What is the state of tolerance of free speech these days?

Mozilla co-founder, Brendan Eich resigned under pressure over his support of the campaign to pass a constitutional amendment that outlawed same-sex “marriage” in 2008.

Condoleezza Rice declined the invitation to speak at Rutgers University Commencement after some antiwar students threw a hissy fit calling her a war criminal.

Brandeis University decided not to give Ayaan Hirsi Ali an honorary degree because she has written books critical of Islam’s treatment of women.

And HGTV cancelled a show starring the Benham brothers when it was discovered that David Benham protested outside of the Democratic National Convention in 2012 and he protested outside of an abortion clinic in 2013. Oh, and they’re both Christians.

Dr. Voddie Baucham,  pastor of preaching at Grace Family Baptist Church in Spring, Texas, discusses the often misunderstood idea of the separation of church and state with our good friends at Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF).  

The concept of the “wall of separation between church and state” has been misrepresented by ALCU, and too many Americans believe that this metaphor is found in the U.S. Constitution. A quick read of the Constitution should dispel this myth, which has wreaked such havoc within American politics, and yet it persists.  

In the video below, Dr. Bauchman speaks to how the lies of our culture have infected pastors and churches today, and how we have failed in our Christian responsibility to engage and influence the culture.

From the video:

You talk to people about pastors addressing political issues and their immediate response is that “the Church doesn’t have any business in the political arena.” Now, that’s a very new idea. You know anything about the history of America, the history of the church, you know that that’s not been the case. We’ve always understood that as our culture faced these issues, that it’s the church that is uniquely equipped to address these issues. 

But there’s an irony there, I believe, in our context. And that irony is, pastors stand up now in their pulpits, in our culture, and spout psychology left and right and nobody ever says, “Hey, this is not the place for psychology.” Why do we believe it’s not the place for politics but that it’s okay for it to be the place for psychology? I’ll tell you why. Because the other side has been effective in causing us to believe in this mythological separation of church and state that somehow makes it inappropriate for the church to have any say in what it is that the State does or thinks. Or how the State acts.

…

The Bible does speak to every issue in life, and our political issues are informed by our theology. There’s no such thing as a politician or a political issue that is not theological. You cannot do politics without theology! So we have to break this false dichotomy.

…

“Let me put it this way. Nobody would have 50 or 100 years ago, shied away from dealing with homosexuality in those passages in the Bible that deal with homosexuality. Nobody would have shied away from dealing with marriage in those passages that deal with marriage. And nobody would have said that those passages were somehow political. Well now all of a sudden, the government comes in, walks onto our territory, and because the government has walked onto our territory, we now say that it belongs to them… They don’t get to do that! They cannot come into our territory and then say that we’re wrong for speaking about it. These issues are not just political issues, these issues are Biblical, theological issues, but beyond that, even issues that are political issues have biblical and theological underpinnings.”

To learn more about the history of this myth and its effects on American culture, read this article from The Heritage Foundation, titled The Mythical ‘Wall of Separation’: How a Misused Metaphor Changed Church-State Law, Policy, and Discourse.

While in the vast majority of their constitutionally related writings the Founding Fathers were explicit that the judicial branch of government is effectively the weakest of the three, such is not the case with today’s modern misapplication. Americans currently live under what is, for all intents and purposes, a counter-constitutional judiciocracy led by nine unelected, black-robed autocrats.

Over many decades, the other two branches of government, the legislative and the executive, have, for some inexplicable reason, acquiesced to the notion of judicial supremacy – a dangerously dominant concept that erroneously regards the United States Supreme Court as the final arbiter of all things public policy. If this is so, then these nine men and women are ultimately unaccountable to anyone or anything, and the other two branches of government are but toothless figurehead bodies merely spinning their wheels while spending our dollars.

This flies in the face of the framers’ intent. It’s also the very unfortunate reality under which we live. It is fully within the constitutional authority of the other two branches of government to rein in these judges gone wild, but, regrettably, no one, as of yet, seems to have the mettle to do what needs to be done.

Article III, Section 2, of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress the authority to “check” judicial activism, up to and including when justices illegitimately legislate from the highest bench in the land: “[T]he Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.”

That’s huge. Unfortunately, to date, Congress has been either unwilling or unable to enact such regulations.

And so, when at least five of these nine justices speak, people listen. When they say, “Let it be,” so it is.

That’s why every so often a Supreme Court decision will come along that, for better or for worse, literally shakes our nation to its core. These opinions can have lasting implications that will affect public policy for decades, even centuries, to come.

Frequently, it seems, these justices, each a fallible human being, go desperately awry, ignoring history, case precedent and the very Constitution they’re sworn to uphold. A few examples include the court’s infamous Dred Scott slavery decision, its Roe v. Wade infanticide decision and its most recent Windsor mock-marriage decision.

Still, as they say, even a blind squirrel finds a nut every now and again. Occasionally, a majority of these nine justices get one right. Such an occasion occurred last week when, in its ruling on the Greece v. Galloway government prayer case, the high court reaffirmed all Americans’ First Amendment right to public prayer – even sectarian prayer – in any government forum. This includes prayer led by government officials, whether acting in their official capacity or their private capacity, and even when praying “in Jesus’ name.”

