And Then There Was The English Court of Appeal Decision

Folau’s Prospects Bolstered

Landmark Religious Freedom Ruling in Britain


By John Steenhof
Sydney Morning Herald

Britain's second-highest court handed down a decision on religious freedom yesterday that will send chills down the collective spine of Rugby Australia. In contrast, Israel Folau and his team will be thanking God for divine providence that is akin to manna from heaven.

In Ngole v the University of Sheffield, the English Court of Appeal has decided: “The mere expression of religious views about sin does not necessarily connote discrimination.”

The factual similarities to Folau’s case are remarkable. Felix Ngole was a social work student at the University of Sheffield and a devout Christian. In 2014, he posted Bible verses about homosexuality on a public Facebook page as part of a political debate. Sheffield University accused Ngole of breaching a vague and broadly worded code of conduct.

Through a hearing and two committee appeals, various bureaucratic apparatchiks repeatedly incanted that quoting Bible verses constituted “views of a discriminatory nature” and breached professional guidelines.

As the British appeal court stated: “The university wrongly confused the expression of religious views with the notion of discrimination. The mere expression of views on theological grounds (e.g. that "homosexuality is a sin") does not necessarily connote that the person expressing such views will discriminate on such grounds.”



Felix Ngole arrives at court in London, where he challenged a ruling that he was lawfully removed from a Sheffield social work course after being accused of posting comments about homosexuals and bisexuals on a Facebook page. 

This lines up almost exactly with Folau’s case.

Weaponising Political Correctness

Opinion: Keeping The Devil Down In The Hole

Apr 01, 2019
Free Speech Coalition

By Chris Trotter -

HOW SHOULD New Zealand respond to the Christchurch Mosque Shootings? What should the Government do? A powerful consensus has formed behind the Prime Minister’s call for gun control. Subsequent initiatives may not, however, be so universally affirmed. Voices are already being raised in favour of restricting the public expression of “harmful” ideas. Clearly, the question of what does, and does not, constitute “harm” is going to be hotly contested. The national unity forged out of shock, grief, compassion and solidarity, is unlikely to survive any attempt to aggressively limit free speech in New Zealand.

 Already, the Leader of the Opposition, Simon Bridges, has indicated his intention to resist strongly any attempt to extend the limitations on citizens’ freedom of expression. This should give Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern serious pause. A straight Left/Right battle over “hate speech” would place her principal coalition partner, NZ First, in an impossible position. Already in a parlous situation, poll-wise, aligning itself with what its electoral base would almost certainly construe as weaponised political correctness would undoubtedly compromise still further NZ First’s chances of making it back to Parliament.

Not that the Prime Minister’s worries are located exclusively on the right.

Petition

The Dark Animus of the Anti-Free Speech Mob

A fried posted an invite to sign a petition being promoted by the Free Speech Coalition.  This is one of those petitions which can be signed on-line.  We recommend the petition and encourage all who are like minded to sign. 

JT

Hi friends, 

Justice Minister Andrew Little has confirmed the Government is fast-tracking a review of our speech laws, with an eye to broadening the types of speech that could be restricted as "hate speech".

It seems pretty clear in the current climate that these laws could be used to shut down Christians and prevent them from speaking what they believe. Already people are talking about unpopular opinion as speech that is hateful and shouldn't be allowed. The furore over Israel Folau quoting the Bible on a social media account is a taste of our future. Whatever we think of these two issues, it is a worrying trend that puts us on a trajectory toward a totalitarian state rather than a democracy.

While we may disagree with someone's speech, the minute we say speech should be banned, we are in danger of losing our own freedom to speak. We need strong laws to protect free speech. I want to alert you to the Free Speech Coalition, and the petition they are running at the moment.

Please sign the petition and pass it on to your friends and urge them to support the petition. 

Cheers,

Supreme Court to the Rescue

Leviathan Checked

Jack Phillips' Masterpiece Cakeshop Sees 3 Times More Customers Since Supreme Court Victory

Stoyan Zaimov
Christian Post 

Jack Phillips told The Christian Post on Thursday that his bakery, Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, has seen three times more customers since his Supreme Court victory.

"We have had so many people coming by to support us as the case has gone on, and there has been an outpouring of love and support since the decision came down. The state's targeting of my beliefs cost me 40 percent of my business and forced me from 10 employees down to four. But we're so happy to be busy doing what we do best at our shop," the Christian baker told CP in an email.

