LOS ANGELES (AP) – A conservative Los Angeles-area church that broke away from the Episcopal Church over theological differences and the consecration of a gay bishop is giving up its property.

The Los Angeles Times reports that St. Luke’s Anglican Church in La Crescenta is being returned Monday to the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles. A judge ordered the move, and the state Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal.

The congregation voted to leave the national church three years ago. The diocese sued to retain the property.

In his sermon Sunday, the Rev. Rob Holman said fighting for principles is more important than a building.

The congregation has rented a chapel in Glendale and joined the new Anglican Church in North America, which was founded last year by breakaway Episcopal parishes.

DENVER (AP) – Denver hosted one of the dozens of readings of a new epilogue about the death of Matthew Shepard.

At the University of Denver on Monday, Gov. Bill Ritter was among Coloradans participating in a reading of the work, developed by the creators of “The Laramie Project.”

“The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later – An Epilogue” also was read at more than 130 theaters nationwide Monday, the 11th anniversary of Shepard’s death.

The work includes material from a prison interview with Shepard’s killer, Aaron McKinney. He’s depicted as being candid but not remorseful over the murder.

Shepard died at a Colorado hospital after being found beaten and left tied to a fence outside Laramie, Wyo. Police said Shepard was targeted because he was gay.

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – As tens of thousands of gay rights supporters rallied in Washington, about 100 Utahns held their own march to push for equality.

Activist Cleve Jones, who worked alongside slain gay rights leader Harvey Milk, announced plans for the national march in June during a rally at the annual Utah Pride Festival. The National Equality March coincided with National Coming Out Day.

Sunday’s rally in Salt Lake City started at the Utah Pride Center. The group marched several blocks and then watched a broadcast of the Washington event.

Jeff Morgan, a 19-year-old from West Jordan, participated in Salt Lake’s event Sunday. He recently came out to his mother and says people waste their time on Earth with anger and hate over the issue of gay rights.

NEW YORK (AP) – New York City police say a 49-year-old gay man leaving a 24-hour corner deli near his home was beaten by two men in an apparent hate crime.

Jack Price remained in serious but stable condition Monday. He is in a medically induced coma.

Police say the two suspects taunted Price and yelled anti-gay slurs while he was in the store early Friday.

They attacked him outside, not far from his home in the middle-class Queens neighborhood of College Point.

Twenty-six-year-old Daniel Aleman was arrested Sunday and charged with assault and aggravated assault as a hate crime. The name of his attorney was not immediately on record.

A second suspect is being sought. The NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating.

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) – New York’s top court is set to hear arguments against providing government benefits to same sex couples married in Canada or other jurisdictions where such marriages are legal.

The state Department of Civil Service extended health insurance benefits to those spouses of state and local government workers in 2007. A year earlier, Westchester County agencies granted similar recognition and benefits.

The Court of Appeals will hear oral arguments Tuesday by the Alliance Defense Fund of Scottsdale, Ariz., contending those benefits are unlawful in New York, which does not permit same-sex marriages.

Lower courts upheld the benefits, saying New York generally recognizes marriages from elsewhere unless specifically prohibited or found abhorrent to public policy.

LEWISTON, Maine (AP) – A Lewiston club that’s being called the oldest gay bar in Maine will serve its last drink next weekend.

The Sportsmans Athletic Club in Lewiston will hold its last hurrah next Saturday after more than 30 years of serving a primarily gay clientele.

Manager Michael Martin told the Sun Journal that business has been down in recent years and that he thinks the building is slated to be torn down.

The bar originally opened in 1958, but it wasn’t until Roland Blais bought the place in the mid-1970s that it became a gay bar. Blais says the business is the longest-running gay bar in Maine.

Blais sold the bar four years ago.

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) – Minnesota will join the rest of the nation on Thursday in observing National Latino AIDS Awareness Day, which is held in response to rising HIV infection rates among Latinos.

The Minnesota Health Department says that since 1982, 610 Latino men, women and children have been diagnosed with HIV, including 129 who have died. Statewide infection rates are nearly five times great than whites.

The Health Department is encouraging Latinos to get tested and to always practice safe sex. Officials also note that medications are more effective when HIV is caught early.

That’s of particular concern for Latinos. Statistics show that Latinos have the highest percentage of “late testers” among population groups. That means many Latinos aren’t getting tested until years after they have been infected.

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) – Lincoln Southwest High School Principal Rob Slauson had hoped students would heed his request to ignore anti-gay protesters outside the school.

But several hundred of the school’s 1,875 students instead carried signs Monday to counter those of Westboro Baptist Church.

On Monday, Lincoln Southwest students carried signs that read “God Hates Hate,” and “God Loves Gays.”

It’s believed Westboro targeted the school because it’s considering a production of “The Laramie Project,” a play that documents the 1998 beating death of a gay student in Laramie, Wyo.

Slauson says he hopes to use the protest as a learning tool to discuss leadership and tolerance.

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) – As tens of thousands of gay rights supporters rallied in Washington, about 100 Utahns held their own march to push for equality.

Activist Cleve Jones, who worked alongside slain gay rights leader Harvey Milk, announced plans for the national march in June during a rally at the annual Utah Pride Festival. The National Equality March coincided with National Coming Out Day.

Sunday’s rally in Salt Lake City started at the Utah Pride Center. The group marched several blocks and then watched a broadcast of the Washington event.

Jeff Morgan, a 19-year-old from West Jordan, participated in Salt Lake’s event Sunday. He recently came out to his mother and says people waste their time on Earth with anger and hate over the issue of gay rights.

NORFOLK, Va. (AP) – Two ministers at a Norfolk Unitarian Church will protest Virginia’s constitutional ban on gay marriage by refusing to sign marriage licenses for heterosexual couples.

The Revs. Phyllis L. Hubbell and John P. Manwell said they will continue to officiate at wedding ceremonies, but will not sign marriage licenses.

In Virginia, only heterosexual couples can get a marriage license validating their legal status as spouses.

The couple said the protest is worth the inconvenience for heterosexuals they wed.

Hubbell and Manwell contend that by signing marriage licenses for heterosexual couples, they are abetting anti-gay bias.

The Unitarian Universalist Association is one of the few denominations that support gay marriage and offer civil union ceremonies for same-sex couples.