Florida church announces Quran burning event

Maybe the tea partiers have found a new hero. News that a Florida pastor was planning a Quran-burning event to mark the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks is typical of the kind of ignorant thinking that characterizes the tea party movement and its over-publicized icon, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin. The announcement of the Islamic good book burning that Terry Jones, pastor of the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, says is to remember the victims of attacks on New York and Washington, D.C., and to express outrage against that religion, has sparked cries of outrage from leaders of U.S. religious denominations, according to Cable News Network (CNN). As we all know, the 19 9-11 hijackers were Muslim and the United States blames the attack on al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, also a Muslim. "We believe that Islam is of the devil, that it's causing billions of people to go to hell, it is a deceptive religion, it is a violent religion and that is proven many, many times," Jones said on CNN this week. Jones is the author of a book entitled "Islam is of the Devil" and his church sells T-shirts and coffee mugs bearing the phrase. But many Muslim and Christian leaders urged Jones to call off his event because it would just aggravate tensions, Reuters said. "American Muslims and other people of conscience should support positive educational efforts to prevent the spread of Islamophobia," said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American Islam Relations. The CAIR called on Muslims and others to hold 'Share the Quran" dinners to educate the public during Ramadan, the month-long fast that begins in August, and began a campaign to distribute copies of the Quran to U.S. leaders, Reuters said. An evangelical Christian group issued a statement promoting "relationships of trust and respect" with members of other religions. "God created human beings in his image, and therefore all should be treated with dignity and respect," the statement said. But "dignity and respect" for others is not what the Dove World Outreach Center is selling. Tellingly, the group also said it was promoting a rally on Monday to protest as "godless" Gainesville's openly gay mayor, Craig Lowe. At least we know this group has nothing to offer. The planet seems always to have been overpopulated with people who claim to know precisely what god is thinking.

Iowa Supreme Court does what courts are supposed to do

It's too much to hope that today's unanimous decision by the state Supreme Court in Iowa invalidating a law that banned same-sex marriage will begin to quiet the unconscionable rhetoric from the homophobic among us, but at least logic has prevailed even briefly. No doubt, the forces of intolerance are planning a ballot-box assault on the court ruling, just like what happened in California. But it's really long past time to retire such ignorance. Our guiding principles and laws guarantee equal treatment to everyone. Gay people think they ought to be able to get married. That's it, game over. End of story. What anyone thinks God wants is immaterial. The United States is a nation of laws that apply to everyone, not subject to some people's definition of religion. The ruling, which takes effect in 21 days, makes Iowa the third state to legalize same-sex marriage after Massachusetts and Connecticut, according to Cable News Network (CNN). "This is a great day for civil rights in Iowa," said former Iowa Solicitor-General Dennis Johnson, who represented six same-sex couples on behalf of Lambda Legal, an arm of a gay rights organization. "Go get married. Live happily ever." But a conservative Iowa nonprofit research group had a reverse reaction. "It's, quite frankly, a disaster," said Brian English, a spokesman for the Iowa Family Policy Center. "Obviously, we're extremely disappointed," he said. "We're saddened . . . and perhaps a little bit surprised in the unanimous decision that the court handed down." San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who captured the imagination of the entire country when he allowed gay people to marry in San Francisco for a brief time in 2004, applauded the Iowa court's decision. Newsom said he was "very proud" of Iowa's high court for "standing tall on equality. "