Posted on 12/04/2019 4:04:31 AM PST by Kaslin
As we head into the Christmas season, religious liberty in America continues to be under attack, and it’s not just about whether people can say “Merry Christmas” in public places. With the recent controversy over Chick-fil-A bowing to pressure to end its financial support of charities the far left has labeled as “anti-gay,” organizations that dare to hold onto certain deeply held religious beliefs will likely be punished for it.
I have served on the national boards of the two charities that Chick-fil-A will no longer be supporting, the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA). Both charities have been smeared by the left as being anti-gay because of their traditional religious view of marriage as between one man and one woman. As a former board member of both organizations, I never witnessed – nor would I have tolerated – any type of prejudice or bigotry toward gay people. All I ever saw was people earnestly wanting to help other people.
In fact, the Salvation Army estimates that it is the largest provider of poverty relief to the LGBT community in the nation. The money it was getting from Chick-fil-A went to its Angel Tree program to provide Christmas gifts for needy children. FCA was using its donation to send poor youth to summer sports camps at historically black colleges and universities.
Contrary to the accusations from the left, Christians do not hate gay people; our faith teaches us to love everyone. This issue is not with gay people; it’s with a small group of anti-religious activists who refuse to tolerate other people’s beliefs and seek to destroy anyone who doesn’t agree with their agenda.
The Chick-fil-A incident is just the latest example of why so many of us fight for religious liberty every single day and why it’s critical for all religious people to be engaged in the public square. The ability to work, live, and provide services compatible with one’s beliefs is essential for maintaining a free society.
When tolerance for religious beliefs wanes, intolerance for other beliefs follows closely behind. Just as it has become acceptable to discriminate against people for their religious beliefs, we’ve seen how it has also become acceptable to discriminate against – and even attack – people based on their political beliefs, their beliefs on how they raise their children, or any other belief that doesn’t comport with the latest checkbox on the social justice warrior agenda.
A pluralistic society like ours is defined by those with different beliefs and different cultures coexisting side-by-side while still sharing one unifying American identity. A society without that kind of tolerance becomes a society of us-versus-them that devolves into constant conflicts and chaos. Unfortunately, that seems to be the very path the far left wants to force us down.
In caving to the bullying of a minority of radical activists, Chick-fil-A has only affirmed that their destructive tactics work, and it guarantees that those tactics will be used again against others. If a giant like Chick-fil-A can succumb to anti-religious pressure, then it can happen anywhere. And the activists now know it.
While private companies certainly have the freedom to donate to whatever organizations they choose, Chick-fil-A, by singling out the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, is telling their once former charitable allies, “If you insist on sticking to your deeply held religious beliefs, you’re on your own.” That feels like a betrayal, not only to those charities, but to the millions of customers who have come to Chick-fil-A’s defense over the years for its right to hold fast to its own beliefs.
In trying to appease bullies who will never be satisfied with compromise, Chick-fil-A has achieved little. Instead, it has emboldened the intolerant, thrown outstanding charities under the bus, and harmed thousands of innocent children and youth that benefited significantly from the help of those charities.
Millions of people of faith in this country have loved Chick-fil-A not only for its good food and friendly staff, but because it stood strong for principles in a world that seemed more and more to have little use for them. Many of those same people are now praying that the company’s leadership reconsiders what it has done. Today, I join them in their prayers.
Homofascists want some gay people on the board of directors or as CEO.
This game is being played in every industry.
I wonder, do they attack muslim organizations for being “anti-gay?”
Inquiring minds want to know.
I guess the moral of the story is to not put your faith into earthly institutions. We,who are true believers,are not of this world. Literally.
This is a good article, but the author completely misses an important point. Chick-fil-A succumbed BECAUSE it is now a giant, not IN SPITE OF its size. This is the same tired old routine you see with any business that starts small and then grows beyond the managerial capabilities of a small group of principled owners.
I used to go out of my way to patronize Chick-fil-A regularly when I would make occasional trips down to the South. Once they started showing up in retail centers up here in the Northeast a few years ago, I knew their days as a company run by people with religious principles were over.
So now I don’t patronize the company up here in the Northeast, and I don’t patronize them down South anymore, either.
They don't and it's because they're cowards.
Have a healthy distrust for all organizations. That includes everything from the church to the military.
Don’t place your faith in a chicken sandwich place.
I hope I am around when the pendulum swings.
And I hope it swings very very hard.
Interesting.
I’m living in a John 3:16 world.
“Don’t place your faith in a chicken sandwich place.”
Welcome to FR.
I rebut your statement. I’m pretty hard on squishy milquetoast freepers, but NO ONE here has ever placed their faith in a “chicken sandwich place”.
They supported the “chicken sandwich place” because of ITS stance on faith — UNTIL NOW.
More than a week of posts has made that perfectly clear to all but the CFA defender trolls.
I’ll now guffaw at the thought of placing one’s “faith in a chicken sandwich place”.
TOO funny!!!!
Faith with with a lower case F was intentional.
The fact is many if not most conservatives are just as ignorant as liberals and often more so.
Chick-fil-A is big because they have made good business decisions. They are a very conservative faith run company who are on the good side. This recent decision on what charities to support was a BUSINESS decision. Many purist conservatives are too ignorant and frankly too stupid to see this.
It's no wonder we are losing our country to leftists. We play right into their hands and they know it. So just keep it up nitwits. Hurt Chick-fil-A if you can. Drive them out of business. Then buy some Nike shoes and head over to starbucks with your money and spend it there.
What the heck is that supposed to mean?
Judas Iscariot made a great business decision, too.
Why are you blaming Freepers for turning their backs on Chick-fil-A when they no longer support a private company whose business decisions no longer align with their faith and morals?
CFA is dead to me. The food was never very good. Church’s & Popeye’s chicken are much better. I only ate at CFA because of their support of Salvation Army. Now that that is gone, so am I.
I am familiar with that verse. The upshot is that the reason for the Gift of forgiveness was so that it would be given to everyone on Earth. All resistance to that truth must be overwhelmed and defeated. And that includes the tyrants at the top of Chick-fil-a. Who, in fact, are they? Who made this decision? Was there a vote? Who voted, and how? Their faces should be posted for all the world to see, and with that their office address, their contact information and what they do. Bible believing people are in despair and hopelessness. They are like sheep without a Shepard. Who will blow the shofar of war and rouse them? Did not the Nazarene say “I have not come to bring Peace but a Sword!” Did he not say that “the gates of hell will not prevail” against his army? Something is fundamentally wrong with a Christianity that has drifted so far from its roots in Torah that the life-flow from the G-d of Israel has been shut off. The answer is in rediscovering and re-activating the Power of Torah. There is no other way.
When a company changes its tune on the one thing that many of its customers consider its defining characteristic, then why would anyone be surprised -- even upset -- when those customers walk away?
When will people realize that to give an inch to these people is a horrible mistake. It is like throwing a bucket of chum in shark infested waters. Never acquiesce to their insanity. Never. They cannot he compromised with.
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