The Trump Justice Department is pressuring Washington Gov. Jon Inslee to loosen restrictions on churches by arguing the state’s policy of allowing unlimited peaceful protests while capping houses of worship is discriminatory and likely unconstitutional.

The Department of Justice, in a June 11 Statement of Interest in a Tacoma, Wash., federal court supporting a Washington state church, argues “imposing a hard cap on all religious worship and no cap on secular gatherings constitutes unequal treatment.”

The state of Washington limits outdoor worship services to 100 people “regardless of distancing, hygiene, and other precautionary measures.” It also limits restaurants and taverns at 50 percent capacity while limiting houses of worship to 25 percent capacity, with a hard cap of 50 individuals.

“Yet, they permit protests without numerical limitation with only an unenforceable and unenforced suggestion by the Governor for ‘people to be safe for themselves and the people around them’ by ‘wearing a mask and … distancing as much as you can,’” the brief says.

The lawsuit against the state was brought by Harborview Fellowship in Pierce County, Wash.

The federal court brief also cites Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts’ May 29 opinion that suggested churches should be treated the same as “comparable secular gatherings” of “large groups of people” in…

In 2019, more women in the UK sought after abortions than in any previous year, according to a new report released by the UK Department of Health and Social Care.

The 20-page report showed statistics for England and Wales last year. Over 207,000 abortions were performed on women last year, which is the largest number recorded since the 1967 Abortion Act was passed, according to the Christian Post.

The largest increase occurred among women over the age of 35 while women under the age of 18 stayed the same. However, women aged 22 saw the highest increase with 31.6 abortions per 1,000 women. In 2018, women aged 21 had the highest rate of 30.7 per 1,000.

Minors seeking abortions have decreased.

“The decline since 2009 is particularly marked in the under 16 age group, where the rates have decreased from 4.0 per 1,000 women in 2009 to 1.4 per 1,000 women in 2019,” according to the report.

Additionally, women ages 18-19 have also sought fewer abortions with a decline from 31.6 per 1,000 to 23.8 per 1,000 women.

Abortions are legal in England, Wales, and Scotland up until 24 weeks gestation. And last fall, Northern Ireland stripped its country of its abortion laws, allowing for greater access.

Both pro-life and pro-choice advocates see the rise in abortions as concerning. According to Jonathan Lord, medical director of abortion provider Marie Stopes U.K., the uptick could be a result of poor access to…

HUD Secretary Ben Carson on Sunday urged Americans to stop being offended “by everything” and to “grow up.” 

Carson, the secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, made the comments on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos after being asked about President Trump’s acceptance speech being scheduled in Jacksonville, Fla., on Aug. 27, the 60th anniversary of a KKK mob attacking mostly black civil rights protesters in that city.

“Is it appropriate to be having a convention speech on that anniversary in that city?” Stephanopoulos asked.

“We’ve reached a point in our society where we dissect everything and try to ascribe some nefarious notion to it,” Carson said. “We really need to move away from that. We need to move away from being offended by everything, of going through history and looking at everything, of renaming everything. I mean, think about the fact that some of our universities, some of our prestigious universities, have a relationship with the slave trade. Should we go and rename those universities?

“It really gets to a point of being ridiculous after a while,” he said. “And, you know, we’re going to have to grow up as a society.”

Earlier, Carson said the U.S. can only be destroyed if Americans “destroy ourselves.”

“We have to stop putting everything into the arena of combat. Let’s see if we can find a way to…

Christian leaders and legal experts alike warned Monday that religious liberty is in danger after the Supreme Court ruled the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in employment.

The case consisted of three separate lawsuits, one of which involved a Christian funeral homeowner who dismissed an employee who is biologically male but identifies as female and wants to dress as a woman at work. The funeral home has a sex-specific dress code.

The Supreme Court, in its 6-3 decision, ruled that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, makes it unlawful to fail to hire or to fire someone on the basis of their LGBT identity. Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the majority, said “sex” in the 1964 law encompasses “homosexuality or transgender status.”

Gorsuch acknowledged the justices were “deeply concerned with preserving the promise of the free exercise of religion enshrined in our Constitution” and that other cases may arise with “free exercise arguments that merit careful consideration.”

“But how these doctrines protecting religious liberty interact with Title VII are questions for future cases,” he wrote.

Future cases also will decide how the court’s ruling impacts religious organizations.

Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern…

Former New England Patriot Ben Watson hosted a special prayer event with thousands of people over the sin of racism on Sunday afternoon.

“What is always needed is a spiritual change,” Watson said at the Boston Pray event held in the Parkman Bandstand of the Boston Common.

“That’s at the heart of everything. Racism is sin,” said the Christian athlete to a cheering crowd as protests following George Floyd’s death entered into its third week across the nation.

“The idea is to get believers and nonbelievers to come together and pray and seek God’s face in terms of our next steps. When it comes to racism or issues of our day, we must enter into it with humility,” Watson said, according to the Christian Post.

“Everybody wants to do something, but it’s always important to understand that our wisdom is nothing compared to God’s,” he noted. “But also humbly come together to show some unity, even though we have to address some real issues in this city and this nation.”

The ex-NFL star asserted that change won’t come until people have “honest conversations and do the work that needs to be done.”

The importance of treating people with the kindness that they want to receive was stressed by Watson.

He also noted that God is a “God of Justice”, and that justice meant that people were recompensed in either protection or punishment.

Watson added that…

In a landmark decision for the LGBT community, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ruled employers cannot fire someone merely for being gay or transgender under federal law.

At issue was Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which makes it unlawful “for an employer to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual … because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.”

Three LGBT individuals in Michigan, Georgia and New York filed separate suits in federal court, arguing they were fired from their jobs for being gay or transgender and asserting that “sex” in the Civil Rights Act encompasses sexual orientation and gender identity. The Supreme Court consolidated the cases into one.

The court, in a 6-3 decision, sided with the fired employees. Two conservative justices – Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Neil Gorsuch – joined the court’s liberal bloc in the majority.

It’s the biggest legal victory for the LGBT community since the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage nationwide in 2015.

Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion.

“An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law,” Gorsuch wrote.

He acknowledged the authors of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 may not have had LGBT individuals in mind when passing it.

“Likely, they weren’t…

A new survey from the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability shows that tithes and donations to most evangelical churches and ministries has stayed steady or grown despite stay-at-home orders across the nation.

According to Christianity Today, in April, giving equaled or surpassed April 2019 giving levels at 66 percent of churches and 59 percent of nonprofits, the report, titled “Optimism Outweighs Uncertainty,” said.

Also, 72 percent of churches and 61 percent of Christian nonprofits in the survey said their April 2020 cash donations met or surpassed January’s level.

Christian leaders had worried that stay-at-home restrictions put in place because of the coronavirus pandemic would impact giving.

“For pastors and church staff, there will be difficult days ahead,” State of the Plate founder Brian Kluth had previously said. In a March podcast, the Barna Group reported that 62 percent of US pastors said giving was down at their churches.

But the new survey shows giving has rebounding despite the pandemic.

Half of the leaders in the survey said they were “optimistic” about cash gifts in May through July, while 27 percent said they were uncertain and 15 percent said they were “pessimistic” about summertime donations.

“From what I’m hearing here in the Silicon Valley, we’re not going to be hit that hard,” California Southridge Church pastor Micaiah Irmler…