Volume VII, Issue 1
PREVIOUS
ARRANGEMENTS
A Washington florist finds that her commitment to Christ
puts her at odds with the state attorney general
Volume VII, Issue 1
Cover
CONTENTS
4 CONFRONTING ‘THE GREATEST DANGER’
TO PEOPLE OF FAITH
Story:
“You didn’t find God. He wasn’t lost.
You were, and He found you.”
8 PREVIOUS ARRANGEMENTS
6 SAME MESSAGE, NEW OPPORTUNITIES
“The landscape of communications
has radically, seismically changed
in the last 10 years.”
“Why is what
I’m doing unusual?
Why isn’t ever yone
doing this?”
14 THE PROBLEM WITH PRAYER IN GREECE, NY
“The privilege of opening our board meetings with prayer
was open to everyone.”
16 ALLIANCE PROFILE: BLAKE ANDERSON
– Barronelle Stutzman –
“The need to defend our faith goes hand in hand
with our legal right to do so.”
Alliance Defending Freedom
@AllianceDefends
www.AllianceDefendingFreedom.org
Editor
Chuck Bolte
Alliance Defending Freedom
Senior Writer
[Phone] 800-835-5233
Alliance Defending Freedom would enjoy hearing your comments
on the stories and issues discussed in Faith & Justice. Please direct
comments/questions to www.AllianceDefendingFreedom.org, call
800-835-5233, or write: Editor, Faith & Justice, Alliance Defending
Freedom, 15100 N. 90th Street, Scottsdale, AZ 85260.
[Fax] 480-444-0025
©2014, Alliance Defending Freedom. All rights reserved.
Lorence, Chris Potts, Alan Sears
15100 N. 90th Street
Scottsdale, AZ 85260
Chris Potts
Design Director/Photography
Bruce Ellefson
Contributors John Auberger, Jordan
Minutes With Alan
I Stand Amazed
by Alan Sears, President, CEO and General Counsel
A
not well-kept secret: I love the old hymns. I know
that choruses and praise teams have pretty well supplanted the grand songs and great choirs that used to
be the hallmark of churches coast to coast, but my heart
still holds a hallowed place for the beautiful, enduring music that I most remember from my earliest days:
Amazing Grace, Just As I Am, How Great Thou Art.
And one I’ve lately found myself humming, in my mind’s
quiet corners: I Stand Amazed, whose chorus goes, “How
marvelous, how wonderful / And my song shall ever be /
How marvelous, how wonderful / Is my Father’s love for
me.” I see so much to marvel at, these days.
We recently celebrated 20 years of public ministry at
Alliance Defending Freedom—a time for taking serious
measure of the remarkable impact our gracious Lord has
enabled us to make on our nation’s legal system over
these two decades. I give thanks and marvel at what God
has done, at the extraordinary ways He has shown Himself strong on behalf of those of us who trust in Him.
I’m continually astounded at the faithful encouragement,
prayers, and gifts we receive from you, our Allied Ministry Friends. Twenty years ago, nearly every observant
Christian realized something was terribly wrong with
America’s legal system; not many believed a unique
new form of legal ministry could do much about it. But
those who did, gave generously, and their numbers have
been multiplied so many times over. Their gifts, your
gifts, have made our work possible; their prayers, your
prayers have made it a success. I’m daily astonished at
the extraordinary talent God has brought together at this
ministry. Not only staff attorneys and more than 2,300
Allied Attorneys of exceptional skill and insight, but outstanding office staff, accountants, and experts in media,
development, and the creative arenas—just a startling
array of gifts and personal commitment to the work of
preserving our nation’s religious freedom.
Perhaps most of all, I marvel at our clients: the rare courage these men and women display in taking their often
lonely stands for freedom. In an age when many Christians trim their sails to the prevailing cultural winds,
some still make a determined effort to steer by the
Bright and Morning Star … and their heroism is saving
our nation’s true legacy for my children and grandchildren—and yours.
I have a unique vantage point from which to see all these
things: as the first team member (before there was even
a team), I’ve probably seen more of what’s happened
here, at every level, than anyone. All I can tell you is that,
from where I’m standing … I stand amazed.
John 15:5–Apart from Christ, we can do nothing.
View a special message from Alan. Visit www.Alliance
DefendingFreedom.org and click on “Faith & Justice.”
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
3
On The Square
Confronting
‘The Greatest Danger’
To People Of Faith
Q&A
with
Kirk Cameron
Though perhaps most famous for his role on the
1980s sitcom Growing Pains, Kirk Cameron’s
Christian faith has led him into widely different
realms of the entertainment industry: as an actor in the Left Behind series and the inspirational film Fireproof, as producer and host of the
popular documentaries Monumental and Unstoppable, and as host of The Way of the Master
television series. He and his wife, Chelsea, are
also the founders of Camp Firefly, which ministers to seriously ill children and their families.
They live in California with their six children.
4
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
How did you become a Christian?
Many people think I probably grew up in a Christian
home. The truth is, I’m a recovering atheist. I like to
phrase it that way because I came out of a worldview
where I denied the existence of God. I thought He was
part of a different trinity: Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny,
and Jesus.
When I was about 18, someone took me to church. I
wasn’t looking for God or religion—I was looking for the
girl that walked into that church. I followed her to the
back pew … and heard a sermon that really captured my
attention. I was looking at a man, standing in a pulpit,
who was very intelligent and articulate—and holding a
Bible in his hand. And he believed in the existence of
God. I didn’t think those two things went together—intelligence and believing in God. But he captured my
attention, my conscience was bothered, and I started
asking a lot of questions.
As I got answers to these questions—about God, the
Bible, Jesus, evolution, science, philosophy—I started
going to church, reading the Bible, and became convinced that I needed to come to God on His terms,
if I was ever to know that He was real, and that He
cared about me. So I did that—in the front seat of
my sports car, parked on the side of Van Nuys Boulevard. I prayed and asked God to reveal Himself to
me and make me the man that He wanted me to be.