It’s difficult to overstate the magnitude of this ruling. It has literally wiped away decades of historical revisionism and church-state separatism by secularist judicial activists and atheist groups such as the ACLU, People for the American Way and the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF).

In fact, its enormity is perhaps best measured by these organizations’ utterly unhinged response. For instance, the always entertaining FFRF was quick to suggest a retaliatory “path forward” for all Christ-haters.

On its website, this Christophobic group, headquartered in Madison, Wisconsin, posted an essay calling the high court’s decision, “disastrous for state-church separation,” and frantically warned, “This decision could be the equivalent of Dred Scott or Plessy for our [anti-Christian] cause.”

The essay brazenly called for “mockery” of God, summoning atheists to infiltrate any public forum that might open in prayer and then to “voice disapproval … by booing, making thumbs down gestures, blowing a raspberry, or by making other audible sounds signifying disapproval. …”

“Citizens may also abruptly walk out of government proceedings and then make an auspicious re-entry as soon as the prayer has ended,” suggested the group.

The stated goal? “Public mockery and ridicule” of Jesus Christ and all Christians.

Psalm 14:1 observes, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good.”

We all owe a debt of gratitude to the FFRF for once again proving true these profound words.

A couple days after it came down, the American Family Association’s Bryan Fischer cut to the heart of this landmark ruling, writing at BarbWire.com, “[T]he Court in Greece v. Galloway changed the standard from ‘endorsement’ to ‘coercion.’ A violation of the First Amendment can now only be claimed if coercion can be demonstrated. …

“The Court swept away with a backhanded swat the ridiculous argument that merely being offended is sufficient to create a breach of the Constitution. Just because someone’s feelings have been hurt does not mean there is some cataclysmic break in the space-time constitutional continuum. In a burst of brilliant, luminescent and concise reasoning, the Court flatly declared what we all know to be true: ‘Offense … does not equate to coercion.’ Feast your eyes on that. ‘Offense … does not equate to coercion.’”

Indeed, this decision also swept away the church-state separatist sand from which the ACLU and other anti-Christian segregationists have built their entire fragile, cultural Marxist platform.

For instance, the ACLU has, in the past, absurdly claimed, “The message of the Establishment Clause [to the U.S. Constitution] is that religious activities must be treated differently from other activities to ensure against governmental support for religion.”

Hokum, says the high court:

“The First Amendment is not a majority rule, and government may not seek to define permissible categories of religious speech. Once it invites prayer into the public sphere, government must permit a prayer giver to address his or her own God or gods as conscience dictates, unfettered by what an administrator or judge considers to be nonsectarian.”

“Adults often encounter speech they find disagreeable,” concluded the court, “and an Establishment Clause violation is not made out any time a person experiences a sense of affront from the expression of contrary religious views. …”

Of course, we’re not really talking about “adults” here.

We’re talking about liberals.

Written by Jonathan S. Tobin

Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court once again affirmed that the so-called “wall of separation” that exists between church and state is not quite the edifice that liberals would like it to be.  In Town of Greece v. Galloway, the court ruled today that a village in upstate New York did not violate the First Amendment in allowing members of clergy to begin town board meetings with prayers, some of which were explicitly sectarian (and usually Christian) rather than ecumenical. The narrow vote along the usual 5-4 conservative/liberal lines is bound to incite many on the left to express fears about the court trying to turn the U.S. into a “Christian nation.”

But in upholding the rights of Greece, N.Y. to have meetings begin with a religious invocation, the court has done no such thing. Rather, it has simply affirmed a long American tradition of beginning public meetings with prayer. Even more to the point, by refusing to be drawn into the question of regulating the content of such prayers, the court has preserved religious liberty rather than constricting it. The decision also provides a timely reminder that for all the talk about separation walls, the main point of the First Amendment is to preserve freedom of religion, not freedom from any mention or contact with faith.

In recent decades, the “separationist” position on church/state interaction has grown more, rather than less, aggressive. In its 1962 Engel v. Vitale decision that banned public school prayers, the court rightly ruled that school districts had no business imposing what were often sectarian prayers on children. Given that students were not free agents who could accept or reject these prayers with impunity, it was clear that the practice could easily be considered an “establishment” of a state religion that is prohibited by the First Amendment. But purely ceremonial affairs such as invocations before legislative proceedings cannot be reasonably interpreted in the same light. Since, as Justice Anthony Kennedy noted in the majority opinion, such prayers go back to the First Congress and have been repeatedly upheld since then, any attempt to overturn these precedents was unwarranted.

It is true that for any member of a minority faith or for atheists, the repeated use of Christian prayers at Greece’s public meetings might be tedious or possibly offensive. But in the absence of a more diverse group of local clergy in this hamlet not far from the shores of Lake Ontario, the town’s choices were between either censoring the prayers of local clergy who were willing to take part or eliminating the practice. Clearly there are many on the left who would have been comfortable with the former and well pleased with the latter.

But what must be acknowledged is that being put in a position where one must listen to the prayers of another faith is not a violation of one’s constitutional rights. A ceremonial prayer, like the words “In God We Trust” on our coinage, does not transform our republic into one with a state religion. So long as those participating in such gestures are not attacking other faiths or those who do not believe in religion, their words are not an establishment of religion or impinge on the freedom of those listening. Adults at a town board meeting are not like schoolchildren in a closed class. They can join in the prayer or not at their own pleasure with no fear of punishment.

