The West Michigan Beef Company should be where cattle are slaughtered — not freedom. Unfortunately for the Vander Boon family, the USDA made their property a dead end for more than livestock. Don and Ellen, the devout Christians who started the plant, found that out the hard way when inspectors threatened to shut down their operation over something as innocent as a piece of breakroom reading material — which not one employee had complained about!

As Don shared Tuesday on our special “Free to Believe” broadcast, the article was mixed in with the stacks of newspapers celebrating the Supreme Court decision that redefined marriage. Even so, the on-site federal officers took offense to the literature, walked into Don’s office, closed both doors, and told him they’d remove their inspectors if the material wasn’t removed. He was stunned. “From the very beginning, we started the business in faith, and made it clear to employees that we run our business according to Christian principles.” But, he said, the company was in an impossible situation. “Within a few hours, I’m being threatened with the closure of my business. [And] if the USDA removes its inspectors, then I’m immediately unable to operate.” In an impossible situation, he pulled the articles from the table — permanently.

For two years, Don’s fought for the rights that every American is guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution: free exercise of religion. And in a privately owned company, whose faith is no secret (its own website says the company “seeks to glorify and honor God in all we do”), this is a shocking case of government harassment. If the USDA – or any agency — can come to your business and dictate what you believe, then you have to wonder where we are: China, North Korea or the United States of America? “I never expected to have to deal with this,” he told us soberly. “I’d done a lot of reading about others that have dealt with it, so all of the sudden it was me — not somebody else. It’s really made me go back and think about what this country was founded on and that our forefathers fought for this freedom. And suddenly I’m in the battle too.”

And Don’s not the only one. Millions of Americans — from service members to social workers — are losing their freedom to live their beliefs out in the open. As the Vander Boons’ attorney, Alliance Defending Freedom’s Greg Baylor, pointed out, “For the government to come in and say we’re not going to let you operate, we’re going to jeopardize your company and jeopardize the jobs of your people just because we find offensive a particular viewpoint on marriage really is remarkable.” But this is exactly what’s at stake if the White House doesn’t step in to shield believers from the fierce climate of hostility created by the Obama administration. As we’ve said from the beginning, this whole issue could be resolved with an executive order. Every American, regardless of their beliefs, should agree: This kind of runaway government censorship is exactly what needs to be reined in by President Trump.

Archbishop William Lori, who was part of the Catholic coalition urging the administration to act on religious liberty, chimed in Tuesday with his take on what has become a very serious crisis in the church. Like us, he’s watched as everyone from Catholic nuns to Christian adoption agencies have been told to swallow their convictions or be punished for them. But, as the Archbishop explained:

Religion is not something we do externally for an hour or two each week to make us feel better. Religion is a way of life. Once you’ve been exposed to the word of God and the love of God has touched you in your depths and transformed you … it gives rise to a whole way of life. As Pope Benedict said, ‘Someone who has hope lives differently.’ And it’s this different way of life, it’s something that causes us to go about our daily life and work differently according to God’s plan. It’s something we bring into the workplace … and it’s going to reflect their deepest convictions. Religious freedom means you have a right to shape your whole life according to your faith and you have a right to bring it into the workplace. And it certainly means that religious institutions have a right to do their ministries according to the faith that inspired them.

I would say that the biggest challenges that we have faced do not pertain to worship, as such. In fact, there has been in many statements and descriptions of religious freedom, a tendency to describe or reduce it to a freedom to worship. In other words, if you want to get together with a church to pray on a Sunday morning, that’s fine with us. But once you step outside the church you have to get along and go along and [the government] will see to it that you do.

Wednesday morning, rumors swirled that President Trump was close to doing what conservative leaders, House and Senate members, pastors, and 168,000 of you (in our joint petition with AFA) have asked: issuing an order on religious liberty that would end the dark shadow cast by eight years of Barack Obama. We’re working to that end! Of all the promises this young White House has fulfilled, defending our First Freedom would certainly be one of the most significant.

(Originally published here.)

Abortion Caucus on the Write Track…

If White House officials wanted to write up a list of pro-life successes, there’s no need! The Left did it for them. In a letter of complaint that reads more like a social conservative victory report, a group of House Democrats wrote to Donald Trump to express their disappointment that the president has done exactly what he promised on abortion.

