear the court reached the correct result, and courts are moving toward greater protections for families that involve either varying kinds of biological connections to their children or who have no biological connection but have functioned as parents in a child's life," she said. The appeals court ordered the case back to the trial judge, Circuit Judge Charlie Crawford in Viera, instructing him to give the egg-donor mom access to her daughter and to iron out custody, visitation and child-support issues. The thing on which he should focus, the appeals court wrote, is the child's well-being. That edict to focus on the child, said Polikoff, the law professor, is one of the most heartening things about the ruling.

Professional gay Lance Bass spotted shirtless on the beaches Miami, Florida.

A hooded Prince Harry hits unsuspecting victims with snowballs thrown from a balcony of a hotel in Geneva.

Leon Jackson, who won the British 2007 X Factor celebrates his birthday in his birthday suit, and posts said suit to Twitter, naturally.

Liam Hemsworth is seen arriving in Los Angeles Friday.