And, as my pastor reminds me, he said, “Kirk, when
people ask you how you found God, remind them
that you didn’t find God. He wasn’t lost. You were,
and He found you.”
What concerns you the most, about what you’re
seeing in American culture today?
Kirk Cameron discusses same-sex unions during a March 2, 2012, appearance on Piers Morgan Tonight.
I’m still trying to figure out life … how God works in the
world that He made, and reconciled, and is redeeming. I
think the best clues are when we look at the beginning of
the story, in the Old Testament, and we see how God works.
I don’t think the biggest threat to America, or any nation, or
group of people, is who’s [president]. I don’t think it’s atheism. I don’t think it’s Islam. The greatest threat is the people
of God failing to be faithful to the One Who made them.
This was always the greatest threat in the Old Testament
to the people of God. God would say, “Don’t worry about
your enemies. You need to worry about not being faithful to
Me … because if you’re faithful to Me, I’ll take care of your
enemies. I’ll make sure of your finances, your crops, your
children. I will protect you. But if you’re not faithful to Me, I
will bring discipline to you, and I will bring enemies to your
front door. I will bring them, and they will enslave you, and
then you will be in a position where you realize where your
pride and your arrogance take you. And then if you call upon
Me, I will still be here to hear you, and rescue you, and redeem you.”
So the thing that concerns me is apathy in the church.
It’s people who have been blessed so tremendously by God,
thinking, We can just coast on this. We don’t have to step up
and be responsible, and steward the things that God’s given
us—like our children, like our marriages, like the faith once
for all delivered to the saints. When we don’t do that, we’re
now dishonoring God. That is ultimately the great danger:
dishonoring the One Who made us.
You’ve been doing some work with Alliance Defending
Freedom. Any impressions?
Two things impress me about Alliance Defending Freedom.
One: that they exist. I didn’t know there was such a thing as
an alliance of Christian lawyers—people who understand and
embrace Judeo-Christian values and the values of our Founders, and who really believe those values are important. Who
put their necks out there to help people, free of charge, who
can’t afford the cost of litigating against the ACLU or organizations like that. That’s been a fantastic encouragement.
Second, I’m impressed at the breadth of education this
ministry offers to so many different people. For instance,
with the Alliance Defending Freedom Academy, the ministry
[offers] different tracks to educate not only lawyers, but pastors, media professionals, and college students, even guys
like me. [We learn] how we can all interface —have this fusion of talent and skill—like the Body of Christ ought to be,
working to defend religious freedom and the right of conscience. These are the things that make America so unique,
and I’m very impressed at the excellence with which this ministry has been teaching these principles and getting them out
there.
Do you see creative arts and popular culture as more a friend
or an enemy to people of faith?
I believe culture is not something that we ought to just complain about, whine about, run and hide from. I believe God
made this world. This is my Father’s world, and Jesus came
in love to redeem the world, to reverse the curse. I love when
I see people and organizations like Alliance Defending Freedom redeeming culture by using the gifts and talents and
skill sets and relationships that they have to influence and
create culture, to shine light in dark places.
The arts, the media, entertainment, often capture the
heart of people in ways that other things don’t. And if we
can understand the importance of being in the driver’s seat
with things like music and filmmaking … using TV, using
film, using theater, for the purposes of advancing a worldview, now I think we’re in the game. Not running from it, but
leading it.
To watch a video of the Alliance Defending Freedom
Town Hall hosted by Kirk Cameron in October 2013,
visit www.AllianceDefendingFreedom.org/video/townhall
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
5
Special Feature
Same Message,
New Opportunities
O
ne recent afternoon, members of the Alliance Defending Freedom
team took a rare pause from their myriad responsibilities to celebrate,
for a few minutes, an unusual—and unprecedented—accomplishment: a
record 400,000 people had “friended” the ministry on Facebook.
The landscape of communications
has radically, seismically changed
in the last 10 years. —Anita Silmser
In the exponentially expanding world of social media, a “record number” changes fast. It also carries considerable significance—not only as
a measure of people’s enthusiasm for the work of Alliance Defending
Freedom, but as a way of gauging that interest against their engagement
with the ministry’s most substantial legal opponents. On the day the
ministry reached that Facebook milestone, for instance, the American
Civil Liberties Union recorded 182,000 “friends”; Planned Parenthood
logged 454,000. (Alliance Defending Freedom has since surpassed both,
with more than 650,000.)
That’s not the only number the ministry is tracking. Other figures
indicate that, beyond affiliating themselves with Alliance Defending
6
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
Freedom, thousands are regularly talking online about the organization and its
issues. Those conversations are crucial to
getting our message out to new audiences and faithful Ministry Friends across
the country and around the world.
“Every ministry would like to find a way
to communicate to a broad constituency—in our case, to let people know
what’s happening in the legal landscape,”
says Anita Silmser, Senior V.P. of Marketing. That growing need to reach changing audiences, she says, is spurring the
organization to cultivate a variety of new
media forums for its messaging.
also be easier to navigate, Tijerina
says. “It will put the most important
things we’re doing front and center
for those who visit the site—giving
them the information they need,
when they need it. We’re really focusing on the issues our Allied Ministry
Friends and visitors care about.”
What’s more, he says, “we’re figuring out
ways to explain complicated legal procedures in terms understandable to a public that is interested in knowing what’s
happening.
“We are not only showing visitors the
legal work we’re doing,” he says, “we’re
showing them what the broader alliance
“The landscape of communications has
radically, seismically changed in the
last 10 years, with the migration
from traditional to electronic
media,” Silmser says. “In
the first few years, that
shift reflected a mostly
younger demographic.
Now, even those 55
and older are increasingly engaged
with all forms of social media.
Visitors [to the website] are getting
the most complete picture of the
worldwide battle for religious freedom.
