Use or Lose Your Rights | Kristen Waggoner at THINQ Culture Summit — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00you're in for a real treat because
2. 0:01you're going to get to hear from one of
3. 0:02the experts in our nation as it relates
4. 0:06to the law as it relates to the Supreme
5. 0:08Court and as it relates to how we think
6. 0:11about our
7. 0:13rights Kristen Wagner is the CEO and
8. 0:16president in general Council for
9. 0:18Alliance defending freedom and they work
10. 0:20to protect fundamental freedoms and they
11. 0:22promote the inherent Dignity of people
12. 0:24all over the world since 2011 they've
13. 0:26argued and won 15 cases at the US
14. 0:30Supreme Court including serving on
15. 0:32Mississippi's legal team in the case
16. 0:34that overturned roie
17. 0:36Wade Kristen Wagner successfully argued
18. 0:39three of those cases in fact she's
19. 0:41coming to our vent from being at the
20. 0:43Supreme Court just yesterday where a
21. 0:45team was arguing another case before The
22. 0:48Supreme Court you realize in our country
23. 0:51today the term lawfare is a term that's
24. 0:53being used more and more it's where
25. 0:56legal EAS and lawsuits are being used to
26. 0:58try to guide policy and if we don't have
27. 1:01leaders stepping into these gaps
28. 1:02standing in these spaces helping
29. 1:04represent the inherent rights that God
30. 1:07gave us not our
31. 1:09state that will stand for those points
32. 1:11of
33. 1:12Freedom then many times our rights go
34. 1:15away but if we just rely on them to
35. 1:17argue for these cases and for these
36. 1:19rights but then when they win these
37. 1:21rights we don't actually use those
38. 1:23rights then those rights easily can go
39. 1:26away and so today we're having a talk
40. 1:29and you're you're going to hear a story
41. 1:31about what it what it means to use your
42. 1:33rights because if we don't use our
43. 1:36rights we could lose our rights and so
44. 1:38will you join me in welcoming the
45. 1:40president of ADF Kristen
46. 1:45Wagner welcome thank
47. 1:51you it's great to be with you I want to
48. 1:54begin in a place you might not expect
49. 1:55after that introduction which is Finland
50. 1:58with a woman named p
51. 2:00rasan py is a long-standing member of
52. 2:03The Finnish Parliament uh she's a
53. 2:05physician she is also a pastor's wife
54. 2:08and she is a member of a religious
55. 2:09denomination there and when her church
56. 2:12in 2019 tweeted or when her church in
57. 2:152019 said that they would be sponsoring
58. 2:17the local Pride Parade py tweeted a
59. 2:20message out questioning her Church's
60. 2:22alignment with scripture and including a
61. 2:24scripture in her
62. 2:26Tweet now you might have thought that
63. 2:28would cause some controversy and it
64. 2:29certainly did but what py didn't expect
65. 2:31is that Finnish authorities would
66. 2:33actually launch a fullbore investigation
67. 2:35combing through over two decades of
68. 2:37every public statement she made looking
69. 2:39for a possible crime that she may have
70. 2:41committed with her speech and they ended
71. 2:43up charging her with three different
72. 2:45hate crimes crimes that actually fall
73. 2:48under finland's war crimes act because
74. 2:51of these public statements on biblical
75. 2:53human
76. 2:54sexuality they then not only charged her
77. 2:57but she went through a full trial where
78. 2:58she was questioned on her her beliefs
79. 3:00and she was asked essentially will you
80. 3:02follow Finnish law or will you follow
81. 3:05the Bible this isn't a western democracy
82. 3:08that this occurred we were privileged to
83. 3:10support our case and we wanted the trial
84. 3:12court level but that wasn't enough
85. 3:14because Finnish authorities needed to
86. 3:15make an example of py so they appealed
87. 3:17it to the court of appeals we won again
88. 3:20at the court of appeals but that too
89. 3:22wasn't enough because Finnish
90. 3:24prosecutors have seen fit that they need
91. 3:25to send a strong message to all of the
92. 3:28citizens of Finland that they can not
93. 3:30only go after those citizens but they
94. 3:31can go after someone as prominent as a
95. 3:33leader like py so in this way nearly 5
96. 3:37years have pass the Finn Supreme Court
97. 3:39is poised to hear her case and the
98. 3:40process itself has become much of the
99. 3:43punishment now you might think this is
100. 3:45an extreme example to provide but I can
101. 3:47tell you that all of the western
102. 3:49democracies in this moment are posing
103. 3:51the same types of questions to their
104. 3:53citizens if you've been reading the news
105. 3:55you can look at what happened in
106. 3:56Brussels just last week the political
