Activist Refuses to Give Up Quest to Destroy Christian Baker
Christian baker Jack Phillips endured years of legal battles and finally won his First Amendment case against the Colorado Civil Rights Commission in the US Supreme Court back in 2018. One would have thought after all that his legal troubles were over.
However, as CBN News reported, the same Colorado government agency decided to pursue Phillips a second time because he declined to design a custom cake celebrating a gender transition just a few weeks after the court’s decision.
Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Phillips against the state and in 2019, the state dismissed most of the charges against him.
Now, he’s just been sued in state court because Autumn Scardina, who requested the gender-transition cake (and who also happens to be an attorney), wasn’t satisfied. Many of the claims are similar to those raised in the case against the baker that Colorado has already dismissed.
Scardina opted not to appeal the Commission’s dismissal, instead filing a lawsuit that seeks more than $100,000 in damages, fines, and attorney’s fees.
Scardina’s request for a custom cake was made on the same day that the US Supreme Court announced that it would hear Phillips’ first case. The shop declined the request because the message of the cake contradicts Phillips’ religious belief that God creates us either male or female.
Then a few months later, Scardina also made another request of the cakeshop. This request was for a custom cake featuring Satan smoking marijuana.
Maureen Collins, web writer for the ADF, says no American should be punished and threatened with financial ruin for living and working in a way that is consistent with their beliefs.
“We live in a country where freedom of speech and religious liberty are protected. While we may disagree on certain issues, we should all be free to live and work according to our beliefs. Jack Phillips, just like every creative professional, has the right to decline to use his artistic abilities to express messages or celebrate events he disagrees with,” Collins wrote on the organization’s website.
“But over the course of Jack’s legal battle, one thing has become abundantly clear: For some, it will never be enough to politely agree to disagree about important issues like the meaning of marriage or whether to celebrate a gender transition,” she noted.
“For some, it won’t be enough until Masterpiece Cakeshop closes its doors and Jack Phillips is in financial ruin. They want Jack, an average American business owner, to pay a hefty price – all because he wants to live according to his faith,” Collins concluded.
(Source: FaithWire)
