Churches Renting Schools On Sundays, Is It Constitutional: Today, Nicole Hudgens with Texas values will be with us. We will be discussing if it’s constitutional and Biblical for churches to be renting out schools on the weekend. Tune in now to learn more! 

Air Date: 01/23/2018

Guest: Nicole Hudgens

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Rick Green, and Tim Barton

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Transcription note:  As a courtesy for our listeners’ enjoyment, we are providing a transcription of this podcast. Transcription will be released shortly. However, as this is transcribed from a live talk show, words and sentence structure were not altered to fit grammatical, written norms in order to preserve the integrity of the actual dialogue between the speakers. Additionally, names may be misspelled or we might use an asterisk to indicate a missing word because of the difficulty in understanding the speaker at times. We apologize in advance.

 

Faith And The Culture

Rick:

Welcome to the intersection of faith and the culture. This is WallBuilders Live. We’re talking about today’s hottest topics on policy and faith and the culture. Always from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective.

We’re here with David Barton, America’s premier historian and the founder of WallBuilders. Tim Barton is with us, national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilders And my name”€™s Rick Green. I”€™m a former Texas legislator. And I love coaching on the Constitution. Check us out at Wall BuildersLive.com and WallBuilders.com.

WallBuilders Live for the radio program, archives of the show, stations across the country and you can also send in questions if you’d like they answered during our Foundations of Freedom Thursday programs. You send those are [email protected].

And that over at WallBuilders.com get your tools to train and equip and inspire your family to be part of the solution. Be good citizens and help save our country. And one of the things you can do if you’re gonna be like the founders and give lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. Please give up some of that fortune and donate to WallBuilders Live and help us continue to bring you this great information and expand the program to reach even more people. You can do that at WallBuilders.com today.

Nicole Hudgens, Texas Values

Later in the program, Nicole Hudgens will be with us. She’s with Texas Values, an organization in Texas that defends religious liberty, marriage, family, and pro-life legislation all these different things they fight for here in the great state of Texas.

There’s an organization somewhat like that in almost every state. Family policy councils and different groups out there at basically lobby for good American values and David, Tim one of the groups doing that is Texas Values. Nicole Hudgens, a Patriot Academy Alumni, does that as well a big part of that.

One of the things that she’s gonna be talking with us later in the program about is this effort where some people, just I mean it’s kind of like the whole cut off your nose to spite your face type thing. Where instead of thinking about the negative effect that it’s going to have, they hate religion so much, and they hate Christians so much that they don’t even want Christian churches renting public school facilities for the weekend which is actually a win-win for everybody.

What”€™s Happening in the Red State

David:

It is a win-win. But it’s interesting. She is dealing with some issues right now that it’s kind of amazing for us to even think are being considered in the Texas legislature. This is still considered a very red state. But here’s what’s happening in a red state. Here’s what’s happening to churches in a red state. Here’s what’s happening to family values in a red state which tells you a lot about what’s going on nationally. So these are not battles. They are isolated to Texas. They are across the country, but this is a pretty good heads up on the way that some of this is going to play out on local communities.

So it’d be a real insightful program and a real informative interview.

Rick:

Stay with us folks. Nicole Hudgens, our guest here on WallBuilders Live.

Moment From American History

This is TimBarton from WallBuilders with another moment from American history. In the early seventeen hundreds, the Reverend John Wise preached that all men were created equal, that taxation without representation was tyranny, and that God’s preferred form of government was the consent of the governed.

All of which is language recognizable in the Declaration of Independence. Why? Because in 1772 the Sons of Liberty led by Founders Sam Adams and John Hancock reprinted and distributed the Reverend Wise’s sermons.

Four years later, much of the Declaration reflected the language of those sermons by John Wise.  In 1926 on the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, President Calvin Coolidge affirmed, “€œThe thoughts in the Declaration can very largely be traced back to what John Wise was saying.”€

Few today know that the Declaration was so strongly influenced by the Rev. John Wise. For more information on this and other stories go to WallBuilders.com.

