We are currently having this issue here in Moscow ID, thanks to a local cult, Christ Church led by Doug Wilson. They have been a pain in the ass and are actively buying up as much of downtown as they can to move their own businesses in, pulling leases out from under other businesses and in one case, managing to get the Hot Topic closed at our local mall by buying the franchise out from under the franchise owner and then closing the store. We have two universities in the area so it was a very profitable site. But horrors of horrors, it sold clothing for young women that the male leaders of the "church" didn't approve of.

Women are also supposed to keep their mouths shut, obey their lords and masters in everything, and don't get me started on the exploitation and sexual abuse of young women. Then there is the pedophile that Dougie boy has protected and gotten off with a slap on the wrist so he can go and repeat his crimes on his infant boy the pedo had with the original victim, who was forced by the church to marry her abuser!

They bullied the city council into letting them open a college downtown, in violation of the regulations forbidding such (originally put in because the UI was starting to own a few downtown buildings that weren't subject to taxes) by screaming religious persecution. Which is the usual tactic to get what they want. They won't be satisfied until they have the whole town under their thumb and anyone not in their church will be 2nd class citizens.

It's been a fight for quite a while and the rest of us are not giving in. Thankfully their numbers are still low, but they are actively trying to get more people to move here, even building new housing projects to sell to their new followers.

Going into the BS they pulled during Covid is a whole 'nuther story.