Sunday, April 24, 2022

The 3 - April 24, 2022

The 3 offers three stories of relevance to the Christian community, and in this week's edition, there is news from Florida regarding new guidelines on attempts to change a person's gender. Also, a Federal appeals court has sided with the challengers of speech codes on the University of Central Florida campus. Plus, a man preaching God's Word in public in the U.K. has been acquitted of charges that he broke the law.

Florida health department takes steps to protect children from gender change treatments and surgeries

The pushback to the real-life harmful consequences of pushing the LGBTQ agenda on children continues in Florida.  Just weeks after Alabama passed a bill criminalizing the use of so-called "gender change" treatments and surgeries, which proponents are now calling, "gender-affirming," the Department of Health of the state of Florida, which is certainly on a mission to stop the advance of this agenda, issued a set of guidelines regarding attempts to change one's gender.

Liberty Counsel reported that:

In a press release from the DOH, Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo stated, “The federal government's medical establishment releasing guidance failing at the most basic level of academic rigor shows that this was never about health care. It was about injecting political ideology into the health of our children. Children experiencing gender dysphoria should be supported by family and seek counseling, not pushed into an irreversible decision before they reach 18.”

The article goes on to say:

Florida’s DOH further stated that “current evidence does not support the use of puberty blockers, hormone treatments or surgical procedures for children and adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria considering:
  • 80% of those seeking clinical care will lose their desire to identify with the non-birth sex,
  • the importance of puberty to brain development, with the pre-frontal cortex (which is responsible for executive functions, such as decision making) continuing to develop until approximately 25 years of age,
  • and the potentially irreversible consequences such as cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, infertility, increased cancer risk, and thrombosis.”

But there are Biblical answers to gender dysphoria, answers that some policymakers want to ban.  Liberty Counsel points out that it...

...represents licensed therapists who provide life-saving counseling to minors who desperately desire to conform their attractions, behaviors, and gender identities to their sincerely held religious beliefs. In Otto v. City of Boca Raton, FL, a three-judge panel of the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a city and county ordinance that banned counselors from providing minor clients with help to reduce or eliminate unwanted same-sex attractions, behaviors, or gender confusion. The appeals court found that the laws were both content and viewpoint based and violate the First Amendment right to free speech.

Federal appeals court sides with challengers on speech codes

We have seen instances in which colleges and universities have attempted to limit the speech of individuals and groups, including Christians, by implementing stiff regulations, including speech codes and small "speech zones," where free speech is permissible. The Christian Post has reported that at the University of Central Florida, a speech code had been put in place, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has recently found it to be unconstitutional.

The article notes:

In February 2021, Speech First filed a lawsuit against university officials on behalf of students seeking to engage in debates over hot-button issues.

According to the complaint, the university policy was “overbroad” because it punished students who engaged in “verbal acts, name-calling, [or] graphic or written statements (via the use of cell phone or the internet)” that other students may find “humiliating” or offensive.

The lawsuit expressed concern over UCF’s bias response team, which according to the lawsuit, could discipline behavior done on or off campus “without regard to whether the act is legal, illegal, intentional, or unintentional.”

The article says that a three-judge panel ruled unanimously against the university, overturning a lower court decision.  The case has been sent back to the lower court. 

Alliance Defending Freedom had filed a "friend-of-the-court" brief in the case; Vice President of Appellate Advocacy and Senior Counsel John Bursch said, in part:

“...We are pleased the 11th Circuit continues to protect this fundamental right and has affirmed freedom for all students at the University of Central Florida. Universities ought to encourage a diverse set of viewpoints and perspectives, not stifle those opinions with which they disagree. As the 11th Circuit rightly pointed out, some regulations that appear well-meaning—like the university’s anti-harassment, anti-discrimination policy in question—can be so vague and broadly applied, that students simply wishing to share their religious or ideological views are chilled into silence. That is a violation of the freedoms protected by the First Amendment for every American.”

British street preacher accused of "hate speech" acquitted

A man in the United Kingdom who was exercising his free speech rights by preaching in public has been acquitted. Christian Headlines reported that:

According to the website Conservative Woman, Pastor John Sherwood of the Penn Free Methodist Church of Penn, England, was acquitted of the charges by the Uxbridge Magistrates' Court on April 7.

As Christian Headlines previously reported, Sherwood was arrested in April 2021 at the center of Uxbridge, London, for preaching on the biblical definition of marriage as outlined in the book of Genesis.

The article goes on to say:

According to CBN News, Sherwood's trial was filled with Scripture to drive home the point that his preaching is grounded in the Word of God. "Pastor Sherwood was determined to impress upon the prosecution that everything that he ever preaches upon is grounded in the final authority of God's word, the Bible," his colleague, Pastor Peter Simpson, wrote in the Conservative Woman article.

Christian Headlines also notes: "Sherwood, who asked to be sworn in with his own Bible, argued in his defense that he has a right to freedom of expression as outlined in Article 10 of the U.K.'s 1998 Human Rights Act."

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