This Wednesday, April 19, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear a religious–liberties case, Trinity Lutheran v. Comer, that focuses on a playground on a church campus in Columbia, Mo., but could have widespread impact across the nation.

The court is at full strength this week for the first time in more than a year, thanks to the addition of Justice Neil Gorsuch earlier this month to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

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Early media reports are portraying today’s confirmation of federal appeals Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court as a victory for President Donald Trump. The Senate confirmed him by a 54–45 vote on April 7.

Our view is that it is a victory for all Americans, because Judge Gorsuch is temperamentally and ideologically prepared to serve with distinction on the nation’s highest court.

Forget the vitriol you’ve heard about Gorsuch occupying a "stolen seat" — the truth is much different. Both major candidates accepted that the vacancy was part of the stakes of the 2016 presidential election. And as President Barack Obama never tired of telling us, elections have consequences.

Click here to respond to your U.S. Senators concerning the April 7 vote.

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The U.S. Senate March 30 passed and sent to President Donald J. Trump legislation that, if signed, would let states move federal Title X funds from Planned Parenthood to legitimate women’s health–care providers.

The 51–50 vote required Vice President Mike Pence, in his role as presiding officer of the Senate, to break a deadlock on the resolution. No matter. Assuming President Trump signs the legislation, states will have the option over where their Title X funds go, and that’s a very good thing.

Click here to ask the president to sign House Joint Resolution 43.

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Confirmation hearings in the U.S. Senate this week represent a critical time for the Supreme Court and our nation, and have only confirmed for us our initial instinct that Judge Neil Gorsuch is an outstanding choice to succeed the late Justice Antonin Scalia on the U.S. Supreme Court. Judge Gorsuch is exceedingly qualified and embraces the Constitution and the rule of law.

We understand concerns that others have raised on specific issues, including critical questions surrounding the sanctity of human life and the importance of religious freedom. But Judge Gorsuch has made it profoundly clear that, on the high court, he would be a judge — someone who interprets the law, without using the office to create new law to achieve a preferred political result. That’s what we’ve long asked for from the men and women who serve in the federal judiciary, and that tells us Judge Gorsuch is eminently qualified to sit on the high court.

It is time for this confirmation process to move forward. CMC urges the U.S. Senate to promptly confirm Judge Neil Gorsuch to the U.S. Supreme Court. You can join us by clicking here to send an email to your state’s U.S. Senators, urging their "yes" vote on the judge.

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The Department of Justice this week walked away from a challenge to a voter ID law being litigated in Texas. And what it is no longer claiming is telling, because it’s something the federal government shouldn’t have pursued in the first place.

Despite progressive rhetoric to the contrary, it’s entirely appropriate to require voters to prove they are who they say they are and live where they say they live. This issue has already been settled in a 2008 U.S. Supreme Court case, and it’s been resurrected by election–reform opponents mainly as a means of stirring partisan rancor, in our view.

Click here to send an affirming email to Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

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The Trump administration on Feb. 22 took the welcome step of reversing the previous administration’s misguided attempt to forge social policy for public–school students who don’t accept their biological gender.

Because we were aghast at the Obama administration’s original action in 2015, we are pleased that the Trump administration has eliminated it. And we believe the hysterical response from the Left regarding this common–sense step reveals more about them than it does about boys and girls who are gender–confused.

Click here to thank President Donald Trump for his leadership on this issue.

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For most of America, the Super Bowl is an annual championship football game, played this year this coming Sunday. But for values voters and others interested in national politics, the Super Bowl came early this year – when President Donald Trump announced his nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court.

CMC believes the Senate should do its duty and confirm Judge Gorsuch promptly. There are no guarantees that he, or any judge, will always rule the way we’d like. But Gorsuch is eminently qualified. Most importantly, he correctly believes judges should stick to their constitutionally assigned role and interpret the law as applied in the cases that come before them, and not legislate their preferred public–policy solutions from the bench.

Click here to ask your U.S. Senators to support the Gorsuch nomination.

