The recent Prime Minister has been accused by LGBT activists of hypocrisy, and the church of spreading hate. Religious analysts say that neither Christianity nor the hardline bishops want LGBT. Is the state playing ping-pong with human destinies? And why should Montenegro be a role model for Serbia?

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Greece has become the first Orthodox country to legalize gay marriages and allow same-sex couples to adopt children. In Serbia, this is not yet a topic, but in the spring of 2021, a law on same-sex partnerships was announced, which solves the legal problems faced by gay couples in Serbia. Why there is no such law three years later – that was discussed in the first episode of “Let’s Understand Each Other”.

The Ministry of Human and Minority Rights and Social Dialogue says that they submitted the Draft Law to the Government of Serbia in April 2021, but it was never considered at any session of the Government.

“The Ministry was not informed by the Government’s General Secretariat that the material needed to be supplemented. After the elections for national deputies and the formation of a new Government in 2022, the Draft Law was returned to the Ministry without instructions for further action. Resubmitting the existing Draft Law to the Government for consideration must be initiated by the government itself,” the Ministry claims.

“This is billiards – it seems that you have put the law into some hole and there is no one to pull it out, you have to insert a token,” says lawyer Milan Antonijević.

“The law can indeed be returned, that is, it is also on the ministry, it does not have to hide behind the government’s decision, because there are no formal, clear steps. So, when you return the law, you must clearly give instructions. Therefore, it could have been brought before the Constitutional Court to raise the question of what is the fate of a law that is just pushed aside and how to continue this billiard game,” says Antonijević.

The finger can be pointed at the parliament, not at one man

Antonijević also reminds of the statement by the President of the Republic that he will not sign such a law.

“You cannot do this indefinitely, meaning according to the Sretenje Constitution of 1835, you could have done it twice as a prince. The current Constitution states that you can return it once. Then, when the parliament adopts it again, the return from the president no longer means anything, but the law comes into force,” says Antonijević, adding that perhaps this is a way to pass the law without pointing a finger at one person.

He emphasizes that such a law does not endanger the institution of marriage, which is defined in the Constitution as a union of a man and a woman, but allows legal protection for same-sex couples – inheritance of property, pensions, hospital visits, taking out loans…

Missed Opportunity of Ana Brnabić

LGBT activist Marko Mihailović believes that there is no political will to allow gay couples in Serbia to have the same rights as others.

“It is hypocritical that we have had three governments led by Ana Brnabić, a woman who is openly gay, who has a partner with whom she has a child, that she did not feel it appropriate to regulate something that we have been demanding for just 20 years. I also fear that all those loud opponents of regulating same-sex unions lack empathy and understanding of how their - it’s not even an argument but simply spreading panic and some crazy conspiracy theories - affects the lives of people like me,” says Mihailović.

The Church Chooses Not to Propagate Love for One’s Neighbor

Mihailović also points out that the Serbian Orthodox Church further raises tensions in society, whose bishops have stated that they would use weapons against the LGBT population if they had them, and blamed the devastating May floods of 2014 on the victory of Austrian singer and drag queen Conchita Wurst at Eurovision.

“They choose not to propagate peace, they choose not to propagate love for one’s neighbor, but choose to raise tensions, choose to call some people animals, to talk that we are not worthy of I don’t know what. If God exists and if Christian teaching is correct, they will go to hell,” says Mihailović.

Religious analyst Draško Đenović, on the other hand, points out that the Christian faith, neither in the Holy Scripture nor in tradition, accepts LGBT, so it is not surprising that the Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church opposed the adoption of this law.

Hardline Bishops, Patriarch’s Rhetoric, and Messages from the Vatican

For example, the Greek Orthodox Church provided some resistance to the legalization of gay marriages, but it is significantly more liberal than the Serbian Orthodox Church, which is turned towards the past, says Đenović.

“You must understand that the patriarch is among the younger and modern bishops and that he has enough problems within the assembly, which consists of 40-something bishops who disagree with him because they consider him to be liberal, lenient, and everything else… There is still a large number of hardline bishops,” Đenović notes.

Guests of the show “Let’s Understand Each Other” do not agree on whether the patriarch has properly distanced himself from spreading intolerance towards the gay population, whether the message of acceptance of same-sex couples sent by the pope and the Vatican is sincere, and whether overindulgence in food and drink is a greater sin than homosexuality.

Source: Radio-Television of Serbia