"We're also eager to start designing custom wedding cakes again," Phillips added.  "A cake is a canvas, and I'm really looking forward to creating beautiful art that celebrates such a special day."  Close to 400 supporters lined up at Masterpiece Cakeshop to celebrate his Supreme Court victory earlier this month, according to Alliance Defending Freedom, whose lawyers defended him. Cookies were offered to the LGBT activists who came out to protest.

As for the response from the community, he said that even though one can never get used to death threats, for the most part people have been supportive and understanding of his position.

Removing Jesus Christ From The Public Square

Chic Atheism

Well, that didn't take long.  Broadcaster, Mike Hoskings has begun to voice the need to suppress the Bible.  It's a dangerous book, apparently.  In this regard, Hoskings is following faithfully in the footsteps of the big atheist dudes--Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and latterly, Xi Jinping--all of whom spent a long time and much energy attempting to defame and suppress the Bible.  Nice company there, Mike.  

Hoskings was opining upon the Australian rugby player, Israel Folau's profession of faith, which includes his belief in I Corinthians 6: 9-10.

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practise homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

Hoskings rejects those statements.  They are untrue, false, misleading, superstitious--we can roll out pejoratives adjectives all day.   Now, the normal pattern in a Western democracy which is supposed to champion liberty of conscience, freedom of speech, and freedom of religion, is for Hoskings to say, "I disagree with your opinions and views, but I will die defending your right to say them".  One recalls the notorious atheist Voltaire uttering just this sentiment.

But the ostensible atheist Hoskings thinks these Biblical particular statements set a dangerous precedent.

Basic Human Liberties Under Threat in the UK

Confronting the Illiberality of Secular Humanism

During a recent debate in the UK, Fiona Bruce, MP exposed the erosion of human rights and religious liberty in the UK.  She makes a powerful appeal for religious liberty as one of the most basic of all human rights and liberties.  In the end, religious liberty is the liberty of conscience. 

Without liberty of conscience, tyranny beckons. 

The Ironies of Free Trade

Free Trade and Intellectual Freedom Don't Mix--Apparently

It seems that for at least some Chinese students studying abroad, a Western education is not all it's cracked up to be.  Chinese students are not used to basic human rights such as freedom of speech, liberty of thought and conscience.  When confronted with views and opinions which are implicitly critical of the Chinese regime or contrary to its propaganda, often Chinese students are alarmed and disturbed by such heretical notions.

Tensions are rising at some Australian universities amid concerns that the Chinese government is infiltrating teaching methods across the faculties, according to a report from news.com.au.

The concerns have arisen after multiple incidents of Chinese students demanding changes to teaching methods, as well as demanding apologies from lecturers about the way they explore certain topics. The trend has led to concern across Australia of the growing threat of the Chinese Communist Party’s authoritarian ideology infiltrating universities and potentially influencing other students.

Some students have even posted footage online of lecturers going against the Chinese Communist Party’s ideology.  Last week, a student at the Chinese University of Newcastle uploaded footage of him arguing with a lecturer who referred to Hong Kong and Taiwan as independent countries.  “You are making us feel uncomfortable,” the student tells business professor Nimay Khaliani. “You have to consider all the students.”  “Exactly, all the students, not one set of students,” replied Khaliani. [Breitbart]

No doubt the Chinese government will attempt to put pressure on Australian schools and universities via the much vaunted free-trade agreement between Australia and China.  We anticipate the exchange will go something like this.

The US Version of the Star Chamber

Washington’s Supreme Court Imposes Its Progressive Faith on a Christian Florist

The ruling in Washington v. Arlene’s Flowers should chill First Amendment advocates everywhere.

John French
National Review Online

[A few days ago, we published a piece on how the state in the UK is taking steps in the direction of persecuting those who speak to others about the Christian faith.  Persecution is taking a different form in the United States, but the end result is same.  In the US, some courts are overtly insisting upon submission to the state religion and are beginning to punish non-conformity.  Ed.]  

If you care about the Bill of Rights, the rights of conscience, or even the English language, there’s a chance that this morning you felt a disturbance in the Force — as if the Founders cried out in rage and were suddenly silenced. That disturbance was the Washington Supreme Court’s oppressive ruling in State of Washington v. Arlene’s Flowers, a case holding that a florist was bound by state law to use her artistic talents to design floral arrangements to celebrate what she viewed as an immoral event: a gay wedding.

The pretext for overriding the florist’s rights to free speech and religious liberty was Washington’s so-called “public accommodations law,” which required the owner, Barronelle Stutzman, to provide goods and services to customers “regardless” of their sexual orientation.

