Ones you would normally get here:
Posted on 10/20/2017 9:32:45 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
The American media would have you believe there is a concerted effort among Christians in America to discriminate against gay Americans. "No gays allowed," they claim small Christian business owners are saying. It is a fiction created to avoid dealing with the facts. The fact is I am unaware of any Christian business that refuses to serve gay customers, but I am aware of many gay activists targeting Christian small businesses for persecution.
The latest issue is also the one where the left has most dramatically overplayed its hand. Jack Phillips, a baker in Denver, CO, has been compared to a Nazi participating in the holocaust. A member of Colorado's Civil Rights Commission said that. What crime did Phillips commit? He dared to offer a cake to a gay couple for their same-sex wedding.
You may need to read that last sentence again. Phillips is both a committed Christian and a renown artist. His cakes are elaborate creations. Phillips was willing to provide a cake for the same-sex wedding, but Phillips was not willing to provide his extra artistic talents for the particulars that the couple wanted. They could have the wedding cake, but he was not going to customize it the way they wanted it. For that, Phillips had to be prosecuted.
Before going further, it would be helpful for you to know just how committed a Christian Phillips is. He will gladly bake a cake for a gay person, but he will not bake a cake for a Christian who wants a Halloween themed cake. Phillips believes Halloween is a pagan holiday that dishonors God, so he will not lend his artistry to its celebration. He will not bake cakes for anyone's second wedding, even if a church is willing to do the wedding. Divorce is a sin. Phillips will not bake cakes celebrating other religions' religious holidays.
But Phillips was willing to bake a cake for the gay couple for their wedding. Still, he must be prosecuted because he would not customize it the way they wanted. For that, he must be shamed, boycotted and compared to a Nazi. His case is now before the Supreme Court. He goes in the company of Baronelle Stutzman. She regularly provided flowers to a gay couple in Washington. She had a long list of gay customers that she lovingly served. But Stutzman would not provide flowers for same-sex wedding of her long time customers. The couple did not file charges against Stutzman. They were, after all, friends and long time customers. But the State of Washington pursued her anyway.
Stutzman was found guilty of discrimination by the Washington State Supreme Court and risks losing her home, her business, and even her dog because of the judgment unless His Majesty Anthony Kennedy, the supreme ruler of the United States, deigns to carve out some small exception for Christians in private enterprise.
It really all comes down to Anthony Kennedy, who decided the Supreme Court had the power to change the multi-thousand year old definition of marriage, despite the government not having created it. Now Kennedy will tell us whether the First Amendment's "free exercise of religion" language means we can actually freely exercise our religion or only believe it without living it.
What the Christians before the United States Supreme Court want is not a ruling that says they can discriminate against gays and turn away a gay couple from their business. All they want is a ruling that says their artistic talents are speech and their speech cannot be compelled to endorse a religious ceremony they disagree with.
The compromise here should be obvious. Just as we should abhor the idea of forcing a black printer to print the fliers for a Klan rally or forcing the Muslim butcher to carve a pig for a church barbecue, we should not force the Christian to provide goods and services to a religious ceremony their religion decries as sin. You may disagree, but who are you to tell someone else how to live his faith? Anthony Kennedy, though, is our supreme ruler and he will tell us all.
bfl
As far as the Left is concerned, the First Amendment guarantees freedom FROM religion and should be used to outlaw Christianity.
One wonders what the erm... decorations they wanted were.
Ones you would normally get here:
Start baking undecorated cakes for everyone. Cake, layers, frosting. That’s it. No words or add-ons. I wonder how much that would cripple business?
Atheism is a religion, despite the lies that atheists tell.
The courts violate the constitution every time they rule on any matter that concerns religious beliefs or practices (at the federal level) Even the USSC has strayed into promoting the religion of nullity over Christianity, a power they do not possess.
I'm all for Christian charity, but that realm is none of the Court's business either.
If you're not free to associate, you're not free. So "Congress shall pass no law" and the Supremes shall utter no fortune-cookie twaddle contradicting that right.
The only discrimination within voluntary transactions that is illegal under the U.S. Constitution is that carried out by the laws of Congress. States are free to roll their own, and do.
The free market is the only real cure for private discrimination, when it's causing disfunction. And the market does a fine job. As Thomas Sowell pointed out decades ago, if (for example) West Indian lawyers are discriminated against in hiring, that's a golden opportunity for a West Indian law firm to hire lawyers at lower prices and beat non-West Indian law firms on price. They'll eat the market's lunch until the situation changes. Before the nanny state got into the act, that same process was the ticket to success for Chinese, Jews, Irish, Italians . . . and in fact, West Indians. No whining, no marketplace busybodies, no lawsuits, just beat your competition if you're better.
Tyranny sneaks in as a solution looking for a problem.
her dog? how come she loses her dog?
You bet it is. Complete with their own dogmas and sacraments . . . and it is often even more intolerant than the religion which must never be criticized.
In Canada, as we saw in Mark Steyn’s ordeal, there are quasi-judicial Human Rights Commissions (HRCs) and their Tribunals which have the power to fine and order actions to force compliance with a plaintiff claiming their human rights were violated.
We now see that this same process has migrated here and in those states where there is an activist sponsorship of using the power of government to quash disagreeable (to them) ideas and traditions, the 1st Amendment is in great danger of being submerged by the usage of the Civil Rights Act and its Public Accommodation clause.
Patriots are reminded concerning misguided, pro-LGBT activist states punishing Christian business owners that Congress has the 14th Amendment power to make laws to make laws to strengthen the constitutionally enumerated rights of citizens from state abridgment of those protections.
”14th Amendment, Section 1: All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States [emphasis added]; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
"14th Amendment, Section 5: The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article."
The problem is that we’ve still got a corrupt Congress left over from the lawless Obama administration that will predictably continue to ignore state abridgment of constitutionally enumerated protections.
So patriots need to make sure that there are plenty of constitutional rights-respecting candidates on the primary ballots and pink-slip career federal lawmakers by sending patriot candidate lawmakers to DC on election day in 2018.
Even if justice is delayed by several decades, some day those thugs who abuse government power to deny Christians religious freedom need to be prosecuted.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/242
18 U.S. Code § 242 - Deprivation of rights under color of law
Whoever, under color of any law . . . willfully subjects any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States . . . shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if bodily injury results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include the use, attempted use, or threatened use of a dangerous weapon, explosives, or fire, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both
By their very nature, the massive fines inflicted by jack-booted government thugs in Washington State include an implicit threat of government force including dangerous weapons. A decade behind bars for each offense would be a good start. Some crimes are so heinous that they can never be forgiven or forgotten, and this set of crimes makes that short list.
Make lefties bake cakes that say Jesus is LORD, Hell is real, will burn there forever?
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