Christian baker says over a decade in court has strengthened his faith: 'God provides'

[Guest Fox News]

Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips said his relationship with God has grown stronger over the past 12 years after facing multiple lawsuits and death threats for declining to create cakes with messages that violate his deeply held beliefs.

 

"One of the most important things to come out of this is that it's made my faith much stronger and drawn our family closer together and built all of our relationships with Jesus Christ," Phillips told Fox News Digital.

 

"It's also taught me that God provides everything we need through these last days of not creating the wedding cakes and the income that's involved in that. But he's also given us many other opportunities," he continued.

 

The Colorado cake artist has not made wedding cakes, which were a large part of his business, since being sued in 2012 by the state's civil rights office after he declined to bake a same-sex wedding cake.

 

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Phillips, a devout Christian, has always maintained that he will bake a cake for anyone, but he cannot create cakes with messages he doesn't agree with.

 

His case ultimately wound up at the U.S. Supreme Court in 2018, where the justices ruled, in a 7-2 decision, that the state of Colorado was hostile to his religious beliefs.

 

However, Phillips' legal troubles didn't end there.

 

On the same day that the U.S. Supreme Court announced it would hear his case, a local transgender attorney asked Phillips to make a cake celebrating a gender transition. After he declined the request, the attorney called again later to request a second cake, this one featuring Satan smoking marijuana, to "correct the errors of [Phillips’] thinking," according to the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which has represented Phillips since 2012.

 

After Phillips again politely declined the request, according to ADF, the attorney filed a discrimination complaint with the state's civil rights office, which in turn brought charges against Phillips. After ADF filed a countersuit in federal court, the state agreed to drop the case in a settlement. However, the same attorney decided to file another lawsuit about the same gender transition cake in state court a few months later.

 

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That particular saga ended last week, after the Colorado Supreme Court decided to hear his case and dismissed the lawsuit on a technicality.

 

"We granted review to determine, among other issues, whether [the attorney] properly filed [this] case," the Colorado Supreme Court wrote in its opinion in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Scardina. "We conclude that [the attorney] did not."

 

"The underlying constitutional question this case raises has become the focus of intense public debate: How should governments balance the rights of transgender individuals to be free from discrimination in places of public accommodation with the rights of religious business owners when they are operating in the public market?" Justice Melissa Hart wrote in the Colorado Supreme Court’s majority opinion.

 

"We cannot answer that question."

 

Phillips said he's been targeted with protests, death threats, and lost 40% of his income because he stopped making wedding cakes. But he said he's grateful for the support he's received from the community and from his legal representatives over the years.

 

His lawyers said he's been through enough, and they are hopeful that going forward he will be free to operate his business without being harassed.

 

"Our view is that enough is enough between government officials in Colorado and activists in the state. Folks have been hounding Jack for the last 12 years. It's time to leave him alone - alone to live his life and operate his business consistent with his beliefs," ADF chief legal counsel Jim Campbell told Fox News Digital.

 

Phillips said last October that he didn't hold a grudge against the attorney who has targeted him for a decade.

 

"This person isn’t fighting against me, this case is against the state and my right to express my religious freedom and do so without fear of punishment in the marketplace," he told Fox News Digital at the time.

 

"So, it’s not about a personal issue, even though this person has stalked me, or you know, followed me for multiple years, 11 years at least. But I have nothing to forgive. This person isn’t an enemy," he said.

 

Fox News' Jamie Joseph and Brianna Herlihy contributed to this report.

 

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