For the past 35 years, Mississippi has been hosting a Saturday summer picnic in Central Park, a small affair of white tents and fried catfish and country music meant to promote the culture and heritage of the great, misunderstood state of Mississippi. Over the years, it has grown into a somewhat official pilgrimage. Every governor of the state has attended. This year, the Mississippi Development Authority hosted events stretching over three days including an exhibition of emerging artists at the National Arts Club and a night of short films in Brooklyn. Currence was here to cook not one, but two very different meals.

This morning’s private luncheon, held annually, was largely aimed at attracting what are known as “site selectors,” corporate employees typically based in New York who determine where their companies should place their next manufacturing plant, call center, or distribution warehouse. With an unemployment rate tied for fourth highest in the nation, Mississippi needs those jobs. They began to arrive around 11, in sharp, black suits, and were one-by-one greeted by the name-tagged executive team of the Mississippi Development Agency — here was the “Director of Tourism” and there was the “Chief Marketing Officer” and so on — and a glass of sweet tea.

As Currence began sending out boards of pimiento cheese sandwiches spiked with Tabasco and deviled eggs garnished with bright orange bursts of trout roe to the dining room, a black car escorted by a New York State Trooper arrived outside. As he walked in, Gov. Phil Bryant waved to the crowd, now about 60 in number, and took a seat.

Brent Christensen, executive director of the MDA, turned on a microphone, made a few small introductions to the room, bowed his head, and said a prayer: “Bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies and us to thy service. Amen.”

When Christensen raised his head, it was time to introduce the chef who had flown in to Mississippi to cook this meal. He said a few polite words about Currence's celebrated restaurants in Oxford, about his James Beard Award, about how happy they were to have him. Currence was called in from the kitchen and the crowd clapped politely in return. The mood remained polite, perhaps because of what Christensen politely left unsaid.

This spring, a Mississippi state senator and Baptist pastor named Phillip Gandy sponsored Senate Bill No. 2681, better known as the Mississippi Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The bill called for something simple, adding the words “In God We Trust” to the state seal, but also for something harder to understand: “to provide that state action shall not substantially burden a person's right to the exercise of religion.” Some say the bill simply protects freedom of speech. Others have suggested that it could sanction religiously oriented discrimination, namely that a Christian business would no longer need to serve gay customers. Unlike similar legislation in Arizona, which was vetoed under intense scrutiny, the bill passed in Mississippi with little national notice. Bryant gathered lawmakers' who sponsored the bill for a small private signing ceremony with Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, a conservative Christian think tank that “believes that homosexual conduct is harmful to the persons who engage in it and to society at large.” The bill will go into effect on July 1, 2014 — the day before the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act.

Of the many Mississippians who voiced opposition to the act, Currence has been among the most prominent. In an interview with the New York Times, he said, “The law sends a terrible message about the state of consciousness in the state of Mississippi. We are not going to sit idly by and watch Jim Crow get revived in our state.”

Of course, people who speak out openly against the governor’s policies aren’t typically hired to cook for him. Currence had been booked months before Bryant signed the bill. Currence considered cancelling, but then he and another chef, Kelly English of Memphis, hatched a plan they thought would get more attention: On Thursday, they would prepare this luncheon for the governor and on Friday they would hold a protest dinner called the Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table. The ploy was simple. The same weekend that the state’s ambassadors would be wining and dining in New York, Currence would be there to send a message.

The response from the governor’s office was swift. The morning the news broke about the Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table, Currence said, “I got a phone call, a dressing down by the governor's office — they wanted to know why I would embarrass the governor like this. And then it fucking dawned on me: You assholes don’t fucking talk to me like a sixth-grader in the principal's office, I’m a 50-year-old man. More to the point, I’m on the right fucking side of this thing. All you assholes have to do is come to dinner.”

Currence extended an offer to the governor: If the bill wasn’t about discrimination, if it was simply about protecting freedom of speech, then all the governor had to do was come to the Big Gay Mississippi Welcome Table. “Just show up,” Currence said. “Show the world that we’re not going to accept discrimination on any level. That’s all you have to do. Just show up.” If this weekend was about sending a message to the rest of the world about Mississippi, then why not that message? The governor declined, but Currence promised to save him a chair, anyway.