At the heart of this issue is the notion that any expression of faith in the public square is a violation of a vast mythical wall that some believe must completely separate religion from state. But while the Founders explicitly and with good reason forbade any one sect, denomination, or faith from being empowered by and identified with the state, they did not intend the First Amendment to be used as a shield to prevent Americans from any contact with religion. To the contrary, they saw faith as having an important role in preserving a democratic nation and a civil society.

There may have been a time when religious minorities and non-believers felt that the identification of the state with the faith of the Christian majority resulted in discriminatory practices that compromised their rights. But what is at stake here are not cases of bias or religious rule but rather the desire of some to be insulated from expressions of faith, and that is a privilege that the First Amendment does not provide them.

As we have seen with the efforts by the Obama administration to restrict the rights of religious believers in the Hobby Lobby case concerning the ObamaCare contraception mandate, there is a not inconsiderable body of opinion that would like to promote a cribbed definition of religious liberty that would be restricted to prayers in houses of worship or private homes. But Americans have always defined religious freedom in a more open and expansive manner that allowed them to practice their faith on the public square rather than only in private. It is that rich legal tradition that the court has upheld in Town of Greece. Though only a narrow majority is defending that principle on the Supreme Court at present, it is one that is well worth preserving.

This article was originally posted at the CommentaryMagazine.com website.

For years now, anti-Christian activists have been pushing the hate button and accusing those of us who hold to biblical morality and family values of being intolerant, hate-filled bigots (and worse).

But this strategy, seen most recently in the attack on godly twin brothers, Jason and David Benham, will inevitably defeat itself. After all, when the alleged victims are the bullies and the alleged tolerant ones are full of bigotry, their rhetoric cannot be taken seriously.

Back in 2008, as Californians voted to preserve marriage with the Proposition 8 marriage amendment, the amendment was quickly dubbed Prop Hate, as if the only way anyone could believe that marriage was the union of a man and woman was if they were full of hate.

But that was only the beginning. In Sacramento, demonstrators held signs reading: 

• Prop 8=American Taliban
• Ban Bigots
• Majority Vote Doesn’t Matter
• 52%=Nazi [this referred to the 52-48% vote in favor of Prop 8]
• Don’t Silence the Christians, Feed Them 2 the Lions
• Your Rights Are Next

Taliban? Nazis? Feed them to the lions?

This kind of demonization will only defeat itself in the long run exposing who the real bigots are.

In the last week, as soon as my newest book was released, I was accused of being the incarnation of the late Fred Phelps (infamous for his “God hates fags” protests), as well as branded the leader of my own “religious cult” that “requires human sacrifices.” (I’m not making this up.)

So, by writing a book filled with compassion and speaking of God’s great love for those who identify as LGBT, also urging the Church to recognize the unique struggles faced by those with same-sex attractions, I have become a hate-filled bigot and cult leader.

It’s like calling Shaquille O’Neal small or Bill Gates poor.

At some point reality kicks in – in this case, the moment someone reads the first pages of my book (or the middle pages or the last pages) – and instead of advancing their cause, the anti-Christian activists undermine their own.

In a blog post entitled, “The homophobic rantings of Michael L Brown,” Jay H. wrote, “Fred Phelps is dead. Long live Fred Phelps, apparently. Or rather his new incarnation: Michael L. Brown.”

Unfortunately for Jay H., when people actually read my book, rather than “homophobic rantings,” they find the opposite. As one reader noted, “[Brown] . . . freely uses life testimonies of people who were divinely delivered from homosexuality, and others NOT divinely delivered from homosexuality. This isn’t cherry-picked propaganda here…there are sections in this book that are very sobering for [an] evangelical believer to read.”

And so, readers quickly realize that I am no more the new Fred Phelps than I’m the new Michael Jordan, and the anti-Christian rhetoric exposes itself.

That’s what is happening with my good friends David and Jason Benham, Christian businessmen and committed husbands and fathers.

They were about to be the stars of a new reality show on HGTV that featured them helping hurting families get their dream homes, until a single post on RightWingWatch caused HGTV to pull the plug. (For those unfamiliar with RightWingWatch, the website is a project of Norman Lear’s ultra-liberal People for the American Way. The website references Christian family activist Phyllis Schafly 351 times, conservative political leader Gary Bauer 334 times, President Ronald Reagan 111 times, author Chuck Colson 57 times, and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas 37 times, just to give a few examples. You can be sure most all of the references were not flattering.)

Shortly after HGTV announced its decision, a young man on YouTube opined that the Benham brothers were “the textbook definition of a psychopath” and that “they have no feelings, no consideration for other people.”

The problem, of course, is that the moment you get to know David and Jason – or even watch them on a TV interview for a few minutes or see them interacting with their families – you realize that they are not the ones who need help. It’s the young man on YouTube who needs help, and I can guarantee that if they had the opportunity, the Benhams would reach out to him directly to show him the love of God. (When I played part of this YouTube clip for Jason on my radio show, he responded with real compassion and concern.)

But it’s not just some anonymous YouTuber who is spouting such extreme, self-disqualifying anti-Christian rhetoric.

