Colorado Christian Baker Receives Award for ‘Courage in the Face of Power’

Jack Phillips, the Colorado Christian cakeshop owner who refused to make a cake for a same-sex wedding, has received the “Courage in the Face of Power: Daniel Award.”

According to CBN News, Phillips was given the award at the 2017 Weyrich Awards Dinner in Washington D.C. on Tuesday, October 17.

The Weyrich organization gives the award each year to a person who has shown courage and remained true to his/her convictions despite being up against resistance from those in power.

Phillips has been engaged in a years-long battle which began when he declined to make a cake for a same-sex couple, citing his religious beliefs. Since then, he has lost his case with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, but with help from Alliance Defending Freedom, he appealed his case to the U.S. Supreme Court which has agreed to hear it.

Oral arguments in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission are scheduled for December 5.

Phillips has become a nationally-known figure, but the baker from Lakewood, CO says he simply wants to be able to run the business he loves while being allowed to live out his deeply-held religious beliefs.

Phillips has also said that he would gladly make a cake for a gay individual for a birthday or other event, but he cannot in good conscience make a cake for a same-sex wedding.

Photo: In this March 10, 2014 photo, Masterpiece Cakeshop owner Jack Phillips decorates a cake inside his store in Lakewood, Colo. Phillips is appealing a recent ruling against him in a legal complaint filed with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission by a gay couple who sought a wedding cake from him after he refused, based on his religious beliefs.

Photo courtesy: AP/Brennan Linsley via Religion News Service

Publication date: October 20, 2017