But that isn’t stopping this president from launching another attack on religious liberty.
This time, Obama is using the purse strings of the federal government to marginalize employers with religious convictions.
President Obama today signed an executive order which demands that all federal contractors and subcontractors grant special treatment based on “sexual orientation” and “gender identity.”
The executive order signed by Obama thankfully preserves an exemption put in place by President George W. Bush which allows religious employers the freedom to favor employees of a certain religion in making hiring decisions. So under the new rules, a religious university could not fire a teacher for being a lesbian, but could fire her because she’s not a Catholic.
Legal experts say that Obama’s new executive order will launch a flood of lawsuits against employers who have deeply-held convictions that certain kinds of sexual behavior is inconsistent with their moral or religious beliefs.
The executive order, expected to take full effect in 2015, will affect 24,000 companies employing approximately 28 million American workers, or about one-fifth of the country’s workforce.
President Obama could have easily issued this executive order for LGBT employees while maintaining a robust exemption for religious liberty.
Once again, Obama has shown his strong hostility to religious expression in American life. In his mind, we have only “freedom to worship” inside the four walls of our church. But we dare not practice “freedom of religion” where we take our faith to the public square. If we do that, Obama believes that we must also sacrifice any religious principles out of sync with the federal government.
In Obama’s mind, it’s ok if you go to Church on Sunday, but don’t you dare act like a Christian any other day of the week.