Religious Liberty – Page 2

KC Chiefs Kicker Harrison Butker Encourages Graduates to Live Out Their Faith in Commencement Address

May 16, 2024Jerry CoxCurrent EventsAbortion, Free Speech, LGBT, Marriage, Religious Liberty, Sanctity of Human Life, Transgender

Last weekend Kansas City Chiefs Kicker Harrison Butker received a standing ovation for his commencement address at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas — even though some pundits have oddly criticized his remarks as “controversial.”

Butker, 28, arguably is responsible for the Chiefs’ Super Bowl LVIII victory over the San Francisco 49ers in February. He is a devout Catholic, and he and his wife have two children.

During his commencement address, Butker discussed the many challenges that the Class of 2024 had overcome — such as graduating from high school and enrolling in college during the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic and “missing out on so many milestones the rest of us older people have taken for granted.”

What grabbed some people’s attention, however, was Butker’s willingness to criticize abortion, IVF, surrogacy, euthanasia, dangerous gender ideologies, and “a growing support for degenerate cultural values in media.”

Butker noted how President Biden often professes his Catholic faith, and yet strangely made the Sign of the Cross during a pro-abortion rally in April.

But Butker also pointedly criticized Catholic bishops who fail to take their calling seriously, and he urged ministers to lead in a Christlike manner.

Critics have seized on Butker saying women “have had the most diabolical lies” told to them, and observing, “Some of you may go on to lead successful careers in the world, but I would venture to guess that the majority of you are most excited about your marriage and the children you will bring into this world. I can tell you that my beautiful wife Isabelle would be the first to say her life truly started when she started living her vocation as a wife and as a mother.”

But Butker also challenged the men in the graduating class to pursue God’s calling on their lives, and he spoke bluntly about the damage that absentee fathers cause.

Most of his address focused on encouraging the graduates to stand strong in living out their faith. “A life without God is not a life at all,” Butker said, “and the cost of salvation is worth more than any career.”

Throughout the speech, Butker was interrupted multiple times by applause from the graduates and their families, and he received a standing ovation at the end.

But pundits have criticized his statements. The radical, pro-LGBT group GLAAD, for example, issued a lengthy press release calling Butker’s remarks “inaccurate, ill-informed, and woefully out of step with Americans.” The Today Show encouraged viewers to watch a rebuttal to Butker’s comments, and the anchors on Good Morning America seemed genuinely puzzled that Butker would receive a standing ovation from the crowd.

The fact is Butker’s speech didn’t appear remotely controversial with his audience. It was very well received, and there are literally millions of Americans who would strongly agree with what he told the graduates. Plenty of people have expressed opinions about what he said, but it seems odd that so many would try to mischaracterize his remarks as “controversial.”

It shouldn’t be shocking when Christians publicly share their convictions. All of this reminds me of something John Stonestreet said in 2022: “Culture is most powerful in what it normalizes, and when lies are normalized, the truth becomes shocking. Thank God for Christian ministers willing to ‘shock’ and speak truth.”

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

A Heresy to “Misgender” in Scotland: Guest Column

Apr 10, 2024John StonestreetLGBTFree Speech, LGBT, Religious Liberty, Transgender

On April 1, the Scottish government made it illegal to “misgender” someone. The new law “makes it an offense to stir up hatred with threatening or abusive behavior on the basis of characteristics including age, disability, religion, sexual orientation and transgender identity,” with obviously the last two getting the most attention.

Anyone found guilty of hurtful content could face up to seven years in jail, even for content published outside of Scotland. All it takes is for someone in Scotland to think it “might” be offensive.

As Lois McLatchie Miller posted on X, “It was 1697 when the last man in Scotland was condemned for blasphemy. Today, we’ve introduced a new blasphemy law to punish heretics of the dominant Church of ‘woke.’”

The promise of secularism was that religion would fade and freedom would rise. Instead, what we’ve done is replace the faith that gave us freedom with a new one that is far more intolerant.

Attorney Tells Congressional Committee How Banks Targeted Family Council and Other Conservatives

Mar 18, 2024Jerry CoxReligious FreedomAlliance Defending Freedom, Banking, Free Speech, Religious Liberty

Recently attorney Jeremy Tedesco, Senior Counsel and Senior Vice President of Corporate Engagement for Alliance Defending Freedom testified before a congressional committee about how big banks have targeted Family Council and other conservative organizations.

On March 6, the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government released a report indicating the federal government weaponized banks against conservatives.

The report shows that after the events of January 6, 2021, federal law enforcement officials from the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and the FBI initiated multiple discussions with financial institutions to discuss ways financial institutions could share customer information with federal law enforcement outside of normal legal processes.

The U.S. Treasury Department gave banks and other financial institutions guiding “typologies” — patterns that could be used to identify suspicious people or activities — including search terms and patterns like “TRUMP” and “MAGA”, and encouraged financial institutions to comb through transactions for terms like, “Bass Pro Shops,” “Cabela’s,” and “Dick’s Sporting Goods” when looking for “Homegrown Violent Extremism.”

The report also reveals the Treasury Department provided banks and financial institutions with an analysis that listed legitimate, conservative groups such as Alliance Defending Freedom, the American College of Pediatricians, American Family Association, Eagle Forum, Family Research Council, Liberty Counsel, National Organization for Marriage, and the Ruth Institute as “Hate Groups” alongside the KKK and the American Nazi Party.

On March 7attorney Jeremy Tedesco, Senior Counsel and Senior Vice President of Corporate Engagement for Alliance Defending Freedom, told the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government how big banks have targeted other conservative organizations like Family Council.

In his remarks, Mr. Tedesco said,

JP Morgan Chase de-banked the Arkansas Family Council for being “high risk” and never provided a credible reason for canceling the account of former U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback’s organization the National Committee for Religious Freedom. And Wells Fargo denied payment processing to the pro-life group The Ruth Institute. These are some of the many instances of viewpoint-based de-banking and are likely only the tip of the iceberg.

These stories highlight the systemic risk of political and religious bias that pervades the financial industry, particularly at the largest banks and payment processors. These institutions maintain reputational risk policies that allow them unfettered discretion to punish customers who have, in their view, problematic political or religious views. Many also have prohibitions on “hate” speech and “intolerance” that require the institution to make subjective and value-based judgments on a customer’s viewpoint. Both types of policies are vague and ambiguous, sweep in broad swaths of content, chill constitutionally protected speech, and erode economic freedom.

Worse, government regulators can all too easily wield their outsized power over financial institutions to pressure them to leverage these against disfavored views—all with virtually no public accountability. Financial institutions in turn can hide behind that same shield to discriminate without ever explaining it to the customer—regardless of whether the action was prompted by government pressure.

In 2021 Family Council’s credit card processor terminated our account after designating our organization as “high risk.”

At 10:29 AM on Wednesday, July 7, 2021, our office received a terse email from our credit card processor — a company owned by JPMorgan Chase — saying, “Unfortunately, we can no longer support your business. We wish you all the luck in the future, and hope that you find a processor that better fits your payment processing needs.”

Within sixty seconds, our account was terminated and and Family Council could no longer accept donations online. We never received any further explanation concerning our abrupt, unprofessional cancelation. All we can do is speculate that our conservative principles and our public policy work might have had something to do with the decision to close our account.

You can watch Jeremy Tedesco’s full congressional testimony below or read it here.