The 3 - March 2, 2025

President's first Cabinet meeting opens with prayer

Last week, President Trump held the first meeting of his new Cabinet, and it was opened with a prayer offered by the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Scott Turner, according to a report on the CBN website.  The report quoted the secretary, who said:

"Father the Bible says that blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, Father today we honor You in Your rightful place and thank You for giving us this opportunity to restore faith in this country and be a blessing to the people of America, and we pray in our meeting that You would be glorified in our conversation. In Jesus name, Amen..."

The article mentioned what appears to be a greater spiritual awareness in the President's life as the result of an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania last summer.  The article stated:

"None of us knows exactly when our time on earth will be over," Trump told those gathered at the National Prayer Breakfast. "You never know — a truth I confronted a few short months ago when there was an incident that … was not fun."

The president has frequently said he believes the Lord saved him that day. "God was watching me," Trump said.

“It changed something in me,” he said. “I feel even stronger. I believed in God, but I feel much more strongly about it. Something happened.”

The Christian Post reported that Turner "serves as an associate pastor at Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas."  The article related:

Turner later tweeted a video of his invocation, writing, "Giving the opening prayer at President Trump's first cabinet meeting was the honor of a lifetime."

Turner was confirmed as HUD secretary earlier this month after previously having served as executive director of the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council in the first Trump administration.

Turner, who played defensive back in the NFL for eight seasons, told the audience at the Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland, last week that he believes God is calling him to make a "generational impact."

Judge allows Christian school to participate in government funding program

Just because a Christian school holds to Christian principles does not disqualify it from government-sponsored programs that other schools can take part in.  That's a premise that has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.  But, Colorado school officials attempted to bar a Christian school from participation in such a program.  And, as The Christian Post reported, a judge ruled their actions to be unconstitutional. The article said that, "U.S. District Judge Daniel Domenico...ruled...that Darren Patterson Christian Academy can participate in Colorado's Universal Preschool Program."  It went on to say:

The academy had previously been denied an exemption to the program's antidiscrimination provision due to its refusal to hire non-Christians and its expectation that both staff and students adhere to traditional standards of sexual ethics and gender identity.

The article went on to say:

State officials lack a "compelling interest" to deny DPCA an exemption to its antidiscrimination provision over the school's "sincere religious beliefs," Domenico concluded.

The article noted that the school is represented by Alliance Defending Freedom, and...

ADF Senior Counsel Jeremiah Galus said in a statement on Tuesday that state officials "can't force religious schools to abandon their beliefs" in order "to participate in a public benefit program that everyone else can access."

"The U.S. Supreme Court has reaffirmed this constitutional principle multiple times, and the district court has now fully followed up on its previous decision to safeguard this right for religious schools in Colorado," stated Galus.

High court refuses to re-think previous ruling on "buffer zones" around abortion clinics

The U.S. Supreme Court, meanwhile, declined to hear two cases involving so-called "buffer zones" around abortion clinics. USA Today reported:

The court declined to hear challenges to a law in southern Illinois and to a 2014 ordinance in Englewood, New Jersey, that created a protest-free buffer zone around certain health care facilities.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito said they would have taken the cases.

The article noted that pro-life groups and some state attorneys general had hoped the Court would use these cases to overturn the ruling in Hill v. Colorado, which, according to the article, "upheld protest restrictions around abortion clinics."

USA Today said: 

In his dissent Monday, Thomas said Hill “has been seriously undermined, if not completely eroded, and our refusal to provide clarity is an abdication of our judicial duty.”

Thomas also said he would have used the Illinois case to explicitly overrule Hill.

In that case, according to Worthy News, "officials prohibited protesters from getting within 8 feet (2.5 meters) of patients at an abortion clinic without consent."  That article notes Thomas was on the court with Hill was decided and dissented from the majority opinion.  The article goes on to say:

The justice said the Hill case “manipulated this Court’s First Amendment jurisprudence precisely to disfavor ‘opponents of abortion’ and their ‘right to persuade women contemplating abortion that what they are doing is wrong.'”

He suggested the Supreme Court revisit Hill to give clarity to lower courts “who feel bound by it,” particularly after Roe v. Wade enabling nationwide abortion was overturned in 2022.