Posted on 07/18/2015 2:45:16 PM PDT by Kaslin
Sweet Cakes by Melissa owners Aaron and Melissa Klein had the audacity to defend their religious beliefs two years ago, and they suffered mightily. When a lesbian couple, Laurel and Rachel Bowman-Cryer, requested a cake from the Oregon-based Christian bakers for their wedding, the latter politely declined because doing so would violate the religious edicts they so strongly follow. The Kleins’ religiously motivated decision prompted the gay couple to sue, and the Oregon labor commissioner ruled that the Kleins would have to shell out $135,000 in damages. Thanks to Americans who still cherish religious freedom, however, it appears this Christian family will be more than able to pay that bill.
The Kleins had a fundraising page set up on the crowdfunding website GoFundMe. After pressure from gay marriage activists, site administrators decided to remove the page. Here’s how GoFundMe got away with that after their initial explanation about restricting crowdfunding pages for companies faced with "formal charges in defense of heinous crimes" didn't fly (the Kleins were not charged with a crime):
A few days later, GoFundMe changed the policy to include a ban on “claims of heinous crimes, violent, hateful, sexual or discriminatory acts,” making it easier to remove campaigns for Christian-owned business owners fighting discrimination charges after declining to provide services for gay weddings.
Despite being booted from the website, the Christian bakers still managed to rake in and keep about $109,000 from the fund.
Their campaign was picked up by another crowdfunding site, Continue to Give, and it has lived up to its name. As of today, the campaign has reached about 250 percent of its goal. Here are the astounding figures:
A crowdfunding campaign for the Oregon bakery Sweet Cakes by Melissa has set a site record by raising $352,500 in about two months after being kicked off the GoFundMe website, far exceeding the initial goal of $150,000.
That, reports the Washington Times, is a new crowdfunding record for the website.
A similar scene was played out earlier this year in a small pizza shop in Walkerton, Indiana. After Gov. Mike Pence (R-IN) signed the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act into law, which protects business owners from the government infringing on their religious beliefs, tensions were already high throughout the state. The owners of Memories Pizza became unwanted martyrs in the fight. After telling local news reporters they supported RFRA and could not cater gay weddings because their faith would not allow it, the O’Connors received hate mail - even a death threat - and were forced to close up shop.
In response to the bitter backlash, The Blaze’s Dana Loesch announced she was starting a GoFundMe page for the O’Connors and the response was immediate. The embattled pizza shop owners raked in $35,000 in just four hours (and it seemed the page was permitted to stay active.) Once again, Christian business owners stood up to the backlash - and won.
Both of these instances have proven that lawsuits and threats only make unapologetic Christian businesses stronger.
Now that the Kleins have reached their fundraising goals – and then some – it goes to show that a sizable number of Americans still err on the side of religious liberty.
As for those who are trying to remove the Klein’s crowdfunding page from Continue to Give, founder Jesse Wellhoefer has a simple message:
“Lots of people have been asking us to take it off,” Mr. Wellhoefer said. “Our response has been, ‘Thank you for your concern, have a great day and God bless you.’”
| Also, is the “labor commissioner” a poof? Aren't all white male liberals poofs? |
What you have posited is not an absolute as people gossip, and gossip has a tendency to spread. And even in a large town, if they go to a mega church or the same church that is smaller, both sides would probably know.
Bring on the Christian sectarianism! Not.
"ERR"??? You should reconstruct that sentence, Courtney. How about "...it goes to show huge numbers of Americans are worried about the totalitarians destroying their First Amendment rights"? Grrrr!
I approve of supporting decent people like the victims of this malicious prosecution, but I pray that not one cent will go to the bullies who filed charges and lied about the so-called trauma of not having their orders to bake the cake obeyed (loss of appetite and weight gain, both? $135,000 in alleged suffering from not being able to order others around? really?). The lesbians in this case, the administrative "judge", and BOLI Commissioner Brad Avakian are shockingly disgusting people, who I hope will be shunned by all decent people until they repent, make restitution to the innocents they have harmed, and reform their thuggish and totalitarian ways. I hope the lesbians will die of old age or other natural causes before they are able to collect from their victims.
You started out well - before the first coma - but then you started engaging in broad-brushing comparisons.
You are dealing in hypotheticals. The baker is not going to know if someone who is asking for a Wedding cake has previously been married - unless the purchaser feels compelled to blab about it and give an account of the grisly details. At that point, the baker can do as he/she feels. It is her business, she can accept the order, or not. If the business was refused, I also doubt the blabber would care two bits about it - they'd just move on to another baker (and maybe not blab so much).
The requirement for a Christian baker to prepare and sell a Wedding Cake for a Sodomite 'marriage' (there is no such an animal - but hypothetically speaking) is analogous to forcing a humanist who runs a general store to sell gasoline to someone who says he is buying it to pour on himself to commit self-immolation. I would hope that the Government would not force said General Store humanist owner to sell that gasoline.
Now multiply that by a million (or more). The Christian knows that the Sodomite, unless he/she repents and turns will end up in the everlasting fires of Hell. The Christian would rather go to jail than willingly participate in this self-immolation of someone's soul.
So why didn’t they just go to a different baker?
You do indeed support forcing people to do things that violate their religious beliefs.
Now that is a statement. See the period at the end?
Why didn’t they just go down the street to a different baker? The baker has rights to decline service to people who are flaunting their perversions in his face.
I dont understand how its lasted this long. The commissioners demands are in clear violation of the Oregon Constitution
ARTICLE I
Sec. 2. Freedom of worship
3. Freedom of religious opinion
8. Freedom of speech and press
This could only be by the Discriminatory Gay Mafia.
I hope they use the excess funds to sue the so-called “labor commissioner” into oblivion, like Mike Nifong after his evil persecution of the Duke lacrosse team.
You can tell by his Facebook page he’s a big Poof supporter.
Yeah...and the Gay Bakers in the town were discriminated against by not getting their cake order....
....and all those mail (no pun intended) out of state LBGT bakeries were also loosing business....
So hit them with a RICO
If I owned a store that supplied mining companies with dynamite and a Muslim customer wanted to buy a couple of cases I wouldn't sell it to him. Should the mayor of my town be legally able to bring charges against me before a labor commission?
I don't think so here in GA, but in the liberal never-never land called Oregon the mayor probably could and would.
The children look so happy and well-disciplined. Not.
I’m pretty sure they’ve already stated they are NOT paying the fine & instead are going to court. We’ll see if the Supremes take the case.
No, it is not stronger than the Lord intended. Romans 1:32 states that those who approve of homosexuality and sexual immorality are as bad in the eyes of the Lord as those who practice them.
Ok but how much are these useless (to humanity) mouth breather lesbians going to be raking in? Its a major crime if they score $100,000 off this phoney claim plus collusion with the phony baloney gov’t official who imposed the high fine
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