Guest Column: Jesus Would Have Baked the Cake

Mar 18, 2026John StonestreetLGBTLGBT, Same-Sex Marriage

. . . and other nonsense Jesus would not have done.

On a Saturday morning in 2012, sitting on my porch reading an actual newspaper, I first learned of a Denver baker named Jack Phillips. A gay couple, having been “married in a different state,” asked Jack, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop, to custom design a cake for their same-sex “wedding” celebration. Jack offered them service and any cake in his store that was already made. What he could not do, he said, was use his creative talent to communicate a message that violated his conscience and said what he knew to be untrue.

To say that a lot has happened since is, to put it mildly, an understatement. He was harassed by the state of Colorado, specifically the Civil Rights Commission. He was slandered online and subjected to death threats against him and his family. He was sued, not only by the state but also by a man—who claimed to be a woman—who repeatedly asked him to bake perverted and disgusting cakes. In the end, his case, which went all the way to the Supreme Court, has been pivotal in advancing the rights of conscience, suppressing state hostility to religion, and attracting many to Christ.

But I also remember the chorus of voices, many of them Christian leaders, saying at the time, “Just bake the cake.” Or even, “Jesus would’ve baked the cake.” Jack was accused of hate, intolerance, and bigotry. But he stood courageously, even in the face of great criticism from brothers and sisters in Christ.

Thank God he did. Recently, at an event hosted by Colorado Christian University and featuring the brilliant Ayaan Hirsi Ali—one of those who was inspired by Jack’s story—I asked Jack, and Kristen Waggoner, Jack’s attorney and CEO of the Alliance Defending Freedom what he thinks now as he looks back on the past decade and a half.

Here’s Jack:

God tells us to live by a truth. He says we need to know the truth and that the truth will set us free. Jesus is the Truth, and we just have to know Him. And we get to know Him better and more clearly through His Word, through good teaching, and by spending time with Him. The more time you spend with Him, the better you know Him, and you don’t want to disappoint somebody you know well.

It would have been a huge disappointment to Jesus if I’d have [baked the cake] when He’s given us the power to live by what He says. And people want good news. There are tons of people who I’ve talked to who have been encouraged by this story. I think if I had made the cake . . . I don’t know because we’ve had so many things that have just happened that have been so good. Tonight is one of them.

Kristin Waggoner added more context:

In Jack’s situation, Jack modeled tolerance, and the other side did not. And so, it’s not about refusing to serve, because Jack serves everyone. Everybody. But when the government can compel you to speak messages and affirm lies that violate your conscience, then there is no limit to the government’s power. . .. So that’s really what that was about—it was “the message” that Jack was being asked to communicate.

I can tell you, having talked to hundreds of people over the last 10 years, that they have said that courage begets courage. And they’ve modeled that because they heard of Jack’s story, and it caused them to consider Christ and come to salvation. But it also caused them to be courageous in their moment.

One example that comes to mind is Sher Lori from Downtown Hope Center. She runs a homeless shelter in Alaska, and a man who identifies as a woman wanted to come into that shelter sleeping three feet away from the women in the shelter. As she’s coming down the stairs, she knows that the man is at the door wanting to come in. He had a reputation that would suggest that would not be a good thing. Even aside from the fact that he’s a man, he had violent tendencies and things like that. And what goes through her mind is, remember the baker. So, she gives that man cab money to go to the hospital to get his wounds cared for because he was in a fight earlier. But she does not let him in. She keeps that safe space for those women. So that’s what I think of; all the people who were inspired by Jack as well.

Praise God. The entire conversation, preceded by a stunning and brilliant speech by Ayaan Hirsi-Ali, is now available on YouTube. And, of course, the stories of Jack Phillips and Ayaan Hirsi-Ali are told in Truth Rising: The Study and the Truth Rising documentary. Learn more at colsoncenter.org/truth.