Rick:

Welcome back thanks for staying with us here on WallBuilders Live. Our good friend Nicole Hudgens back with us. She’s a patriot Academy Alumni and part of Texas Values, which means she’s out there on the front lines every day fighting for the things we believe in and doing that incredibly effective here in Texas.

Nicole always good to have you. Thanks for your time.

Nicole:

Thank you so much for having me Rick and thank you so much for the work you do and equipping the next generation to stand for limited government, individual liberties, free enterprise, and traditional family values. I always remember the lift principles because of you guys.

Rick:

Well, I love that. I appreciate the fact that you’re fighting for Him so effectively here in Texas and across the nation. Frankly, you’ve become a great spokesperson for our values. I mean, you articulate them incredibly well, and I’ve watched you in front of committees, in front of you know frankly, the front of the Supreme Court building. I mean you’ve been in front of all kinds of places, and you just do a great job. So it’s every time I watch you in an interview or something I pat myself on the back go, hey she’s one of us.

Nicole:

I was about to say. Part of the training you have contributed to me being able to do that, so I greatly appreciate it.

Celebration Church

Rick:

Well, we love it. And we love what you guys the Texas Values are doing as well. It’s the start of a new legislative session here in Texas. I know you got your hands full, and you’re running crazy and got a ton to do, so I really do appreciate your time, and there’s a lot that’s been going on even in Texas.

There’s a church here that you guys have been trying to help that was running some school facilities to reach out to the community and do some good things. And a lot of people came after them and wanted to stop that. Tell us a little bit about what’s going on a celebration.

Nicole:

Yes. So there’s a great congregation, and it started in Georgetown. And Pastor Joe Champion they have a wonderful church in Georgetown called Celebration Church. They do a lot for the community.

They have a church plant now in the Mueller area, and they’ve been renting the Austin Independent School District Performing Arts Center similar to what about 50 other churches do in the Austin area. Certainly, you know thousands of churches do across the state and then across the nation where you run a school facility on a weekend when it’s not being used. It can help provide revenue for the school district of course but provide a place of work.

Rick:

Oh it’s great

Nicole:

Right.

Nicole:

It”€™s great for everybody.

Rick:

It”€™s great for everybody. I mean it’s it’s a win-win. That building sitting there, it brings them revenue and the church doesn’t have to have a church sitting empty for six days a week. I mean I think for a community,  I’ve always loved that. The church I attend is in a school building. I just think it’s awesome. Who would be against this?

LGBT Protest

Nicole:

Right, exactly. So you know this is nothing new here. When the church had their first their first meeting in the Performing Arts Center, they had 95 LGBT protesters show up Throw all kinds of things at the members of the congregation who were walking in because the Pro-LGBT groups found out, that shockingly, the church believes that marriage is between a man and a woman and that sexual relations outside of that is unbiblical. Which is what that church has been teaching for thousands of years.

But for some reason, the LGBT groups decided to pick on Celebration and have been protesting and then even asking for the school district to withdraw the lease to the church because the church simply holds on to biblical values. Thankfully the lease has not been withdrawn. And they’ve been able to say the church has been able to successfully rent the facility, but they’re still being protested against because they hold biblical values.

Rick:

And I’m assuming Nicole that these 90 or so protesters also were protesting at the local mosque where Muslims believe the same thing about homosexuality and sex outside of a man-woman relationship. I mean, they of course were we’re not only picking on the Christian church they were right.

They Only Decided To Take On Celebration Church

Nicole:

I mean, you know it’s it’s pretty bizarre. They, for some reason only decide to take on Celebration Church and (it”€™s) really telling. You know, really just decide to go after that one when it’s like look, the church has been for how long teaching that marriage is a picture, a beautiful picture of Christ and the church and that it’s a holy relationship. That’s what we support and things that aren’t the picture of Christ and the church, so that’s what we don’t support. You know this is a teaching that’s been held for thousands of years.

