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KEN CHITWOOD

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“The person who knows only one religion, knows none”
— Max Müller

German Pastor to Pay for Anti-LGBTQ Statements

September 2, 2024

Nearly five years after a German pastor sparked controversy with comments about homosexuality, the legal dispute appears to be over with a settlement of 5,000 euros (about $5,550 USD).

Olaf Latzel, pastor of a conservative congregation in the state-privileged Protestant Church, called homosexuality “degenerative” and “demonic.” He condemned what he called the “homolobby” and slammed “these criminals” at a Berlin LGBTQ pride celebration, “running around everywhere.” Latzel made the comments during a 2019 marriage seminar. Only about 30 couples attended, but the seminar was later shared on YouTube.

He was charged with incitement of hate against a people group and found guilty in 2020 in the Bremen District Court. Latzel was ordered to pay a fine of 90 euros per day for 90 days—the equivalent of nearly $9,000 USD.

Latzel appealed and won in regional court. The judge ruled that while offensive, the pastor’s comments were nonetheless protected by constitutional protections of freedom of religion and freedom of expression.

Prosecutors appealed that decision and in February 2023 the Higher Regional Court deemed the case “incomplete” and sent it back to Bremen.

Now, the Bremen Regional Court has suspended the proceedings, with one condition: the pastor must give 5,000 Euros to the nonprofit Rat & Tat-Zentrum für Queeres Leben (Advice and Action Center for Queer Life) in Bremen.

Latzel has six months to transfer the funds. With that, the case against him will be dropped completely.

Read the full story at Christianity Today
In Religion and Culture, Religion News Tags Olaf Letzel, Germany, Evangelicals in Europe, LGBTQI rights, LGBT, Homosexuality, Bremen, Ken Chitwood, Christianity Today
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Image via Unsplash.

Culture Wars 3.0

July 9, 2024

How we identify — according to race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion or gender — is at the heart of hundreds of bills in legislatures across the country. And as U.S. voters across the political spectrum gear up for the 2024 presidential cycle, debates are intensifying about how to define the nation’s values around these issues.

Just weeks ago, the U.S. Supreme Court announced it will hear arguments on the constitutionality of state bans on gender-affirming care for transgender minors.

The issue has emerged as a big one in the past few years. While transgender people have gained more visibility and acceptance in many respects, half of U.S. states have instituted laws banning certain health care services for transgender kids.

In recent years, voters have been particularly fired up about the lessons and books that should, and shouldn’t, be taught to children about their bodies or the nation’s past. But those culture wars have also come to corporate America and college sports.

These renewed culture wars have take over everything from local school board meetings to state legislatures and the U.S. Capitol.

In the following, I unpack how we got here and round up stories and sources for going deeper into the culture wars’ decadeslong history.

Read more at Patheos
Dig deeper at ReligionLink
In #MissedInReligion, Religion, Religion and Culture, Religion News, ReligionLink Tags Culture wars, What you missed without religion class, ReligionLink, Elections 2024, Transgender rights, LGBTQI rights, Gender, Sexual orientation, Schools, Education, Religious freedom
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Image: Courtesy of ADF

Christian Politician Awaits Finnish Court’s Verdict on Hate Speech Charges—Again

September 14, 2023

The facts are the same. The arguments, the same. But for two days in an appeals court in Helsinki, prosecution and defense rehashed the arguments that previously cleared Finnish politician Päivi Räsänen and Evangelical Lutheran Mission bishop Juhana Pohjola of charges of criminal incitement against a minority group.

State prosecutors argued there was a mistake last March. They say the district court weighed the evidence incorrectly, setting the threshold for “incitement” too high. According to them, a pamphlet the former minister of the interior published with a conservative Lutheran press in 2004, and comments she made about homosexuality on Twitter and on a national radio show in 2019, should be judged as hate speech.

State prosecutor Anu Mantila says Räsänen’s comments are not only disagreeable and offensive, but harmful.

“Offensive speech has a damaging effect on people,” she said.

Read the full piece here
In Church Ministry, Religion and Culture, Religion News Tags Paivi Räsänen, Finland, Juhana Pohjola, Free speech, Freedom of religion, LGBTQI rights, LGBT, Hate speech, Lutheran, Lutherans
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Photo by K8 on Unsplash.

Persecution or Proper Protection? In Finland, a case looks set to probe where religious freedom ends and other human rights begin

January 3, 2022

In August 2021, church leaders, families, and politicians gathered for Juhana Pohjola’s consecration as Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland (ELMDF). 

Under tents protecting them from the late summer sun, participants celebrated Pohjola’s investiture. They also shared concerns about the heat he and others faced outside the tents’ sheltering canvas. 

That’s because Finland’s Prosecutor General Raija Toiviainen is charging Pohjola, 49, along with Päivi Räsänen, 61, a member of the Finnish parliament in attendance at the consecration, with criminal incitement against a minority group. 

According to the prosecutor, Räsänen has fueled intolerance and contempt of LGBT people three times: in comments she made on a nationally syndicated talk show on Finnish state-supported radio; in a 2019 tweet where she quoted Romans 1:24–27 to criticize the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland (ELCF)—one of Finland’s two national churches—for its affiliation with Helsinki Pride; and in a 23-page booklet that Räsänen wrote titled Male and Female He Created Them. 

Juhana Pohjola.

Pohjola is being charged for publishing Räsänen’s booklet, which argues against same-sex marriage, contrasts LGBT identities with the Christian notion of what it means to be human, and describes same-sex attraction possibly as being inherently sinful and possibly the result of a “negative developmental disorder.” It was released in 2004 by Luther Foundation Finland, the legal entity behind the ELMDF.

For the Prosecutor General, Räsänen’s comments violate the equality and dignity of homosexuals, potentially fueling intolerance and contempt toward the LGBTQI community and thus transcend the limits of free speech and religion. 

Some of Pohjola’s and Räsänen’s allies, however, frame the trial as persecution, an attack on the proclamation of the “pure Gospel.”

Although human rights organizations and religious communities often share common cause, there are issues of moral conviction that can become points of divergence, said legal scholar Farrah Raza. The debate over “normative clarity” around conditions placed on religious freedom when beliefs or practices are deemed to be at variance with other fundamental human rights — such as LGBTQI rights — is one such instance, she said. 

The question becomes whether the specter of persecution becomes a rhetorical tool used to exclude and suppress other groups’ basic rights. The friction, said Raza, is not between “religion” and “human rights” per se, but how the two are respectively interpreted and applied, she reasoned. 

Beyond Finland’s particular politics — or the question of whether or not it rises to the level of “persecution” — this case, due to begin on January 24, 2022, has caught international attention and is being viewed as a precedent-setting example of how secular states might draw the fault lines between religious freedom and the protection of human rights. 

Read the fully story at Christianity Today
In Church Ministry, Religion and Culture, Religion News Tags Juhana Pohjola, ELMDF, Finland, Lutherans, Perse, Human rights, LGBT, LGBTQI rights, Paivi Räsänen, Raija Toiviainen, Farrah Raza
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