Free Republic

It appears that the nation's tyannical governors and mayors are perfectly fine with allowing mobs of rampaging democrats and their elite friends to march all across our nation in huge crowds numbering in the thousands even hundreds of thousands, vandalizing, burning and trashing business establishments along the way, yet the bible clinging deplorable classes aren't even allowed to open their shops, get a hairccut, take their families to church or to a restaurant for a night out. And most of us aren't even allowed to go to work. Locked down and silenced.

Pastor Larry Ihrig had a message for congregants as he greeted them with elbow bumps Sunday morning at the entrance to the sanctuary at Livermore’s Celebration Church. “Welcome home again, guys. I wish we could hug, but we can’t do any of that.” One congregant rejoiced as they arrived at the doors: “Thank the Lord. We’re finally back.” More than 100 worshipers came out to the church Sunday morning for the first in-person service in more than two months, curtailed in March by the region’s public health orders, put in place nearly two and a half months ago to curb...

SNIP Close to midnight on Friday, while rioters used the killing of George Floyd as a pretext to set America aflame, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a 5-4 ruling that declined to enjoin the states of California and Illinois from restrictions on communal worship imposed due to the coronavirus pandemic. Most startling was that Chief Justice John Roberts not only joined the court’s four left-leaning justices (Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan) in declining to uphold religious liberty. Roberts also wrote a brief opinion explaining his decision. That opinion is an eye-opener. Roberts accords the right to...

There have been violent riots in Wisconsin's capital of Madison, where a group of about 150 demonstrators threw rocks at police officers on Saturday night, according to WITI-TV. At least 75 stores were damaged or looted overnight. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel politics and statehouse reporter Patrick Marley tweeted, "Police chief says they aren't arresting people tonight." Interim Madison Police Chief Vic Wahl said his officers stood back during the protests. While Madison didn't do much to prevent the barrage of looting in the city, officials want citizens to know that church services of more than 50 people will absolutely not be...

Chief Justice Roberts joined the the liberal bloc of the Supreme Court in deciding Governor Newsom has the right to deny churchgoers the right to assemble during this pandemic. Once again, Roberts’ logic is muddled as he this time sided with the far left against the First Amendment of the United States. The Hill reported: "The Supreme Court issued a rare late-night ruling on Friday against a California church challenging their state’s stay-at-home order. In a 5-4 vote, Chief Justice John Roberts broke from other conservative justices to rule in favor of the state. The case was brought by the...

President Donald Trump stepped up to declare houses of worship "essential places that provide essential services" to the American people. "The governors need to do the right thing and allow these very important, essential places of faith to open right now for this weekend," he said. The president raised eyebrows by declaring that he will "override" governors if they don't do it. Where's the president's authority to override governors on this matter? I'm not a constitutional attorney, but I do have common sense. The president takes an oath of office during which he swears to "preserve, protect and defend the...

Reopening of churches and other houses of worship appears to be developing as an issue of some controversy as the nation moves to reopen society. An earlier article reviewed unreasonable attempts to prevent corporate worship even where there were drastic measures to prevent the spread of disease (such as drive in worship in separate cars or very small congregations widely spaced). The unreasonable claims that such meetings endanger lives when drive-in restaurants are allowed is clearly inconsistent, and appears to show that religious activity is being unduly restricted. As this writer has argued in a previous article related to the...

Chicago Pastor Courtney Lewis said he was in the middle of delivering a sermon to his congregation Sunday when he heard loud banging on the church doors. It was the police sent by the city's Democratic Mayor Lori Lightfoot. Lightfoot had allegedly dispatched officers in three squad cars along with two unmarked vehicles in order to shut down the service at Cornerstone Baptist Church, Lewis claimed in a letter of grievance to U.S. Attorney John Lausch.

A president can be an ardent defender of religious freedom without being overtly devout himself. But that didn't stop CNN from branding President Trump a hypocrite for having not attended church this weekend while having recently promoted the re-opening of houses of worship. Here's how New Day co-host Alisyn Camerota teed up CNN senior political analyst John Avlon this morning: "Over the past week [Trump’s] been very interested in churches. Very interested in churches reopening . . . But then yesterday he didn’t go to church. He played golf. So how do we process that?" Get the rest of the...

Churchgoers across the country are reasserting their fundamental rights of conscience—rights that too many political leaders have forgotten or denied. On Friday, President Trump said churches and houses of worship are “essential” and called on governors nationwide to allow them to open this weekend. If they don’t, Trump said he would “override” governors, citing forthcoming guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.In remarks Thursday, the president criticized some governors who have “deemed liquor stores and abortion clinics as essential” but not churches. “It’s not right. So I’m correcting this injustice and calling houses of worship essential.”Trump is right,...