Sadly these pro-LGBT groups have been outside screaming, saying all kinds of thing to the congregation going in. What was interesting though is that they tried to say, you know, this is a racist group. You know, the campus pastor is an African-American, his wife is a Canadian immigrant. You had people from all kinds of backgrounds going into the church, and they had a wonderful

Rick:

Wait, wait, wait.

You got you got to back up and say that again. So, they were accusing him of being a racist church, and the pastor is African-American?

Nicole:

Campus pastor. Yes, wonderful gentleman.

Rick:

Interesting.

Churches Are Being Protested For Biblical Values

Nicole:

He and his wife are just absolutely precious. And it’s just sad because then they realize, you know the protesters realize, oh you know this is a church that actually looks like the Body of Christ. You”€™ve got people from all kinds of different backgrounds, and they’re all coming together to worship Jesus, you know. And what’s sad is that no one would think, churches being protested for biblical values but it’s happening right here in Texas.

Rick:

And I guess you know I mean the other I could see if this church was out there you know actively advocating for anyone that fits the LGBT community has to leave Texas cannot be a citizen of Texas, you know has no rights in Texas, I’d get it. I’d understand it. I know Joe Champion. I know they aren’t doing that, I know they speak the truth in love, and so that’s part of what I don’t understand about these types of protests.

They Want You To Be Doing What They Are Doing

It would be like employees of a beer manufacturer protesting at an Alcoholics Anonymous group and saying, hey because you’re not doing what we’re doing we don’t like you. Or you know just because you’re not drinking, you’re you know you’re not trying to pass laws to keep us from drinking but we just want you to — I just don’t get that mindset.

It’s like they want you to be doing what they’re doing or they’re against you. What happened to the whole, you know love wins and freedom and let everybody you know march to the beat of their own drum thing.

Nicole:

Right and that’s what’s sad. These groups are telling us that they’re tolerant. But yet those who disagree with them are now being protested against. You know they’re bringing all these protesters together to say you don’t agree with us. It”€™s like. That”€™s ok. You know, we can disagree. It”€™s OK.

Based On The Politics of Austin, Celebration Should Have been Kicked Out

Rick:

Right.

Well, I have to tell you, I am surprised that AISD, I mean Austin’s extremely liberal town, I would have expected them to cave and kick Celebration out. Just based on the politics of all of Austin, were you surprised that they didn”€™t and that so far Celebration is still able to rent the facilities?

Sexual Orientation Gender Identity Policies

Nicole:

You know what, we’re very thankful that the lease has not been withdrawn at this point. And so Austin, you know on this issue has done the right thing. But you know, earlier we were talking about the legislative session, and one of the concerns we have at Texas Values is that there are these policies called sexual orientation gender identity policies that are being passed by local governments in the state of Texas. They got it through in Houston and was in 2014.

Those policies, they come under the guise of non-discrimination. What the left has done is taken these policies, they put them in place but what people don’t realize is that those are the same policies. When you say you can’t discriminate on gender identity they’ll use that to say, well if a man identifies as a woman, then he should be able to have access to showers, locker rooms.

That’s been something that we’ve been concerned about and why you saw when finally that organization in Houston went to a referendum where citizens actually got to vote on it. They said, no that’s not the kind of policy we want. I mean, I’ll tell you everyone should be treated with kindness regardless of what they think, what they believe – all of that.

But when it comes to issues like intimate facilities, everyone’s privacy should be protected. And especially when we’re talking about women and children and these policies have been passed in school districts where girls are put in situations where they have to share a bathroom with a boy. And it makes them very uncomfortable, and they’re not OK with that.

SOGIE Ordinances

Rick:

Of course.

Nicole:

And so, one little girl who testified at last session said it really well. She”€™s only 10 years old at the time. She said, look I love my brother, but I don’t let my brother come into the to the bathroom when I’m taking a shower at home. Why would I do that at school with a boy that I don’t even know?