—Joshua Tijerina
Perspective, a 60-second daily radio
program featuring Jim Garlow, senior
pastor of Skyline Wesleyan Church in
San Diego, California.
Garlow drew national attention as a
leader in defending California’s Proposition 8 (the voter initiative defining
marriage as the union of one man and
one woman), where he worked closely
with Alliance Defending Freedom
attorneys. In the wake of that effort, he has been prominently
featured in national media;
his radio commentary now
airs in markets coast to
coast.
“We’ve been fortunate
over the years to have
our attorneys speak on
national and regional
radio programs across
the U.S.,” Silmser says,
“Obviously, people
facebook.com/AllianceDefendingFreedom
“but we’ve not had a
will continue to de@AllianceDefends
consistent, daily prespend on radio and
ence. Because of our long
TV,” she says, “but the
Alliance Defending Freedom
relationship with Jim, we
electronic media will infelt it would be mutually
creasingly be where peoWatch the Alliance Defending Freedom page on Facebook for updates on the
advantageous for us to partple consume the most news
premiere of the new website at www.AllianceDefendingFreedom.org
For a list of radio stations airing The Garlow Perspective,
ner together. One, it makes ecoand information.”
go to www.JimGarlow.com
nomic sense; two, it’s a third party
ith that in mind, the ministry is
talking about our values; and three, it’s
working on relaunching its own website,
a good fit with our ‘alliance’ model.”
culminating months of effort to reassess
of like-minded legal groups and ministhe site’s purpose and greatly improve its
With religious freedom threatened more
tries is doing, and how that is shaping
functionality for both devoted friends of
than ever before, she says, “it’s vital to
the culture. Visitors are getting the most
the ministry and casual visitors curious
communicate to Americans of every age
complete picture of the worldwide battle
about the organization.
and background the importance of standfor religious freedom.”
ing for their God-given, constitutionally
ven amid the flurry of online activThe new site “will mark a big philosophy
protected rights.” The rapid, strategic
ity, though, the ministry is finding
shift from what we have been doing,”
expansion of Alliance Defending Freedom
new ways to communicate its message
says V.P. of Digital Communications
into every form of social and electronic
through more traditional media. BeginJosh Tijerina, who is leading the reboot.
communication is multiplying the ability
ning last fall, for instance, stories of
“It will be more robust in teaching who
of the ministry and its supporters’ ability
the ministry’s clients and cases have
we are, what we do, why we do it, and
to reach and impact these increasingly
been featured regularly on The Garlow
what we stand for.” The new site will
diverse audiences.
W
E
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
7
8
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
A WA S H I N G T O N F L O R I S T
FINDS THAT HER
COMMITMENT TO CHRIST
PU TS HE R AT ODD S W I T H T H E
S TAT E AT TOR N E Y G E N E R A L
PREVIOUS
A R R A NG E M E N T S
She slips inside the way most people seem to come into a flower shop
… like she’s stepped through the looking glass, out of the hard-edged
world of traffic and asphalt into a small patch of jungle maintained by
Hallmark. Stuffed bears blend with sunflowers, exotic vases with violets
and petunias. Women in aprons scurry between the ferns in the hothouse and the roses in the cooler.
One of the women, white-haired and wearing glasses, steps briskly over
to the new customer with a sunny “Good morning” that belies the overcast skies outside. “May I help you?”
A distant relative has died. The customer is looking for something appropriate to send by way of floral condolence. The woman behind the
counter is helpful in the way you’d want a florist to be: warm but not demonstrative, polite but not intrusive. The customer has a hard time explaining exactly what she wants, but the florist quickly grasps the idea,
and shows her an arrangement that she likes immediately. She writes
down an address and pulls out her checkbook.
“Aren’t you Barronelle Stutzman?” she asks.
Barronelle’s eyes look up, just a little wary: “Yes, I am.”
“My mother told me to come see you,” the customer says, smiling. “She
heard about you on the radio. She said we need to support you.”
Barronelle smiles, and relaxes a little. It’s a bit of an odd moment for her,
because—until recently—she’s been the one who puts her customers at
ease. For 35 years, they’ve been wandering into her shop to share
their hearts and mark their
mortal milestones: a new baby,
a prom, a wedding, a friend in
the hospital, a funeral. They
come to buy, but wind up talking. Around Valentine’s Day
and Mother’s Day, Barronelle
hears more overflowing souls
than a priest in the confessional.
Her ability to listen and discern her customers’ floral
desires—to produce beautiful
arrangements that say what
they don’t quite know how to
say—has long been a point
of professional pride for Barronelle. One spring day last
year, though, that discernment
required of her an especially
painful decision … and became the turning point of her life.
With Barronelle, it’s not really about
selling flowers. That just pays the bills.
Long years ago, making deliveries for her
mom’s shop after school, she found that
carrying vases full of flora around to offices, churches, and hospitals held little
appeal for her. Sweeping floors and cleaning out buckets held even less. But then
a manager quit, and Barronelle filled in,
and soon enough, she made a wonderful
discovery: florists don’t just sell the flowers … they create the bouquets, weave
the wreaths, design the arrangements—
and summon the emotions. Gradually,
she found she had a subtle sense for
what colors and kinds to mingle. It was
her calling, her gift, and—to her surprise—her ministry.
Ask her employees (10-12 on an average
day, twice that during big holidays), and
many will tell you how Barronelle took
them in at a low point in their lives—after
the divorce, the retirement, or the move
to Richland from some other part of the
country. She has a kind of sensible sensitivity for giving struggling souls the job,
the environment, and the time they need
to heal.
10
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
EVERYTHING
I HAVE IS CHRI
SO IF HE WANT
ME TO GO
UNDER, THEN
WILL GO UNDE
—BARRONELLE STUT
“She’s not just a boss, she’s a friend, and
a sister in Christ,” says Janelle Becker,
who’s worked with her for more than a
decade. “One of a kind. When we need
prayer, or someone to talk to, she’s always there.”