Yet Another Study Shows Marijuana Use Raises Risk of Stroke

Mar 18, 2026Jerry CoxMarijuanaMarijuana

In spite of federal law, states across the country have enacted measures legalizing marijuana, and public opinion polling suggests many Americans do not think marijuana is as dangerous as other substances. But research continues to show marijuana is harmful.

Researchers at the University of Cambridge released a study this month that demonstrates marijuana use raises a person’s risk of stroke by 37%. The the results were based on health data from more than 100 million participants in multiple studies over the course of several years.

Unfortunately, marijuana has been found time and again to pose serious health hazards.

THC — the main psychoactive substance in marijuana — has been tied again and again to everything from heart disease and cancer to stroke, mental illness, and birth defects.

In fact, researchers now say marijuana use doubles a person’s risk of death from heart disease.

Heavy marijuana use has also been linked to reduced brain activity.

A recent study from Columbia University found even “casual” marijuana use is connected to higher rates of depression, anxiety, and impulsive behavior in teenagers, and researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital found teen psychiatric emergencies spiked in the wake of marijuana’s commercialization.

All of this underscores what we have said for years: Marijuana may be many things, but “harmless” simply is not one of them.

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

One in Four Likely Voters Now Supports Socialism

Mar 17, 2026Jerry CoxCultureCommunism, Socialism

Earlier this month Rasmussen reported that support for capitalism has declined since 2023, and a growing share of likely voters now say socialism is better. On the whole, most Americans still support free markets — but that support has dwindled.

Rasmussen writes:

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 25% of Likely U.S. Voters say socialism is a better system than capitalism. More than twice as many voters (51%) say capitalism is better. Fourteen percent (14%) are not sure. Support for capitalism has declined by 16 points since February 2023, when 67% of voters said capitalism was better than socialism.

We’ve seen support for socialism play out in recent elections. In November, Zohran Mamdani won New York City’s mayoral election. Mamdani, 34, belongs to the socialist Working Families Party. In his victory speech, Mamdani promised New Yorkers a “new age,” saying, “We will prove that there is no problem too large for government to solve, and no concern too small for it to care about.”

Unfortunately, there is nothing “new” about what Mamdani is saying. During the last century, Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Fidel Castro, Mao Zedong, and others made similar promises to their citizens, and they all met with the same results. Many young people have been taught that socialism and communism failed in the past because they weren’t properly implemented, but that’s not the case. Socialism and communism failed every time they were implemented, because they are fatally flawed.

After the election, our friend Joseph Backholm, Senior Fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement at Family Research Council, published a list of some of socialism’s and communism’s basic flaws:

1. Socialism misunderstands human nature and implies that people will be virtuous as long as they have enough money. Then, ironically, it assumes everyone with money is sinister.

2. Socialism takes from the capable and gives to the less capable, ensuring that resources won’t ever be used productively.

3. Socialism destroys competition and consequently destroys innovation.

4. Socialism destroys people’s incentive to be productive by denying them the benefit of their labor. It always produces fewer, lower-quality products.

5. Socialism assumes I have the right to other people’s property just because they have more than I do. It depends upon and incentivizes greed.

6. Socialism denies people the dignity of having what they earn and earning what they have.

7. Socialism assumes people engaged in commerce always operate with corrupt motives, but people in government never do.

8. While claiming to decentralize power, it always centralizes power with a handful of bureaucrats.

9. Socialism assumes it’s always unjust for one person to have more than another, when real justice means the dishonest and unskilled shouldn’t have as much as the honest and skilled.

10. Socialism assumes humanity’s natural state is prosperity and rages over the fact that we aren’t all rich, when in reality the natural state is poverty, and capitalism is the only reason we aren’t all poor.

Joseph concluded by rightly pointing out, “Of course, none of this means a capitalist system doesn’t have weaknesses, but it can produce good outcomes and has. Communism never has because it assumes a world that does not exist and never will.”

Over the decades, other pundits have pointed out that socialism and communism are oppressive and cannot work without using force against everyday citizens.

Americans — and especially Christians — need to understand socialism’s basic problems and its track record. This is a fatally flawed belief system that has produced disastrous results every time.

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