The Briefing with Albert Mohler - Thursday, March 12, 2026

Episode Date: March 12, 2026

This is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.On today’s edition of The Briefing, I discuss Portland’s vote for legal protection for polyamorous families, how the push for polyamory is bigger than polyamory, the strategy of legalizing polyamory in U.S. cities, and Iranian sleeper cells in California.Part I (00:14 – 13:40)Portland is Now Ground Zero for Polyamory: Portland Votes for Legal Protections for Polyamorous Families – But This is Bigger Than PolyamoryPortland advances antidiscrimination protections for polyamorous families by Oregon Public Broadcasting (Alex Zielinski)In the Northwest, Polyamory Finds Something New: Legal Protection by The New York Times (Anna Griffin)Part II (13:40 – 19:55)A Page Out of the LGBTQ Playbook: Liberal Activist for Polyamory Reveals Gameplan – This Should Be a Wakeup Call for State LegislaturesPart III (19:55 – 26:56)The Iranian Sleeper Cells in California? We Should Be Watchful For Iranian Threats Among UsIran’s threats on U.S. soil: sleeper cells, lone wolves, cyberattacks and eerie numbers code by LA Times (Richard Winton)Iran may have activated ‘sleeper cells’ to carry out attacks around the globe, US officials say by The Independent (Isabel Keane)Sign up to receive The Briefing in your inbox every weekday morning.Follow Dr. Mohler:X | Instagram | Facebook | YouTubeFor more information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to sbts.edu.For more information on Boyce College, just go to BoyceCollege.com.To write Dr. Mohler or submit a question for The Mailbox, go here.

It's Thursday, March 12, 2026. I'm Albert Moller, and this is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview. Well, when you start looking at cultural change, you understand that sometimes the question is not so much what or when, but where. Location does make a difference. I've often remarked upon the fact that social progressivism, leftist ideologies, tend, along with alternative lifestyles, to be concentrated in cities. around campuses, on coasts. That is to say, there's some predictability to this.

And it's one of the reasons why you add all this together, cities, campuses, coasts. You're also looking at something like the Pacific Northwest, more secularized than the rest of the country, by some historical estimations, never evangelized. So in other words, you look at the Pacific Northwest and you compare it to the Yankee Northeast. There is no question that in the Northeast there once was a very thick Christianity on the ground, not so much in the Pacific Northwest. And by the way, that's not just true of Oregon and Washington. It is also true of cities across the border, including Vancouver in British Columbia. The Pacific coast is different than the Atlantic coast. And thus, looking at liberal cities in

the United States, two that are infamously liberal are Portland and Seattle. Portland is ground zero right now for a big development, big headline news, having to do with Polly Amory. Now, this is one of those terms that Americans are going to have to know and use more frequently, at least recognize more frequently. We know the language of monogamy, which refers to a couple in their sexual and romantic exclusivity. We understand that the entire premise of marriage throughout not only Western civilization, but going back to Adam and Eve, are one man and one woman, the family, the natural family thus being the man and the woman and their natural offspring, at least is the place you begin. but when you're looking at big news and you're looking at polyamory, remember the word polygamy having to do generally with multiple wives, but polyamory is an even more general concept that's rooted in the language about polyamorous or polyvary different kinds of love, different kinds of

relationship. So this could be same sex, it could be opposite sex, it could be three or four or five. The term polyamory has no limit in terms of morality. or gender or number. Another way of putting this is that from a Christian biblical worldview, it is the almost comprehensive. Indeed, it's a direct contradiction, the comprehensive repudiation of a biblical worldview. The biblical worldview says sexuality and reproduction limited only to marriage as the union of a man and a woman. This says anything goes, any number goes, any gender goes, just about anything at all goes. What's included in polyamory? The more important moral question is what's not? Why are we talking about it today? It is because the city government

in Portland, Oregon, has decided to include polyamorous relationships in terms of legal protection. Oregon Public Broadcasting, so we're talking about a very left establishment news source here. Oregon public broadcasting tells us, quote, Portland advances anti-discrimination protections for polyamorous families. Okay, so before we go any further, I want to us to note that the word family here is used as if it applies. And here's where we have to recognize it really doesn't apply for numerous reasons. For one thing, there don't have to be any relationships whatsoever in this polyamorous arrangement. There doesn't have to be any genetic relationship. There doesn't have to be any formal legal recognition such as marriage. So when you

