Lutheran Center for Religious Liberty- With Kelly Shackelford

The following program is sponsored by evangelical life ministries.

Welcome to the Liberty alert with Gregory SEL sponsored by our friends at the Lutheran center for religious Liberty here in Washington, DC, a program that cuts to the chaos and confusion in the culture today by talking to kingdom, citizen chip old biblical principles for robust public Christian life. And now your host, Dr. Gregory ultz

Good day, good day, Washington DC, and friends of the program all around the country. I'm Gregory. Ultz welcome to the Liberty of alert

Where every week

We try to cut through the noise and take on the issues, especially the public issues that matter to people of faith today. Uh, our guest on the Liberty alert were privileged to have on the program, Mr. Kelly Shackleford, a name most of our listeners already know if you follow the major religious Liberty cases before the Supreme court in America. He is the president and CEO of first Liberty Institute, the largest legal firm in the nation dedicating to protecting our religious, uh, Liberty. Um, one of the 25 greatest Texas lawyers of the past quarter century winning a lot of the cases that, that keep the church's public voice free in the public square. And he's presently arguing a case that is of concern to our listeners, the Carson versus Macon case. And we'll get to that in just a minute. Welcome Kelly.

Oh, thanks for having me.

Yeah, pleasures ours. And again, I was just talking a little bit about basketball before we, uh, came on here and he's, he's proud that his Baylor bear is our back at number one, but he's a little nervous that now everyone's shooting for him. Right.

That's right. I I'm still just gonna, I continue to enjoy my national championship game against Gonzaga last year. That was a lot of fun. So, uh, Well,

Well, like I said, good luck. And as a Michigan guy, uh, I wish you luck until the last game, if we happen to be

Thank to you.

All right, listen, before we get to the case, Carson versus me, I, I wanna say, cuz this was really, I just came to, uh, Washington DC five years ago to represent our church and religious Liberty issues and things like that. And the Bladensburg case, I remember the day that that was ruled on and it it's and chills up my spine because I started to think, Hey, maybe we can push back on some of this nonsense. And so I wanna say congratulations on that, first of all, but can you just real quickly talk about how that was such a significant case for our church's public voice?

Very significant for 32 years, I've been doing this kind of work and under the establishment clause, um, there's been a really bad case. My whole life, our whole life's that is really been damaging to religious freedom. It's called the lemon case,

Right?

And under lemon, the court, you know, the establishment clause says Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. The, the founders didn't want there to be a national church that we all had to support. Right. But they went much further. In that case, it was the Warren court, very liberal court. And they said, no, it means separation to church and state. It means if you're offended, you can bring lawsuits. And so you can't bring lawsuits cuz you're offended. But our whole lives, we've seen one type of lawsuit able to be brought just because you're offended. And it's when you're offended by religion. Right? So nativity scenes have come down our whole lives, uh, uh, 10 commandments monuments under attack veterans Mors. Why? Because the founders had any problem with those things. No, they'd be appalled it's because of this lemon case. So we get this case that you're talking about, the Bladensburg cross, which is right outside of DC. It's a Memorial that was put up almost a hundred years ago. Mothers who lost their sons in world war I and the American Legion. And uh, the federal court of appeals said after a hundred years, um, you know, well actually what they said in the oral argument was why don't we just cut the arms off the ground?

I REM yeah, I remember that. Let's just make it an O list, you

Know? Cause that way nobody will be offended and we won't have to tear it down. Like Christians wouldnt be offend.

Like we wouldn't be. Yeah.

Yeah. And um, and so we knew we gotta take this to Supreme court, right. And so we went and instead of just, you know, we worked really hard on, on good judges getting on the court under the last administration, cuz they talked about wanting judges who were originalists. And we thought, you know, if we get originalists who looked to what the founders wanted on religious freedom, we're gonna have some great decisions. And so we asked for them to get rid of lemon and we won that case, upholding that cross seven to two, but more importantly, we won five, four, uh, the court saying we're not following lemon. And if you watch at what's happening in these lower courts, since then, it's traumatic. The change that is now occurred, uh it's like for 50 years we've gone in this hostility to religion direction from the government and we just turned and now religion and public is presumptively constitutional.