107. 3:57heart of Europe where a conservative
108. 3:59conference was supposed to be shut down
109. 4:01by a mayor's order because the mayor
110. 4:03disagreed with the views of that
111. 4:05conference views extreme extreme as life
112. 4:08begins at conception we had to stand up
113. 4:10a legal team in the middle of the night
114. 4:12just to keep the conference open or you
115. 4:14might be paying attention to what's
116. 4:15happening in Scotland right now where a
117. 4:17law has just been passed and in Ireland
118. 4:20where they're considering a similar law
119. 4:22these are What's called the new
120. 4:23blasphemy laws you might see them in
121. 4:25third world countries play out
122. 4:26differently but here in Western
123. 4:29democracies they're called hate speech
124. 4:30laws and Ireland has said the quiet part
125. 4:33out loud which is that they shouldn't
126. 4:35Define what hate speech is because that
127. 4:38would limit the amount of prosecutions
128. 4:39they can have under the
129. 4:42law it's chilling in many respects but I
130. 4:44also need to tell you I'm guessing you
131. 4:47may be thinking well what are we worried
132. 4:49about we have the First Amendment well
133. 4:51now I need to tell you that most of the
134. 4:53governments and the Western democracies
135. 4:55around the world have religious freedom
136. 4:56and Free Speech guarantees in their
137. 4:57governing documents but they're not wor
138. 4:59the paper that they're written on when
139. 5:01activists and judges are able to come in
140. 5:03and gut those protections and when
141. 5:05citizens are too apathetic to stand up
142. 5:07for their rights to insist on their
143. 5:09enforcement so right now as we stand
144. 5:12here in your
145. 5:13generation the United States is the last
146. 5:15Western country in the world that is
147. 5:18resisting this type of government
148. 5:21censorship the last country in the world
149. 5:24and surely you know that major
150. 5:25corporations and government officials
151. 5:27right now are trying to impose a new
152. 5:29Orthodoxy an Orthodoxy that silences
153. 5:32punishes and ruins those who would give
154. 5:34voice to the truth that life begins at
155. 5:37conception that marriage should be
156. 5:38between a man and a woman or that we're
157. 5:41fearfully and wonderfully but immutably
158. 5:43made in God's image this is the new
159. 5:47Orthodoxy that we're facing so that's
160. 5:49one of the reasons that I bring up P's
161. 5:51example because again this test of Truth
162. 5:53leads to human flourishing and we know
163. 5:55what more would the enemy of our souls
164. 5:57want to do but to silence that truth to
165. 6:00this generation the second reason that I
166. 6:03bring up py as an example is because I
167. 6:04think she's pro pro she is displaying a
168. 6:07profound amount of courage in this
169. 6:09moment with a lot at stake and when you
170. 6:12ask her why she says because we have to
171. 6:14speak the truth the speaking the truth
172. 6:17in this moment is loving our neighbor
173. 6:19it's not just about our freedoms it's
174. 6:22about the message that we're speaking
175. 6:24it's about being Christ's hands and feet
176. 6:26because it's not just about us getting
177. 6:27the message out it's about the person
178. 6:29that gets to hear that message it's
179. 6:31about the person that gets to receive
180. 6:32that Ministry these freedoms aren't just
181. 6:35focused on the freedom holder but on the
182. 6:38benefactor the book of Hosea says that
183. 6:40we're living right now in a time when we
184. 6:44live without the Creator we eat the
185. 6:46bitter fruit of Lies think about that do
186. 6:49you do you feel do you taste the bitter
187. 6:51fruit of lies in our culture because
188. 6:54when laws Embrace those lies what we
189. 6:56know comes is Injustice misery and human
190. 6:59suffering
191. 7:00and that's the moment we're
192. 7:02in but when we dare to speak and live
193. 7:05the truth we can help other people so I
194. 7:09want to give you a few examples today of
195. 7:11how these freedoms are in Jeopardy right
196. 7:12now in the United States the first is
197. 7:15Shane and Jennifer they've been foster
198. 7:16care parents for 9 years but they
199. 7:18recently went to get the renewal of
200. 7:19their foster care license and they were
201. 7:21told that they're no longer fit to serve
202. 7:23as a foster parent because they don't
203. 7:25Embrace gender identity and they decline
204. 7:28to take kids who may identify as the
205. 7:30opposite sex to Pride parades or to um
206. 7:33have other gender affirming treatments
207. 7:36now you might say well why don't you
208. 7:38just not place a child of that age in
209. 7:39their home it's not good enough under
