Oh boy.

On Wednesday, a federal court will hear a case involving religious liberty and homosexuality. And for once, it doesn’t involve eggs, milk, or flour.

Here’s the story:

In December 2017, a Christian group within the student body of the University of Iowa filed a lawsuit against the school. The reason? They’d been deregistered by the administration because they’d not allowed an openly gay student to be a leader.

In February of that year, out-and-proud Marcus Miller complained to the university, resulting in the college’s request that the Business Leaders in Christ amend their constitution in the name of inclusivity.

Note: Ideologically, there is no such thing as “inclusion.” No concept exists which subsumes all others. For example, if you say that gay is wrong, you have excluded those who believe it is right; but the converse is also true. The whole notion of inclusivity defies reason.

Therefore, the school was asking a group with a particular position to eliminate that position in favor of a different, mutually exclusive position which would disenfranchise others based on their beliefs.

It is absolutely permissible to label a belief wrong, deeming it inferior to another; but no idea is inclusive of the rest.

Unfortunately, the University of Iowa hadn’t read this article, so they dropped the BLinC as a registered organization.

Then, by court order, that deregistration was undone.

But not so fast: Somehow via the citing of baker Jack Phillips’s Supreme Court victory (here, here, and here), on June 12th, the banishment was judicially reinstated.

The official reason for Marcus’s rejection, by the way, was that “he did not agree with BLinC’s biblically-based views on sexual conduct.”

The group’s statement of faith:

“God’s intention for a sexual relationship is to be between a husband and a wife in the lifelong covenant of marriage. Every other sexual relationship beyond this is outside of God’s design and is not in keeping with God’s original plan for humanity.”

What’s to come? Wednesday will tell.

Here’s an Ace, it would seem, for BLinC, as described by The Gazette:

“It appears a large number of student organizations were operating in violation of the university’s stated policies at the time the university revoked BLinC’s registered student organization status,” U.S. District Court Judge Stephanie Rose wrote in her opinion, citing new data provided by the UI’s own review of how it applies its human rights policy. “The university does not reconcile that fact with how the proceedings against BLinC were carried out,” Rose wrote. “Presently, too much remains unknown about what role BLinC’s viewpoint played, if any, in the decision to deregister the group.”

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty — which also aided Hobby Lobby in a faith-and-freedom case — is representing BLinC.

-Alex

Relevant RedState links in this article: here, here, and here.

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