American fast food chain Chick-fil-A has this week quietly closed its second UK branch in Scotland following substantial pressure from the LGBT lobby.
Chick-fil-A launched its first restaurant in Reading shopping centre, The Oracle, in October 2019, with a second outlet opening in Aviemore in the Highlands last year.
Chick-fil-A has a long history of being targeted by LGBT activists in the USA for the company’s alleged support for traditional marriage and historical donations to charities that uphold the Biblical definition of marriage.
Shortly after opening its first branch in the UK, the company once again came under fire, with local LGBT activists calling for it to be closed down. The Oracle quickly issued a release stating they would not renew Chick-fil-A’s six-month lease after it expired. The Reading branch is due to close in April.
However, after news broke of its second outlet in the Highlands, LGBT campaigner Scott Cuthbertson began a petition to close that branch down, too, gaining some 1,200 signatures.
Carys Moseley has previously suggested that there is evidence that Chick-fil-A has been gradually “capitulating to the intimidation of LBGT activists for several years,” notably when it stopped donating to Christian charities Exodus International and Family Research Council in 2011.
More recently, the chicken chain has been criticised by many Christians after it made a large donation to Covenant House, a charity that supports the LGBT agenda while working with homeless young people.
Despite the chain drifting from its Christian principles, LGBT opposition to the company has remained determined, calling for boycotts of the two UK restaurants and celebrating its closure.
Chick-fil-A said in a statement that the company closed its doors in Aviemore on 18 January “in line with our plan for a temporary pilot licensed location.”
It continued: “These insights will help us immensely as we look to having a permanent location in the UK in future.”
However, Carys Moseley warns that the company must not cave to pressure from the LGBT lobby if it wants to stay in the UK, and should stop giving out mixed messages to Christians:
“It is hard not to escape the conclusion that Chick-fil-A has changed its donation priorities under compulsion, perhaps more of an inner than an outer compulsion born of fear of yet more LGBT activists’ intimidation and shaming. God has promised that He will bless those who are generous in His Kingdom. He has never promised to bless giving to causes that attack Him as the creator. Christian businesses, take note.”
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