210. 7:41state law doesn't matter the age of the
211. 7:43child what matters is what your ultimate
212. 7:45beliefs are this is happening around the
213. 7:48country it's not an isolated incident
214. 7:50Grant Park Christian Academy is a
215. 7:52religious institution they serve
216. 7:54families a number of families that are
217. 7:55below the federal poverty level which
218. 7:57means that those families rely on school
219. 7:59to give those children two meals a day
220. 8:01and a snack through the national lunch
221. 8:02program but the federal government posed
222. 8:05to Grant Park that they need to make the
223. 8:06same church Choice as py and the same
224. 8:08Choice as uh the others choose between
225. 8:11your faith and your biblical beliefs or
226. 8:14serving and the school quickly realized
227. 8:17that in that instance they're not only
228. 8:18called to feed the body they're called
229. 8:20to feed the soul they have to bear
230. 8:22witness they stood against the federal
231. 8:24government and now that policy has
232. 8:26changed to protect religious
233. 8:28schools last example I want to raise
234. 8:30with you is Kaylee Kaylee is a licensed
235. 8:32counselor and sometimes she has young
236. 8:35kids that come to her and adolescents
237. 8:37that are confused about their bodies
238. 8:39they want to learn to live at peace with
239. 8:40their bodies but her state law forbids
240. 8:42her from sitting and listening and
241. 8:44having those conversations what it
242. 8:45doesn't do is forbid her from helping to
243. 8:48transition those kids to identify as the
244. 8:49opposite sex this is regardless of the
245. 8:52fact that the science tells us more than
246. 8:5480% of all children that have these
247. 8:57conversations that receive counseling
248. 8:58live at peace with their bodies for the
249. 9:00rest of their lives over a 100
250. 9:03jurisdictions right now have this law in
251. 9:05place it's a violation of free speech
252. 9:07it's a violation of our right to
253. 9:09practice our faith it's religious
254. 9:11discrimination Abraham Lincoln told us
255. 9:14long time ago that if this nation fell
256. 9:16it wouldn't be because of foreign armies
257. 9:18it would be a free people suicide
258. 9:20because we're apathetic and we don't
259. 9:22Steward the inheritance of our freedom
260. 9:24nii said in a post-christian society we
261. 9:27would feel disoriented as if the Earth
262. 9:28was unchanged from the Sun certainly the
263. 9:32Earth does feel unchanged from the Sun
264. 9:34in this moment and yet this is the
265. 9:36moment that God created all of us to
266. 9:38live in and it's a moment of great
267. 9:40opportunity because in when we are
268. 9:43facing a world that is looking at
269. 9:44compromise we offer the joy of
270. 9:47conviction in a moment where we're
271. 9:49grappling with what human dignity is we
272. 9:51offer a conviction and a vision of real
273. 9:54life of real equality of real dignity
274. 9:57because we're made in God's image in a
275. 9:59moment with broken families we offer a
276. 10:01vision of what family stability looks
277. 10:04like through Sac sacrificial love and
278. 10:06sexual
279. 10:07Fidelity and in a moment where Now power
280. 10:10is seen as a means of Oppression we
281. 10:13offer a vision of government that
282. 10:15recognizes we are all Fallen creatures
283. 10:18so checks and balances work well and
284. 10:20religious freedom and Free Speech curves
285. 10:22government
286. 10:24authoritarianism these freedoms are
287. 10:26critical to our success and they're
288. 10:27critical to Western civilization
289. 10:30at root they're all biblical ideas and
290. 10:33they have made the West the Envy of the
291. 10:34world in fact what you may not know is
292. 10:37the United States Constitution is
293. 10:39actually the longest enduring
294. 10:41constitution in the history of the world
295. 10:43and it's in Jeopardy right now in your
296. 10:46lifetime so what do we do in this moment
297. 10:49give you two keys align your conscience
298. 10:52with God's word not with what the world
299. 10:54says don't let cancel culture get to you
300. 10:57spend time with Jesus not necessarily
301. 11:00CNN and Fox News the second thing to do
302. 11:03is don't violate your convictions don't
303. 11:06rationalize it in the moment because
304. 11:08light shines brightest in darkness the
305. 11:11third thing is know your rights they
306. 11:14can't force you to say something that
307. 11:16you don't believe the government doesn't
308. 11:17have the right to do that nor can it
309. 11:19infringe on your right to practice your
310. 11:21faith or to raise your kids consistent
311. 11:23with it and lastly talk to your kids
312. 11:27parent them