Evangelical Church Concerned about Section 53 Ruling

Lance Lewis

The Evangelical Churches today offered their interpretation of the recent ruling relating to Section fifty-three.  On December thirtieth, 2019, the Court of Appeal handed down a judgment, upholding the Chief Justice’s ruling on Section Fifty of the Belize Criminal Code in which he found that it contravened the constitutional rights to dignity, equality before the law, privacy, freedom of expression and non-discrimination on the grounds of sex, and was therefore unconstitutional.  CJ Kenneth Benjamin also ruled that the word sex is to include sexual orientation. Eight days after the judgment, the National Evangelical Association of Belize hosted a press conference in Belize City where they claimed that such a ruling will have disastrous ramifications for Belize. 

Pastor Lance Lewis, President, NEAB

“We are, however, gravely concerned at the Appeals Court ruling last week upholding that “Sex in the Constitution is meant to include Sexual Orientation.” This is Judicial Activism, where one judge changed the meaning of our Constitution with the stroke of a pen, bypassing Parliamentary and Constitutional procedures. This will have disastrous ramifications for Belize. And what is the definition of Sexual Orientation? Whose definition? Pedophilia is currently claimed as a “sexual orientation” by pedophiles, so now a “fluid, evolving” definition will form the basis for non-discrimination in our Constitution? We and our member churches are vehemently opposed to man’s efforts to redefine marriage and sexuality, which man did not create. God did! As we have warned for years in this battle, the LGBT now have a green light by the Court for same sex marriage and to teach our children and grandchildren in schools that “homosexuality and transgenderism is normal and natural.” Belize, wake up! And our Government is quietly fast-tracking Anti-Discrimination and Hate Speech legislation set for Public Consultation this month, January, yet has not given us a copy of the Law? Neither legislation nor judicial decision can ever turn an unnatural “human wrong” into a “human right,” nor can it confer “human dignity” upon acts in which there is no dignity! For those who will mock God with “the sky is falling,” we caution, after years of loving, patient warning by God and Noah, a “sky of rain” did fall! No doubt, God will have the last word! He calls us all to repent”