Rick:

A 10-year-old educating the legislature. I mean just little common sense for you folks, so good.

Nicole:

Exactly.

Rick:

So good. And Nicole is this also I mean the SOGIE, the ordinances you’re talking about, that’s the situation where a Celebration Church would be kicked off that campus. If they had a SOGIE ordinance, they’d be able to say, hey you because you won’t allow homosexuality to be taught in your church and that sort of thing. You’re discriminating, I mean they would use these and have used them across the country to do exactly what we’re trying to prevent this school district from kicking this church off campus.

This Was the Same Policy Used Against Jack Phillips

Nicole:

Or even going to your point about the national issues, this is the same type of policy that was used against Jack Phillips, the cake baker you know.

Rick:

That’s right.

These SOGIE Policies Have Brought Harm

Nicole:

The cake Baker who would serve anyone. But when he was asked to do a vulgar cake, he said no. When he was asked to do, I think a school type cake. He said no, and when he was asked to design a wedding cake for a same-sex wedding, he politely declined and said no.

But then the Colorado Commission on Civil Rights said well because of our SOGIE policy, you’re in violation. Not only that they went after him, personally attacked him and the Supreme Court said, whoa you can’t do that. But now Jack Phillips is back in court because now he was once in the middle of that before the Supreme Court ruled he was also asked to do a “€˜gender transition cake.”€™ And the Colorado Commission on Civil Rights is going after him again now because of that. So he’s back in court. So that’s where these policies have gone way beyond and brought harm to individual, churches, organizations and business owners. And so that’s something we’re very concerned about here in the State of Texas.

Being A Voice on Privacy And Religious Freedom Issues

Rick:

Yes. It strikes at the very concept of freedom and the ability to have your freedom of conscience and to live and work according to the dictates of that conscience. To be forced to use your gift and your skill to do something that violates that conscience.

I mean that’s as anti-American as you can get. That’s exactly what those SOGIE Ordinances do, and so I guess, are you looking at legislation potentially this session that would prevent communities in Texas from being able to adopt these very dangerous very anti-freedom SOGIE Ordinances.

Nicole:

Well, right now we’re being a voice for Texans when it comes to these issues of privacy of religious freedom issues.

And I’ll tell you Rick one thing that’s concerning is that the left, we’ve had media ask what our legislative priorities are, but it’s interesting because they haven’t been reporting that the left has already filed multiple bills that would implement these SOGIE ordinances.

Criminalize People Who Don”€™t Agree With the LGBT Agenda

But not only that Rick, they would implement them with criminal penalties. They want to criminalize people who don’t agree with

Rick:

Put you  in jail for not participating

Nicole:

Or being fined a hundred dollars a day for having to deal with criminal penalties if you don’t agree. If you don’t agree with the LGBT agenda.

Not only that there’s one bill that’s filed that tells counselors: think of individuals who may approach a counselor and say look I’m struggling with the sexual orientation, with gender identity and I want you as a counselor to counsel me from a biblical perspective and help me address these issues in my life from a biblical perspective. It’s the law that the left wants to pass then that counselor can get in trouble for going according to the Bible.

I mean, that’s the kind of attacks that have been coming. And you know that’s one thing that we’re working on in session is trying to make people aware of what’s happening and continue to stand against these policies.

Rick:

Well, you guys do great work. I wish you the best this session. Thank you for the hard work you all are doing and keeping us apprised as well and involving so many other great folks across the State in these in these very very very important fights. So look forward to getting some updates from you throughout the session if you’ve got time.

Nicole:

Absolutely Rick. For you Rick and for WallBuilders, I will make time for that and I encourage our listeners if you want to get an update on what we’re doing you can go to TXvalues.org sign up for our emails.