Running the shop (named Arlene’s, for
the original owner) “is just a real ministry,” Barronelle says. She likes “the people
you meet, and the chance to serve them.”
That, and the creativity.
Your father was a farmer, and you want a
floral arrangement that suggests a tractor
in a potato field? (This is small town, rural
Washington.) Barronelle can do that. You
want Goofy? She can do him better with
petals than the Disney folk can with pens.
You want flowers that look like animals?
Angels? A fishing stream? A quilting bee?
Barronelle can do that.
“It’s all in my mind,” she explains. “I just
… see it, and I do it. You want to do something out of the ordinary. Something that
tickles somebody’s fancy, or makes them
smile.”
Which is why she’s been the go-to florist
in her county for three decades, and why
she’s now doing prom corsages for the
children, and even grandchildren, of cou-
ples whose corsages she fashioned years
ago. It’s also why a man named Rob Ingersoll kept bringing her his business.
There are two reasons why anyone with a
creative bent flexes that creativity: for the
sheer joy of it—and because someone else
appreciates it. Lots of folks in Richland
like what Barronelle can do with a handful
of carnations and some delphiniums. Rob
Ingersoll truly appreciated it.
“He’s been a customer for years,” Barronelle says, “and he’s a great guy. He likes
different, unique things. He’d come in and
say, ‘I’m having a party,’ or ‘It’s a special
occasion,’ or ‘I just want something fun,’
and he’d pick out really unusual things—
a vase or something—and say, ‘Do your
thing.’ It was really fun and enjoyable,
because I got to use my creative side and
make something off-the-wall. He always
loved it. That’s just the kind of relationship we had.”
The relationship was friendly enough for
Barronelle to know something of Rob’s
personal relationships, including the fact
that he was in a same-sex relationship. It
didn’t change a thing between them.
IST,
TS
I
ER.
“I never ask anyone’s
sexual orientation,” she
says. “I’ve had designers
and friends and other
customers who [identify
as] homosexual, and when
they come in the shop, it
doesn’t matter. Whatever
color or creed or sexual
preference they are, they
get waited on just the
same.”
But Rob was special. He
understood how much
Barronelle relished a
challenge—and always
delighted in all those little
touches of creativity that
made the difference between an arrangement that
was “nice” and one that
was wonderfully, beautifully perfect for
the occasion.
TZMAN
So it caught Barronelle off guard, one day,
when one of her store crew told her that
Rob had been in earlier, looking for her.
He wanted her to do the flowers for his
same-sex wedding.
Same-sex ceremonies became legal in
Washington in 2012, and the new law had
never impacted Barronelle. Now, the question was before her. As a Christian, she
holds the biblical conviction that marriage
is between a man and a woman—a holy
symbol of Christ’s relationship to His
church. Same-sex unions, to her, do not
reflect that relationship. And yet …
“It was very difficult,” she says. “My husband and I talked it over, and it basically
boiled down to the fact that I could not
do Rob’s wedding, because of my relationship with Christ.” She had no doubt at all,
she says, about the right thing to do, but
telling her friend … “it was hard.”
The next day, Rob came into the shop eager to share plans for the ceremony and
what he’d be wearing and—“before he
could get any further, I put my hands on
his,” Barronelle remembers, “and said,
‘Rob, I am so sorry. I cannot do your
wedding, because of my relationship
with Christ.’
much of it vicious, unprintable. At last
count, the stack was three feet high.
“He was very gracious. He said, ‘I understand,’ and we talked about his mom a little
bit, and about how he got engaged. And
then we hugged each other, and he left.”
“What went through my mind,” Barronelle says, “was how sad it all was.
People were so hateful and intolerant
and misinformed. It’s just very sad that
those people are that angry.”
It was a few days later that the phones
began to ring. And ring. And ring. Turns
out, Rob’s partner had posted on Facebook exactly what he thought of Barronelle’s refusal to do flowers for their
wedding. Now, other people from across
the state were dialing her shop to follow
suit. They kept it up, nearly nonstop—on
all five of her shop’s phone lines—for the
next two weeks.
“The calls were … not very nice,” Barronelle remembers. “Very hateful, very
threatening,
things you
could not repeat. Things
I had to look
up, because I
had no idea
what they
meant.
What did not go through her mind was
the possibility that she had moved, overnight, to the top of the state attorney
general’s litigation target list.
At least 206 murders were committed in
the State of Washington in 2012.
There were more than 2,100 rapes, 5,700
robberies, 12,200 aggravated assaults.
Somehow, none of those crimes seemed
to raise the rancor of state Attorney
“I tried to answer most of
the calls, because I didn’t
want to put
the others
through
that,” she
says, but
most of her
team rallied
to help her.
“The only thing we said was, ‘Thank you.
We appreciate your call.’ We never argued back … just tried to be as gracious
as we could.”
General Bob Ferguson to anything like
the intensity he focused on a great-grandmother who ran her own flower shop
down in Richland.
The calls finally tapered off a little (she
still gets at least one a day); then the
hate mail began pouring in. Many dozens of letters, hundreds of threatening
emails—all of it angry, most of it vile,
In April 2013, Ferguson—having heard
something about the Facebook post—filed
a consumer protection lawsuit against
Barronelle, charging her with illegally discriminating against Ingersoll and his
LITTLE BY LITTLE, THEY ARE STRIPPING
US OF ANY THOUGHT WE MIGHT HAVE,
OR ANY DIFFERENCE OF OPINION. THIS
IS OUR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AT STAKE.
—BARRONELLE STUTZMAN
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
11
partner on the basis of their sexual orientation. No one had asked him to do
so. Not Ingersoll or his partner. Not the
Washington Human Rights Commission,
which is charged with initiating action in
such cases. Not even the American Civil
Liberties Union (ACLU), a group usually
vigilant for the opportunity to file this
kind of lawsuit.