The whole culture is changing and we, we plan to do the same thing on the free exercise clause. There's a really bad case there that we are going after. So that Bladensburg case was much bigger than people know. It really was a whole culture change for the church and, and for freedom. And I've been saying this for the last year, year and a half in my speeches around the country. And I really believe this to be true. Every American is about to have more religious freedom than they've ever had in their lifetime and who would've get that in a time where darkness and the attacks are maybe greater than ever, that God is doing this thing behind the scenes that is incredible. And that he's providing expanded protection more than we've seen in our lifetime. But it we're just at the beginning of that, we're gonna watch that occur more, more. I think the case we argued at the Supreme court last week, the making case is gonna continue to expand that protection. And we're gonna see that under both religion

Clauses. I didn't realize all these other things were even happening behind the scenes. I knew the lemon case was pushed back. I remember reading Clarence Thomas's, uh, notes on that as well, but it's even better than I thought, uh, what you're saying and

I give lots of examples. I'll give 'em one. Just so you see, um, there was a community that wanted to put up. They did, they put up a monument to police officers and it had a prayer on it and it mentioned God three times on the prayer and some somebody com plane. And so they went rubbed off, got off the monument. Well, people were offended by that and they all came and they complained. And so they just took the monument down and we sent 'em a letter. And we said, have you not seen the blades for cross decision? You know, you don't have to wipe out God. Yeah. Um, and they went no and they read it and they put it back up with God on it. How about, and that's the kind of thing that's happening all over the country without us having to talk to anybody, cuz they're reading the case, the lower court opinions, everything else, nativity scenes, all those types of things now are much more protected. And this idea of sort of wiping religion off the, the public square is longer. The, the presumption, the presumption is the opposite direction and the case law supports it now.

Yeah. And it just, you know, I like to tell our, especially our church people, um, you know, we don't want the government solving our problems. We want free people exercising their faith and service to their neighbor and protecting that right. Is one thing. But then now making your voice known because we really believe it blesses people. And I think that's gonna be the cultural challenge. Uh, but thank God you're giving us the legal protection to do that.

Absolutely. And you know what, a lot of people talk about the concept of separation of church and state,

Right?

Just talking about the institutions it's talking about. We don't want the government running our church or the church we're running our government, but it's not what, what it was perverted into was separation of religion and government. Right. Which is a horrible thing. And you know, it's basically Marxism ultimately, which is Antigo as you find. Um, and so, so we're finally getting back to what the founders intended, which is as much religious freedom as possible and, and, and keeping the institution of the church free and the institution of government, you know, free from being taken over by a particular church. But the idea that religious people can't participate in government, you know, that was a horrible idea. And now we're starting to free ourselves from that.

This case is outta Maine. Maine has most of their school districts don't have public schools. Okay. And so for over a hundred year, they've allowed parents to choose whatever school, public, or private to take their tax money that is associated with their child and place it wherever, say I choose this school. And then about 30 years ago, they decided they would change all that. Or 40 years ago they said, we're gonna start saying, yeah, well we know we've always included all the schools, but we're gonna now allow any school you want, as long as it's not a religious school. And in fact, they'll say you can have a religious school and name only, but if they actually believe anything, religious or teach anything religious, the way they put it in is if you teach a class on religion or if you teach any subject through the frame, the lens of religion, then your money's taken away.

Wow. I mean, so it's just clear discrimination on the face of the statute against religious schools. And we file a lawsuit on, on behalf of some parents. I mean, it's really sad. One of our, uh, parents, um, they've already kinda lost somewhat because their child, they wanted to put them in the Christian school. They couldn't, and this lawsuit has gone on long enough where they're now graduated. Right. Um, but there are millions of other people who will be impacted by this. And so know we're fighting for them and they're right to pick the school that's best for their children. And, uh, and if we win, which I do believe we're going to, we'll see, um, it'll not only protect all the parents now and all the programs that already exist cuz you, you know, the school of choice programs everywhere. Right.

But it will cause a lot of Christian school to come into existence because if people, if parents get to choose and the money follows their child, then schools will be able to form. They'll have the resources. And I just think about one child's life that, and that the difference going to a Christian school could mean and how many people, that person impacts and think of all, all the schools, all the kids all across the country, this, this is really a, a change that you probably wouldn't see the impact of until you got to heaven. Uh, I think it would be very dramatic and I, and I do think we're gonna win after the argument. Okay.

Um, well and there's, I mean, it's gonna rest authority ultimately away from these unions, rest authority away from these secular movements that really are dictating what our children learn rather than allowing us to determine those things. You know, you were talking about, uh, separation of church and state. We, we use the word differentiation because we believe God's at to preserve. And God, there's a providential view of, of the state too, that our founding fathers believed in that our kids aren't being taught. But one of the things I was told people, if you limit the government, you know, if the government's only job is to fill potholes, I don't know that you have to have a Christian pothole filler, you know, to do that. But it's when the government takes over everything and becomes so expansive that it's in everything, that's where this religious argument becomes. And the secularists now are the ones that are trying to take over whole, whole aspect of our life. And we're just saying, you're not gonna do that. Right?

