Andrew Garfield Tells Christian Bakers: 'Bake a Cake for Everyone' at Tony Awards
Hollywood actor Andrew Garfield, who has starred in a number of major Christian films, used his speech at the Tony Awards in New York on Sunday to urge bakers to bake cakes for all people, including the LGBT community.
The Associated Press reported that Garfield won the Tony Award for best leading actor in a play for his work in "Angels In America," where he plays a young gay man living with AIDS.
Garfield, who on the big screen has played major Christian roles, such as in Mel Gibson's "Hacksaw Ridge" and Martin Scorsese's "Silence," dedicated his win to the LGBT community, stating that they have fought and died for the right to love.
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"We are all sacred and we all belong," the actor said.
He added, "[let's] just bake a cake for everyone who wants a cake to be baked," seemingly in reference to the recent Supreme Court decision that backed Christian baker Jack Phillips and his refusal to make a custom-made cakes for gay wedding celebration.
The 7-2 high court decision earlier in June found that the state of Colorado had previously violated the First Amendment when it punished Phillips and his Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood for refusing to make a custom cake for the wedding of Dave Mullins and Charlie Craig in 2012, when same-sex marriage was still illegal in the state.
Phillips has continuously insisted that he does not discriminate against anybody and that he serves gay people in his shop. At the same time, he says that his religious beliefs that marriage is solely a union between one man and one woman prevent him from making a cake that expresses support for gay marriage.
"I serve everybody," Phillips told the "Today" show last week.
"I don't discriminate against anybody," he said. "It's just that I don't create cakes for every occasion that people ask me to create ... a wedding is just an inherently religious event and the cake is definitely a specific message that goes with that."
Alliance Defending Freedom attorney Kristen Waggoner, who represented the Colorado baker, said that the decision is about tackling "government hostility toward people of faith."
"Tolerance and respect for good-faith differences of opinion are essential in a society like ours. This decision makes clear that the government must respect Jack's beliefs about marriage," Waggoner stated.
Garfield, also known for Hollywood blockbusters such as "The Amazing Spiderman," has previously talked about how deeply he was affected playing a 17th century Jesuit priest in "Silence."
"There were so many things in the exercises that changed me and transformed me, that showed me who I was ... and where I believe God wants me to be," the actor said in January 2017.
"What was really easy was falling in love with this person, was falling in love with Jesus Christ. That was the most surprising thing," he added.
"That was the most remarkable thing ... falling in love, and how easy it was to fall in love with Jesus."
He argued that he also feels many have given Jesus a "bad name," however.
"I felt so bad for [Jesus] and angry on His behalf when I finally did meet Him, because everyone has given Him such a bad name," Garfield said at the time. "And He has been used for so many dark things."
