A state House panel for a third straight year rejected a Republican-led effort to expand religious freedom protections in Colorado, derailing an emotional fight over whether people should be able to deny services to someone on the basis of religion.

Religious freedom laws have been on the books in the U.S. since 1993, but in the last few years have been defined by a single issue: whether Christians should be able to refuse to provide wedding-related services to same-sex couples.

Supporters say the bill is a needed layer of protection for people who believe that participating in a same-sex wedding — by say, baking a cake or photographing the service — would violate their religious beliefs.

“This is a good bill,” said co-sponsor Rep. Stephen Humphrey, R-Severance, noting that opponents’ fears haven’t come to fruition in other states that have such laws. “It’s not some Wild West of discrimination out there.”

But opponents call it a thinly veiled attempt to legalize discrimination against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. And, they fear a slippery slope — how far could someone go in claiming religious belief to justify ignoring anti-discrimination laws?

“At its core, the premise of this bill is to allow people to use religion to ignore laws they don’t want to follow,” said Kelly Brough, president and CEO of the Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce.

The measure, House Bill 1013, would establish a more rigorous legal test for any law that might be considered a burden to someone’s religious beliefs. Such laws would have to “further a compelling government interest” and be the least restrictive means of pursuing that interest.

The State, Veterans and Military Affairs Committee on Wednesday heard more than three hours of testimony on the measure from religious leaders, legal experts, business owners and civil rights advocates, before casting a vote that fell along party lines. The three Republicans voted to advance the measure to the full House, while the six Democrats voted against it, a predictable split that led one supporter who testified at the hearing to remark: “We seem to be talking past each other.”

Bills like it have proven controversial around the country in recent years, leading to protests and boycotts in conservative states such as Indiana and North Carolina that have passed them. The economic fallout in Indiana was once expected to be so dire, with major conventions and employers threatening to pull out of the state, that its measure was later amended to preserve local anti-discrimination ordinances.

Religious leaders from a number of faiths spoke at the hearing, but were deeply divided over the bill, with some calling it an essential protection, and others saying it would sanction discrimination, invoking the past use of religion to justify things such as slavery.

“This bill is a thinly veiled attempt to make tolerable that which is not tolerable,” said Jasper Peters, a pastor with Trinity United Methodist Church in Denver.

Jay Ledbetter, a messianic rabbi, countered that it doesn’t provide a right to discriminate — it simply gives those who object to laws a voice in court.

“When the law says you must do something and my God says I cannot do it, what can I do?” Ledbetter said. “Who do I honor?”

As many as 21 states and the federal government have religious freedom laws, according to the National Conference of State Legislators, but most were adopted at a time when gay rights weren’t widely accepted and the measures weren’t viewed in that context.

In recent years, a Lakewood baker who in 2012 refused to bake a cake for a gay couple from Massachusetts has become something of a poster child for the national debate. The Colorado Court of Appeals in 2015 ruled that Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips couldn’t cite his religious beliefs in refusing to make a wedding cake for the same-sex couple.

The situation in Colorado differs from that of many conservative states that have religious freedom laws because state law here already prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation. How those protections would be viewed in the context of a religious freedom law would likely be left to court interpretation.

But there are other differences, too. Multiple legal experts opposed to the bill told the committee that the proposal goes further than other religious freedom laws around the country.

“This law is not only about florists and bakers that are not wanting to participate in certain types of weddings,” said Melissa Hart, a constitutional law professor at the University of Colorado Law School.

“…The room for personal interpretation of this law and the opportunities for abuse are simply astonishing.”

In Indiana, the first tests of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act have had nothing to do with providing services that conflict with someone’s beliefs. A Muslim inmate claimed last year that his religious freedom was being violated by a county jail that refused to provide him with a halal diet. In other cases, defendants have unsuccessfully tried to claim RFRA as a defense against child abuse and tax evasion charges.