Princeton Professor: Chick-Fil-A Is Validating Black-Listing Strategy Employed By LGBT Lobby

Editor’s note: The following text is reprinted with permission from a Facebook post by Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. 

Professor George posted this response following Chick-fil-A’s announcement that the fast food chain was discontinuing donations to The Salvation Army and Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Several news agencies and Christian leaders have criticized Chick-fil-A for making the cuts to appease LGBT groups, who are opposed to the Salvation Army and FCA’s adherence to biblical values and traditional marriage.

Facebook post by Robert P. George:

Let’s review the bidding. (I ask anyone who believes that there is an error of fact or an unwarranted inference in what follows to please point it out in the comments.)

1. Dan Cathy, son of Truett Cathy, founder of Chick-fil-A, publicly stated his view that marriage is the conjugal union of husband and wife and that he and his family and their business stood by that Biblical teaching.
2. Folks on the left declared him to be a “bigot” and called on people to boycott his family’s business. Wherever possible, they applied pressure, including political pressure, to prevent Chick-fil-A from opening stores.
3. The Cathy family encouraged the Christian community to stand with them and support them, which conservative Christians and other socially conservative people did–en masse.
4. Chick-fil-A’s business flourished financially, despite the efforts of the LGBT lobby and the left to destroy the company.
5. Chick-fil-A included among the beneficiaries of its philanthropy Christian organizations, such as the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, who upheld Biblical moral standards.
6. Then, suddenly, the company announced that it would no longer fund organizations like the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian athletes. It said that in assessing its philanthropic work, it would only support organizations that “align with its values”–clearly implying that those organizations did not.
7. There is no explanation for this development apart from the fact that the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes uphold Biblical standards of marriage and sexual morality.
8. If there is some other explanation, Chick-fil-A has not provided it, despite requests to do so.
9. Chick-fil-A has announced that it will support Covenant House, which publicly embraces “gay pride” activism and has been praised for it by the pro-LBGT “New Ways Ministry.”
10. This makes clear that Chick-fil-A has established a litmus test for its philanthropy. If an organization holds to Biblical standards of marriage and sexual morality, it will not be funded. By notable contrast, if an organization publicly rejects such standards it is nevertheless eligible for funding.
11. Thus, Chick-fil-A, which encouraged and received the support of countless Christians and other social conservatives when it came under attack as a result of its founder’s statements, is effectively validating the black-listing strategy employed by the LBGT lobby–which means that it is also made itself complicit in promoting the idea that to uphold Biblical standards of marriage and sexual morality is a form of “bigotry,” which therefore warrants a company’s (or a person’s) being stigmatized and black-listed.

In addition to Professor George, other local leaders chimed in.

Pastor Mario Gonzalez, Hope Center Tabernacle, Jersey City:

Greg Quinlan, President & Executive Director at Center for Garden State Families: