An impressive braintrust of international relations is gathering at Boise State today, participating in the 28th annual Frank Church Conference, which this year examines the timely topic of the Arab Spring. The noontime speaker was Daisy Khan, executive director of the American Society for Muslim Advancement, recently profiled in BW's Citizen feature.

"I am here in the name of God," said Khan. "The same God that we all worship. The God of Abraham, Ishmael, Moses and Jesus."

Khan spoke to a packed ballroom at Boise State's Student Union, which included several dignitaries such as Ambassador Christopher Hill, former U.S. assistant secretary of state and ambassador to Iraq, Ambassador Hesham El Nakib, consul general of Egypt, and Dr. Peter Howard of the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs at the U.S. Department of State.

"The struggle for acceptance is the cross that Muslims bear in the United States," said Khan. "We have representatives from the U.S. State Department here today. I can tell you directly that we can be your ambassadors."

Facing an influx of divorces, some Mexico City lawmakers are proposing two-year marriage licenses.

Reuters is reporting that the proposal to Mexico City's civil code would allow couples to decide on the length of their commitment. The minimum marriage contract would be for two years and could be renewed if the couple stays happy.

"You wouldn't have to go through the tortuous process of divorce," said Leonel Luna, co-author of the bill. "If the relationship is not stable or harmonious, the contract simply ends."

Luna said his proposal is gaining support, and he expects a vote by the end of the year.

A full school year has come and gone since the Nampa Classical Academy had its charter yanked due to financial insecurity. But representatives of the now-defunct school said they still want to fight for their right to use the Bible as a teaching tool in a classroom (if they ever reopen). Last week, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a dismissal of a suit filed by the school against the state of Idaho over the use of the Bible.

But a senior legal counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund told the Idaho Press Tribune that his group is prepared to take their case to the Supreme Court. David Cortman said the Ninth Circuit "ignored the right of local school districts to choose their own texts and curriculum." Ultimately Cortman said he's prepared to file a petition to submit the case for review by the high court.

Travel to Idaho's panhandle this weekend and you might pass a unique statue at the corner Sherman Avenue and Sixth Street in Coeur d'Alene. It's part of the city's ArtCurrents, a new art-on-loan program. The six-foot-tall statue is of the Hindu god Ganesha, with four arms and an elephant's head.

ArtCurrents placed 15 sculptures around Coeur d'Alene, including two with Christian references and another with a Native American reference.

A church is expected to file suit today against the City of Mountain Home, alleging religious discrimination.

The No-Limits Christian Ministries, in its suit filed today in U.S. District Court in Boise, said its First and 14th Amendment rights were violated when the Mountain Home City Council denied approval of a conditional use permit.

NLCM wants to convert a former Salvation Army building into a church and counseling center. Their request has been bouncing between the Mountain Home Planning and Zoning board and the City Council since December.

First, the major sticking point was parking. The building has a maximum occupancy of almost 300 people, but the parking lot only fits 23 vehicles. Mountain Home city officials said the church needs at least 71 spaces. Church officials said their dilemma was fixed by finding shared parking sites across the street.

City officials next said there would be a safety issue with dozens of churchgoers crossing two main traffic arteries. NLCM pastor Clark Williams argued that the arteries pumped little to no traffic on Sunday mornings.

“Initially, the city said, ‘Jump,’ and we said, ‘How high?’” Williams said. “In hindsight, we could have never jumped high enough.”

Representing NLCM, attorney John Mauck cited the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, stating religious institutions cannot be treated “on less than equal terms with a nonreligious institution.”

All traces of Bryan Fischer have been wiped clean from the Idaho Values Alliance website in preparation for Friday's re-launch of IVA under new president—and abstinence education consultant—Gary N. Brown.

On the website sourceministires.net, Brown wrote, “I am known across America as the nation’s Abstinence Pastor, impacting abstinence and marriage-education legislation and policy on every level of government. I have been able to gain the trust of senators and House members, alike.”

Brown told Citydesk he first met Fischer, who left IVA in 2009 for Mississippi-based American Family Association, when he moved to the Idaho panhandle from Atlanta two years ago. Brown left his position as pastor of Coeur d'Alene's NorthStar Church after 10 months to helm the IVA, saying that he found work like that of IVA's a better fit for him.

As head of IVA and during his time with AFA, Fischer has been a polarizing figure. Citydesk asked Brown if he shared Fisher's stance on homosexuality and Islam.

“I am very well aware of some of Bryan Fischer’s positions on issues, and to be honest, I would rather not go there,” he said. “In the future we will have to address issues like that. I mean my goodness, it is a hot button topic … I don’t want any particular issue to take the headlines today.”

Brown plans to recast the focus of IVA toward education and maintains it will have a different focus.

“I am for an open market place of ideas. I will defiantly express opinions in the future, and we may not always agree, but I’ll tell you something: I’ll fight for your right to stand for your beliefs any day.”

Despite Brown’s seemingly greater openness, IVA will remain affiliated with AFA, which currently employs Fischer.

“We are not on a crusade to make everyone Christians, we are on a crusade to help everybody understand the values that went into our Constitution and Declaration of Independence … We are calling on Idahoans to a revival of Americanism,” Brown said.

To Brown, Americanism expresses the values our founders believed in when they wrote the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

“The Ten Commandments, for example, were huge with the founders and where we get our basic Judeo-Christian Values.”

In one of Brown's sermons posted online, he talks about speaking to the Pachyderms, a Boise Republican group, about "the church being the gatekeeper of the Constitution” and how he is “looking forward to the day when Christ and his church takes their rightful place again in the nation.”

