News

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The city of New York agreed to pay $100,000 in legal fees and nominal damages to a Jewish psychotherapist this week after the city council repealed a law which cracked down on professionals assisting individuals to accept their biological sex or overcome unwanted same-sex attraction.

The city council passed the law in 2018 making it unlawful for any person to provide services for a fee  that “seek to change a person’s sexual orientation or seek to change a person’s gender identity to conform to the sex of such individual that was recorded at birth.”

Alliance Defending Freedom, which represented Orthodox Jewish psychotherapist Dr Dovid Schwartz in the case, said that the law unconstitutionally censored private conversations between counselling professionals and their patients.

According to the ADF, “the law only prohibited counsel in one direction—assisting a patient who desires to reduce same-sex attraction or achieve comfort with their biological sex.”

Penalties of up to $10,000 applied.

Inconsistently, counselling that steers a patient towards a gender identity different than his or her physical body was permitted, according to ADF.

Alliance Defending Freedom lawyers requested a federal district court in June 2019 to halt enforcement of the city’s new ordinance that they say violated Schwartz’s freedom of speech and infringed on his religious faith and that of his patients.

Due to the lawsuit by ADF, the city voted to repeal the counselling ban in September last year and the ADF is no longer pursuing its lawsuit on behalf of Dr Schwarz.

“All New Yorkers and all Americans deserve the right to private conversations, free from government control,” said ADF Senior Counsel Roger Brooks.

“New York City directly violated our client’s freedom of speech by trying to regulate and censor private sessions between an adult and his therapist. While the city eventually saw the writing on the wall and reversed course, it needlessly cost the taxpayers of New York tens of thousands of dollars for enacting its unconstitutional policy in the first place, because Dr. Schwartz was forced to go to court to protect his rights.

“Other cities should not repeat the same error. We’re grateful that New York City is no longer threatening to censor Dr. Schwartz’s conversations and impose government-approved orthodoxy on him or his patients.”

According to the ADF, Schwartz has practices for over 50 years and has regularly encountered and served patients who want his help overcoming same-sex attraction.

“Because of their religious beliefs and personal life goals, clients who seek his counsel often desire to experience opposite-sex attraction so they can marry, form a natural family, and live consistently with their Orthodox Jewish faith.

“A number of patients have pursued and achieved those goals with the aid of his psychotherapeutic services. Schwartz uses no techniques in working with his patients other than listening and talking—yet the 2018 law claimed to forbid even that.”

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William Wilberforce battled for 20 years to abolish the slave trade

Some of you may remember Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali. Ten years ago he spoke to FamilyVoice supporters across the nation on the theme Courage in a hostile world.

Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali was born in Pakistan to Muslim parents who had become Christians – an act that today would receive the death penalty. 

Michael himself came to Christ as a teenager. As an Anglican priest and later bishop, he worked among the poor in southern Lahore. However, increasing assaults and death threats against his children forced him to flee to the UK with his family in 1986.

Earlier this month he wrote an article about the history of slavery and the current campaign to destroy statues of past heroes who also owned slaves.

“Slavery is a stain on humanity,” he said (in part). “It existed in the Arab world before the rise of Islam and continued to be practised right up to modern times. The Arabs were pioneers in the slave trade with Africa, and European slavers learnt much about their business from them.”

But when it comes to tearing down statues, he said: “Where do we start and stop?”

He pointed out that Plato and Aristotle were slave owners. Abraham and Sarah had slaves, as did King David. Jesus himself healed the slave of a Roman officer. He said of the latter that he had not found such faith even in Israel.

Nazir-Ali said we erect statues of people because they have been part of or leaders in some historic event we wish to remember, such as war memorials.  No one would claim that such people were exemplary in every aspect of life.

Unlike Islam, the Bible does not portray its heroes as flawless – except for Jesus.

Abraham hid the fact that Sarah was his wife. David committed adultery and murder. Moses doubted God. The apostle Paul even sent Onesimus, a runaway slave, back to his Christian master –with a plea for Onesimus to be treated as a beloved brother. Paul says male and female, slave and free, all are “one in Christ Jesus”. But we all have sinned. We all need to repent and turn to Him.

The early Christian church was a powerless and persecuted group that was in no position to oppose the institution of slavery. It did try, however, to improve slaves’ conditions and often bought slaves to set them free. Nazir-Ali said, “It is notable that wherever Christianity advanced, slavery retreated.”

As the Middle Ages progressed in Europe, both church and state began to take action against slavery. The French king Charlemagne was against it. In 1102, the Council of Westminster penalised slave trading with excommunication.

But slavery flourished again when Europeans wanted free labour to work on their sugar and cotton plantations in the Americas. William Wilberforce, an evangelical Christian, was among those who opposed this horrendous trade in human lives.

William Wilberforce battled for 20 years to abolish the slave trade

After a 20-year battle, his bill to abolish the buying and selling of slaves passed the British parliament in 1807. Days before he died in 1833, the parliament also banned owning slaves. Over 800,000 were freed.

So what should we say to those who want to trash statues of heroes who have flaws in their past?

Bishop Nazir-Ali reminds us that commemorating past historical leaders “does not necessarily mean celebration of every aspect of a person or a group … history is about what actually happened, not what we wish had happened.”

Peter Downie - National Director

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Brisbane mum Katrina Tait had a win the other day.

All parents should rejoice. Sydney homosexual activist Garry Burns has decided to withdraw his vilification complaint against Katrina, even though the NSW Anti-Discrimination Board had accepted it. 

You may remember Garry Burns. He’s the guy who is pursuing Queensland dad and former Army Major Bernard Gaynor under NSW anti-discrimination law.  Over the years, Burns has made nearly 40 complaints against Gaynor, who has had to sell his home to pay for legal expenses.

