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Going to Court for the Gospel
I work for Seattle’s Union Gospel Mission, so I’ve been asked to be careful about what I post for confidentiality purposes. But I think I’m okay passing on this Daily Signal article. Our director, Scott Chin, does a good job of making our case. Here’s a bit from the article along with the link:
Seattle’s Union Gospel Mission has been serving the homeless and needy of its community for nearly 90 years. But now, the Washington Supreme Court has given it the Hobson’s choice of changing its religious beliefs or closing its doors.
“[O]ur beliefs are everything to us,” Scott Chin, president of Seattle’s Union Gospel Mission, says, adding that it is “unimaginable that we would change our beliefs just so that we could continue operating.”
In 2017, Matthew Woods applied for a lawyer position with the organization. The mission requires all of its employees to hold and live by the ministry’s Christian beliefs, but Woods was open about the fact that he does not profess Christianity. Woods sued the homeless ministry after he was not hired for the job.
The Washington Supreme Court ruled against the ministry, but now Chin is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take up his case and defend the religious freedom the organization has enjoyed for decades.
Here’s the link. (There is video as well, about twenty minutes worth.)
Published in Law
It will soon be verboten.
The problem is that the long court battles, even if they work in the favor of the religious group in question, tends to discourage them from the activity even if it wins, which is an acceptable option for those going up against the Church in these legal battles. It doesn’t matter to them whether the law is on their side or not: they want to eliminate the Church and discourage anyone who is a part of it. Why do you think they keep going after the same baker in Colorado? Some assume they want to punish him — which I suspect is a small part — but mostly they want to bog him down in court and lawyer fees so that eventually, even if he wins, he’ll just go away.
Of course they’ve no regard for what will happen even in the short term. The Church operates charities all over. Destroying them is actually making society and culture worse. But so many of these are blind in their zealous pursuit to eliminate the Church, they don’t care to think about what will fill the gap when it’s gone and whether it’ll be nearly as effective. For many of these, the assumption is the government will step up. But for the past century we’ve seen how well the government can handle the charitable tasks usually done by the Church, and its record is spotty at best, disastrous at worst.
And show others that to persist in “undesirable” behavior is expensive.
True. There’s the aspect of making an example of him to discourage others. He might win his court battles, but do you want to do the same?
That’s one reason I’m happy we have him, instead of just another “surrender-monkey.”
Like the idiot suing Masterpiece Cakes. Again.
And I believe I read several years ago that at least one federal government position on the matter was that religion only takes place in church buildings, and not in any other place.
Franklin Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms said freedom of worship, not freedom of religion. That didn’t limit it to church buildings, but it is a limitation. And of course it didn’t stop there.
Not that all our almsgiving activities are not worship.
I wonder if FDR expanded on his point to remind people of that.
Bible studies and cook-outs are worship, like-minded or not. Loving your neighbor is an act of worship.
Or, more to the point, any.
It’s not true that any of our almsgiving activities are not worship.
Preach!
But what about when the Holy Scripture says “[so-and-so] fell down and worshiped….” Well, it doesn’t say the person wasn’t engaging in worship by whatever he was doing just prior to that act.
There are different forms of worship, and different ways to worship. Life itself should be a worshipful experience. The Bible, literally God Himself in this case, says, “And you shall teach them to your sons, talking of them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road and when you lie down and when you rise up.”
Also “pray without ceasing.” Worship and living worshipfully is a 24-hour activity.
I got some NT references if there’s any need. Romans 12, probably. Something in Colossians. (3:21? 3:17?) And something in a Corinthians.
There have been a number of arguments along this line against schools and colleges.
And only doing it at home or in church . . .
Here are two questions on the religious exemption form I had to fill out for the Department of Defense to avoid Brandon’s “No Jab, No Job” executive order. It demonstrates how the non-religious don’t understand religious people.
9. Please describe when and how you came to hold the religious belief or observe the religious practice.
10. Please describe how you have demonstrated the religious belief or observed the religious practice in the past.
What a mess.