Congress is considering H.R. 6666, the “Testing, Reaching, And Contacting Everyone Act” (“TRACE Act”), a bill by U.S. Representative Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) aimed at limiting the spread of COVID-19. The bill ostensibly would achieve that goal by creating “mobile health units” to “conduct diagnostic testing . . . trace and monitor the contacts of infected individuals” and then “support the quarantine of such contacts”—all at the cost of $100 billion. Rush says that “increased testing and contact tracing is the only way we will get back normal and safely reopen our economy.” Essentially, Rush’s position—which is echoed by the bulk...

Minnesota Catholics and Lutherans tell @GovTimWalz they are reopening churches on May 26—after the Governor announced malls, salons, tattoo parlors, & casinos can open, but churches can’t. The leadership of over 700 Catholic and Lutheran churches, represented by @BECKETlaw & @SidleyLaw, told @GovTimWalz and AG @keithellison that the First Amendment doesn’t let the government put churches at the back of the line during reopening. Minnesota’s re-opening plan lets people seek retail therapy at the mall, but not spiritual solace at church. Today’s press conference underscored @GovTimWalz’s failure to appreciate the integral role of faith in the well-being of the community....

May 20, 2020, 7:21 p.m. EST: BREAKING: The Minnesota Catholic Conference and The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod in Minnesota sent Governor Tim Walz separate letters today announcing that they will resume worship services on May 26 despite Governor Walz’s current COVID-19 executive order which allows retailers to operate at 50 percent capacity but caps church worship services at ten people. Governor Walz’s latest re-opening order allows the Mall of America to open its doors to those seeking retail therapy but disallows churches from providing spiritual healing to their congregations. At the same time, The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty sent Governor...

The Emergency Services Act gives California’s governor broad emergency authority. Typically, the state constitution requires policy decisions (what we should do going forward) to be made through the deliberative legislative process.[1] But in a crisis, that authority (what we should do right now) may be consolidated and exercised by one executive.

Houston church cancels Mass after coronavirus outbreak Holy Ghost Catholic Church has canceled public Mass indefinitely while members of the religious order remain in quarantine. HOUSTON — A Southwest Houston church canceled public Masses until further notice after five members of its religious order tested positive for COVID-19 and a priest, who died last week, may have had it, too. The five members of the religious order live and work at Holy Ghost Catholic Church. The church said a priest, Donnell L. Kirchner, died on May 13 and may have been infected with the virus as well. Father Kirchner was...

An Oregon judge on Monday halted statewide coronavirus restrictions, ruling in favor of churches and congregants who challenged the measures as an unlawful infringement on their religious freedoms. Circuit Judge Matthew Shirtcliff's ruling temporarily suspends all of Gov. Kate Brown's (D) emergency coronavirus measures, not just those applying to religious gatherings. Brown vowed to immediately appeal to the Oregon Supreme Court. In lifting the restrictions, Shirtcliff said the church groups challenging the orders were likely to win a final ruling on the merits. Their initial showing persuaded him that the health orders’ harms to religious and economic freedom outweigh public...

A federal judge overturned North Carolina Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s orders Saturday that sought to cap religious services at no more than 10 people while businesses and other organizations in the state were left to accommodate up to 50. The double standard, District Court Judge James C. Dever ruled in the Eastern District of North Carolina, was an overt show of distrust among those gathering to worship and deemed the directive illegal, according to the News and Observer. “The record, at this admittedly early stage of the case, reveals that the Governor appears to trust citizens to perform non-religious activities...

Chicago's Mayor Lori Lightfoot may have exempted herself from her own prohibition on haircuts, but she made and carried out drastic, and probably illegal, threats against a church that announced its plans to hold Sunday services yesterday.  Evidently, only important people like the mayor get to exercise their constitutional rights. CBS Chicago covered the mayor's threats on Saturday: People heading to Philadelphia Romanian Church in Ravenswood on Sunday might have a hard time finding a parking spot. Ald. Matt Martin (47th) said no-parking signs have been put up for several surrounding blocks near the church at 1713 W. Sunnyside Ave. The signs have been...

What a travesty on so many levels. As reported by CBS Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot ordered a parking ban from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday in the neighborhood of Philadelphia Romanian Church in response to its intention to hold services. On Sunday morning the tow trucks descended – not just on churchgoers, but on residents and everybody else, and on a private lot used by parishioners. Read this from Second City Cop: City tow trucks arrived and yanked the vehicles of every single resident, including numerous elderly people and a more than a few nurses coming in from the...

MILFORD, PIKE COUNTY (WOLF) — The Pike County Sheriff's Office announcing it will not be enforcing, if asked to do so, any order that violates the U.S. Constitution or the Pennsylvania Constitution. "I'm proud about what the sheriff's office is doing, I think it's a fine line, he's not going to enforce anything that's unconstitutional, which is all we ever want," said Eve Yasthal, Milford resident. Businesses that decide to reopen under the Red Phase will not have to worry about facing any citations from the Pike County Sheriff's Office. In a statement Sheriff Kerry Welsh said "Just to be...