ERLC President Russell Moore, Tennessee Christian Leaders Denounce ‘White Lives Matter’ Rallies

Source: Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission

Nashville, TN - October 30, 2017 - (The Ponder News) -- Russell Moore, president of The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, and Christian leaders across Tennessee joined together in denouncing the “White Lives Matter” rallies scheduled for Oct. 28 in Middle Tennessee.

In a joint statement, Moore and others agreed, “As Christian leaders in Tennessee, we declare ourselves in resolute opposition to this expression of racism and white supremacy. We denounce and repudiate white supremacy as a work of the devil, designed to dehumanize and divide.

“We call every follower of Jesus in the state of Tennessee to speak out against white supremacy, in all of its forms and to pray and work for racial unity in our communities. We also pray for those who advocate racist ideologies and those who are thereby deceived, that they may see their error through the light of the Gospel, repent of these hatreds and come to know the peace and love of Christ through redeemed fellowship in the Kingdom of God.”

ERLC’s Russell Moore calls HHS religious liberty exemption ‘crucial achievement’

Source: Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission

Washington, D.C. - October 7, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- Russell Moore, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, commented today on the decision by the Trump administration to provide a robust religious liberty exemption to Health and Human Services’ contraceptive mandate, which provides employers with religious or moral objections an exemption to the requirement that they must pay for contraception, including contraceptives with abortifacient properties.

Moore commented:

“This religious exemption is a crucial achievement in the preservation of religious liberty. The government has no business whatsoever forcing citizens to subsidize the destruction of human life and the exploitation of families and communities. More still, the contraceptive mandate revealed the audacity of a state that believed it could annex the human conscience, which is why I have long opposed it as an unlawful overreach asking citizens to choose between obedience to God and compliance with the regulatory state. A government that can pave over the consciences of some can steamroll over dissent everywhere. I am thankful for this move, which recognizes that freedom of conscience is a natural and inalienable right, not an allowance handed out by Uncle Sam.”

Seeking the overturning of the HHS contraceptive mandate has been a signature issue for the ERLC, beginning in 2014 after Guidestone Financial Resources and many other Baptist institutions filed suit against the United States Department of Health and Human Services, citing religiously held convictions that would prevent them from including such coverages in their health plans.