What is clear is IVA is back. What is not clear is what it will be.

Landis Rossi has been named the new executive director of Catholic Charities of Idaho.

Rossi, who is serving as program manager for service integration at Idaho's Department of Health and Welfare, will assume her new duties Monday, Sept. 20. Rossi also previously worked for Easter Seals / Goodwill.

Rossi will replace Rosio Gonzalez, who is leaving the first week of October to join her husband, Will Rainford who has taken a teaching position in San Antonio, Texas. Both were board members of Interfaith Sanctuary, a shelter for the Treasure Valley's homeless.

"I'm very excited for Landis," Gonzalez told Citydesk. "She has great connections in the community and has great passion for what she does."

Every week, the Boise's mayor's office sends the media a transcription of all the calls the Mayor's Hotline has received. People complain about everything from the F35 to their trash service to "the trolley" to their neighbors' yards.

Citydesk spotted a few calls in the latest log from some very un-Christian Christian types. Looks like these callers missed out on a few civics lessons in high school. Especially the part about the U.S. being founded as a place to freely practice any religion. (Then again, there is that whole separation of church and state part, which begs the question: Why are we still praying prior to government meetings?)

Here's what a few locals had to say to Mayor Dave Bieter about Rajan Zed opening a Boise City Council meeting June 8 with a Hindu prayer.

Beth Fain
Invocation: I found out that you plan to have a Hindu pray for the City Council and it’s very
offensive to me. It’s also offensive that you and the City Council had the Ten Commandments
taken out of the park and yet you let this Hindu come in and recruit or whatever it is. It makes
me very angry and upset, and offended. Have a nice day.

Anonymous
Invocation: Having the Zen priest come here to open the council meetings with his prayer is a
perfect reason to vote Mayor Bieter out of office.

Kathleen Osman
Invocation: I don’t agree with that Hindu prayer cause we were founded on Judeo Christian
and they’re not even giving Christians equal time. You know, these days we’re getting
persecuted and it just doesn’t seem to be right. I guess it would be o.k. if we were getting equal
time and if these people were paying taxes and are citizens I understand that part, if they are
part of the local government but are you going to open with Christian prayer as well? Where do
we draw the line? What if Satanists then want to start opening up a prayer. Where do we draw
the line? Muslims don’t have tolerance like that. We tolerate to a certain degree but now the
other religions don’t tolerate this country that was founded on Judeo Christian values.

"Recruit." Really? And here's a bit of useful knowledge, Anon: "Zen" refers to Buddhism, not Hinduism. And, finally, regarding equal time for Christians, this is the first Hindu invocation opening a Boise City Council meeting. Although the city doesn't keep an ongoing tally of the denominations to which those offering the invocation belong, city officials say the "vast majority—if not all—are performed by Christians."

It sounds like Boise's old buddy Bryan Fischer is continuing his headline making habits in his new home. The former Idaho Values Alliance director, who relocated to Tupelo, Miss., last summer to take a job with the American Family Association, is making waves with his call to kick out all Muslims from the U.S. military in the wake of the Ft. Hood shootings last week.

Writes Fischer in his Focal Point blog:

It it is time, I suggest, to stop the practice of allowing Muslims to serve in the U.S. military. The reason is simple: the more devout a Muslim is, the more of a threat he is to national security. Devout Muslims, who accept the teachings of the Prophet as divinely inspired, believe it is their duty to kill infidels. Yesterday's massacre is living proof. And yesterday's incident is not the first fragging incident involving a Muslim taking out his fellow U.S. soldiers. (Nov. 6)

It's an argument that builds on an Aug. 27 post in which Fischer posited that devout Muslims cannot be good Americans.

Fischer's comments also briefly riled the feathers of MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, who called Fischer a "knee jerk racist."

A Pentagon spokesman just confirmed for citydesk that the God and Country Festival in Nampa was denied a military flyover last week.

"In the case of the God and Country Festival, the determination was made that flyover support would not be in accordance with Air Force and DoD policy which prohibits support for events which appear to endorse, selectively benefit, or favor any special interest or religious organization, regardless of the event date," said Capt. Tom Wenz at the Pentagon's Air Force Press Desk in a statement to BW.

God and Country organizers are laying blame on the Obama administration, but Wenz asserted that Department of Defense regulations govern military flyovers and than none of those policies have changed.

"In their previous applications the organizers described the event as a 'patriotic tribute,'" Wenz said. But this year's application had religious connotations and further investigation (a brief peek at their Web site?!) revealed the mission as clearly religious in nature.

“Supporting this event would be a clear violation of the DOD policy,” Wenz said.

Below is Wenz's full statement:

The guidelines applied by the Air Force that govern the approval process for aircraft flyovers are stipulated by Department of Defense regulations. These guidelines are not the result of new policies directed by any other agency or government office.

Each aviation request received is evaluated and considered on its own merits. In the case of the God and Country Festival, the determination was made that flyover support would not be in accordance with Air Force and DoD policy which prohibits support for events which appear to endorse, selectively benefit, or favor any special interest or religious organization, regardless of the event date.

Several other similar events were determined ineligible this year for the same reasons as the God and Country Festival. The Air Force carefully scrutinizes the purpose and overall missions of those organizations
interested in receiving aviation support. Each request is reviewed on a case-by-case basis to determine if it's in the best interest of the Air Force to support and meets all applicable guidelines set forth in both DoD and AF policy.