Many Christian pastors and celebrities are warning that some politicians taking advantage of the pandemic to enact religious persecution throughout the nation. Southern Baptist leader Albert Mohler Jr. believes that some politicians are using the COVID-19 pandemic as a way to enact policies that reflect an “overt hostility” toward churches. The president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, was a speaker at the recent Values Voter Summit.  

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins interviewed Mohler for the segment, with the former talking about a “spiritual dynamics” to recent events in the United States. At one point, Perkins asked Mohler when churches should start to question “the motives of government” regarding COVID-19 pandemic restrictions on in-person worship.  

Mohler responded he believed “some politicians have used COVID-19 as an opportunity for overt hostility to religious congregations and especially the Christian churches. And that overt hostility is what we have to confront.”

“No government authority has a right to say that the church isn’t essential. No government authority has the right to tell us how we are to order our worship services, and no government has the authority to say that Christian churches or other religious gatherings can be uniquely discriminated against,” Mohler continued.

Several states, including California and Oregon, still call for churches to be closed. Yet, they allow for bars and strip clubs to remain open. In Nevada, churches have a 50-person cap on religious gatherings while the state allows for casinos to operate at 50% of capacity.

Mohler did express support for “reasonable, temporary, generally applicable rules” aimed at curbing the pandemic, but warned, “that’s not what we’re looking at in some cases.” The inconsistencies are staggering when it comes to churches.

As an example, Mohler referenced Capitol Hill Baptist Church of Washington, D.C., which recently filed a lawsuit against Mayor Murriel Bowser over outdoor worship gathering restrictions. The suit accused Bowser and government officials of being “discriminatory in their application of the ban on large scale gatherings,” pointing out that the mayor herself spoke at an outdoor event in June that had thousands of attendees.

In a similar manner, actor Jim Caviezel spoke out against cancel culture, saying religious leaders in America need to rise up because churches are under persecution. Caviezel, best known for his portrayal of Jesus Christ in “The Passion of the Christ,” told Fox News that Christians are “being persecuting for their faith. If Christians don’t watch out, it will be canceling Christianity as well.”

The actor, whose latest film “Infidel” is a true story about an American Christian who’s kidnapped in Cairo, Egypt, and imprisoned in Iran under false spying charges, called on Christian leaders to stand up for their faith. “A lot of our pastors, our bishops, our priests, they’re laying right over. They let their churches be burned. How do we know that? Well, it’s right there in the news,” he said. “That’s why we’re in this situation right now. We can’t go to churches. We can’t go into our church. Why? Because they could get contaminated, right? So why are we on airplanes?”

Caviezel insisted that keeping churches closed during the pandemic is affecting those who need it most in these times. “I have had friends that have committed suicide. I have seven SEAL buddies that lost seven of their friends committing suicide. Would it have helped to get into a church especially during this time? Absolutely. And is it good for mental illness? Yes, it is,” he stressed.

Churches across the country closed their doors beginning in the spring to help curb the spread of COVID-19. With gathering restrictions still in place months later, some churches have chosen to defy orders or file lawsuits, claiming discrimination against places of worship, including the aforementioned Capitol Hill Baptist church and John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church among others.