The National Football League on Saturday passed on its chance to draft the first openly gay athlete in professional football, while straight ally and gay rights advocate Chris Kluwe found himself pondering his future in the NFL.

REYKJAVIK, Iceland — The world’s first elected openly gay head of government has retired. Johanna Sigurdardottir, 70, ended her political career on Saturday, capping 35 years of public service in Iceland, where she served as Prime Minister since 2009.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — One final vote stands between Rhode Island joining the rest of New England and four other states in allowing gay couples to marry.

It may be a man’s world, as the saying goes, but lesbians seem to have an easier time living in it than gay men do.

Mixed martial artist Matt Mitrione has issued an apology for his comments earlier this month when he called transgender fighter Fallon Fox a “disgusting freak” who lied about her gender to “beat up women.”

John Paulk, the former chairman of Exodus International, a Christian ministry devoted to performing controversial gay-to-straight “reparative therapy” has formally renounced his past and says he is “truly, truly sorry” for the pain he’s caused by advocating for that gays could change their sexual orientation through prayer and therapy.

SAN FRANCISCO — Racing to stanch a flow of criticism, the president of San Francisco’s annual gay pride celebration said Friday night that the U.S. Army private charged in a massive leak of U.S. secrets to the WikiLeaks website will not be an honorary grand marshal after all.

I have a lovely friend. She is a transgender woman who lives in Nigeria. Her dream, at present denied her, is to be a professional dancer and actress. In her heart and in her spirit, she is both. As I think about her, I imagine the words and music from the song “Mirror and the Music” from the show A Chorus Line encompassing her as she goes to sleep each night…

ST. PAUL, Minn. — A national group of prominent GOP donors that supports same-sex marriage is pouring new money into lobbying efforts to get Republican lawmakers to vote to make it legal.

BEAR, Del. — A sign at a Delaware church opposing same-sex marriage has been drawing national attention online.

Imagine a world where “gay” was “straight” and “straight” was “gay.”

The founding members of the gay conservatives group GoProud said Friday that are stepping away from their day-to-day roles at the organization they started four years ago as a grassroots alternative to the Log Cabin Republicans.

SAN FRANCISCO — The U.S. Army private charged in a massive leak of U.S. secrets to the WikiLeaks website has been named as a grand marshal of San Francisco’s annual gay rights parade, a choice that was immediately condemned by several groups representing gay and lesbian service members.

NOVO-OGAREVO, Russia — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday warned that agreements with other countries on the matter of adoption of Russian children may be changed to ban such adoptions if those countries legalize same-sex marriage.

WASHINGTON — The Federal Election Commission said Thursday that married, same-sex couples cannot pool their money to donate to political campaigns as married, opposite-sex couples are able to do so.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — A bill protecting all workers from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity will be introduced in the South Carolina House of Representatives next Tuesday, according to staff at a state LGBT equality group.

Actor Tuc Watkins, who played gay neighbor Bob Hunter on ABC’s “Desperate Housewives,” reveals for the first time that he is gay in real life, and a single dad.

MOSCOW, Idaho — The Latah County, Id., Republican Party has voted to censure its chairman for his vote as a Moscow city councilor supporting an ordinance outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation.

RED LION, Pa. — The American Civil Liberties Union has sent a warning to a Pennsylvania school district on behalf of a transgender student who was denied the chance to run for prom king when his principal placed his female birth name in the column for prom queen, despite repeated requests to be listed under his correct gender identity.

OLYMPIA, Wash. — Gov. Jay Inslee this week signed off on the final installment of a six-year effort to make language in Washington state’s copious laws gender-neutral.