After Luke Ash, a bi-vocational pastor, was fired from his job at the East Baton Rouge Parish Library on July 10 for his refusal to use the preferred pronouns of a transgender-identifying coworker, Dr. Lewis Richerson stood up in that same library to deliver his remarks at a July 17 public meeting to address its budget.

“Since your agenda includes the budget, I want to speak briefly about what the budget represents,” Richerson began. “A budget is more than a financial document. It reflects the priorities and values of an institution. And today, many of us in this community are asking, what kind of culture is this budget promoting and funding? Last week, Luke Ash, a faithful employee and pastor of this parish was fired for refusing to use pronouns that conflict with his Christian convictions. He did not mistreat or disrespect anyone. He simply could not, in good conscience, speak in a way that violates his faith.”

As Richerson spoke these words, the moderators of the discussion started interrupting him. For the next few minutes that he spoke, several different people attempted to speak over him. They started telling him to sit down. He continued reading his statement. One moderator started yelling: “Hello? You need to take a seat!”

Another moderator spoke up, telling Richerson to stay on the topic of the budget. Richerson continued to bring up his first point, that the budget was funding and promoting this kind of political agenda and progressive ideology. “Public dollars should not fund ideological coercion or religious discrimination,” he pointed out.

Eventually, one of the moderators just started to repeat into the microphone the same sentence: “Stay germane to the topic, sir.” Whenever Richerson attempted to continue speaking, the moderator loudly repeated the same sentence into the microphone. Finally, Richerson simply continued his speech, attempting to speak over both moderators who were now loudly attempting to drown him out by repeating the same lines into their microphones. As Richerson’s speech was ending, one moderator continued to shout: “Hello?” into her microphone.

After this dramatic ending to his speech, Richerson joined “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” to discuss how he first found out about Pastor Luke Ash’s firing.

“One of the pastors that served with Luke at his church is a young man that grew up in my church and discipled in the life of our church,” Richerson shared. “He sent me a message and said this was taking place and asked me just to be praying for Pastor Luke. … And I said, ‘Brother, you know, we’re here with you. We’re going to stand with you. I’ll do whatever I can.’”

Richerson compared his public remarks to the Apostle Paul’s testimony before King Agrippa. Paul spoke boldly, knowing that he was speaking God’s word. In the same way, Christians must be bold in speaking the word of God, especially in public contexts.

“Paul’s source of authority for what he’s going to say is the word of God. And we’ve got to have confidence in that and then be willing to step out and clearly articulate that in a kind, gracious, yet firm way. And that was part of my desire at the library the other day,” Richerson reflected.

Richerson emailed the library the same day he spoke. “We’ve heard absolutely nothing from them other than the response that they gave us Thursday at the board meeting,” Richerson stated.

Nevertheless, Richerson chose to stand boldly for God’s word. “I went into that conversation with the conviction I was going to finish my statement, and regardless of how they responded, I would not respond in like manner,” Richerson recalled. “I drew that inspiration and that encouragement from the text of Scripture, to do exactly those things, state the truth of God’s word, and do so kindly, and then not be intimidated by the Left.”

Richerson stated that he would not cease to fight for Pastor Ash being reinstated at the library and for a change in the library’s policy on pronouns.

“I will not be quiet. And I will not lead my church to be quiet or this community to be quiet, until those two demands are met. And I don’t think those are unreasonable.”

Evelyn Elliott serves as an intern at Family Research Council.