FEBRUARY 28, 2020 BY MICHAEL STONE
Speaking Truth To Power: Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams conservative Christians for using “religious freedom” as a cover for “bigotry and discrimination.”
Speaking at a House hearing entitled “The Administration’s Religious Liberty Assault on LGBTQ Rights” earlier this week, Ocasio-Cortez went after conservative Christians trying to weaponize “religious freedom,” at one point declaring:
I am tired of communities of faith being weaponized and being mischaracterized because the only time religious freedom is invoked is in the name of bigotry and discrimination.
Ocasio-Cortez began her powerful remarks by noting:
I’m experiencing this hearing and I’m struggling whether I respond or launch into this question as a legislator or from the perspective of a woman of faith…
The congresswoman went on to note that the conservative Christians have a long history of using their religion to justify all sorts of intolerable evil, such as slavery, Jim Crow, and racial segregation:
It’s very difficult to sit here and listen to arguments in the long history in this country of using scripture and weaponizing and abusing scripture to justify bigotry. White supremacists have done it, those who justified slavery did it, those who fought against integration did it, and we’re seeing it today.
Ocasio-Cortez continued, noting how confused and dishonest conservative Christians are when it comes to their own holy book, explaining:
If Christ himself walked through these doors and said what he said thousands of years ago – that we should love our neighbor and our enemy, that we should welcome the stranger, fight for the least of us, that is is easier… for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into a kingdom of heaven – he would be maligned as a radical and rejected from these doors.
Speaking about the challenges transgender people face getting medical care, the congresswoman said:
There is nothing holy about rejecting medical care of people, no matter who they are, on the grounds of what their identity is; There is nothing holy about turning someone away from a hospital.
In concluding her remarks the congresswoman said:
The only time religious freedom is invoked is in the name of bigotry and discrimination. I’m tired of it.
This is not the first time the congresswoman has challenged toxic conservative Christians. Previously Ocasio-Cortez called out religious conservatives for their misogyny after Alabama’s sweeping ban on abortion was signed into law, noting that abortion bans are about religious fundamentalists “owning women.”
And last June Ocasio-Cortez called out religious conservatives for their hypocrisy by noting that they only invoke religion “to punish women and queer people.”
As for conservative Christians, many fear the truth-telling congresswoman, with some even believing that Ocasio-Cortez is a witch guided by demons and leading an attack against President Donald Trump.
Bottom line: Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams conservative Christians for using “religious freedom” as a cover for “bigotry and discrimination.”
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