Let’s be clear, according to the plain language of the law and the undisputed facts of the case, Stutzman did nothing illegal. She had always consistently and joyfully served gay clients, including the man who ultimately decided to bring potentially ruinous legal claims against her. On each of those prior occasions, however, she was not using her artistic talents to help her clients celebrate an occasion she considered immoral.

In other words, she was not discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation.

Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow

Totalitolerance and the Tactics of Trigglypuff

Douglas Wilson
Blog&Mablog

INTRODUCTION

If you assume that secular society is an actual possibility, which is a big suppose, one of the first things you have to do is ignore the outliers. In other words, diversity is great, and will continue to be great, just so long as nobody leans too far to the right or left in our wobbly societal canoe. In other words, secular diversity works great so long as we manage to keep the diversity to a minimum.

This is just another way of saying that any culture, in order to be a functional culture at all, has to operate around shared values. If the values are not shared, if people cannot quietly assume them in their disputes with members of a rival party within that culture, with the rival party assuming the same values, then we do not have a culture at all. What we have is a cultural civil war.

And that is what we currently have.

THE SET UP

In order to work out the ramifications of this, let me point to a current manifestation of what is being touted as simple liberal hypocrisy. But it is not so much hypocrisy—although there is a hypocritical element—as it is an example of the limitations of stage four secularism. The current secular ruling elites are incapable of handling the hardline outliers, and their canoe is going over.

Self-Autonomy Means Tyranny Over Others

Christian Bakery Loses Appeal over ‘Gay Cake’ Discrimination Conviction

Donna Rachel Edmunds
Breitbart London

The Christian owners of Ashers Baking Company have lost their appeal to overturn a conviction which found them guilty of discrimination for refusing to make a cake bearing a slogan which promoted gay marriage.

The Court of Appeal in Belfast upheld the previous judgement, filed last year, which found that the company had discriminated against local gay rights activist Gareth Lee by failing to provide a cake bearing a picture of Bert and Ernie with the slogan “support gay marriage”. The initial judgement ordered them to pay £500 in compensation to Mr. Lee.

The owners, Daniel and Amy MacArthur, said that they were happy to serve Mr. Lee, but felt unable to make a cake endorsing a message they did not agree with. They, therefore, argued that they had not discriminated against Mr. Lee, but had merely declined to support his cause.

Speaking on their behalf during the case, John Larkin QC, Attorney General for Northern Ireland, said if the County Court ruling against Ashers was right, the laws used against the bakery fall foul of Northern Ireland’s constitutional law.

Toleration That Comes At a High Price

Secularism's Cant and Its Insecurity

The secular state has clung to the notion that it is neutral toward all religions.  Therefore, from the vantage point of neutrality, it can claim the modern secular state believes in religious freedom, liberty of conscience, and tolerance.  It turns out that this is all a bunch of horse manure.

A moment's reflection would show that in order to promulgate the idea of religious toleration and freedom for all religions, the secular state has already decided that no religion is actually true; the only true truth is the secularist stance, which presupposes the ultimate irrelevance and untruth of all religions.

In one sense, the secular state is clearly neutral towards all fairy stories.  Little Red Riding Hood compels no more loyalty from the State than, say, Cinderella.  Why can the State argue for universal toleration towards all such children's fables and fairy stories?  Because all such stories are equally untrue.  They are fairy stories after all.  In precisely the same manner, the secular state proclaims toleration and freedom for all religions.

Chinese Government Tolerates Only What It Can Control

Destruction of Churches and Burial Alive 

The Latest Round in China’s anti-Christian Policy

Epoch Times

Leo Timm

In a recent flurry of repression against the prominent Chinese Christian community in southeast China’s Zhejiang Province, communist authorities demolished two churches on April 13 and 14.  One woman was killed in the April 14 demolition when she and her husband, both Christians protesting the destruction of their church in the city of Wenzhou, were buried alive by a bulldozer.

The 3-story, 3 million-yuan (about $460,000) Island Head Christian Church, also located in Wenzhou, was torn down on April 13 under the pretense that it had been constructed illegally and that its cross was too tall, according to China Aid, a nonprofit Christian human rights organization based in the United States.

While the Chinese Communist Party maintains a strict policy of atheism among its members, it also manages a number of politicized religious organizations that promote the Party line among the clergy of five recognized faiths.