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Defense of the right to life is sometimes called a fringe issue, but it isn’t and never has been. Don’t be fooled by the crowds at last weekend’s Women’s March events in Washington and elsewhere — more than half of the nation opposes abortion, and a greater majority doesn’t understand why tax dollars ever pay for the violent termination of an unborn baby’s life.

It’s appropriate, then, that one of the first legislative priorities for the new Congress is found in H.R. 7, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion and Abortion Insurance Full Disclosure Act of 2017. This bill, if enacted into law, would keep the abortion industry away from the federal treasury. Importantly, it would also make the Hyde Amendment, passed annually to prohibit Medicaid funds from being used for abortion, a permanent part of federal law.

Click Congress is found in here to ask your Member of Congress to support H.R. 7 when it comes to the House floor for a vote.

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The inauguration of President Donald Trump on Jan. 20, as we’ve said before, represents "a chance to dramatically improve public policy concerning the nation’s most important issues — including life, religious liberties and the temperament of the federal judiciary. But that’s exactly what it is — a chance." There are no guarantees.

To seize the opportunity before us will require one of Jesus’s admonitions to His disciples: "Look, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves" (Matthew 10:16, MEV). We must be like the Old Testament tribe of Issachar, understanding the times as well as what to do about them. Importantly, we have to remember that being on the right side of the issues is no guarantee of success.

To begin to right our upside–down culture, we need to set attainable goals and work toward them smartly.

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We’ve thought often in the past week of The Candidate, the seminal 1972 film starring Robert Redford as a dark–horse political candidate who improbably wins a seat in the U.S. Senate. Overwhelmed with the implications of his victory toward the end of the film, Redford blankly asks his campaign manager (Peter Boyle), “Marvin…what do we do now?”

We’ll never know for sure, but we believe that question has been asked often among Donald Trump’s inner circle. Trump astounded almost every political pundit and, by all accounts, even himself in pulling off a dramatic, decisive victory in the Electoral College over Hillary Clinton. He deserves our congratulations and our earnest prayers as he forms a team that will lead the executive branch of our government when he’s inaugurated Jan. 20, 2017.

For values voters, Trump’s victory represents a chance to dramatically improve public policy concerning its most important issues — including life, religious liberties and the temperament of the federal judiciary. But that’s exactly what it is — a chance.

The Church’s unexpected opportunity for the next four years is far better than the alternative, but is far from guaranteed. In addition, the Church has its own battered reputation to rebuild in the months ahead.

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The nearly summer-long conflict between the Israeli Defense Force and the terrorist group Hamas no longer dominates world headlines. And that’s unfortunate, because we can’t recall a more stark contrast between right and wrong on the world stage in many years – or a more prominent reason why God commands Christian believers to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Full Story . . .

Two years ago the U.S. Supreme Court threw the overwhelmingly flawed Affordable Care Act a lifeline, ruling that one of its most contentious aspects – a financial penalty for not buying health-benefit coverage – was in fact a tax.

Another vital aspect of the law is being debated in the federal court system, and is likely headed to the U.S. Supreme Court for its term that begins in early October. If the high court rules that the law must be carried out as it was written, it will likely spell the end of the federal effort to take over the health-care system. That would be a good thing. Full Story . . .

Some members of the U.S. Senate, undeterred by a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision, are taking the reactionary step of seeking new government powers through an expansion of the federal Voting Rights Act. The court struck down portions of the civil-rights-era legislation last year as unnecessary.

Click here to tell your U.S. Senators to abandon this effort to re-write an insightful and important Supreme Court decision. Full Story . . .

Those of us who grew up believing that our public servants in Washington were there to protect our fundamental freedoms have been forced to shift our thinking in recent years. Increasingly, we are faced with the need to protect our fundamental freedoms from our public servants.

The latest case in point involves U.S. Senate President Harry Reid of Nevada, who last week made the case for a constitutional amendment that, he says, would take money out of election campaigns. The problem is, it would do so by violating one of our most cherished rights – the First Amendment guarantee of freedom of speech. This idea is a dead-skunk-in-the-road stinker, and it deserves to die a quick death.

Click here to ask your U.S. Senators to reject S. J. Res. 19, which would permit Congress to regulate political speech in the form of campaign contributions. Full Story . . .