Every two years, the United States Congress enacts approximately 300–500 laws. Like any American, there are certainly a percentage of these laws with which I disagree. Because of this, of the hundreds of bills passed into law every two years, there are several about which I contact my elected representatives before they vote. And of those, there are a few about which I encourage others to call their representatives as well.
But the Equality Act—which has already passed in the House of Representatives and will soon come up on the Senate floor—is the only bill I remember for which I have repeatedly asked Christians all around the nation to see the dangers and contact their representatives. Although I have written twice previously on this blog about the Equality Act (see here and here), I can’t overstate the importance of this bill and the need to pray and contact your US senators. If you have already contacted your senators, share this post with friends, and ask them to as well.
At first glance, the title sounds good. Who doesn’t want equality?
In fact, Bible-believing Christians, have Bible-based reasons for emphasizing the importance of equality:
- Every human is made in the image of God and worthy to be treated with dignity and respect (Genesis 1:27).
- Human equality applies regardless of physical, mental, gender, national, ethnic, social, or economic differences (Acts 10:34, James 2:9).
- All people are born with a sin nature for which the only remedy is salvation through Christ—freely available to all (Romans 10:12–13).
- Within the church body, the ground is level at the foot of the cross. We all come to Christ the same way, and there is no difference in any Christian’s worth to God or inclusion in the church body (Galatians 3:28).
But the Equality Act is not about equality at all. It is an improperly-named piece of legislation that aims to make biblical convictions a crime.
There are already many anti-discrimination laws in place to protect the equality I mentioned above. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is one of these. But the Equality Act seeks to expand the Civil Rights Act to include sexual orientation and gender identity.
Think about what that means. American law already forbids discrimination based on the non-choice aspects of one’s life—ethnicity, gender, etc. But expanding that protection to sexual orientation and gender identity effectively makes it a crime to disagree with the current cultural ideology and hold to the convictions that Bible-believing people have held for thousands of years.
And unlike every other piece of anti-discrimination legislation passed to date, the Equality Act has no protection to religious exercise included. In fact, it eliminates use of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) which was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1993. This means no one can claim exception to this law based on their sincerely-held religious beliefs.
Don’t think, however, that the Equality Act, if passed, would be a danger just for a handful of committed pastors or Christian business owners. This will affect everyday Americans…including children. Here’s how:
- It will allow activists educators to teach your children to question their gender and sexual orientation. Because the Equality Act adds sexual orientation and gender identity privileges to Title IV, VI and IX, it would affect every school that receives federal funding. In an article about this grave concern, Cissie Graham Lynch described several scenarios across schools in Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Wisconsin, and California in which young children have already been actively taught gender identity and sexual orientation material without their parents even knowing it was happening. She wrote, “Every American will feel the effects of the Equality Act, but it would hurt children the most.”
- It will change athletic programs for girls and women’s sports. Because it rolls back Title IX protections for women’s sports, biological girls and women would be forced to compete with biological boys and men. This is already happening in some sports programs with disastrous results for the women in those programs. It’s not fair to the women competing, nor to their opportunities to receive scholarships for their competition.
- It will limit privacy and safety for women in restrooms, locker rooms, shelters, and prisons. The Equality Act forces women to share private, sex-separated facilities (bathrooms, locker rooms, sleeping accommodations, etc.) with biological men. It will legislate that biological men be allowed in women’s shelters and in women’s prisons.
- It will require Christian business owners to adapt policies and provide medical coverage that goes against their sincerely-held beliefs. Christian business owners will be required to use an employee’s preferred pronouns and allow either biological gender into restrooms. They will also be required to provide coverage for gender transition surgeries and treatments.
- It will strip health professionals of their rights of conscience. It will force doctors and medical professionals who long to do no harm to engage in gender transition treatments such as hormone-blocking, cross-sex hormones, or surgery—including on children. It’s worth noting, too, that there is robust disagreement among the medical community regarding these procedures, even without Christian reasoning. Because of the serious mental health and physical repercussions involved and because of studies showing that many regret having these treatments, there are secular doctors who object. But they are actively being silenced.
- It will impact the curriculum of all schools, including Christian and private schools. As mentioned a moment ago, there is no protection to religious exercise included. By determining that basic biblical convictions are discriminatory, it opens a wide door to lawsuits accusing Christian or Catholic schools of teaching “hate speech” when they are simply teaching biblical morals. It will affect Christian curriculum development and education choices and will result in losses for distinctively-Christian education.
- It will limit religious freedom for churches and faith-based education. This will impact everything from Christian adoption agencies to homeless shelters and rescue missions to schools, colleges, and universities. Additionally, it limits the rights of churches and faith-based organizations to hire like-minded individuals who commit to a statement of faith and a code of conduct.
- It will threaten everyday speech where people can be fined or lose their jobs for using the wrong name or pronouns. As we have seen in recent years, this will not apply only to on-the-job moments, but to the personal beliefs a Christian might share on social media or other venues. In effect, it would police the entire nation into agreeing with the radical position of forceful activists.
For all of these reasons and more, I would ask you to call your senators and simply ask them to vote no on the Equality Act. (You can find the contact information for your senators here.)
It’s that simple. Two phone calls, and you can make them both in under five minutes.
After calling your senators, contact two friends and ask them to call as well.
We can complain, or we can make a difference. Let’s make a difference.
Pray.
Call.
Share.
