DALLAS, TX -– ExxonMobil shareholders on Wednesday voted against a resolution that would have prohibited workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The California State Senate today approved a bill designed to limit the ability of mental health providers in California to engage in dangerous sexual orientation change efforts (sometimes referred to as “ex-gay therapy,” “conversion therapy” or “reparative therapy”).

Two more “men of God” — Curtis Knapp of the New Hope Baptist Church in Seneca, Kansas, and Dennis Leatherman, pastor at the Mountain Lake Baptist Church in Oakland, Md. — are on record as advocating for the death of gays and lesbians.

Lambda Legal and the ACLU of Illinois on Wednesday filed two separate lawsuits representing 25 same-sex couples and their families seeking the freedom to marry in Illinois.

TORONTO — A dispute over the use of the term “gay-straight alliance” in Ontario schools has prompted the Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto on Monday to accuse Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty’s administration of making “religious freedom . . . a second-class right.”

LINCOLN, Neb. — Opponents of a new city ordinance that would prohibit prohibit discrimination against LGBT people in the areas of employment, housing and public accommodations, said Tuesday they had collected enough signatures of registered voters to force the city council to either repeal the measure or place it on the November ballot for a city-wide referendum.

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Opponents of same-sex marriage in Maryland announced Tuesday they have collected more than twice the number of signatures needed to put the state’s new marriage equality law to a public vote on November’s ballot.

Dharun Ravi, the former Rutgers University student convicted earlier this year of using a webcam to spy on his gay roommate who later committed suicide, will turn himself in Thursday to begin serving a 30-day prison term.

It has come as no surprise that the Religious Right has been up in arms over President Obama’s recent announcement in support of marriage equality, but what seems to have really upset them was his citation of the Bible’s “do unto others” teaching in explaining his views.

President Obama’s leadership on marriage equality is proving to have a major impact, form national organizations and local polling. Anti-equality forces set a record, but it’s probably not one they wanted. And DOMA is ruled unconstitutional in a fifth federal case.

Lambda Legal and the ACLU of Illinois will announce two separate lawsuits Wednesday morning seeking same-sex marriage rights for Illinois gay and lesbian couples.

WASHINGTON — Tony Perkins, president of the anti-gay hate group Family Research Council, has accepted — somewhat — an invitation to dinner in the home of a married, same-sex couple and their family.

NEW YORK — Award-winning news magazine “In the Life” will celebrate Latin pride in June with “Orgullo Latino,” a look at the complexity of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Latinos in the United States.

Actress Cynthia Nixon (“Sex and the City”) and longtime girlfriend Christine Marinoni married Sunday in New York City. Nixon, 46, and Marinoni, an education activist, 45, have been together since 2004, and had been engaged for three years.

ST. PAUL, Minn. — A Minnesota pastor is at risk of losing his church after most of his congregation abandoned him because he voiced his support for same-sex marriage.

While all Americans have a right to serve openly in the military, without regard to sexual orientation, thanks to the repeal of the ‘Don’t ask don’t tell’ law, LGBT servicemembers still suffer rampant discrimination with regard to marriage equality, green card sponsorship of binational partners or spouses and a host of other missing benefits caused by lack of equality under the civil law of the U.S.A.

For me, Memorial Day is about honoring not only those who died fighting for our freedom, but also those closer, lost to far different battles, particularly AIDS. … And so, this Memorial Day, I’ll pause and honor the many of my own troops who have fallen in battle. They may not have had the uniform or the recognition of our armed forces, but the wars they fought were just as valiant, and I, for one, am richer for their many, varied gifts and sacrifices.

NEWTON, N.C. — Over 1,000 people gathered in this small town about an hour outside Charlotte on Sunday to protest what they called messages of hate by Maiden, N.C. Pastor Charles Worley, whose comments at Providence Road Baptist Church during a sermon on May 13 made headlines last week.

How and why do otherwise kind and Jesus-esque people become machines motivated by fear and unleashed in ignorance when the topic switches to the gay community? And how, on this one topic, do some Christians neglect the clear Biblical mandates to care for the poor and the outcast and turn all their negative energy onto the LGBT community? Who can we “thank” for this diversion and inoculation of deception and ignorance? “Holy Terror: Lies the Christian Right Tells to Deny Gay Equality,” by Mel White, is a treasure map to the answer…

The lack of public figures or role models for teenagers, and the hesitancy of schools to include same-sex sexualities in sex-ed curricula, despite these being a normal part of human sexuality, give these negative attitudes more influence by not contrasting them with the more positive reality. Given the body of mental health research that has consistently connected stigma and suicidality, and despite the progress we’ve made, the present state of society leaves me concerned…