have the description here of anti-discrimination protections for polyamorous families, again, just about anything can qualify here. Certainly, anything where the number starts with three and goes up. Okay, Oregon Public Broadcasting Reports, quote, Portland is poised to be the largest U.S. city to allow polyamorous families to sue over discrimination. Okay, so wait just a minute. Now we're being told that this anti-discrimination protection means that polyamorous families can sue over discrimination, such as housing discrimination, saying you're not going to allow them to live together as a family. The article continues, quote,

the Portland City Council advanced a policy on Wednesday, that's just yesterday, that protects people from discrimination based on their, quote, family or relationship structure. Quote, the policy, part of the larger ordinance upholding LGBTQ plus rights, allows people to sue over claims of discrimination related to employment, housing, and other areas, end quote. So they can claim employment discrimination

or housing discrimination or other forms of discrimination legally defined, and they can do so on the grounds that they've been discriminated against because of their belonging to a polyamorous family. Now, one of the first things we need to note here, I guess the most basic thing we just need to say out loud is that this is directly contrary, not only to scripture is directly contrary, even to the civilizational achievement of understanding what marriage is and privileging marriage and making marriage responsible for, for instance, human reproduction and making parents a mother and a father responsible for the care and nurture of their children, there is an entire body of family law that goes back for centuries.

And of course, that's based upon the accumulated thousands of years of human experience when it comes to the establishment and recognition of the marriage relationship and the family structure. So what you have here is the direct repudiation of not only of monogamy, it is the direct repudiation of marriage as the number two. And so now it's being said that you can have a family structure, a polyamorous, a multiple love family structure that include virtually any number. Now, let me just also note, there is no upper limit here. There's no upper limit. And so even just in terms of the mathematical workability of such a plan, it's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. And I'm going to make the argument that this isn't most importantly, rightly understood from a

a Christian worldview, this isn't most importantly an effort to promote polyamory. It is a far more subversive effort even than that, and that's just to destroy any vestige of traditional marriage as the founding, the basic building block of civilization. It's the basic way of saying, at this point, it's not just same-sex marriage, anything goes. And if anything goes, well, everything will go. Listen to this from the Oregon Public Broad Broadcasting Report. Quote, Polyamorous families are households where more than two adults are in a consensual relationship without being married, sometimes co-parenting children together.

Marriage between more than one adult polygamy is illegal in the United States. Okay, all right. For now. So polygamy would be a legally recognized structure in which there would be usually one man and multiple women, but at least it's imaginable it could be one woman and multiple men. But the point is that there would be some kind of marriage contract or marriage-like contract, some kind of artificial contract. When it comes to polyamory, there's not even an artificial contract. There's not even a formal relationship that requires legal recognition.

And so what we're looking at here is more than anything else, not just what might be considered as a leftist achievement in terms of the recognition of polyamorous relationships. it is the near total subversion and destruction of heterosexual marriage as the center of the culture, the cultural expectation. Because needless to say, it's not likely that the vast majority of Americans are even interested in being in a polyamorous relationship. What many people on the left are interested in is destroying any commitment to marriage as a union of a man or woman and destabilizing the family, period. because, by the way, it's not just when it comes to the number or the gender of people in the relationship.

It also has to do with children and it has to do with parental rights. And this kind of move also is deeply subversive of parental rights based in the natural family. Oregon Public Broadcasting also tells us that this will be new for Portland, but it's not unprecedented in the United States. Okay, get this. At least four cities, says the broadcaster, have adopted similar protections for. for polyamorous families, including Oakland, California, and Cambridge, Massachusetts. Oh, oh my goodness.

