Finland court rules in favor of politician accused of ‘hate speech’ for tweeting Bible verse… And there’s Ms. Räsänen’s sin: questioning the religion of LGBT…
A Finnish court dismissed all charges against parliament member Päivi Räsänen after she was accused of hate speech for tweeting a Bible verse, according to a press release.
Räsänen was charged in 2021 with “agitation against a minority group,” which falls under the “war crimes and crimes against humanity” section in the Finnish criminal code. The Helsinki Court of Appeal found Räsänen not guilty Tuesday, affirming the ruling of a district court that acquitted her in March 2022, according to the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF).
The charges against Räsänen stemmed from a 2019 tweet sharing a Bible verse and questioning her church’s sponsorship of a pride parade, along with statements sharing her beliefs on a 2019 radio show and a 2004 pamphlet she published, titled “Male & Female He Created Them.” The publisher of the pamphlet, Lutheran Bishop Juhana Pohjola, was tried alongside Räsänen.
The Bible verse is apparently Romans 1:24-27. The rest of her tweet is simply mentioning that a church is somehow a partner of an LGBT pride group, and asks whether sin is compatible with pride (or with church doctrine?). It’s not translated coherently, or else some grammatical nuance is lost.
As for Romans, line 24 refers to people having sex. Either sex is degrading, or certain forms of sex are degrading. Line 25 explains why, because creature is confused for creator, reinforcing the message of lines 21 through 23. Lines 26 and 27 explain that degrading lust is the result of the line 25, and proof of this can be seen in lesbians and gays. The end of line 27 says that these men received in themselves “that recompense of their error which was meet.” They got what they deserved, but it could also potentially be a dirty reference.
“At the heart of the prosecutor’s examination of Räsänen was this: would she recant her beliefs?” Paul Coleman, Executive Director of ADF International and part of Räsänen’s legal team, said in a statement.
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“The answer was no – she would not deny the teachings of her faith. The cross-examination bore all the resemblance of a ‘heresy’ trial of the middle ages; it was implied that Räsänen had ‘blasphemed’ against the dominant orthodoxies of the day.”
ADF President Kristen Waggoner tweeted that Räsänen’s victory “should resonate globally.”
“Free speech isn’t just an American political liberty,” Waggoner tweeted. “It’s a human right. What happened to Päivi should not happen in any free society. We are grateful for this victory.”
BREAKING: FREE SPEECH VICTORY FOR FINNISH POLITICIAN ON TRIAL FOR A BIBLE VERSE TWEET!!
The Helsinki District Court has ruled UNANIMOUSLY that @PaiviRasanen and Bishop Pohjola are NOT GUILTY of “hate speech”.
Reactions & more in our PRESS RELEASE: https://t.co/Swm8fBAWrv pic.twitter.com/jBmUyVBhxC
— ADF International (@ADFIntl) November 14, 2023
Räsänen said she is “deeply relieved” by the court’s ruling.
“It isn’t a crime to tweet a Bible verse, or to engage in public discourse with a Christian perspective,” Räsänen said in a statement. “The attempts made to prosecute me for expressing my beliefs have resulted in an immensely trying four years, but my hope is that the result will stand as a key precedent to protect the human right to free speech.”
Prosecutors have the option to appeal to the Finnish Supreme Court by Jan. 15, 2024, according to the press release. [TDC, TAC]
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