Is Quoting the Bible Becoming a Hate Crime in America? One Pastor Risks Jail Time If He Keeps Speaking Truth

By William Wolfe , Standing For Freedom, 5/15/23

“Do you know where people get thrown in jail for their social media posts? In China. In Saudi Arabia. In Russia. Not in the United States of America — or so we always thought. Until now.”–WILLIAM WOLFE

America was founded by Christians seeking the freedom to preach and practice their faith, as compelled by their conscience. By the 1630s, thousands of Puritans had fled to America seeking a land in which they could worship God without persecution, to speak freely about what the Bible says about good and evil; right and wrong; sin and righteousness.

Now, almost 400 years later, a street preacher in Oklahoma is facing possible jail time if he continues to do just that — speak his mind freely about his sincerely held religious beliefs. In fact, if all he does is share Bible verses, they still might lock him up.

Reporting on this developing story, the Christian Post explains that Rich Penkoski “faces the possibility of arrest if he protests the activities of an Oklahoma LGBT advocacy organization online or in person after being hit with a restraining order for posting about a lesbian couple’s church wedding ceremony on Facebook.”

In 2022, Penkoski, who runs an online organization called Warriors for Christ, began using his First Amendment freedoms of speech and religious expression to speak biblical truth about the sinful and immoral practices of a local church in Bartlesville that supports same-sex “marriage” and has even hosted drag queen shows with children in attendance.

In his posts, Penkoski shared verses like Romans 1:32, which states: “and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.”

He also shared Matthew 18:6, which states: “whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.”

In response to Penkoski’s faithful proclamation of God’s Word, one of the homosexual couples who had been married in the local church sought a restraining order against him for “threatening” and “harassing” them.

Amazingly, this past February, Washington County District Court Judge Linda Thomas granted the couple a five-year protective order against Penkoski “after they claimed they felt unsafe in Bartlesville,” according to Fox News.

Now, The Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties organization that “defends individuals whose constitutional rights have been threatened or violated and educates the public on a wide spectrum of issues affecting their freedoms,” has taken up Penkoski’s case and is appealing to the Oklahoma Supreme Court.

In an interview with CBN, John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, raisedthe alarm on the ramifications of this case, explaining,

“He can be put in jail, fined, taken away if he says anything in terms of Bible verses or anything dealing with these LGBT people that felt threatened by one of the Bible verses. He never approached anybody physically or contacted them directly. He just posted on social media.”

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Is Quoting the Bible Becoming a Hate Crime in America? One Pastor Risks Jail Time If He Keeps Speaking Truth