Dan Savage, a leading gay activist (and sex columnist) supported HGTV’s decision, comparing the Benham’s pro-family viewpoints to “white people” who used to “go on TV and say the most racist [expletive] imaginable (argue against legal interracial marriage, argue in favor of segregation) and keep their jobs and be invited back on TV to say that [expletive] a second time.”

Savage facetiously remarked that “hating the [expletive] out of gay people is something all Christians have in common,” titling his blog, “HGTV Cancels Reality Show After Twin Stars Anti-Gay Activism and Rabid Homophobia Exposed.”

What is rabid, however, is not the position of the Benhams. It is Dan Savage’s militant and vicious anti-Christian rhetoric that is rabid, and so, when reasonable, thinking people listen to Savage and to the Benham brothers, it’s easy to see who is filled with hate and who is filled with love.

Eventually, as those who claim to be champions of tolerance and diversity continue their crusade to silence and defame those who differ with them, they will ultimately defeat themselves.

Watch and see.

This article was originally posted at the TownHall.com blog.

In an unhinged response to Monday’s U.S. Supreme Court decision in Greece v. Galloway – which reaffirmed Americans’ First Amendment right to public prayer, to include sectarian prayer – the always entertaining Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) has announced its retaliatory “path forward” for Christ-haters.

Saul Alinsky would be proud.

On its website, the Christophobic FFRF, headquarter in Madison, Wisconsin, posted a member essay calling the High Court’s decision, “disastrous for state-church separation,” and frantically warned, “This decision could be the equivalent of Dred Scott or Plessy for our [anti-Christian] cause.”

The Supreme Court’s infamous Dred Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson decisions, of course, upheld slavery and racial segregation respectively. This is richly Ironic considering that groups like the FFRF, the ACLU, People for the American Way and others, are simply anti-Christian segregationist organizations that exist for the sole purpose of segregating Christians and Christianity from any public forum.

“In light of yesterday’s dreadful ruling, we, and all activists, will have to fight harder and smarter,” declared the screed. “We will need to lodge more complaints, write more letters, conduct more protests, and bring more lawsuits. No matter how long it takes, Greece v. Galloway must be overturned.”

The essay brazenly called for “mockery” of God, summoning atheists to infiltrate any public forum that might open in prayer, and to then “voice disapproval…by booing, making thumbs down gestures, blowing a raspberry, or by making other audible sounds signifying disapproval. …”

“Citizens may also abruptly walk out of government proceedings and then make an auspicious re-entry as soon as the prayer has ended,” suggested the group.

The stated goal? “Public mockery and ridicule” of Jesus Christ and all Christians.

The FFRF post concluded:

If after the above actions have been taken, the government continues to insult atheists and/or religious minorities with sectarian prayers, activists may turn to public mockery and ridicule. One example is the “prayer mockery hat.” Activist can easily make a brightly colored hat with large ear muffs and dark sunglasses. Wording on the cap could say: “I OBJECT TO PRAYER!” Then, as soon as the pastor or chaplain has been introduced, activists can put on their “prayer mockery hat” with exaggeration and then remain seated throughout the prayer, completely ignoring the pastor until finished. Activists can also mount a small GoPro-style camera to their cap to record the response for posting on Facebook or Youtube.com.

In spite of the disastrous ruling, the fight is not over. We must not submit to this subjugation of our constitutional right to be free FROM unwanted religious intrusion by government. Indeed, “Nothing Fails Like Prayer,” so let us use reason and our constitutional rights of free speech, free association, and the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances to our full advantage.

Still think there’s no left-wing war on Christianity?

Think again.

• “The tradition reflected in Marsh [the primary existing Supreme Court precedent regarding prayer before public bodies] permits chaplains to ask their own God for blessings of peace, justice, and freedom that find appreciation among people of all faiths. That a prayer is given in the name of Jesus, Allah, or Jehovah, or that it makes passing references to religious doctrines, does not remove it from that tradition.”
• Plaintiffs are asking that federal courts “act as supervisors and censor of religious speech, a rule that would involve government in religious matters to a far greater degree than is the case under the town’s current practice….”
• “Marsh nowhere suggested that the constitutionality of legislative prayer turns on the neutrality of its content.”
• “Our tradition assumes that adult citizens, firm in their own beliefs, can tolerate and perhaps appreciate a ceremonial prayer delivered by a person of a different faith.”
• “Respondents argue, in effect, that legislative prayer maybe addressed only to a generic God.”
• “Marsh, indeed, requires an inquiry into the prayer opportunity as a whole, rather than into the contents of a single prayer.”
• “That nearly all of the congregations in town turned out to be Christian does not reflect an aversion or bias on the part of town leaders against minority faiths.”

While it is right and good to thank God for this victory, it should not be lost on anyone that the margin of victory was one vote from a further narrowing of religious liberty.

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty; power is ever stealing from the many to the few. The manna of popular liberty must be gathered each day or it is rotten. The living sap of today outgrows the dead rind of yesterday. The hand entrusted with power becomes, either form human depravity or esprit de corps, the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continued oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot; only by unintermitted agitation can a people be sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity.”  ~Wendell Phillips (American Abolitionist)

Many Christians choose self-employed careers because they want to be able to run their business according to the dictates of their faith and conscience.

That list is quickly shrinking as homosexuals pro-actively seek opportunities to wreck the personal business and career of any Christian who declines to support the LGBTQ political agenda.

