If the extremists at U.C. Berkeley want Isabella Chow’s senate seat, they’ll have to come and take it. The Christian at the center of a campus-wide controversy isn’t backing down — no matter how ruthless the opposition is. Believing in basic biology isn’t hate. And you’d think any college that wants to be taken seriously in America ought to know it.

For Chow, the last few weeks at Berkeley haven’t exactly been easy. She’s been kicked out of her campus political party, screamed at on her way to class, and accused by more than 1,000 of her peers of being “violent, hypocritical, and bigoted.” All because she dares to agree with thousands of years of human tradition. “As a Christian,” she said before a vote to support transgenderism, “…I believe that God created male and female at the beginning of time, and designed sex for marriage between one man and one woman.”

That was on Halloween. In the days since, Chow’s been the target of campus op-eds, a threatened recall campaign for her senate seat, and — now — nationwide attention. When she tried to explain her position in the campus newspaper, they refused to print her column. “What they said was… they reserve the right to not publish homophobic statements. And because in my op-ed, which was worded as an open letter to the Christian community at Berkeley, I referenced my transcript [from the vote], which they considered to be homophobic. Therefore they couldn’t publish my op-ed.”

The campus’s student association blasted Isabella for creating a “toxic space” at Berkeley — which must be liberal-speak for open and honest debate. On Wednesday’s “Washington Watch,” it became very obvious that Isabella’s experience was just a microcosm of the LGBT movement at large. When she let her sponsoring party know that she planned to abstain from the vote, “… They told me, ‘You either fully affirm or you’re out.’ And that’s pretty much been the prevailing view I’ve been faced with over the past few weeks.”

More than anything, that reveals what the other side wants: complete and utter surrender. If you don’t affirm and celebrate their lifestyle, you’re a hater. As Christians, that’s an impossible proposition. You can’t be a true follower of Christ and embrace something that’s antithetical to Scripture. Isabella understands that and has tried to explain that her position isn’t rooted in prejudice — but love. “… [E]ven last Wednesday, there were 300 protestors chanting, ‘Senator Chow resign now!’ I sat there, listening to all of the public comments, and I recognized that behind all of the hurt and anger are broken and wounded hearts. And I, as a Christian, am not called to return anger with anger, but I am called to love you unconditionally, even if you don’t extend the same respect and civility to me.”

Unless they’re directly involved in the debate, most people can’t grasp the true nature of the LGBT movement. They see the contempt and hostility from the other side and think the Christian in their crosshairs must have done something horrible to have sparked such a vicious reaction. In almost every case, Christians have nothing to apologize for. All they’ve done is refused to embrace an agenda at odds with God’s truth. It doesn’t matter how lovingly they express it or how pure their motives are — if you don’t bow at the altar to the ideology of this age, you’re a bigot and a hater.

Unfortunately, Isabella’s experience isn’t at all unlike the choice Christians across America are facing: bake the cake — or lose your business; cover abortion — or fork over fines; include same-sex couples — or kiss your promotion goodbye. Melissa Klein, who was forced to close her bakery for holding a different opinion than state liberals, is living proof that our culture has accepted “two huge lies,” she says. “The first is that if you disagree with someone’s lifestyle, you must fear or hate them. The second is that to love someone means that you must agree with everything they believe or do. Both are nonsense. You don’t have to compromise convictions to be compassionate.”

Isabella hopes that’s what people take away from her story. “I’m very glad that what I said on the senate floor — however painful the backlash has been — has helped spark a greater dialogue in the church about how to love and speak the truth in love.” If a young girl at U.C. Berkeley can be true to her faith in the darkness, what about you? Can you stand up in the workplace? Or in the pulpit? What about around the dinner table?

You can send Isabella a message of support on her Facebook page. Then, join us in praying that Isabella’s bravery will be an example to a generation of young people who want to live and love fearlessly for God.

Originally published here.

The Truth about the Adoption Debate

If you listen to liberal activists talk about faith-based adoption services or read the lawsuits filed against them, you’d think these groups are roving bands of discriminators going out of their way to single out and marginalize same-sex couples who want to adopt children. But what do faith-based adoption providers and consultants actually do?

FRC hosted a Speaker Series event to find out. Courtney Lott is both the Co-Executive Director of Faithful Adoption Consultants (FAC) and also the lead consultant. As an adoption consultant, she walks alongside adoptive families throughout their adoption journey, assisting with each step along the way as she maintains close relationships with multiple licensed agencies and attorneys.

“Our heart is this,” Courtney said. “We feel very strongly that we don’t want women to abort their babies. Adoption is a way — our company is a way — to put that to action and to put action to our desires and to what we are asking people not to do. Our heart is that if you can’t parent your baby, and you think abortion is your only option, I want to be able to tell you I’m here, and I will take that baby no matter what. It doesn’t matter the ethnicity, the age, the situation, the special needs — we’re here and we can help you.”

As Courtney pointed out, one of the primary ways that her organization is able to share the gospel is through educating adoptive families about how they can love “first families” — the biological family of the adopted child — through having an “open adoption.” Open adoptions are where both the child’s biological family and the adoptive family share information back and forth throughout the child’s life, where the adopted child “has access to all of the knowledge of their first family while still being loved and cared for by their adoptive family.” Courtney pointed out that through this process, “maybe these first families that don’t know the gospel will have the opportunity to come to know Christ through the experience of their adoption plan. And maybe their life circumstances can be catapulted in a different direction based on this adoption plan.”

That should make it obvious to any reasonable person that barring faith-based adoption services from ministering to families and children in need based on their biblical beliefs is ludicrous. In a free country such as ours, there is more than enough room for both faith-based and secular adoption services to coexist so that the greatest number of children possible are given a loving home.

Be sure to watch the full Speaker Series event below for more.

Originally published here.

This is a publication of the Family Research Council. Tony Perkins’ Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC Action senior writers.