The apparent hypocrisy was further entrenched in statements made by current Communist Party head Xi Jinping at a recent political conference, who reiterated the need to steer young people away from religious beliefs and for religious leaders to “interpret religious doctrines in a way that is conducive to modern China’s progress.”

Douglas Wilson's Letter From Moscow

Twice as Much Water!

Douglas Wilson
Blog&Mablog


It used to be that discrimination was a good word. A man with discriminating taste was a man with aesthetic standards that he understood and applied in wisdom. Now discrimination is an all-purpose term of condemnation designed to shut you up, Christian.

Of course, discrimination is one of those words that carry the inescapable concept around with it. It is not whether you have a standard of discrimination, it is which standard of discrimination you will have. Not whether, but which.

For example, Mississippi recently passed a law prohibiting, get this, discrimination by the government against sincerely held religious beliefs. Residents of that state will still have the freedom to follow their own conscience when their conscience requires them to decline to do crazy stuff. This outbreak of common sense was too much for the governor of New York, and so Andrew Cuomo banned all “non-essential travel to Mississippi” for state employees. Take that, Hattiesburg.

But the point here is that absolutely everyone involved is discriminating. Mississippi formally allowed her citizens to discriminate against abnormal people, and New York is mandating discrimination against normal people.

Ah, there it is — the intolerable word.

No Longer the "Land of the Free"

Courageous, Principled Christians Resist State Persecution

Billy Holloway
TheBlaze

A Christian florist who was sued and found guilty of discrimination after refusing to provide flowers for a same-sex wedding is continuing her fight for a religious accommodation, with the Washington Supreme Court recently agreeing to hear her case.

So, what’s the legal battle all about?

In essence, it’s yet another effort to strike a balance between the rights of religious wedding vendors and those of gays and lesbians seeking out said services. From scenarios involving bakers to photographers to florists, these legal conundrums continue to unfold and seem to be ramping up in the wake of the Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court decision that legalized gay marriage across the nation last year.

Attorneys for Barronelle Stutzman, the 71-year-old owner of Arlene’s Flowers in Richland, Washington, plan to argue that the florist’s right to decline making arrangements for gay weddings and to, thus, live out her Christian values are “robust” at both the state and federal level.

PC Idealogues Produce Growing State Power

Sunday Schools to be Monitored

UK Government Scrutiny to Prevent Hate Preaching in Sunday Schools

Simon Kent
Breitbart London

Sunday schools, church groups, choirs and Scout troops will all be swept up by broad surveillance proposals designed to confront Islamic radicalism in teaching institutions.  New Ofsted rules designed to monitor any organisation which interacts with a child for more than six hours a week means traditional church gatherings along with community groups are liable for inspection by government authorities.

Schools Minister Nick Gibb has said the new rules would cover all activities taking place, meaning every church that offers several activities for youngsters, including Scouts, choirs or youth clubs, would need to be registered with the government and be prepared for their activities to be monitored by the state.

Ofsted chief Sir Michael Wilshaw revealed his inspectors would use powers intended to crack down on Muslim madrassas run by extremists who might be seeking to groom pupils for radical activities to also regulate Christian Sunday schools.

Not Part of the Hip Group

Unlikely Servants

Kim Davis, who has resisted the tyrant's attentions, is an unlikely servant of God.  But the Lord has both declared, and demonstrated, that it is always His pleasure to call as His servants those who are despised in the world.  In God's Kingdom, only repentant sinners may stand. 

For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”  [I Corinthians 1: 26-31]

In God's Kingdom, we don't spend our time judging those whom God has called to be His servants (not ours).  In God's Kingdom we have no interest in whether someone is hip or cool in the eyes of the world.

Kim Davis is an unlikely servant of the King.  That's why we find ourselves in merry mirth over the dyspepsia she has provoked in the bellies of many.

Cyber Bullying Laws--Satisfying No-one

Wanting It Both Ways

Choices, choices.  Too much choice.  One of our local bloggers, writing at Kiwiblog has blessed us all with his insight into the disputation over the recent NZ legislation restricting online communications.  The intent of the law is to proscribe cyber bullying.

David Farrar writes:

The Act stated digital communications “should not denigrate an individual by reason of his or her colour, race, ethnic or national origins, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or disability.”

You can’t choose your colour.
You can’t choose your race.
You can’t choose your ethnic or national origin.
You can’t choose your gender.
You can’t choose your sexual orientation.
You can’t chose whether to be disabled.
But you do choose your religion.
Religion seems the odd one out to me.