Don’t be fooled. This is a focused effort to ostracize and humiliate faith-based businesses and their owners. Here are a few recent examples:

• Photography – A Christian photographer in New Mexico was fined $6700 for politely declining to photograph a lesbian commitment ceremony. The Supreme Court allowed this fine to stand.
• Baker – A Christian baker in Oregon is facing both civil and criminal penalties, including jail time, for politely declining to bake a cake for a gay wedding ceremony. Her business has closed.
• Florist – Baronelle Stutzman, a Christian florist in Washington, is being sued by the state attorney general for politely declining to prepare an arrangement for a gay wedding ceremony.
• Broadcasting – Craig James was fired by Fox Sports Southwest after only one day on the job for expressing his support for natural marriage while he was a candidate for the United States Senate.
• Counseling – Jennifer Keeton was dismissed from the counseling program at Augusta State University for her religious reservations about the homosexual lifestyle.
• Innkeeping – The Wildflower Inn in Vermont was fined $30,000 and forced to shut down its wedding reception business after politely declining to host a lesbian ceremony.
• Teaching – Ms. Gillian John-Charles was kicked out of a doctoral program in education at Roosevelt University for expressing in class her belief that homosexuals aren’t born gay.

What you can do about it…

The American Family Association is improving the way we communicate, so you can get the latest information quickly and effectively engage the culture when our Christian brothers and sister come under attack from homosexual aggression.

You can join us right now by downloading the AFA Action Alert App on your handheld or mobile device.

With the AFA Action Alert app, you will get our alerts and be able to take action on issues you care about instantly!

AFA is still standing strong and we need you to join us. You can believe AFA will always stand on God’s word and will never compromise our values.

Elections have consequences! Visit www.AFAAction.net for the latest election tools for values voters including an online voter guide, congressional scorecard and voter registration information.

Written by Derrick Morgan

Across social media last month, some in the Twittersphere claimed family businesses fighting for a fundamental freedom want to impose their religious and moral beliefs on their employees.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The distortion is part of a fierce national argument into which the Supreme Court is about to wade. One side insists government must force all to agree with them. The other wishes simply to be left alone to pursue their own occupations in accord with their conscience.

In a reversal of commonly held stereotypes, many so-called progressives now seek government-enforced conformity. The left used to argue that we should be free to live without fear of government sanction. Today they insist everyone agree with them – or else.

President Barack Obama’s health care law includes a mandate that employers must provide coverage of drugs that can cause an early abortion – without cost to the employee. Some object on religious grounds and on March 25, two family-owned businesses – one is evangelical, the other Mennonite – will get their day before the Supreme Court.

The Constitution and a law called the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act provide a check against unreasonable government coercion. Before imposing a substantial burden on those with sincerely held religious beliefs, the government must show a compelling interest, pursued through the least restrictive means.

This fair balance ensures that government properly respects all people, including religious minorities. It also makes sense for the law to apply at our workplaces. As first lady Michelle Obama has said, “Our faith journey isn’t just about showing up on Sunday . . . it’s about what we do Monday through Saturday as well.”

For Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood, the two family businesses making arguments before the Supreme Court this month, their faith journey includes paying fair wages and providing health care to their employees. It also means not paying for abortion-inducing drugs.

Under the Obamacare regulation imposed by the Department of Health and Human Services, the two businesses face fines of $36,500 per year, per employee if they don’t provide coverage of those drugs. Even if they drop health care coverage altogether to avoid the mandate, they would still face government penalties. The Green family, which owns the Hobby Lobby chain, and the Hahn family, which owns Conestoga Wood, simply seek relief from the court so they can continue to provide insurance for their employees.

The issue in these cases gets at the heart of what religious freedom is and who will get to determine where one’s faith is lived out. Throughout the creation and implementation of the mandate, the Obama administration essentially has argued that faith should remain a private affair: You can practice your beliefs in the four walls of your home or house of worship, but your religious freedom ends when you go into business.

But, as Cato Institute’s Ilya Shapiro points out, that’s not a view in line with the Constitution’s protection of religious freedom. He writes:

“These individuals don’t check their religious values at the office door…The government can’t force individuals to forfeit their free exercise rights when they incorporate a business – just as it can’t force them to forsake these liberties when they enter the workforce, attend school, or engage in any other secular pursuit.”

You don’t need to agree with the Greens or Hahns about abortion to recognize that government shouldn’t coerce these families into paying for coverage of potentially life-ending drugs and devices.

Shapiro notes: “Americans understand intuitively that the essence of religious freedom is that government can’t willy-nilly force people to do things that violate their religious beliefs.”

In fact, polling shows that nearly 60 percent of likely voters oppose the Obamacare mandate that is trampling on families’ ability to live and work according to their beliefs.

For lovers of liberty, it’s time to hope the Court will stop the left’s drive to empower the state to trample the consciences of our neighbors.

Derrick Morgan is Vice President for domestic and economic policy at The Heritage Foundation.

*** UPDATE: The hearing has concluded in Regina, Saskatchewan, and Peter LaBarbera will be permitted to remain in Canada to speak at a pro-life/pro-family values conference. Praise God, and thank you to everyone who prayed about Pete’s situation and who contacted Canadian authorities. ***

As of the writing of this plea, my good friend Peter LaBarbera, President of Americans for Truth about Homosexuality, awaits his appeal of the Canadian Border Services’ decision to prevent his entry into Canada for his alleged “hate crimes” against homosexuals.

