CBN NEWS – Four pastors in Massachusetts are dropping their lawsuit against the state after the attorney general’s office revised the interpretation of a new gender identity anti-discrimination law which categorized churches as places of public accommodation.

The state’s move protects the First Amendment rights of Massachusetts churches to express their beliefs about gender and sexuality and operate their bathrooms in a manner consistent with their theology.

Classifying churches as places of public accommodation is virtually unprecedented and potentially opens them up to variety of anti-discrimination laws that could clash with their beliefs.

The trouble for churches came Sept. 1st, when the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination issued a “Gender Identity Guidance” that said churches could be considered as places of public accommodation under certain conditions. “A church could be seen as place of public accommodation if it holds a secular event, such as a spaghetti supper, that is open to the general public,” said the commission.

The guidance says that an individual’s gender identity can be identified “by an evidence that the gender identity is sincerely held as a part of the person’s core identity.”

The attorney general’s office also issued a “Gender Identity Guidance for Public Accommodations” and said that “houses of worship” are places of public accommodation.

Now, the attorney general’s office says that its revision to the guidance removes the “categorical reference to ‘houses of worship’ as an example of a ‘place of public accommodation.'”