The argument Farrar is running rests on the proposition that one should not be ridiculed nor mocked nor otherwise denigrated for matters over which one has no choice or control.  But if you choose to do or be someone, then the law should permit denigrating free speech over your choices.

We are not sure that the "Farrar principle" can withstand critical scrutiny.  But even so, his list has unfounded, contradictory, and tendentious assertions.  Let's have a look at some of them.

Low Hanging Fruit

Speaking in Klingon At a Federation Conference

The social ethic of free speech can only flourish within a broader, deeper religious context.  It is always messy.  Those who desire a utopia on earth, created and sustained by law, end up destroying the liberty rights of free speech. 

The problem lies here.  Free speech ends up tolerating evil as well as good.  Worse, it ends up fostering evil.  Because all men are evil, born in sin, free speech necessarily gives opportunity and, therefore encouragement, to evil thoughts, sentiments, words--and eventually acts.  Language is powerful.  Language and human thought motivate to action.  Evil speech, therefore, always ends in propagating evil acts in a community.  The ethics of free speech argue that such bad consequences are a worthwhile trade-off in order to be free and live in a free society.

Secular society, however, knows only the dead weight of the law, administered by the State, when it comes to controlling free speech.  In the secularist utopia, the law establishes the right of free speech.  The law defines, rules and regulates free speech.  But the State is also the agent of punishment for crime.  The law ends up crushing free speech because the secularist law refers only to itself as the highest ethic when it comes to deciding what speech to tolerate and what speech to repress and punish.  Secularist utopias have no centre beyond the law of the State: therefore, in the end, liberty of conscience and the ethic of free speech cannot survive. Everything kind of speech becomes constrained by the demand to submit to the law.  

We have been afforded a real life example of the unsustainable tensions over free speech in a secular society.

Letter From the UK (About Cameron's Sinister Version of Free Speech)

The Conservative Party has just introduced thought policing to the UK

If this really is the struggle of our generation, it just got off to a bad start 

Brendan O'Neill
The Telegraph 

There is a dark, twisted irony to David Cameron's tub-thumping speech against the poison of extremism. The PM presents himself as standing up for British values yet he is demolishing what ought to be the most important British value of all: freedom of speech.

Cameron let rip on Isil and its apologists. In a wide-ranging speech he had a pop at everyone from internet companies that fail to protect web-surfers from violent Islamist videos to the National Union of Students, whose alliance with Cage, the jihadi-sympathising charity, he described as shameful.He talked about the failure of integration, and how this left some sections of certain British communities out in the cold — where conspiracy theories about 9/11 can take hold and where the propaganda of Isil can seem like a “glamorous" alternative to life in Blighty.  We must remind these people, and everyone, that Britain remains a “beacon to the world”, said Cameron. We have good values and we should big them up, he said, in the "struggle of our generation” — the struggle against violent Islamist extremism. 

Yet elsewhere in the speech, a mere few breaths after talking about Britain’s beacon status, Cameron showed just how cavalier he is about freedom of speech — surely the most important values in any society that considers itself enlightened.

Shrinking the "Public Square"

Good For All of Us

The US Supreme Court has made a decision in recent days that is significant for maintaining religious liberty in the United States.  We have blogged previously (here, here, here, here, and here) about the "Hobby Lobby" case where a private company, owned by Christians, refused to comply with the Federal Government's Diktat that it must pay for abortifacient drugs for its staff.  The Court has ruled that the Hobby Lobby owners do indeed have the right to apply their religious beliefs and conscience to their business and have upheld their freedom-of-conscience right to refuse to pay for abortifacient drugs to secure abortions for any staff that might seek them. 

The Obama administration has argued that churches (as employers) could legitimately be exempted from its Diktats on the ground of religious liberty--but not businesses because they were not religious organisations.  To Christians, who believe that all of one's property--as an extension of one's life and conscience--must be conformed to Christ's lordly reign, this was a terrible overreach by the government.  The State was presuming to declare that only certain rarefied parts of human life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness could enjoy religious freedom.  To Christians, this was a claim in direct contravention of the command of our Sovereign Lord that whatever we do, even the most mundane things, such as eating and drinking, are all to be done to the glory of God.  (I Corinthians 10:31; Colossians 3:17; I Peter 4: 11,12). 

Thankfully, the Supreme Court has ruled in favour of Hobby Lobby, which is a tremendous boon to Christians, and all people, in fact.  Pete Kasperowicz of Breitbart News reviews the case: