In Finland, a member of the parliament and former Minister of the Interior Päivi Räsänen has appeared before trial over three charges of incitement against a minority group of the Finnish society. The Christian Democrat politician has cited the Bible to argument, why she did not comprehend the support by the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland to a Pride parade in Helsinki, Finnish public broadcaster YLE reports.
Out of the three charges, one relates to a tweet sent by Räsänen in 2019 about that year’s Pride parade, in which she asked how «the church’s founding doctrine the Bible fits with shame and sin being celebrated as pride». The text was tweeted together with a photograph of verses from the Bible, translated into Finnish between 1933 and 1938. In a police interview ahead of the trial, the Finnish politician noted that she had wanted to provoke discussion with her opinion, and not to offend gay people, as Räsänen believed these were important issues related to freedom of speech and religion. In 2019, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland had been one of the official sponsors of the Pride parade in Helsinki in 2019.
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YLE, reports that the other two charges in the case tried by the Helsinki District Court since Monday, January 24, concern Räsänen’s writings on the websites of the Luther Foundation Finland, a conservative reform movement, and the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland, as well as her publications and statements on numerous social media and on an Yle Puhe radio programme.
The case marks the first time in Finland that a court will rule on whether quoting the Bible can be considered a crime, YLE reports.
Finnish ex-minister tried for incitement against homosexual people, citing Bible