“This is the first time in the history of
the Washington Attorney General’s Office
that they have done something like this,”
to create floral arrangements for samesex ceremonies. Inclined to do none of
those things, she knew she would need
an attorney—and called the Attorney
General’s Office to request time to hire
one. She was at home, waiting for an
answer, when a friend called to tell her
that the TV news was announcing a state
lawsuit against her. Before she could turn
on her set, there was a knock at the door.
The man standing there served her with
the attorney general’s lawsuit.
THE OTHER SIDE BROUGHT
A COURTROOM FULL
OF ATTORNEYS. THAT IS
UNHEARD OF.
—DALE SCHOWENGERDT
says Dale Schowengerdt, senior counsel
with Alliance Defending Freedom. “The
attorney general saw this in the news,
plucked it out, and intervened without
request from the plaintiff.” Despite the
fact that any number of other local florists could easily have provided flowers
for their ceremony, Rob and his partner,
urged on by the ACLU, quickly filed their
own legal action. (The two lawsuits have
since been combined.)
Some friends told Barronelle about Alliance Defending Freedom, and her
inquiries to the organization resulted in not one, but
two lawyers. The local one,
Justin Bristol, is one of the
ministry’s allied attorneys.
He had been at his desk, he
told her, “praying that God
would use me for His good,”
when an email popped up,
telling him of Barronelle’s
case. He called her immediately to enlist.
As the legal army opposing Barronelle
grew, Schowengerdt came on board. He
and Bristol filed suit against the attorney general on her behalf, charging
him with violating the state constitution in denying her religious freedom.
Schowengerdt was quickly impressed
with his client.
“She has got very deep faith,” he says.
“She had to make a snap decision, out
of the blue, and she made the right decision. She followed her faith and followed her convictions. She could make
this go away, but she has taken a stand
for her faith—and for the rest of us.”
Soon enough, it became apparent how
much she would need their support.
“We had a status conference with the
state,” Schowengerdt says, “a no-frills
hearing where we are basically getting
together with the parties and the judge
and figuring out where we are with the
case. The other side brought a courtroom full of attorneys. That is unheard
of. I’ve never seen that before. They’re
loaded for bear. There’s no question that
the ACLU and AG’s Office are going to
see this to the end. They’ll pursue this
lawsuit to the nth degree—and we’ll
meet them every step of the way.”
Barronelle’s attorneys weren’t the only
ones to be surprised by what they were
up against.
Attorneys for both sides held a deposition, during which the lawyers could
ask questions of each other’s clients.
That meant Barronelle was on hand, of
course—and so was Rob Ingersoll. It was
the first time the two had met since that
last visit in the shop.
“It was awesome,” Barronelle says. “I asked
my lawyer if I could hug Rob, and he said
yes, and we hugged each other.” During
breaks, she asked about his family, and his
new business venture. “He’s worked really
hard,” she says, “so I was really happy for
him. It was great to see him.”
Presumably, ACLU attorneys and attorneys general don’t see a lot of hugging
between the parties of their lawsuits, but
Barronelle didn’t mind that. She never
gave them a thought. “We were just enjoying seeing each other,” she says.
“This is definitely a political issue for
the attorney general,” Schowengerdt
says. “It’s unusual for him to go around
the state talking so much about specific
cases, but he has talked a lot about this,
and when they filed the suit, he was the
media point person for it.”
Barronelle soon found that same determination in her new attorneys.
Opposing counsel may not have been prepared for how clear, unwavering, and selfeffacing Barronelle’s convictions are, either.
Barronelle first learned of the attorney
general’s concerns in a letter that threatened her with legal action unless she immediately paid a fine, donated $5,000 to
a homosexual organization, and agreed
“I was just impressed, for one, that they
belonged to the Lord,” she says, “and
that it was not their intent to be hateful,
or make money. They’re just standing
up for their beliefs, and what’s right.”
“What is at stake is so far beyond me,”
she says. “It’s our personal rights that are
being taken away—our relationship with
Christ. Little by little, they are stripping
us of any thought we might have, or any
12
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
says more than
Barronelle’s rights
are at stake.
WHY IS WHAT
I’M DOING SO
UNUSUAL?
WHY ISN’T
EVERYONE
DOING THIS?
See an inspiring video of
Barronelle’s story by visiting
AllianceDefendingFreedom.org
and clicking on “Faith & Justice.”
—BARRONELLE STUTZMAN
difference of opinion. This is our religious freedom at stake. I have every right
to have Christ as my Savior, and to live
my life that way.
“I still don’t think of this as a big thing,”
she says. “It is so simple to me: there is
no discrimination. There’s nothing to
dodge. Everything I have is Christ’s … so
if He wants me to go under, then I’ll go
under. If He wants me to succeed, I’ll succeed. I own nothing. It’s just my responsibility to be obedient and to stand up for
Christ. He stood up for me.”
As it happens, He’s inspired a lot of
others to stand up for her, too. In the
year since her decision became public,
Barronelle has received phone calls, letters, emails, and encouragement from
people throughout the U.S. and 66 other
countries around the world. Just in Richland, churches of two different denominations have sponsored civic rallies that
drew strong crowds to raise support and
cheer her cause.
A pastor in India calls every week to
check on her; someone on a train told
him her story. A man from her own state
contacted her once, offering generous
“People for a
long time have
been saying that
same-sex marriage and religious
liberty can peacefully coexist,” he
says. “Cases like
this show why
that’s just not the
case. If Barronelle
wins, it supports
the fundamental
right of Christians
to exercise their
faith, both in their
private and their
public lives. If
she loses, it will further undermine that
right.”
financial support. He told her he himself
was homosexual—but what was being done to her was wrong. A Michigan
florist called to ask for prayer; she was
facing similar intimidation. A church in a
nearby town sent Barronelle a Bible, with
highlighted verses and notes of encouragement from the whole congregation.