The NSW Anti-Discrimination Board has been ruling against any criticism of the homosexual lifestyle. It has been accepting complaints, not only against people in New South Wales, but those from other states as well.

Katrina Tait lives in Brisbane with her husband and four children. She didn’t even mention homosexuality when she shared a petition on her Facebook page in January.

She asked Brisbane City Council to cancel a “drag queen story hour” led by a former adult entertainer in a council library.

In part she wrote, “What happened to protecting children’s innocence and letting them just be kids?”

It’s a good question. So how come we’re seeing “drag queen story hours/ times” in our schools, bookstores and local council libraries?

Well, they seem to be part of the push by LGBT activists to teach children, including preschoolers, that they can be any gender they want.

Sydney drag queen “Hannah Conda” says: “Part of my job with Drag Queen Story Time is to educate kids…  I’m often asked by the kids if I’m a girl or a boy. I simply tell them sometimes I’m a boy, and sometimes I’m a girl, but I’m ALWAYS a Princess!”

Is it any wonder increasing numbers of children are becoming confused?

Garry Burns has now withdrawn his homosexual vilification complaint against Katrina Tait, but hasn’t said why. Part of the answer could lie in NSW MP Mark Latham’s new bill to close some loopholes in the NSW anti-discrimination law.

I mentioned Mark Latham in my weekly email on 7/5/20. Please keep praying that his bill may find favour with the NSW Parliament. Garry Burns may have withdrawn his complaint against Katrina so it cannot be used as yet another example of his long history of vexatious litigation.

And if your local council library or school is thinking of allowing a drag queen to tell stories to children in your area, do follow Katrina’s example. Speak up about your concerns!

Peter Downie - National Director 

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The Australian Capital Territory government will not allow the public to personally raise concerns about so-called “gay conversion” therapy, citing concern about corona virus transmission, in a move that has angered FamilyVoice Australia.

Last year the ACT Chief Minister Andrew Bar promised to punish anyone seeking to help people wishing to turn away from same-sex attraction. Mr Bar is Australia’s first openly LGBTI governmental leader.

According to The Australian newspaper (3 July 2020) the ACT government says “changing a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity and/or gender expression has the potential to cause harm”.

This drew a sharp response from FamilyVoice Australia National Director Peter Downie:

“People seeking help should make their own decision about accessing therapists or counsellors and don’t need governments restricting freedom of choice,” he said.

“The ACT government is not concerned about so-called harmful interventions but is blatantly pushing against biblical Christian ideals.

FamilyVoice Australia is currently calling for a full inquiry into the harms done to young people through government sponsored gender identity ambitions.

As noted by The Australian, Victoria’s Premier Dan Andrews promised Australia’s first “conversion therapy” ban at the 2019 Midsumma Pride March, but the government of Queensland tried to gazump him and took medical bodies by surprise with a rushed consultation during the 2019-20 summer holidays. However, the evidence and drafting for the Queensland bill were savaged, and it was withdrawn.

Peter Downie urged the ACT government to allow a public consultation as occurred in Queensland.

“If the ACT government will use common sense and facilitate consultation by video conference, the public may well raise similar concerns to those expressed in Queensland, that would undermine the government’s unhelpful agenda - or is that what the ACT fears?”

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I take my hat off to Sunday School teachers. They provide an important service, especially to those children whose parents are uncertain how to teach them about the Christian faith, including God’s word in the Bible.

But the teachers’ task is much more difficult if some of their pupils cannot read.
 
One former Sunday School teacher encouraged her nine and ten-year-old pupils to read Bible verses related to the lesson every week.
 
“But several of them simply couldn’t do it,” she said. “They knew some common words by sight, but had no idea about how to tackle more complex ones. 

“They were intelligent, but they hated reading. There was no way they would go home and read the Bible on their own,” she said.
 
Since the 1970s, significant numbers of students have been graduating from primary and high school with few or no reading skills.
 
Studies have shown that more than a third of Australian adults can only read a few words.  They cannot read a map, or a recipe, or instructions on a medicine bottle – let alone a newspaper or the Bible. 

The Australian newspaper recently featured an article by literacy expert Jennifer Buckingham:  

At the start of the year (2020), 17,000 12- and 13-year-olds walked into high school classrooms all across the country unable to read even at a minimal level... A further 35,000 students achieved only the minimum standard, in which they can barely find basic information in simple written text.

Dr Buckingham explained the reason: most of these children have never been taught systematic phonics – how to blend letter sounds into words. 

Instead, their teachers have told them to remember the “look” of words, using pictures, context or first letter clues to help. Sadly, children without good visual memories often guess wrongly.

When FamilyVoice first became aware of the problem in 1991, they held a seminar led by US phonics expert Sam Blumenfeld. It was so popular they had to turn people away. 

Sam was born a Jew, but later became a follower of Christ. His parents had fled to New York from Hitler’s Germany. Sam, along with all the other immigrant five-year-olds in his crowded classroom, learned to read in English – by phonics.
 

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Sam Blumenfed teaches Sam Findlay (3) after our FamilyVoice seminar

So Sam did some research – later producing his best-selling book, Alpha-Phonics. It has not only helped the children of Sam’s boss, but many thousands since.

Alpha-Phonics is a workbook that parents can use, spending just ten minutes a day. The first lessons blend short vowels with simple consonants. Gradually more letter combinations are added until the child can decode any word by the end of the book.

If children you know have problems reading the Bible – or any other book – you may like to check out this or other phonics systems. Our office secretary Hannah still has a few copies of Alpha-Phonics, or you can buy it online.
 
Peter Downie - National Director