Led by House Pro-Choice Caucus Chairs Diana DeGette (D-CO) and Louis Slaughter (D-NY), the liberals grumble, “As Members of Congress committed to advancing health and economic security, we find it especially unacceptable that your administration has prioritized:

• ‘Defunding’ Planned Parenthood

• Attempting to Repeal the Affordable Care Act

• Global Gag Rule

• Eliminating U.S. Funding to United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)

• Appointments that Jeopardize Women’s Health

• Confirmation of a Supreme Court Justice Who Puts Roe v. Wade at Risk

• Attacks on Title X Family Planning

• Budget Priorities

"If your administration began to listen to the people it represents, then you would reverse your harmful agenda.” But that’s just it. Donald Trump did listen to the people — and it’s in large part why he won the election. As Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) pointed out just this week (to the dismay of plenty of pro-abortion groups), social values are what propelled a candidate everyone counted out to the highest office in the land. “That’s why Donald Trump is president of the United States,” the House Minority Leader told reporters. “Evangelicals and the Catholics. Anti-marriage equality, anti-choice. That’s how he got to be president,” Pelosi said. “Everything was trumped, literally and figuratively, by that.”

Ironically, the Left seems to recognize what some conservatives do not: that this president is absolutely determined to defund Planned Parenthood. He reminded people again Tuesday night, “I said I wouldn’t fund Planned Parenthood, and at the appropriate time things will happen.” But that appropriate time was not the omnibus spending bill, as some pro-lifers have suggested. As a movement, we have to fight for what’s right on every piece of legislation — but we also have to use the right weapon to do it. There’s a reason that House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Republican leaders didn’t try to end the forced partnership between taxpayers and Planned Parenthood in the package of 11 appropriations bills.

The omnibus requires 60 votes, whereas the budget reconciliation measure — which is how Republicans are replacing Obamacare and defunding Planned Parenthood — only needs 51. Without a supermajority in the Senate, there’s absolutely no way the language would survive the 60-vote threshold. And even if it did, adding that provision to the omnibus wouldn’t affect a single cent of the mandatory spending programs, which also finance Planned Parenthood.

While I understand pro-lifers’ frustration, it’s a little short-sighted to complain about the omnibus when the real victory on America’s biggest abortion business could come as soon as this week — through a vehicle that’s already proven to work. Help make that a reality by contacting your congressman and encouraging them to save dollars and lives with the America Health Care Act!

(Originally published here.)

Kneel to Heal!

On the National Day of Prayer, may each of us take to heart the official NDP prayer, authored by Chairperson Anne Graham Lotz: “We now turn to You as the God of Our Fathers. You alone are our Hope for the future. If we as a nation do not get right with You, no one in Washington or in our state capitals can reverse the downward moral and spiritual spiral that has become a freefall and is provoking Your judgment. We approach You now with fear and trembling, as we confess our national sins.”

The National Day of Prayer was proclaimed to be a day for Americans to join together openly to seek the face of God, to confess their sins and the sins of our nation, to repent as best we know how, to submit our lives and nation to God afresh, and to collectively call upon Him for help and mercy. Our nation’s problems — political, economic, and otherwise — are spiritual problems at their roots and are directly related to our national sins and departure from God. Repentance needs to begin with God’s people. How else will the church be in a position to win our lost family members, friends, colleagues, classmates, and fellow citizens? How else can we lead a national return to righteousness and justice, which are the foundations of God’s throne (Ps. 89:14)?

When the Continental Congress called for days of prayer and fasting during the War for Independence, and when presidents have called for such days of prayer in times of national crisis throughout our national history, our citizens took them seriously. They came together in their houses of worship in large numbers to repent and turn to God! May we do likewise today at appointed NDP gathering places and every opportunity thereafter.

The annual NDP National Observance will take place Thursday evening from 7:30 - 9:00 p.m. (ET) in Statuary Hall of the U.S. Capitol. Click HERE at the right time to watch the observance live.

(Originally published here.)

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This is a publication of the Family Research Council. Mr. Perkins is president of FRC. Reprinted by permission.