A new Hart Research poll finds that 68% of U.S. women voters oppose allowing corporations to refuse to cover contraception in their health plans because of religious objections.

Key findings: “Women of all demographics overwhelmingly support the provision of the Affordable Care Act requiring employers to cover contraception and other preventive health services for women, including 92% of Democrats, 83% of independents, 63% of Republicans and 79% of Catholics.”

Evangelist Franklin Graham is praising Russian President Vladimir Putin for his aggressive crackdown on homosexuality, saying his record on protecting children from gay “propaganda” is better than President Obama’s “shameful” embrace of gay rights, the Raleigh News & Observer reports.

“I think we got off that track when we allowed our government to become a secular government, when we stopped realizing that God created this nation, that He wrote the constitution, that’s based on biblical principles.”

— Former Rep.Tom DeLay (R-TX), in an interview on Global Evangelical Television.

“The growing specter of legalized gay marriage, which has been advanced by numerous court decisions starting with the Supreme Court’s overturning of the federal Defense of Marriage Act last year, seems to have put a scare in GOP lawmakers,” TPM reports.

“So they’ve started legislating, introducing a string of similar bills that claim to defend religious liberty, but would effectively allow for lawful discrimination against same-sex couples by businesses or government employees on religious grounds. The bills have appeared in Congress and at least six state legislatures.”

The Week: How Christianity gave us gay marriage.

“This war is waged in our courts and in the halls of political power. It is pursued with grim and relentless determination by a group of like-minded elites, determined to transform the country from a land sustained by faith into a land where faith is silenced, privatized and circumscribed.”

— Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), quoted by Politico, on the Obama adminisrtration’s “silent war” on religion.

“This is a faith-based nation and a faith-based state. I think it is very offensive they would contemplate or even have this kind of conversation.”

— Oklahoma state Rep. Earl Sears (R), quoted by Tulsa World, insisting that a Satanist religious group should not be given the same treatment as Christians.

“I don’t worry about gifts — I love that part of the tradition! When people wring their hands about the presents, I get it, though. It costs money and sometimes people aren’t as thankful as you think they should be when you spend your time and money on them.”

— Sarah Palin, quoted by the Anchorage Daily News which adds, “Wonder who she has in mind.”

“Marxist ideology is wrong. But in my life I have known many Marxists who are good people, so I don’t feel offended.”

— Pope Francis, in an interview with La Stampa, responding to conservatives who say he’s a Marxist.

Evangelist Franklin Graham tells CBN News that greed, lust, and wickedness are at the heart of Washington’s woes.

Said Graham: “Our government is in trouble; our country is in trouble. We are in moral decay; we are in economic decay.”
 
He continued: “Our politicians don’t know right from wrong. And our politicians come to this city and they fight one another and it’s the greed in their hearts, the lust that’s in their hearts and they make all these rules and laws that affect the rest of us.”

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) accused President Obama of arming al Qaeda militants in Syria and said it was evidence “we’re in God’s end times,” The Hill reports.



Said Bachmann: “This happened and as of today the United States is willingly, knowingly, intentionally sending arms to terrorists. Now what this says to me, I’m a believer in Jesus Christ, as I look at the End Times scripture, this says to me that the leaf is on the fig tree and we are to understand the signs of the times, which is your ministry, we are to understand where we are in God’s end times history.”

Jon Stewart noticed that God may be sending mixed signals to the Pope and the Republican party.

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Exodus International, the Christian ministry known for its “pray away the gay” therapy for homosexuals, issued an apology “for years of undue judgment by the organization and the Christian Church as a whole.”

The group also announced it was closing down after 37 years.

Said President Alan Chambers: “Exodus is an institution in the conservative Christian world, but we’ve ceased to be a living, breathing organism. For quite some time we’ve been imprisoned in a worldview that’s neither honoring toward our fellow human beings, nor biblical.”

The Week: Is this the end of “ex-gay” conversion therapy?

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) signed a law protecting Christmas and other holiday celebrations in Texas public schools from legal challenges while stressing that freedom of religion is not the same thing as freedom from religion, the AP reports.

Said Perry: “It’s a shame that a bill like this one I’m signing today is even required, but I’m glad that we’re standing up for religious freedom in this state. Religious freedom does not mean freedom from religion.”

Arizona State Rep. Juan Mendez (D) acknowledged that he is an atheist as he gave the daily House invocation, urging legislators to look at each other, rather than bow their heads, and “celebrate our shared humanness,” the Arizona Republic reports.

Mendez said it was freeing to be open about his secular views.

Responding to a question from a viewer concerned about her cheating husband, Pat Robertson said that married men “have a tendency to wander” and it is the spurned wife’s job “to focus on the positive and make sure the home is so enticing, he doesn’t want to stray,” the Huffington Post reports.

Said Robertson: “Does he provide a home for you to live in. Does he provide food for you to eat? Does he provide clothes for you to wear? Is he nice to the children… Is he handsome?”

“Our nation has seen judgment not once but twice on September 11 and that’s why we’re going to have ‘9-11 Pray’ on that day. Is there anything better that we can do on that day rather than to humble ourselves and to pray to an almighty God?”

— Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), quoted by Huffington Post, promoting a day of prayer on September 11.

In an email exchange with a constituent, North Carolina state Rep. Michele Presnell (R) was asked if she was comfortable with a prayer to Allah before a legislative meeting, the Raleigh News and Observer reports.

Her response: “No, I do not condone terrorism.”

Interestingly, Presnell is a co-sponsor of a resolution asserting that North Carolina can establish a state religion.

“Frankly to tell you the truth some in the evangelical Christian movement I think have appeared too eager for war.”

— Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), in an interview with David Brody.