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Nancy Webster bows her head in prayer during the rally. Attendees say the health care mandate is not only an attack on employers but on their freedom to say no to something they believe is wrong.

Few Downtown Memphis workers stopped for the lunchtime rally on Friday.

But that didn't dampen the zeal of the approximately 150 people who took part in the Stand Up for Religious Freedom Rally at Civic Center Plaza on North Main.

The gathering, one of 160 events in other U.S. cities, was in protest of the Affordable Care Act's Health and Human Services Mandate which requires faith-based employers like schools and hospitals to provide contraceptives and other forms of reproductive care.

"This campaign is about stirring the whole community in a grass-roots effort to mobilize people to stand up for the freedom of religion," said organizer Kent Pruett.

Attendees say the mandate was not just an attack on employers but on their freedom to say no to something they believe is wrong.

"It's an infringement upon the freedom of conscience and as far as I'm concerned the freedom of conscience is the big thing," said Stan Schulz of Germantown. "That pertains not only to health and human services, that pertains to abortions, where you can send your children to school, where you go to church, where you can hold rallies like this. It pertains to many different things."

The First Amendment prohibits the establishment of a state religion, prohibits laws that inhibit the free exercise of religion and guarantees the right to free speech.

And while we often hear about free speech, it is worth noting that freedom of religion is mentioned first in the First Amendment, said speaker Paul Houghland, the Family Action Council of Tennessee's director of community relations for Shelby County and West Tennessee.

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Stand Up for Religious Freedom Rally protests health care mandate