Jack Hibbs of Calvary Chapel Chino Hills is fighting the Transgender laws in California.
Article from Inland Valley Daily Bulletin
By Beau Yarbrough,
A group seeking to overturn California’s law allowing transgender students access to programs and facilities based on the gender they identify as, rather than the sex they were born into, is continuing the fight by serving Secretary of State Debra Bowen and other officials, the group announced Tuesday.
“We have served the Secretary of State with another legal action asking her to qualify the referendum and we have served county officials across the state with a demand for the documents to prove the abuse of discretion in rejecting more than 131,000 signatures,” Gina Gleason, director of faith and public policy at Calvary Chapel Chino Hills, wrote in a press release issued Tuesday morning.
Gleason is one of the proponents listed on a proposed referendum that would repeal Assembly Bill 1266, which was signed into law last September by Gov. Jerry Brown, and took effect on Jan. 1.
Opponents say the law will allow curious teens to ogle members of the opposite sex while at their most vulnerable, and for male students to game the system by dominating female sports teams. But officials in school districts where such policies have already been in effect — including Los Angeles and San Francisco unified school districts — have said those issues haven’t emerged in practice.
Chino-based group Privacy For All Students, with Gleason and Calvary Chapel Pastor Jack Hibbs as its most proponent spokespersons, collected signatures during the fall to put the matter before voters as a referendum on the 2014 ballot. An initial random sampling of the signatures showed PFAS came up 22,178 signatures short of the 504,760 signatures required to qualify for the ballot. They did get close enough to force a mandatory manual recount of every signature collected. (The previous sampling effort just looks at 500 signatures or 3 percent of the signatures submitted in each county, whichever was greater.)
But the manual recount also came up short, with officials saying on Feb. 24 that PFAS came 17,276 shy of the mark.
Read the full article here:
CalvaryChapelAbuse.com Commentary and Opinion:
This article and issue peaks my interest on many levels. I’ll preface my comments by recognizing and affirming that our Current System requires that the populace and the particular Groups who hold competing moral opinions engage in a battle to carve out both “law” and morality. That’s how it works. As such, the Evangelical Christian* has as much right to influence and push for the definition of laws and the definition of morality as any other competing philosophical Group who disagrees.
While “Transgender” proponents take a “civil rights” posture…from a critical thinking perspective it doesn’t appear to be the case. Removing your male anatomy and fashioning the female organ in its place or feeling you are a boy trapped in a girl’s body no more makes you biologically male or female than sharpening your teeth to a point, dying your hair black and wearing a cape makes you a vampire. Except in the case of the hermaphrodite, Science appears to demonstrate either male or female biology, despite the psychological disposition of the particular individual.
Conversely, Transgender should not be a taboo or some sort of lightening rod or target for abuse and bullying by those who disagree morally. While I am highly critical of Evangelicals with regards to other issues, I do not see the Evangelical as wanting to target and bully Transgenders…as is the propaganda coming out of uber-liberal voices like Rachel Maddow and MSDNC.
Both Groups have their right to a moral opinion. The “civil rights” of the Transgender should be protected just like the civil rights of anyone else…with regards to the Bill of Rights. If a Transgender person is threatened with physical violence, they should use their right to pack a gun and protect themselves. If the Transgender person wants to speak out and present their moral opinion…they should have the right to do so.
The reality is that the “law” will be dictated by which Group in the Moral Debate will be able to apply more pressure and influence to write the law. Right now in California, the Pro-Transgender Group is winning that battle. It is not wrong for a church and church leader with a contrary moral opinion to fight against the current law. That’s how the Current System works.
While I disagree with Evangelicals on many issues…and there are many criticisms of the Group that are valid…Evangelicals have the right and responsibility to vote their Conscience and they have only themselves to blame when the issues of Morality and Law are dictated for them by other Groups in their Municipality, State or Nation.
Another issue that piques my interest with this one: Pastors are public figures and Pastors do interject themselves into public moral debate all the time. In the current lawsuit I am in with Bob Grenier of Calvary Chapel Visalia…he is arguing he is not a public figure…and that he has not interjected himself into the public debate about morality and moral issues regarding child abuse or about financial corruption or other similar moral issues. Nothing could be further from the truth (and God hates “liars” and “liars” go to hell according to Bob’s bible).
Grenier fought against Gay Marriage publicly (quoted in the newspaper as well) and he also publicly railroaded Phil Aguilar of Set Free Ministries in a very aggressive campaign alleging child abuse, corruption etc. and was eventually successful in getting Aguilar booted from Visalia. Those are glaring examples of a Pastor interjecting himself into the public discussion of morality. Pastors do it all the time. When they take a stand publicly against a moral and legal issue like Transgender or Gay Marriage or any other similar issue…they are interjecting themselves into the public discussion about morality and holding themselves up as a public figure in that debate. Hibbs demonstrates this dynamic for us with the Transgender fight. I’m not saying it is right or wrong…I am saying it is the action of a Public Figure and not a private person. Regardless, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled that private persons have to prove “actual malice” even if they aren’t considered public figures…if the matters under discussion are “in the public interest”…so I guess it’s a pretty moot point after that ruling. Pastors are clearly public figures in most cases…but if the issue is “in the public interest” then they must prove “actual malice” regardless.
A last comment about this one…a guy like Jack Hibbs will get up in arms about Transgender stuff in his State…something that is “outside the church”…yet not a peep from Hibbs about getting his Calvary Chapel Association to require mandatory Child Protection Policies and Financial Transparency in the by-laws of prospective Calvary Chapel affiliate/franchises to become an official Calvary Chapel.
Seems Paul the Apostle and the bible…which Hibbs and other Calvary Chapel guys say we are to interpret “simply”….says this:
1 Corinthians 5:12 It isn’t my responsibility to judge outsiders, but it certainly is your responsibility to judge those inside the church who are sinning.
Just goes to show…there’s nothing “simple” about bible interpretation…always an asterisk and fine-print for why Calvary Chapel pastors have no responsibility and no duty to “judge” their own Church Organization/Association.