“God is so faithful. He has done miracle
after miracle in this … things that cannot
be explained,” Barronelle says. “The attorneys that He has sent me, the support
people He has sent me, the prayer groups
that are praying for us … it is very humbling, and very overwhelming.”
Day after day, week after week, the
encouragement keeps pouring in. At a
Christian school fundraiser, a roomful of
people gave her a standing ovation, and
tears rolled down her cheeks. “Why is
what I’m doing so unusual?” she asked.
“Why isn’t everyone doing this?”
A
s of this writing, Barronelle and her
attorneys are still awaiting a ruling from
a Washington judge on the state’s lawsuit
against her. The timetable for her federal
lawsuit against the attorney general is
also still being decided. Schowengerdt
Whatever the outcome, Barronelle is convinced she has done the right thing.
“I’m a grain of sand in a little spot, and
why God chose what He did … that is up
to God,” she says. “It’s a battle, but it’s a
good battle to be in, and I’m glad I’m on
this side of it. It’s an opportunity for me
to be obedient, to show Christ’s love, to
stand up for what I believe.
“And it’s not a burden—it’s a joy,” she
says. “I don’t mean that to sound ‘Pollyanna.’ It’s just that Christ has given me
this peace. I’m sure there will be a lot
more hate coming, but they’re not hating
me, they’re hating Him.” She smiles. “And
He can take care of Himself.
“My wish is that, when this is over—win
or lose—we can all walk out on the courthouse steps, and Rob and I can give each
other a hug. And I hope there are a whole
lot of reporters there, watching … and
they’ll see it, and they’ll know: there is no
hate here.”
That’s the picture she sees, in her mind.
Something out of the ordinary, that might
make her Savior smile.
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
13
My View
THE PROBLEM WITH PRAYER
IN GREECE, NY
Greece Town Supervisor John Auberger (left) listens
as a local citizen prays before a town meeting.
John Auberger recently ended a 16-year tenure as town supervisor of Greece, New York—a town of 96,000 people on the
shores of Lake Ontario. His four consecutive terms climaxed in
a court fight to defend a policy Auberger himself introduced: an
open invitation for citizens and local clergy to take turns opening
town board meetings with prayer. The case worked its way to
the U.S. Supreme Court last November, and the court is expected
to render a decision any day now on whether or not these “legislative prayers” are protected by the U.S. Constitution.
It all began with the idea of televising our town board meetings. Like most town meetings, ours don’t draw that many
spectators or participants, unless some especially controversial issue is up for discussion. It had been our long-standing
practice to contract with a company to film our board meetings and air them on a local public television station, in order
to make the people’s business a little more accessible to the
people themselves.
So, one evening, the board was preparing to make a decision
regarding movement from our current vendor to a national
cable company. And, as usual, our board meeting opened
with one of our citizens leading in prayer.
14
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
by John Auberger
The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives
have paid a chaplain to lead prayers at the start
of their meetings for more than 220 years.
I first experienced this kind of legislative prayer during my
10 years as a county legislator. It struck me as a thoughtful
practice … a kind of humbling of ourselves, before making
decisions that would ultimately impact our whole community. When I was elected town supervisor for Greece, I brought
the idea along with me.
The privilege of beginning our board meetings with prayer
was open to everyone, whatever their religious convictions—
or lack of convictions, for that matter. We specifically invited
local clergy, but the opportunity was never restricted to
religious officials. Over the years, our prayers have been led
by everyone from evangelical pastors to Catholic priests, a
Jewish citizen to a Wiccan priestess. However, as Greece is a
town predominantly populated by Christians, the majority of
those volunteering to pray were Christians.
To say these people open in prayer is not to say that everyone
stops and bows their heads. Nor is anyone directed to do so.
The prayers are frequently punctuated
and half-muffled by people moving about
the room, shuffling papers, taking their
seats. No one is coerced into participating.
For nearly 10 years, no one expressed
any problem with any of this. Town
leaders received no complaints or objections—if anything, people seemed
pleased to see their elected officials
adopting a valued American tradition.
But then came the night of the cable
presentations.
An advocate for one of the local public television companies—a woman
from another city—was taken aback
that we would begin our night’s work
with prayer. She expressed her dismay
pretty openly and emphatically, before
we politely reminded her that she was
not of our community, and so how we
choose to run things, in Greece, really
wasn’t her concern.
Not long after—and probably not coincidentally—we received our first complaint, from two women who are citizens of Greece. They said the prayers
made them … uncomfortable.
That’s unfortunate, but then it’s hard to
imagine anything that happens in any
aspect of public life and government
that doesn’t make someone uncomfortable. If “discomfort” were the standard
for abolishing aspects of civic activity,
we couldn’t have any government at all.
Representatives of the town met with the
women to explain that anyone and everyone was free to offer an invocation—but
they made it clear that wasn’t enough.
They demanded that the prayers be
ended or at least censored, saying they
considered the intercessions a violation
of the Constitution, specifically the First
Amendment, which forbids the government to “establish” a religion. But, since
our prayers were available to anyone,
and no one was being forced to listen to,
agree with, or participate in the praying
itself, it was hard for the board and me
to see where any particular faith was be-
ing “established.”
When we elected
not to give in to
their demands, the
two women enlisted
the legal support of
Americans United
for Separation of
Church and State
(AU), which filed a
federal lawsuit on
their behalf. We, in
turn, enlisted Alliance Defending
Freedom to represent our interests.
W
e won the first
round, in district
court. The two women chose
to appeal that decision to
the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the Second Circuit, which
ruled that our legislative
prayers constituted an establishment
of religion. Given the directives of the
court’s ruling, it seemed to our town
board that our only options were to a)
discontinue the praying, b) have those
praying remove any reference to the
Almighty or to the name of Jesus from
their intercessions, or c) appeal the
decision. (We rejected as impractical the
court’s implicit suggestion that we bus
in people of non-Christian belief from
other nearby communities to balance
our opening prayers.)