Register For Text Alerts with TXVALUES.ORG

And actually, we’ve gotten updated technology. You can get text alerts now by texting TX values to 797979, and we’ll be able to text you when there’s an important religious freedom bill that comes up. That would protect cake bakers not just like Jack Phillips, but there is a Texas cake baker who is in a similar situation. Her name was Edith Delorum, and she had to obtain legal counsel because she was put in a similar situation.

So vote a bill to protect individuals, businesses. When it comes to religious freedom bill comes up we will alert you, you can call your elected official. But then when some of these bad bills, if one of the bad bills are brought up we’ll alert you to what’s happening.

Rick:

I love it.

All right, good stuff. We’ll have all of that available on WallBuildersLive.com. We”€™ll make it easy for you to get on their Website. Get on their email list and follow what Texas Values is doing.

Nicole, thanks for your time appreciate you coming on today.

Nicole:

Thank you so much.

Rick:

Stay with us folks, we”€™ll be right back with David and Tim Barton.

This Precarious Moment Book

David:

This is David Barton. I want to let about a brand new book we have called This Precarious Moment: Six Urgent Steps That Will Save You, Your family, and Our Country. Jim Garlow and I have co-authored this book, and we take six issues that are hot in the culture right now.

Issues that we’re dealing with, issues such as immigration, race relations, our relationship with Israel, the rising generation Millennials, and the absence of the church in the culture wars, and where American heritage is our godly heritage. We look at all six of those issues right now that are under attack, and we give you both Biblical and historical perspective on those issues that provide solutions on what each of us can do right now to make a difference.

These are all problems that are solvable if we’ll get involved. So you can grab the book This Precarious Moment and find out what you can do to make a difference. This Precarious Moment is available at WallBuilders.com.

SOGIE Ordinances – International And State Level

Rick:

Welcome back. Thanks for staying with us here on WallBuilders Live. Special thanks to Nicole Hudgens for joining us today. As well we’re back with David and Tim Barton.

Guys, one of the things Nicole mentioned were those SOGIE ordinances. We just had Staver. I met Staver on what last week I guess talking about the same thing at the international level with the NAFTA trade agreement having that language slipped in by the Canadians. She was talking about it on the state level and really across the country. Something else to be on guard for during this legislative session.

Rick:

Yeah, there’s about 300 cities that have passed SOGIE ordinances. She mentioned Houston we were able to get 5000 churches engaged in Houston and instead of having their normal 2.6% voter turnout we got it up to 15%. We repealed that and Houston got that off the books by 60 to 40 margin.

San Antonio Gives Criminal Penalties

But San Antonio also passed one in San Antonio it actually gives criminal penalties. It is a fine of 500 dollars a day, it is a Class C misdemeanor. If you speak in favor of marriage in that if you speak in favor of marriage, you’re not allowed to hold office, you’re not allowed to run for office. You will be dismissed small if you are currently in office. It’s called malfeasance of all.

It’s unbelievable. The penalties they have put in and a lot of the cities let this stuff go through thinking, oh yeah we don’t want to discriminate. No this is not nondiscrimination. This is single-ing out the Christians and hit them hard and

Explicit Discrimination Against Traditional Family Values

Tim:

This is explicitly discrimination.

David:

That”€™s right. That”€™s what this is. This is explicit discrimination against traditional family values. And even at the time, the San Antonio in Houston passed it they weren’t thinking of transgender at the time. This wasn’t a bathroom issue that had not even come up yet.

This was simply singling out those people who had voted and in the Texas constitutional amendment to support marriage. It was single-ing those people out.

Racism

So and by the way just a little rhetorical question here: when you consider the issue of race, what is one of the most widely used terms today that has nothing to do with race. The answer is racist. I mean you’ve got a black pastor being accused of being a racist because of his views on family.

Tim:

You hate black people, you black man. Wait for no wait.

Rick:

I don’t know that’s the way that works.

David:

You just now throw out the word racist for anything that people disagree with you on.