Late last night Peter was briefly detained by the Canadian thought police who searched his luggage, computer, and phone and then released him until his appeal today at noon (Canadian time). I am pleading with Christians to contact and politely but firmly express their outrage at the detention of Peter at the Regina International Airport, Saskatchewan Airport last night and their effort to bar him from Canada.

Peter was invited to Canada by the Saskatchewan Pro-life Association to speak on the unholy alliance between the political movement to defend the “right” to destroy human life in utero and the movement to normalize sodomy and sodomitic relationships.

When Canadian homosexual despots heard that Peter was invited to their country, their panties got so wadded up around their heads they couldn’t think straight. That’s when they began their campaign to prevent Peter from entering the country. Yes, you heard that right. Anyone who holds and espouses unvarnished, uneuphemized biblical truth about homosexuality—not hate speech, but biblical truth—the Canadian government wants to stop at the border. Just try to say what St. Paul says in Romans, and it’s in the brig you go.

Nine years ago, I had never heard Peter’s name. Nine years ago, I had never heard of the Human Rights Campaign, GLSEN, or GLAAD. I had never heard of the dishonest homosexual activists and bloggers Wayne Besen, Jeremy Hooper, Joe Jervis, Timothy Kincaid, or Michael Signorile. I was a suburban mom raising four children and knew precisely nothing about the movement to normalize sodomy and oppress, repress, and suppress orthodox Christians by any unethical means available.

I knew virtually nothing about this noxious cultural effort until I started working at Deerfield High School. It was that experience, witnessing up close the nature and extent of censorship, intolerance, arrogance, and, indeed, hatred from the Left that transformed me into an accidental activist.

Then I met Pete and learned that what I had experienced at Deerfield High School was small potatoes compared to what Pete experiences from the most virulent and tyrannical political group operating in America today.

With regularity Pete, a married Christian father of five, is called “Porno Pete” and accused of being a closeted homosexual by silly men-boys whose life goal is to compel the world to believe that sodomy—an act which the creator of the universe abhors—is a legitimate activity upon which to center one’s identity and change the definition of marriage.

The reason for the epithet “Porno Pete” from the potty-mouths of the “no-name-calling” crowd is that Pete goes where most decent people fear to tread: the events of the sodomy-celebrating, anti-cultural movement. There he collects evidence to prove that this movement is wicked (yes, I’m deliberately using biblical language which sounds archaic to our cool, hipster, post-modern, post-Christian, non-rational anti-culture).

This is how those whose minds have been darkened by worshiping the bodies of those of the same sex work. They create, disseminate, and revel in pornography, promiscuity, and public displays of perversion, and then mock and revile Pete for collecting their filth as evidence of their perversity. They hurl this  epithet at Pete—not because they themselves find anything offensive about sodomitic porn—but in the hope of humiliating Pete into silence, marginalizing him from the Christian community, and hurting his family.

Pete is a hero to me. He is truly one of the most courageous men I personally know, enduring the vitriol, lies, threats, and bracing ugliness of the pro-homoerotic movement in order to awaken Christians to its threat to children, to families, and to First Amendment speech and religious rights.

Pete is a joyful, funny, compassionate, humble, whip-smart, serious Christian who desires that all come to know Jesus Christ—including those who vilify him. He deserves much more recognition, support, and appreciation from Christians than he receives. The machinations and lies of the Left have been effective in some Christian circles in marginalizing Pete. Those Christians should be ashamed.

I feel honored to have Pete as my friend.

As an aside, I wonder if Dan Savage, the homosexual man-boy who speaks so fecklessly about “integrity” and bullying while regularly spewing obscene hateful venom at orthodox Christians, would be allowed into Canada.

Please contact Chris Alexander, Minister of Education to express your outrage at Canada’s oppressive violation of speech and religious liberty through the banning of Peter LaBarbera: chris.alexander@parl.gc.ca. 

The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has dealt a severe blow to religious freedom and freedom of speech in a highly publicized case involving a New Mexico photographer. 

The High Court has refused to hear the appeal of Elaine Huguenin, who was found guilty of “sexual orientation” discrimination for failing to photograph a same-sex ceremony. 

Huguenin owns Elane Photography along with her husband, Jon, in Albuquerque.  They are both committed evangelical Christians.  Elaine was approached in 2006 by a lesbian “couple” who asked her to photograph their civil union ceremony. 

When Huguenin declined to accept the job, the lesbian women filed a complaint with the New Mexico Human Rights Commission, alleging “sexual orientation” discrimination.    

New Mexico has adopted revisions to its “public accommodations” law that prohibits businesses and business owners from discriminating based on “sexual orientation.” 

The Human Rights Commission found Elaine guilty, and required her to pay $6,600 in attorney fees to the lesbian couple. 

The Huguenins filed an appeal.  In a shocking decision, the New Mexico Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion did not apply to business owners such as Huguenin. 

New Mexico’s High Court stated that business owners are compelled to conform their convictions to those of their customers.  In the decision, one of the Justices stated that business owners are required to compromise their religious beliefs “as the price of citizenship.” 