Since a) and b) would mean surrendering our citizens’ religious freedom, we
went with c), and appealed the appeals
court’s decision … all the way to the U.S.
Supreme Court.
Interestingly, the high court has already
ruled on this particular question. Back
in 1983, in the case of Marsh v. Chambers, the Supreme Court decided that
legislative prayer was perfectly constitutional and part of the “fabric of our
society”; they even OK’d government
funding for chaplains. That seemed
natural enough, since the U.S. Senate
and House of Representatives have paid
November 6, 2013: At the steps of the
U.S. Supreme Court, protesters surround
supporters of legislative prayer.
Visit www.AllianceDefendingFreedom.org, and click on
“Faith & Justice,” to find the latest news on this case,
and learn more about this ministry’s efforts to preserve
religious freedom in the public square.
a chaplain to lead prayers at the start of
their meetings for more than 220 years.
AU built their argument on the idea that
while praying may be permissible, praying to a specific God, or in the name of
Jesus, is not. Only generic prayers to
a “higher power” are protected by the
Constitution, they claim. An interesting idea, given that Founding Fathers as
diverse in their religious convictions as
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson,
and Benjamin Franklin all endorsed
legislative prayer, and invoked the
Christian God in their own intercessions. What’s more, the writers of the
Constitution themselves opened their
sessions with prayer—to the Christian
God—which hardly makes it likely they
were opposed to the practice.
The Supreme Court heard all those
arguments last November; their decision is due any day. It’s my hope—my
prayer—that they will come down in
favor of letting their fellow Americans
speak their faith openly, in their own
words, even in public meetings … even
if the prayers make a few other Americans uncomfortable.
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
15
Alliance Profile
B
lake Anderson is Chief Operating Officer of Ratio Christi (“The Reason of Christ”), an
international student ministry founded in 2008 to equip university students and faculty to
give historical, philosophical, and scientific reasons for following Jesus Christ.
Anderson says Ratio Christi partners with other campus ministries as a kind of “special
forces unit” that complements those groups’ discipleship and evangelism efforts by training students in apologetics—giving them the intellectual confidence to defend God’s
existence, the reliability of the Bible, and the fact of Christ’s
resurrection. The ministry has 120 chapters on campuses
throughout the U.S., and is launching others in Africa, Europe,
South America, and New Zealand.
Blake Anderson
“We give students basic training in how to have a conversation … introduce people to the available evidence … and
witness the enormous confidence they gain from that to go out
and share their faith with others,” Anderson says. “One of the
most interesting things to come out of this is that we have developed deep relationships
with some of the most anti-Christian groups on campus—Secular Student Alliance, atheist clubs. We have some really solid dialogues with those who are against God—a unique
chance to intersect with them and discuss evidence for the faith.”
Their determination to speak up for the truth puts Ratio Christi on a collision course
Go to www.ratiochristi.org to learn more
about the work of Ratio Christi.
with school officials bent on silencing faith on campus. That, Anderson says, is where his
group’s long partnership with Alliance Defending Freedom has proven crucial. The ministry’s attorneys assist Ratio Christi staff in drafting charters that can be reproduced with
each new chapter, and train them in what to expect from administrators, “helping us shape
language and responses that are direct but respectful, upholding our rights, not letting
them push us around.
“Alliance Defending Freedom has been absolutely essential to getting us off the ground
and growing like we have,” Anderson says. “We are not attorneys. We are Christian apologists, trying to defend the faith, and have a firm belief in our right to be able to share
the Gospel. But when it comes down to the legal ins and outs—knowing these guys are
behind us, to give us advice on little things and big things, has been a huge help. Plus,
they’ve saved us tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees that, as a young ministry, we
could never have afforded.
“They believe the need to defend our faith goes hand in hand with our legal right to do
so,” he says. “Our ability to spread the Gospel is very much in line with our God-given
right to express our religious and intellectual viewpoints.”
16
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
Updates
In The News
Vol. II, Iss. 1
Alliance Defending Freedom
attorneys have asked the U.S.
Supreme Court to reverse a
decision last August by the New
Mexico Supreme Court. It legally
compels the Christian owners
of a photography business to
use their creative talents to take
pictures at same-sex marriage
ceremonies, even though such
unions violate their personal
religious convictions.
POINT AND SHOOT
While recognizing that the owners “now are compelled by law
to compromise the very religious beliefs that inspire their
lives,” one of the New Mexico
justices wrote in a concurring
statement, doing so “is the
price of citizenship” in America
today. The petition filed with
the U.S. Supreme Court explains
that the owners of Elane Photography “will serve anyone;
they do not turn away any customers because of their protected class status. But they will
decline a request, as the First
Amendment guarantees them
the right to do, if the context
would require them to express
messages that conflict with
their religious beliefs.”
A ruling on the petition is
expected in time for the 20142015 Supreme Court session.
PLANNED PARENTHOOD’S DECEPTION
Alliance Defending Freedom
attorneys presented oral arguments on November 20, 2013
at the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the Eighth Circuit on behalf of
Susan Thayer, a former Planned
Parenthood facility director now
suing that company for fraud
and abuse. The lawsuit claims
that Planned Parenthood’s
Iowa affiliate submitted “repeated false, fraudulent, and/or
ineligible claims for reimbursements” to Medicaid. Alliance
Defending Freedom attorneys
Vol. VI, Iss. 2
filed the suit on behalf of
Thayer under both a state and
federal law that allows “whistleblowers” with inside information to expose fraudulent billing by government contractors.
The ministry has filed similar
lawsuits against Planned Parenthood affiliates in Texas
and Washington.