Coast, city, campus, Cambridge, Massachusetts, what could go wrong? Some days ago, the New York Times anticipating this wrote an article by Anna Griffin, and Griffin reports, quote, under President Trump's leadership, the country as a whole was swinging to the right on social policy, but in the Pacific Northwest,

as usual, it's swinging its own way. Okay, then listen to this, quote, a wave of recent ordinances in large liberal bastions like Portland, Oregon, but also smaller communities like Astoria, Oregon, which has a population 10,100 in AD1, not one more, not one less, quote, would confer the beginning of legal protections to polyamorous relationships. The goal, pushed by a group based in California, is to establish protected family structures for groups of adults who are romantically

or otherwise tied together under one roof. End quote. Okay. This in the law and in civilizational history is a massive, massive shift. And we need to know how it is acknowledged by accident in that statement. I'm going to say it again. See if you hear it. Quote, the goal is to establish legally protected family structures for groups of adults who are romantically or otherwise tied together under one roof. Now, the word otherwise covers anything and everything. So if you have more than two people under one roof, regardless of the relationships, the formality, regardless of the gender, regardless of anything, then you can have a new family structure according to this law in Portland. And what I want to point out again is I don't think there's going to be a mad dash to polyamorous situations. I think what you're seeing here is the deliberate destabilization of marriage itself. The destabilization of marriage is a union of a man,

and a woman in the reproductive stewardship that is invested in the natural family beginning in biblical marriage and that's just civilizational marriage is recognized virtually everywhere throughout human history overwhelmingly so the exclusive union between a man and a woman it's just remarkable when you look at this it's also very very interesting i want to read that statement again see if you hear this is to establish legally protected family structures for groups of adults who are romantically or otherwise tied together under one roof. Romantically or otherwise, wow. If it's not romantic, then what is it? In other words, this isn't based necessarily even in any kind of relationship. If it's in some sense romantic or otherwise, what is this? A law firm? Is it a legal partnership?

You put a shingle out front with just several names on it. It's just an economic cooperative? Well, why not a bunch of young men who were entirely heterosexual with not yet married getting the other declaring themselves a polyamorous unit because they're all living under one roof and thus they might qualify for certain benefits. It's ridiculous. And frankly, that's just where our society is headed. But I want to note again, it's not headed there coast to coast all at once. Red America is not rushing into this. This is the bluest of blue America. But just note, what starts in Oregon doesn't stay in Oregon. And I know there are a lot of Oregonians are going to be mad. I say that. So let me say to another one.

What starts in Portland, doesn't stay in Portland. All right. So let's look at another very interesting statement here. A transgender activist named Jessa Davis, who is an organizer in Seattle, we're told that this person, quote, lives in a non-romantic family structure or three or other transgender women and two toddlers. Quote, it's about the law catching up to where we are culturally, end quote. Oh my goodness. Just understand the moral collapse of a civilization, just in a few words there. Let me just point to it again, a transgender activist who lives in a non-romantic family structure with three other transgender women and two toddlers.

You know, I mention this sometimes. One moral test is whether or not this is an explainable situation to any previous generation. I don't mean all previous generations. I don't mean even say 150 years ago. just go back 20 years and try to explain this, the vast majority of Americans wouldn't have had even the vocabulary or the conceptual toolkit to understand this. Now, I mentioned the fact that this is taking place in Portland.

It is expected, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting, that the city of Seattle to the north, there in the state of Washington, it may follow very soon. And that makes sense, because you really are looking at the Pacific Northwest is a very unique cultural context. And quite frankly, it's been famously liberal and progressive on all kinds of issues for a very long time.

Okay, now get this. So one person identified as Brett Chamberlain, identified as the director of Open, O-P-E-N, the Organization for Polyamory and Ethical Non-Monogamy. We're told that this person is working with the laws in Massachusetts and California, and, quote, is now helping with the Northwest efforts. Chamberlain said this, quote, Given the realities of making political change in the United States, we have to start with cities where they're going to be more receptive to these kinds of protections and not look at passing it in a city where conservative state legislators are going to catch wind and then preempt it.

You know, every once in a while, someone on the other side actually says, let me open my playbook and read it to you. That's exactly what's going on here. Now, it's not like it was hidden. We figured this out. It's going to be in a blue area. and when you're talking about Portland or Seattle, but Portland in particular, man, is it blue? In other words, it's far more likely to happen here. But rarely do you have someone who's an activist on the liberal side, on the leftist side here,

the four polyamory and, quote, ethical non-monogamy, you just don't see very many candid statements in which they say, you know, we're going to have to start with cities that are going to be receptive to this. But it's the next part that's really interesting, quote, and not look at passing it in a city where what, where conservative state legislators are going to catch wind and then preempt it. End quote. Okay, that's really interesting. You might not hear what's there.

