The Supreme Court on Monday handed a narrow victory to a Christian baker from Colorado who refused for religious reasons to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.
"For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet." Romans 1:26,27 (KJV)
EDITOR'S NOTE: The Obama administration was openly hostile toward Christians, especially in the last 4 years of his second term. Jack Phillips, the Colorado baker that refused to make a wedding cake celebrating something that the Bible condemns as an abomination, was persecuted and driven into bankruptcy for his Biblical beliefs. Early on into his term, President Trump decided to weigh in, and he was decidedly on the side of the baker's right to refuse to provide service to anyone he chose not to do business with. That is not discrimination, that is capitalism, that is how people operate in a free society. Today, the Supreme Court sided with the baker as well, and upheld his right to not be forced to provide a service for something that violated his religious liberty. Score another victory for the Trump Train...
The justices, in a 7-2 decision, faulted the Colorado Civil Rights Commission's handling of the claims brought against Jack Phillips, saying it had showed a hostility to religion. In doing so, the commission violated his religious rights under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
But the court did not issue a definitive ruling on the circumstances under which people can seek exemptions from anti-discrimination laws based on their religious views.
The commission had said Phillips violated the Colorado anti-discrimination law that bars businesses from refusing service based on race, sex, marital status or sexual orientation by rebuffing gay couple David Mullins and Charlie Craig in 2012.
Two of the court's four liberals, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan, joined the five conservative justices in the ruling authored by Justice Anthony Kennedy.
"The commission's hostility was inconsistent with the First Amendment's guarantee that our laws be applied in a manner that is neutral toward religion," Kennedy wrote, referring to the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
"The outcome of cases like this in other circumstances must await further elaboration in the courts, all in the context of recognizing that these disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market," Kennedy said.
Of the 50 states, 21 including Colorado have anti-discrimination laws protecting gay people.
No comments:
Post a Comment