U.S. SUPREME
COURT HEARS
CASE AGAINST
ABORTION
PILL MANDATE
The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to
review a lawsuit challenging the Obama
administration’s abortion pill mandate
filed by Conestoga Wood Specialties,
a Pennsylvania family-owned custom
cabinet business. Alliance Defending
Freedom is representing the owners,
who are Mennonite, in their lawsuit,
which asks the court to declare the
mandate illegal and unconstitutional.
The mandate forces employers, regardless of their religious or moral convictions, to provide insurance coverage for
abortion-inducing drugs, sterilization,
and contraception—or face heavy financial penalties. Alliance Defending Freedom is representing similar lawsuits
from nearly 20 other Christian groups
and businesses.
Eighteen states and other parties filed
friend-of-the-court briefs asking the
Supreme Court to hear the Conestoga
case. The court also agreed to review
a near-identical lawsuit filed by Hobby
Lobby Stores, another family-owned
business, which is being represented by
Alliance Defending Freedom ally, The
Becket Fund.
The high court is scheduled to hear oral
arguments in both cases in late March.
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
17
Opinion
Jordan Lorence
In The Arena: Two Decades At The U.S. Supreme Court
I
n June 1995, I was in the Supreme
Court’s courtroom every time the justices
were. Our new ministry, then called Alliance Defense Fund, awaited rulings on
two cases being reviewed by the highest
court in the country. In those still-early
days of the Internet, the only way to learn
immediately what rulings the high court
was handing down on a given day was to
actually be sitting in the courtroom.
The first ruling came in Hurley v. IrishAmerican Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual
Group of Boston. Attorney Chester Darling
was representing a group of veterans
being sued for discrimination for not
allowing a group with pro-homosexual
messages to march in their annual St.
Patrick’s Day parade. Chester had cashed
in his last retirement fund to pay for the
cert petition filed at the Supreme Court.
When the court granted review, I called
Alan Sears and suggested we offer to help
Chester with the case. He agreed, and the
ministry covered the ensuing legal costs.
We also set up a moot court—a kind of
courtroom dress rehearsal—to help Chester prepare.
18
funding to help Professor Michael McConnell represent students who challenged
a university rule that excluded religious
groups on campus from receiving funds
to print Christian newspapers. Now, I sat
listening as the high court said that the
university violated the Constitution by
denying funding to a paper simply because
it expressed a religious view.
Many groups work for years to be involved
in a high court case. Just 18 months after
opening its doors, Alliance Defending Freedom had already contributed to two significant wins. By committing to help others,
we’d opened the door to what would prove
to be a series of successes at the Court.
In November 1999, I had the privilege, as a
member of the Alliance Defending Freedom
team, of arguing at the Supreme Court on
behalf of Scott Southworth. Scott, a law
student at the University of Wisconsin, was
challenging the mandatory fee his school
used to fund campus groups advocating
ideas—like support for abortion—that he
and other students opposed.
Former Attorney General Ed Meese ran
the moot court, enlisting former Supreme
Court clerks and attorneys from his Justice
Department days to help Chester sharpen
his presentation. He did well at the oral arguments, and now, two months later, came
the ruling. I sprinted across the street to
a Senate office building to call Chester on
a pay phone (cell phones were not ubiquitous yet) to tell him we won, 9-0. The court
said the First Amendment protected the
veterans from government efforts to force
them to communicate a message they
could not, in good conscience, support.
An attorney representing the university
reacted skeptically when, early on, I predicted the case would go to the Supreme
Court. Now, three years later, as we stood
waiting to present oral arguments to that
Court, I reminded him of that conversation. In truth, I was thankful just to be
standing there—72 hours earlier, I’d been
stricken with a kidney stone. But, by God’s
mercy, I recovered and argued that day.
The following March, the high court issued a ruling that ultimately forced public
universities to change the ways they raise
and allocate student fees to fund advocacy
groups on campus.
Ten days later, our second ruling came
All in all, now, our ministry has been
down, this time in Rosenberger v. University of Virginia. Our ministry had provided
part of 69 cases at the Supreme Court—
many of them great victories, some of
|
Alliance Defending Freedom
them painful defeats. I remember the
thrill in 2011, when our attorneys defeated the American Civil Liberties Union in a
critical win that has significantly limited
the ACLU’s ability to sue over school
choice programs around the nation. And
I recall the sad disappointment as I sat
in the courtroom listening to the 2010
decision in Christian Legal Society v. Martinez (undercutting the rights of religious
groups at universities), and last summer
in two marriage cases we were involved
with: Hollingsworth v. Perry and United
States v. Windsor.
President Theodore Roosevelt famously
praised “the man in the arena,” who,
even when he loses, knows he has expended himself valiantly for a noble
cause. We are so blessed to have won
much more often than we’ve lost, and
those victories have been sweet, protecting the liberties of all Americans from
governmental intrusion. They inspire us
to persevere in our continuing fight for
religious liberty, life, and marriage.
With our current cases—Conestoga
Wood Specialties v. Sebelius this spring,
possibly Elane Photography v. Willock,
next term—I won’t have to run for a
pay phone to spread news of a Supreme
Court victory. And I pray that, one day,
one of our own allied attorneys or Blackstone Fellows will be among the justices
deciding these great issues at the nation’s highest court.
Jordan Lorence is Senior Counsel and
Director of Special Initiatives for Alliance
Defending Freedom.
Opposite page: The bronze doors opening
off the west portico of the U.S. Supreme
Court building trace the “Evolution of
Justice” in Western culture.
By committing to help others,
we’d opened the door to what
would prove to be a series of
successes at the Court.
Alliance Defending Freedom
|
19
TODAY’S
PLAN
TOMORROW’S
PROMISE
“Our estate planning began with
one question … how can we make the
most significant difference for future
generations with what we’ve been given?
Alliance Defending Freedom
was our answer.” —Bobb B.
Pass on a legacy of freedom. Let us assist you in making this special gift
to Alliance Defending Freedom in your Will or Trust. Please contact
Lisa Reschetnikow at 800-835-5233 or [email protected]