Yeah. The separation of church and state fundamentalists, um, say anywhere government is religion must flee. Right. And of course government is now everywhere. So it it's just a tool for them to be anti-religious. So you'll find groups like Americans uniting for separation, right. And when you look at all the people who run the group, you'll find that they're all members of the American humanist society. Exactly. So they're not really about separation. They're really about let's move religion to the corners of society. And in fact, if we can get of it, that would be nice as well. So that's what that was a tool for. Of course it's not in the constitution. Anyway, the constitution says Congress will make no law respecting an establishment of religion. We didn't wanna establish churches, uh, by the government, by the federal government. Um, in fact, many states did have established churches. Exactly.

They

Just wanted choice. They wanted, they didn't want the government to take over. Right. Uh, so, so yeah, you're exactly right. The concept is a concept. I mean, the idea of the separation of the institutions is really a biblical idea. Yes. The idea that God created, the government, God created the church, God created the family and that they each have their responsibilities and you really shouldn't have one creation stepping into the other's area of authority. Uh that's correct.

It's amazing at every step of the way. Um, there have been Supreme court cases first, there was Zelman, which said, because the old approach under this liberal, this, this, uh, lemon approach, this attacking religion approach was that religious schools couldn't even participate in school choice programs because the government money would reach the schools. And somehow that would be an establishment of religion. Even though the parents were the one making the decisions, the government wasn't saying, I shall establish. So, and so Christian school, they were saying, we're just gonna treat everybody the same. Well Zelman said, no, that's not in constitution. And so at that point, Maine had a chance to go, oops, okay, well this restriction where we're restricting all the religious schools, uh, you know, maybe we should take that away. They refuse lawsuit filed the court there, uh, said, Nope, don't see any problem with that even after Zelman.

So they have to go to the Espinoza case comes next outta Montana. Where again, they're trying to make clear. No, no. You know, not only can you, not only is it okay to have a religious school, but you can't exclude all the religious schools. So that was sort of the next step. We go back to Maine again, after that one and they still refuse, they say, well, Espinoza's different because ESP in Espinoza, the religious schools were being dis banned because of their status of being religious, where in this case, it's not because you're religious, it's just cuz you're doing religious things that we're banning you. Wow. So it's like, we're not banning the soccer players. We're just banning the people that do soccer things, you know? And so we're our argument is it doesn't really matter whether the government is discriminating against you because you are religious or because you do religious things, which religious people do.

Um, it's discrimination either way. And I think the court this'll sort of tie the bow, put the last nail in the coffin on this discrimination against religious schools across the country. And I tell you, there was some great questions in oral argument. Um, probably my favorite was a discussion, uh, that justice Alito had justice Alito asked the, the attorney for Maine. So a CT school is okay under this law. Right. And a white supremacy school is okay, it's just a religious school that's band. And of course the answer is that's exactly right. Um, my other favorite was he, he asked a question about what if my religious school was just about tolerance and, and American values. And he listed these sort of virtues. And he said, then that's what our religion was. The attorney for Maine said, well, that's really similar to what we try to teach in the public school.

So that's fine. And then justice ATO said to him, he said, what I just described to you was the Unitarian religion. Right? And so what you're saying is certain religions are in and certain religions are out. Right. And uh, it became obvious through the questioning that this is a really disturbing kind of program where some, uh, regulator from Augusta Maine decides whether you're too religious or not too religious to be in the program. The other big argument they had was that while you have a right to your free exercise, you don't have a right for the government to subsidize it. I mean, our point was, look, you don't have to subsidize anything. But if you create a program where everybody gets to to choose, right, you can't then discriminate. Okay. Justice Thomas went even further. He said, aren't there compulsory attendance laws. Aren't you forcing all these parents to pick a school.

So how is, is it a subsidy when you force them by threat of law to pick a school and then you try to take away their choices of school. That's not a subsidy. I, I feel like we have six boats going into the beginning of the writing of the opinions and we'll just have to see where it comes out. You know, probably it'll be June. So I, I tell people this pray, uh, yes. You know, people pray for the arguments and that's great. It it's important. Like think of the Dobbs case that was just argued on abortion. And so many people praying for that. Right. Right. The real prayer is now from now to June, what's gonna happen is these justices are gonna be writing their opinions and sharing them with each other to try to convince each other to switch sides. Right. And until that opinion comes out in late June things shift. Right? And so if you wanna know where the spiritual warfare's going on, it's on between now and June, right? Both on the abortion case on this religious Liberty case. So if you're a prayer, a warrior and you have a prayer team, I suggest committing, if you care about the church, if you care about Christian schools, if you care about these things, pray now through June and, and see what it does with this opinion. I think we're gonna get good opinions, but there's gonna be a lot of warfare going on between now and then.