So let's look at it. What this says is that if the state of Oregon had adopted legislation, which said that cities and municipalities don't have the power to do this, then Portland wouldn't be able to do it. Okay. They really do show their cards here. They really are giving us their game. plan. And this should be a wake-up call to legislators all over America. And I'll just speak explicitly to state legislators and governors in red state America. You had better adopt state laws

that make very clear that municipalities and cities and counties don't have the right to take the action that Portland has just taken. So you're in the state of Texas and you say, well, this is red state. I can't say anything like this passing. Well, what about in Austin? and I would hope maybe it wouldn't happen in Austin, but, you know, Austin is a famously blue dot in the middle of red Texas. And I'd be just wondering if at least it'd be more likely to happen in Austin than in the deep rural areas of the state. You just have to wonder if indeed the Texas state legislature needs to take some action.

A memo to Governor Abbott, you just might need to take some action to make certain this doesn't happen right down the street or down the interstate. Okay, the same man said something else that also includes a little moral bomb we ought to hear. So listen to this. Again, this is Brett Chamberlain identified as executive director of that group, OPEN, the Organization for Polyamoring and Ethical Non-Monogamy. Later in the article, he says this, quote, But even in the Bay Area or Portland or Seattle,

there are people who don't feel comfortable talking about their non-monogamous identity and might still be at risk at work if they're open about that aspect of their life, end quote. Okay. All right. What should we hear there? The interesting thing there is that even when you're talking about the cities identified here, Portland or Seattle or the area such as the Bay Area in California, there's the open admission that there's actually not even there yet a moral consensus about just how great ethical non-monogamy or polyamorous relationships. are. You don't need this kind of law unless you're trying to use the law as a, as something of a wedge to force further moral change in society. So that's another very interesting accidental

admission on the part of those pushing this. You know, we need this because it's going to take legal action to force this kind of moral change. Another way to look at this is when you look at moral response, you look at the reaction coming from people about this kind of thing. And you talk about the fact that God has made us in his image in such a way there's a natural, there's a moral conscience within us, a natural capacity God has given us as a supernatural gift, whereby we actually do intuitively know right from wrong on so many issues. It's one of the reasons why a toddler who hasn't been told not to do something when he or she does something wrong, sometimes immediately knows it's wrong. It acts as if he or she's done something wrong. It's

because of conscience. And that's not the product of evolution, folks. That is the gift of the creator in terms of making us in his image. All right. So one of the interesting things to see here is that if it's just based upon moral response, I think it's still probably true. The vast majority of Americans would have kind of at least an ick or more famously expressed as a yuck, as in the yuck factor, would have some sense of moral disgust. But here's the strategy of the left.

And it's always been this way. This is why they aim so much of their energy at Hollywood. it. You make this so that Americans have to see it and maybe even laugh at it, but they need to become acculturated to it so that their moral defenses against it are broken down. And that's what they've done with homosexuality. In terms, first of all, male homosexuality, they started putting it into sitcoms. They started putting it into television programs. They started putting it into all kinds of things. They didn't start out with romantic scripts. One of the things going on right now is that gay male romantic scripts are being transformed into movies and into a very well-publicized television

projects. But that could not have happened just back a few decades. Maybe it couldn't have happened even five or ten years ago. What you see is you tear the defenses down, you subvert the civilizational boundaries, you start eroding the civilizational conscience. And pretty soon you can just put anything in front of the American people. and they just see it as another thing. Okay, next, I want to look also

at a very troubling headline. And the Los Angeles Times headline is this, Iran's threat on US soil, sleeper cells, lone wolves, cyber attacks. Now, this is really interesting, and I cite the source here intentionally. This is the Los Angeles Times. One of the reasons why that source is important

is because Los Angeles is kind of ground zero for this story. Now, why would Los Angeles, California, be ground zero for a story about sleeper cells, lone wolves, and cyber attacks coming from Iran. While the Los Angeles Times gets right to it in the beginning of this article by Richard Winton, quote, L.A. police warned that lone wolves, inspired by Iranian rhetoric, pose a threat, given the region's 700,000 Iranian Americans, the largest population outside Iran. End quote. Okay, I'm just going to guess the vast majority of Americans don't know that. I think it will come as a surprise as a shock to Americans to know that in just one metropolitan area, Los Angeles, California,

there are about 700,000 identified as Iranian Americans. And, you know, I think it's probably safe to say the vast majority of those Iranian Americans are here in the United States because they sought refuge from, they were attempting to get away from, theocratic government of the Islamic Republic of Iran. And so I understand that's probably certainly the case for the vast majority. They came to America to get out of Iran and to have safety from the Islamists there in Iran. But here is a story in Los Angeles Times. This isn't some fringe source on the Internet.

