Welcome to G3 Weekly—a summary of this week’s top news stories on Christianity and the public square.
This week, retail corporation Target faced backlash over a “pride month” partnership with an artist who makes Satanic designs. Planned Parenthood released a nationwide strategic plan in response to the overturn of Roe v. Wade, which includes a mass layoff. Meanwhile, a Christian university fired two employees for using preferred pronouns in their email signatures.
Target Faces Boycott over Partnership with Satanic Artist
“Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap” (Galatians 6:7).
Target is experiencing backlash from conservative consumers after the firm hired an artist who makes Satanic designs related to homosexuality, transgenderism, and abortion.
Erik Carnell, who identifies as transgender and runs a company called Abprallen, created three items for the retailer’s annual “pride month” collection. Some items featured on the artist’s online store, which were not marketed by Target, included a design of a skeleton wrapped in rainbow colors that said “Trans Witches For Abortion” and a shirt that said “Satan Respects Pronouns.”
“Satanists don’t actually believe in Satan, he is merely used as a symbol of passion, pride, and liberty,” Carnell said on the website, which is now closed because of runaway demand for the items. “He means to you what you need him to mean. So for me, Satan is hope, compassion, equality, and love. So, naturally, Satan respects pronouns. He loves all LGBT+ people.”
Share prices for Target fell considerably in the days after a conservative activist created a social media thread exposing the company’s association with the artist. Target, which also faced criticism for a female swimsuit described as “tuck-friendly” and “extra crotch coverage” for men who call themselves transgender, was forced to remove rainbow “pride month” displays from certain locations or move them toward the back of the stores.
California Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom and other leftists blasted Target for “selling out the LGBTQ+ community” as a result of the conservative backlash.
Planned Parenthood Downsizes and Unveils Nationwide Strategy
“Fret not yourself because of evildoers; be not envious of wrongdoers! For they will soon fade like the grass and wither like the green herb” (Psalm 37:1).
Planned Parenthood revealed forthcoming efforts to increase “abortion access” after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year.
The abortion conglomerate will invest some $70 million into four dozen affiliates across the nation so that they can “increase access to abortion” and “build a powerful movement for abortion access at the local and state level.” Executives also announced increased efforts to promote abortion among members of the black community and utilize online platforms to encourage abortion in parts of the country with more severe restrictions.
Planned Parenthood will meanwhile eliminate between 10% and 20% of staff members next month, an effort decried by the labor unions which represent the organization’s employees.
The overturn of Roe v. Wade, a Supreme Court opinion which said that there exists a right to abortion in the Fourteenth Amendment, has rendered a deluge of state-level policies to either increase or decrease access to the lethal procedure. Even in conservative states where additional restrictions are now enacted, mothers can easily order abortion pills through the mail in order to murder their children, and no state has yet criminalized abortion as homicide.
Houghton University Dismisses Two Workers for Using Personal Pronouns
“No one who practices deceit shall dwell in my house; no one who utters lies shall continue before my eyes” (Psalm 101:7).
Two employees at Houghton University, a small Christian school in western New York, were dismissed from their positions after they included their preferred pronouns in their work emails.
Raegan Zelaya and Shua Wilmot, former residence hall directors who respectively described themselves in their work email signatures as “she/her” and “he/him,” were dismissed by Houghton University after they refused to comply with new policies regarding email signatures. Several hundred alumni of the school, which is controlled by the Wesleyan Church, signed a petition expressing outrage about the dismissals.
“I think it boils down to: they want to be trans-exclusive and they want to communicate that to potential students and the parents of potential students,” Wilmot commented in an interview with The New York Times.
The Wesleyan Church affirms that “gender confusion and dysphoria are ultimately the biological, psychological, social, and spiritual consequences of the human race’s fallen condition” and notes that “adult gender nonconformity” violates the “sanctity of human life.”