Well, aling say, you know, we are gonna do that. And our people have been committed to that. And that's why I wanted them to have information from you. Like you're giving us today to prey on. And I think, like I said, that the other challenge is there's a cultural there that even some of my people believe, which is, you know, the church gotta stay out of this kind of stuff. It's civil stuff, gotta do it. And I said to them, you know, this, I call 'em secular Puritan. There is a secular puritanism, uh, that that's a wash in our, in our government and in our culture and our universities that actually has a view of, of government. It has a view of church. It has a view of what your virtuous life is, all that stuff. And it's contradictory to the Juda Christian worldview. And I think we've gotta start defending the Juda Christian worldview that has blessed not only this country, but it's provided freedom around the world. I have friends from other religions, other cultures who come here and say, we love this play. And we're, we're not sure why you people want to give up these principles that have given you such Liberty and freedom. And so, amen. It's not our salvation. We don't believe that our, our, our principles are gonna save us. I get that, but it can prevent a lot of nonsense. And that's, what's at stake here, right?

Absolutely. I, I would challenge everybody who has in any of those thoughts to read the book live, not by lies

Came Byre. Yeah.

Yeah. It's just, I think helps people put the pieces together of how this really works in real life. Um, if they haven't read it, it's it sort of goes through communist countries, Soviet union, chuckles, Zakia fallen all these places where communis took over and the people that were there tell you kind of what happened and the questions, because this is seeping into our country. Now, Marxism, socialism, all this, and a lot of Christians don't connect Christianity to, to this. They think, well, this is politics. Oh no, no, no, no. And what you understand very quickly with this is the question is as a Christian, what do you do? What's the answer? And the answer is live not by lies, which Alexander Soltz needs. Some's last essay before he was banned from the Soviet union, was that these totalitarian regimes all exist by everybody having to go along with law, with lies.

And if enough people not a majority, just enough people stand and speak the truth. Guess who these people tend to be. They tend to be believers if they do they'll suffer, but the system collapses, they can't handle the truth. Right? And that's the job of the church. And that's why you see and all the history. One of the first thing that happened when communism took over in the Soviet union, they killed all the priests, right. You know, they, they destroyed the church, cuz this is Marxism is, is, is from the devil. I mean, it, it is horrific. This is why it's millions of people get murdered and it's justified. It has to remove the church. And so this is, is about much more than sort of politics. This is about, do you want your church removed? Do you want your, you know, I mean the, the freedom to do what God's calling you to do removed.

Do you want your children blessed or you want 'em cursed? Do you? I mean, this is incredible evil that we're fighting by standing for religious freedom and the church. And it's why our founders called our religious freedom. Our first freedom to, as they knew you lose this freedom, you'll lose all your other freedoms. Yeah. And so I, I challenge people if they have some of those thoughts read live, not by lives, read real stories of how communism was brought down in all these countries. And it's really by believers. I mean, there's some of 'em were non-believers that had the courage to stand up and speak the truth and that's we're called to do. And it's funny. I love, he said the answer when they ask them, you've gotta teach your family truth. Number one, number two, then you have to have a wider group, sort of a small group where you sort of back each other up and encourage one that cuz they wanna isolate you and push you from not standing from the truth.

It's interesting how this is what the church is. Right? And this is why, if you look at Marx's stuff like you look at, you know, the M stuff they originally put up that said were Marxist. The first thing was to get rid of the nuclear family. Exactly right. To get, I mean, so you see how this is the whole point. The church is really the opposite side of these things and there's just no way to avoid or run from these moral issues of the day. Um, you know, Jesus is the answer, but, but his truth, we were called to continue to walk in and speak and silence in the face of evil is sin

Sobering words. But, but what a great conversation and thank you for the encouraging word today. I, when you said this is the greatest time to live in, I was like, okay, that's and to hear it from a lawyer on top of that. So I just wanna say thank you for your leadership.

No, thank you. I will say this. If people wanna follow these cases and stuff, they can go to first liberty.org and go down a little and sign up to be an insider and we'll send out stuff every week so they can like let other people know what's happening. Pray. I think people get encouraged when they see all the victories too. So we'd love people to connect and sort of spread that information to other people. So they're emboldened to stand and live out their faith and realize that they do have the freedom to do that despite attempts to intimidate them.

Thanks for being here.

Absolutely.

Thanks for tuning in today to get to know our LCR L DC work better. Check out our website@lcrlfreedom.org contain. There are resources to empower your public square dynamic discipleship till next time. God bless you. Always I'm Gregory. Seltz have a great week.

You've been listening to Liberty alert with Dr. Gregory Seltz executive director of the Lutheran center for religious Liberty in Washington, DC. This program has been brought to you the Lutheran center for religious Liberty.