This is the Los Angeles Times, a liberal newspaper. And this paper is the one that comes out and says there is the very real danger of Iranian sleeper cells or lone wolves being activated for terrorist attacks. Most importantly, right there in Los Angeles. Other metropolitan areas in the United States have received similar. kinds of warnings of the independent. The major newspaper in Britain says, quote, Iran is potentially sent out an operational trigger to activate sleeper assets across the globe as the war with the U.S. and Israel escalates according to a report. That report is based and sourced from the U.S. government. And here's what the independent says. Now remember, the British press will say some

things about the United States that the American press won't say yet. So that's why it's important when we will go look at what the London press is saying about these developments. So this is the independent. Again, a major establishment paper, quote, the U.S. has intercepted encrypted communications believed to have originated in Iran that were sent out following the death of Iran's supreme leader in a U.S. Israeli attack on February 28, citing a federal alert sent to law enforcement agencies.

That is at least partially sourced to ABC News here in the United States. So these are all major news outlets. This is not some kind of just Internet chatter. and it's based in reports that are coming with government authority, and that should really raise the alert level here in the United States, not only in Los Angeles, but elsewhere. This is something that I think we have to expect as a threat. I hope we don't know it as a reality,

but at least do we have to expect this as a threat? Because when it comes to Iran, there is already full evidence that they have been up to this kind of thing for a long time. For about 40 years, they have been trying to embed sleeper age. and sleeper cells in Western societies and in the United States. One of the big issues here has to do with the use of drones. And this is where the LA Times article is very interesting

because the use of drones launched inside the United States against targets in the United States. That would be a game changer. And, of course, it could be devastating. It's also very interesting to note that the Los Angeles Times reports it this way. Quote, within days of the killing of Iranian supporters, leader on February 28th, cryptic messages were broadcast globally on a new shortwave radio

frequency. So a new shortwave radio frequency. That's old school technology. Doesn't require the internet under most circumstances in terms of shortwave transmission. So this is pretty, pretty sophisticated. Now listen to this. The article tells us that the message began with the repeat of the Persian word for attention. Quote, the eerie male voice then read a scene. randomly random string of numbers. All right. So here are the facts. You can connect the dots on this newly developed shortwave radio frequency.

The Persian or the Iranian term for attention was repeated twice. And then there was the broadcast of an encrypted message that took the place of a sequence of numbers. To state the obvious, you don't have to be the slightest bit paramed. to understand that was almost assuredly a message intended to awaken sleeper cells or embedded Asians. So listen to this. The LA Times goes on to say, quote, the monotone transmission recalled the manner in which deep cover Cold War spies for the KGB in the CIA once received orders. Using a special encryption code, the operatives would translate the numbers into a readable message. Although messages and so-called number stations have been broadcast for decades, they're

are now less prevalent in the digital encryption age." So why would there be a shift from the digital age to shortwave radio transmission? That's virtually a century old. It's because those shortwave transmissions can come even from just an offshore source, such as a transmitter on a lone ship. And you can shut down the internet,

but you can't shut down the airwaves going through the atmosphere. Old school technology with a very new threat. We'll be following this together, but I did not want to let this pass without taking note of it, because this is one of those stories that could turn dark very quickly. And it reminds us to pray for our nation. To pray for peace around the world, yes. And also to pray for righteousness and for justice around the world. And for civilian lives to be protected.

And to pray that here in the United States, we do not see the activation of this kind of sleeper cell or lone wolf attacker. But we do know there's precedent in this country, already, and that was before we launched the military assault upon Iran. So then you asked the question, would Iran do this? And then you answer your own question. Yes, we know at advance. Iran would do this. Thanks for listening to the briefing. For more information, go to my website at Albertmuller.com. You can follow me on X or Twitter or going to X.com forward slash Albert Mueller. For information on the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to sbtsbts.t.u. For information on Boyce College, just go to voicecolle.com. I'll meet you with you.

tomorrow for the briefing.