The U.S. Supreme Court’s rejection to hear the case reflects a remarkable degree of high-level cowardice.  The Court has consistently held throughout the nation’s history that freedom of speech includes not only the right to speak but the “right to refrain from speaking.” 

Federal courts have repeatedly stated that the government cannot coerce private citizens to engage in compelled speech.  The government cannot mandate that an individual communicate a message which they find morally repugnant, including through the artistic license and creative work of a photographer.   

The Huguenins have been represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) in this case.  David Cortman, senior counsel for ADF, condemned the Court’s failure to confront this crucial religious liberty case. 

Americans oppose unjust laws that strong-arm citizens to express ideas against their will.  Elaine and numerous other business owners are more than willing to serve any and all customers.What they are not willing to do is to promote messages that violate their core beliefs.  A government that forces any American to create a message contrary to her own convictions is a government that every American should fear.

Tony Perkins, President of the Family Research Council, says the Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the case allows lower courts to trample on the First Amendment rights of conscience of every American. 

Americans are being forced by government to buy Obamacare, and are now being forced to engage in speech with which they morally disagree.  Is our judicial branch writing the epilogue to the American experiment in religious liberty?  Americans cannot be silent any longer to this affront to our First Amendment freedoms.

The New Mexico Supreme Court decision flies in the face of overwhelming public opinion on this issue.  A Rasmussen survey found that more than 80 percent of American agreed that no photographer should be forced under penalty of law to take pictures of a homosexual ceremony.   

Become a monthly supporter of IFI.  Click HERE for more information.

It shouldn’t have taken the forced resignation of Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich for the Left to admit that homosexual activists and their water-carrying ideological servants have no interest in dialogue, diversity, or tolerance. Jack-booted homosexualists demanded that Eich, co-founder of Mozilla and inventor of JavaScript, be fired for his $1,000 donation to the Prop 8 campaign in California six years ago.

I guess it’s semi-official: American citizens who believe marriage is inherently sexually complementary cannot work in America—not even in their own companies. Remember this the next time someone condescendingly asserts that the legalization of same-sex “marriage” couldn’t possibly affect society at large in any negative way.

I wonder how many of those who drove Brendan Eich out of his job voted for Barack Obama when he publicly opposed the legalization of same-sex “marriage”—you know, before his “evolution.”

For those with short memories, Prop 8 was the ballot initiative that was passed in California that defined marriage as the union of one man and one woman, and then was overturned by a homosexual activist judge whose “reasoning” has been widely criticized.

Now the story Eich story is shifting a bit. Unpleasant homosexual activist and radio personality Michael Signorile asserts that it wasn’t merely that Eich donated to Prop 8 that led to his compulsory resignation. His additional crimes are that 22 years ago Eich supported Pat Buchanan’s presidential campaign and then more recently Eich supported (horror of horrors) Ron Paul.

So now corporations large and small will have ideological litmus tests for upper management? “Affirm sodomy and cross-dressing or look for employment elsewhere–preferably on another planet. Oh, and we will need to see your voting record for your entire life as well.”

Some liberals are trying to argue that Eich’s compulsory resignation is merely a business decision resulting from liberal efforts no different from conservative boycotts of Home Depot or Starbucks for their homosexuality-affirming commitments. But there’s a huge difference between boycotting a business for their corporate policies and practices and boycotting a business because of the personal beliefs of an employee. Can liberals not see the difference?

Even homosexual writer Andrew Sullivan condemns the “hounding” of Eich:

The guy who had the gall to express his First Amendment rights and favor Prop 8 in California by donating $1,000 has just been scalped by some gay activists….Will he now be forced to walk through the streets in shame? Why not the stocks? The whole episode disgusts me—as it should disgust anyone interested in a tolerant and diverse society. If this is the gay rights movement today—hounding our opponents with a fanaticism more like the religious right than anyone else—then count me out. 

The Left tries to ennoble their ignoble pursuit of ideological purity on matters related to volitional sexual acts by recasting it as the “new civil rights movement.” Of course, along the way, they never actually make a case for the soundness of the comparison of sexual feelings and acts to skin color. No matter, just keep shouting “equality” and screaming “bigot” at all dissenters, and they win the day. And why do they win? Lots of reasons, none of which involve the arc of the moral universe bending toward justice.

The reasons include the de facto control of the mainstream press, academia, and the arts (including the publishing industry). The other reasons are that many Americans are non-thinkers (read Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death), and many conservatives are cowards.

We should be afraid of a holy God, not the names hurled by those lost in spiritual darkness. And we should be deeply concerned about the loss of freedom that Eich’s “resignation” portends for our children and grandchildren. The fact that so many conservatives continue to assert that all that matters is the economy and radical Islam is testament to conservative ignorance. 

Eich is the pale featherless canary gasping for breath in the coal mine. Unless conservatives stiffen up those Gumby spines and grow some thick man-skin (as I have been doing in my basement laboratory), they’ll find they won’t be able to make a living unless they genuflect to all things homosexual. One small consolation: bootlicking is easier for those without spines.

Come on, people, walk upright.

Speak the truth in love; Expose the fruitless deeds of darkness; Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds; Be anxious for nothing; Remember that the wisdom of this world is folly with God; And share boldly with others the good news that through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life can set them free from the law of sin and death.

