Droppings from the Catholic Birdcage: "Shouldn't the Synod Documents Label Couples Using Birth Control As 'Wounded'?"

Patrick T. Reardon commenting in National Catholic Reporter on the strange (and more than a little biased) way in which the final statement on the family produced at last year's Catholic synod on the Family talks about "wounded" families:

Fellow Sociologist on Regnerus Study: "Key Measure of Gay and Lesbian Parenting Is Simply a Farce"

"The key measure of gay and lesbian parenting is simply a farce."

Footnotes to Previous Discussions: Mark Regnerus and Margaret Thatcher

Brief glosses today on two items about which I've written recently:

Rob Tisanai at Box Turtle Bulletin: "Dear Dr. Regnerus"

And now, in non-"Dancing with the Stars" news as the weekend arrives:

Mark Regnerus Back in News: Straight Men Who Support Marriage Equality Consume More Porn

Also not to be missed as the year turns: Mark Regnerus, the author of this year's widely criticized study about "gay" parenting that Regnerus himself admits wasn't really about gay parenting at all, is back in the news again. His latest foray into scholarship demonstrating that the notion of marriage equality is unsound: an article at the Witherspoon Institute website claiming that straight men supporting marriage equality tend to watch more porn than do other straight men. 

More Blistering Criticism of Regnerus Study: 200+ Scholars Write Journal to Ask Critical Questions

Peer Review

Not-to-miss news today about sociologist Mark Regnerus's recently published study which claims to prove that children raised by "gay" parents have problems children raised in traditional households lack (I've blogged about the study previously here, here, here, and here):

From the Blogs: Reforming the Catholic Church, Sr. Farley's Book, Southern Baptists, Regnerus, and Religious Right

Some mid-week commentary on a wide range of issues from bloggers whose insights I value, writing about the Lynn-Sandusky convictions, the need of the Catholic church for reform, the decision of the Vatican to bring Fox news in, the condemnation of Sr. Margaret Farley's book Just Love, Southern Baptists, the Mark Regnerus study (and controversy), and the role of the Catholic church in the American religious right:

From the Blogs: Raining Gays, Nuns and More Nuns, Rats and Regnerus, and Jesus

At Huffington Post, Larry Womack notes that  "[w]hen it comes to sex, study participants lie a lot."  This may be particularly true of LGBT folks who live in places where honesty can come with a very high price.  And so how do we get a fix on the percentage of the U.S. population who may be gay?  Womack proposes looking at studies of who googles to find gay porn.  The surprising finding: some of the most conservative anti-gay states in the U.S.  (hint: Texas, Florida) are high on that Google list.

Mark Regnerus's New Study of "Gay" Parenting and Ross Douthat on Gay Marriage and Severing Marriage from Procreation

As he comments on Mark Regnerus's badly conceived and badly executed recent study of "gay" parenting, which isn't actually about gay parents at all and which was bought and paid for by two well-heeled right-wing foundations, one of them closely associated with the National Organization for Marriage, Ross Douthat writes,

And the near-universal liberal optimism on the subject notwithstanding, we don’t really know how straight culture will be influenced on the long run by the final, formal severing of marriage from procreation.

In the News: Nuns, Religious Freedom, Gay Parents, North Carolina Legislating

P.S.  When you have a moment, please denounce my book: Professor Marie Fortune writes a letter to the pope.

State senators in North Carolina passed a measure Tuesday in open defiance of the laws of nature: North Carolina legislates.