Tim: Right.

David:

And you know that’s a real disservice to actual racism as it does exist.

Tim:

Yes.

Why Isn”€™t Austin Throwing Churches Out Of Schools

David:

That’s a real disservice because it so demeans the word to mean nothing. That when there actually is racism, nobody pays attention because you’ve made the word into nothing. So you know to single them out as being racist. But here’s a kind of an interesting thing: here you are in Austin, which is the blue capital of Texas out of 254 counties that was the only county that voted blue in the marriage election. So you have this crazy, crazy, crazy county and even they are not throwing the church out of the schools.

Now why in the world would that be?

And the answer is, in 1990 the U.S. Supreme Court, I think this was the second Supreme Court case I was involved with. U.S. Supreme Court ruled in an eight to zero unanimous decision that public school facilities can be used by churches.

So when you have an 8-0 decision by a lot of liberal justices and a lot of conservative Justices, that is so clear that even Austin attorneys say, hey we can’t cross this one. This is unanimous by the Supreme Court.

Now, granted you know all those folks protest and don’t know a thing about what’s happened here. But at least the Austin attorneys are smart enough to recognize that if they cross this, they’re going to have a hard time in any court of law withstanding a suit and hopefully that church will file suit.

Celebration Church

And by the way, I was intrigued that it was by Celebration church, she mentioned that church? Celebration church.

Tim:

We have a connection with the church.

David:

We’ve got a connection. Celebration church, massive church down there. It’s a very successful good church, solid church. It sits on the highest hill between Austin and Dallas which is where our ranch was.

We sold them the land for that church. So I used to plow that land that the church is sitting right now. So it’s kind of an interesting connection. And my grandfather stood up on that hill where that church is. And he really felt like the Lord told him as a Baptist deacon that land needed to belong to a church someday. Well, it was 20 years after he died, but a church got it, and they are doing great stuff down there. So them having a church in Austin is really good.

Rick:

I had forgotten about that. That Celebration was the one that ended up on y”€™alls property. I remembered the story about the y”€™all knowing that it was going to be a church that ended up on the property. I forgot it was Celebration. Excited about their satellite church being at that school, meeting at that school. And as you said the attorneys even from the Austin school district known better than to do an unconstitutional thing like kick a church off the school property just because these protesters that would love to see that happen.

How Austin Could Do It

David:

Well here’s the way Austin could do it. If Austin decided that they want to kick the church off that property, they can, but they have to kick out every other single group in the entire community or city that also uses that school. They can kick a church off if they allow no other groups. In other words, if their policy is nobody at all, then you can keep a church out, but you can’t let everybody else use it and not let a church use it. That’s called an equal access policy. And so that was that way for clubs. You can have Bible clubs in school, you can have evangelism clubs in school you have all these things in school as long as any other clubs there. If you have a rodeo club or journalism club, then you can’t stop a Christian club.

So this is what’s been used to win on college campuses what’s been used on public school campuses. This is what’s used to have churches meet in public school campuses. Again it’s an 8 0 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court. It’s pretty clear.

Here”€™s How You Can Support WallBuilders

Rick:

Well, special thanks to Nicole Hudgens for joining us today. Thank you for listening today, and I really want to encourage you to visit our both of our Websites today WallBuilders Live for some of those archive programs but also WallBuilders.com. If you’ve never been to that Website, there is so much information available to you there, so many tools.

We’ve got a lot of television programs, DVD sets, audio programs. Lots of things that will equip you. You will get an incredible education there. It all goes back to original documentation, it’s entertaining. It’s a great way to learn and to get your children and your grandchildren, your neighbors, people in your church educated equipped, inspired and involved in saving our nation.

You can also make your contribution there so if you check out that WallBuilders donation page it’s an opportunity for you to come alongside us financially and help us continue the program and also continue all the other great work WallBuilders is doing. Thanks so much for listening. You’ve been listening to what WallBuilders Live.