America’s latest heroine is Robin Bartlett Frazier. She staged her own tea party event last Thursday by tossing an out-of-control federal judge overboard like a trunk of tea by taking a stand for religious liberty. May her tribe increase.

Ms. Frazier, a commissioner in Maryland’s Carroll County, defied a flatly unconstitutional injunction issued by U.S. District Court judge William D. Quarles, Jr., who ordered last Tuesday that no prayer opening a Carroll County commission meeting could mention “the name of a specific deity.”

In a burst of true American patriotism, two days later Ms. Frazier publicly prayed a prayer attributed to George Washington that repeatedly mentions the name of Jesus Christ. Before she prayed, she declared that the judge’s ruling was wrong and contrary to the Constitution and American principle. Good for her.

By exercising her constitutionally guaranteed freedom of religion, Ms. Frazier is risking a contempt citation, which could lead not just to civil penalties but criminal ones as well. She could go to jail for doing what chaplains do in the halls of Congress every day. But she declared that she is willing to be thrown into a cell, like Martin Luther King, Jr., if that’s what it takes.

Said Ms. Frazier, “I’m willing to go to jail over it. I believe this is a fundamental of America and if we cease to believe that our rights come from God, we cease to be America. We’ve been told to be careful. But we’re going to be careful all the way to communism if we don’t start standing up and saying ‘no.'”

President Commissioner Dave Roush noted in a statement that the 4th Circuit, an arm of the federal government, has permitted the commissioners “to continue using the court-approved words in its prayers.”

This is an abomination, that any branch of the federal government would arrogate to itself the authority to tell people how to pray. Nothing on planet earth could be more unconstitutional than for any branch of the central government to tell anyone what words they may and may not use when they pray. The very notion is a constitutional and American obscenity.

If there is any one thing the First Amendment flatly prohibits, it is the federal government dictating the content of prayer. A grosser violation of the “free exercise of religion” would be hard to imagine.

If anyone is in contempt of court here, it would be this federal judge. He himself is in contempt of the Supreme Court, which ruled in 1983 that the name of Jesus may be used in public invocations. Maybe he’s the one who ought to be headed for lockup.

The plantiffs’ lawyer, using an absurdly narrow view of the “free exercise” of religion, wants Ms. Frazier’s religion bottled up inside her home and her church, just like Barack Obama does. Said she: “We appreciate the commissioners’ individual religious freedom, and encourage them to worship as they wish in their homes and in their churches.”

But the Constitution does not protect freedom of “worship,” it protects the “free exercise” of religion. It protects religious liberty 168 hours a week, just as it does the other rights specified in the First Amendment.

Newspapers would be understandably outraged if a judge told them their right to freedom of the press was operational only inside the newspaper’s offices or only in the privacy of their own homes.

No, every First Amendment right is in effect 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, everywhere and in every place. No one forfeits any First Amendment right by walking out the door of his house or his church.

What Ms. Frazier has done is shown us how the stranglehold of federal tyranny can be broken: one elected official at a time. Ms. Frazier, as an elected representative, is not acting in defiance of the Constitution. She is acting in defiance of a tyrant who has mangled the Constitution out of all recognition. She is not defying the Constitution, she is upholding it. May she continue to do so.

The Founders said, “Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.” Ben Franklin loved that phrase so much he wanted it on our nation’s official seal. Thomas Jefferson loved it so much it adorned his own personal seal. Ms. Frazier is a modern embodiment of the spirit that energized the men who bequeathed to us the American republic.

With a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, Robin Bartlett Frazier is willing to pledge her life, her fortune and her sacred Honor in the defense of liberty. Who will join her?

This article was originally posted at the OneNewsNow.com news site.

This week the U.S. Supreme Court hears a critically important religious freedom case. The Court will determine whether Hobby Lobby must provide contraceptive coverage to its employees, which would entail violating the religious beliefs of the company’s owners on a matter of no small import: the killing of the unborn.

Judy Waxman, a vice president of the National Women’s Law Center, asserts that “The key question is whether a corporation can have a religion.”

That strikes me as a dishonest framing of the question in that the “corporation” consists of individuals for whom their faith is central.

I would argue that the key question is whether the free exercise of religion protects the right of citizens to allow their faith to shape the means by which they make a living. The key question is whether an individual has the right to have their religious beliefs inform their livelihood decisions. Many Americans spend most of their waking hours working. For Christians, every aspect of life should be lived in submission to God and shaped by biblical truths. Christians should not lose their right to freely exercise their religion in all areas of life just because they have used their gifts and labor to create successful businesses.

The First Amendment does not merely protect the right of people of faith to freely exercise their religion within the confines of their churches. It protects the right of people of faith to exercise their religious convictions in all areas of life, not the least of which is our work. Shaping business decisions in accordance with one’s faith does not constitute a violation of the separation of church and state. Not subsidizing the provision of abortifacients to women does not constitute establishing a religion or imposing a religious practice on others. If the government declares that commerce is an area of life in which individuals have no right to exercise their religion, the First Amendment is gutted.

Take ACTION:  Our friends at the Pro-Life Action League are asking that we join the “Tweet Storm for Religious Freedom” from 8 a.m. to Noon.  People of faith across the country will be tweeting with the hashtag #ReligiousFreedomForAll during that time, when the Justices will be hearing oral arguments in this case.

 Click HERE to support the work and ministry
of Illinois Family Institute.