Illinois « From Eternity To Here

Exxon.SouthCapitol.SE.WDC.21sep05 (Photo credit: Elvert Barnes)

Illinois officials will begin investigating ExxonMobil to determine if the company discriminates against gay job applicants, putting a spotlight on the company’s employment practices as the Senate considers a bill that would make such discrimination illegal across the country.

The Illinois Department of Human Rights has accepted Freedom to Work’s complaint of employment discrimination against ExxonMobil, the first known time an LGBT group has used a “tester” case — in which a group submits similar applications from fictitious applicants who only differ in the relevant characteristic being tested — in an organizational lawsuit.

“Freedom to Work decided to take a successful strategy from the playbook of African-American civil rights leaders by employing matched-pair employment testing at Exxon and other federal contractors that lack LGBT workplace protections,” Freedom to Work president Tico Almeida told BuzzFeed. “We very quickly found evidence that Exxon has given unfair hiring preference to some lower qualified straight applicants over more qualified LGBT applicants.”

Another reason to avoid Exxon gas… Full story here.

ExxonMobil on Trial for Anti-Gay Discrimination (towleroad.com)
ExxonMobil Shareholders Again Refuse Special Protection for Homosexual Employees (cnsnews.com)
Exxon’s Employment Policies Are Bad for Business (fool.com)

Illinois Catholic bishops are taking their ball and going home in the face of federal non-discrimination requirements for foster care and adoption. The New York Times:

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Roman Catholic bishops in Illinois have shuttered most of the Catholic Charities affiliates in the state rather than comply with a new requirement that says they must consider same-sex couples as potential foster-care and adoptive parents if they want to receive state money. The charities have served for more than 40 years as a major link in the state’s social service network for poor and neglected children.

The bishops have followed colleagues in Washington, D.C., and Massachusetts who had jettisoned their adoption services rather than comply with nondiscrimination laws.

The vilification of LGBT persons by the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church is quickly becoming hysterical paranoia. What I find interesting is that it flies in the face of most of the opinions of people in the pews as well as the experience of many of the clergy and bishops themselves. They know gay people, they minister to gay people, and- I know this from personal experience- many of them are gay people.

Yet, this real-life, personal experience has no credibility in the face of freakishly ideological edicts from Rome. It’s absolutely backward. The experience of the people is supposed to form the church, form the hierarchy.

Not to mention the disregard for social and biological science. This is a church that would rather let the little children suffer. It saddens me.

Where’s the love, people?

Read the full story here