A federal appeals court on Friday revived a lawsuit by a Minnesota couple challenging a state law requiring that their video production company film same-sex weddings, which they say violates their Christian beliefs.
In a 2-1 decision, the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Paul, Minnesota, said Angel and Carl Larsen can try to show that the law violates their rights to free speech and to freely exercise their religious beliefs under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Circuit Judge David Stras, an appointee of President Donald Trump, called videos by the St. Cloud, Minnesota, couple “a medium for the communication of ideas about marriage,” and said the state’s law “is targeting speech itself.”
The court ordered U.S. District Judge John Tunheim in Minneapolis to decide whether the Larsens and their Telescope Media Group deserve a preliminary injunction against the law, which subjects violators to fines and possible jail time. Tunheim had dismissed the lawsuit in September 2017.
“With this perversion of the First Amendment, the majority sanctions a policy of ‘No gays allowed,’” Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Democrat who defended the law, said in a statement.
“Angel and I serve everyone,” Carl Larsen said, in a statement provided by his lawyers at Alliance Defending Freedom. “We just can’t produce films promoting every message.”
Full story at Reuters.
The Circuit Court only said Larsen was entitled to a day in court, not that he was correct.
What is the status of the case of the Colorado wedding cake baker? Didn’t he decline professional services in similar circumstances?
Perhaps this issue is headed for the Supremes?
Where does this end? For example, if I order an Easter Cake from a bakery owned by Muslims, can they refuse to make it on the basis of their religious
beliefs? Many of these cases seem to be an attempt to assert America is a fundamentalist Christian nation.
Knowledgeable Christians do not go to Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist and other bakers to get our Easter cakes. We know better than that. I would not go into a bagel shop and ask for Hot Cross Buns. To knowingly do something like that is to deliberately try to pick a fight.This is all being done to harass Christian bakers and put them out of business. They are cowardly, too, since they pick on small family-owned businesses.
Not.
I see the Devil’s time is short and the trolls are back and out in force here. Well, I say good for the Circuit Court and President Trump for addressing the discrimination and hate of those who want to deny religious liberty.
William Robert: thank you for your post. I agreed with you. What has happened to love of God and neighbor? Jesus treated kindly people who were not Jews – a powerful example for us to treat in the same manner others who are different from us in beliefs, appearance, abilities, etc. Also, what has happened to high quality customer service? For example, the clerk at the grocery store treats customers kindly and with respect regardless of their beliefs or lifestyles (straight or gay, single or married) with the hope that the customers will return in the future. Good customer service is good for business!
Going against your Christian formed conscience is bad for you soul…..This is a war between Truth and falsehood.
AMG….This is not about treating others the way you want to be treated. Jesus commands that and most people agree. This is about “forcing” people with strong religious objections to the redefinition of natural marriage, to violate their religious liberty and videotape a so–called “gay marriage”. The Judge argument was it was … “a medium for the communication of ideas about marriage,” so therefore it violated their strongly held religious freedom not to promote same-gender confusion and what is against their beliefs.
Anne Te: you know the religious faith of the bakers in your city? There are many bakeries in the city where I live and I have no idea if the proprietors are Jews, Christians, Muslims, Bahai’s or atheists. By the way, I am a knowledgeable Christian: I have a personal relationship with our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, through the Holy Eucharist.
William Robert, yes I do know the religions of a lot of the bakers in my area. If they sell goods for Christian holidays and close on Sundays, I assume they are Christian, if they sell all Kosher goods and close on Saturdays, I assume they are Jewish, If a man wears a turban but has a gold bracelet on his right wrist, I assume he is a Sikh and monogamist and not a Muslim who believes in polygamy. You see I have studied religions and been around people of a multitude of religions all my life. And, yes, I know Seventh Day Adventist should close on Saturday.
Now have you any more silly questions to ask?
By the way, William Roberts, I have stood up for those of other religions when I knew they were falsely accused, or did such things as help a Muslim woman in full Muslim garb, but without a face veil, put her children in a shopping cart when the cart kept running away, but there are certain lines that I just will not cross. Forcing a Muslim baker to bake an Easter cake, or forcing a Muslim male barber to cut my hair are two of them. That to me is just plain stupid.
A bakery owned by Muslims would probably have no objections to making an Easter Cake for a Christians. Muslims consider Jesus to be an important prophet and also think very highly of his mother, Mary.
Not if he is true to the teachings of the Koran as the Koran teaches that Issa or Isa (Jesus) never died on the cross nor does it teach that he arose. You seem to know nothing about the religion at all.
Anne Te: yes – you are very knowledgeable about religions. I am a humble servant of the Lord and have read the Catechism and the Bible. Note that I never used the language of coercion- forcing someone to bake a cake or cut my hair. My Muslim friend has shared Islam teaches that Jesus is the greatest of the prophets and a precursor to Muhammad. He also indicated that adherents to many of the sects of Islam would not be offended to baking an Easter cake for a Christian. But again…what do I know…I am but a simple man.
Most likely they are talking about a secular Easter cake with bunnies and carrots, not one with “Christ arose” on it or hot cross buns.
I reacted the way I did because I found your comment “attempt to assert America as a fundamentalist Christian nation” most obnoxious, and I did not find that comment humble at all.
Actually, that comment was made by William Robert, so I apologize FHK for attributing it to you, but it is still true that most practicing Muslims would not make an Easter cake with any real Christian symbolism as Mohammed in the Koran hated the cross and told Muslims to hate it too. Also, Muslims consider calling God “father” blasphemous.
A previous post of mine was not posted.. In that post I said that all I expected was the same consideration for my conscience, and that Christians like me should not be forced to go to or serve at so-called same sex marriages.