Finnish MP Päivi Räsänen, who is also a Lutheran bishop, was unanimously acquitted by the Helsinki Court of Appeals on charges stemming from her 2019 tweet that took issue with the Finnish Lutheran Church’s promotion of LGBT “pride month” by citing verses from the Bible. She faced another charge for comments she made about homosexuality on a radio show.
She faced further charges for a pamphlet she wrote in 2004 titled “Male and Female He Created Them: Homosexual relationships challenge the Christian concept of humanity.” Bishop Juhana Pohjola of the Evangelical Lutheran Mission Diocese of Finland also faced charges for having published the pamphlet 19 years ago.
Räsänen, the former leader of Finland’s Christian Democratic Party, who also served as Finland’s interior minister from 2011 to 2015, had already been acquitted in March 2022 by the three-judge District Court of Helsinki, which ruled that the government should not be interpreting “biblical concepts.”
She was dragged back into court in August when state prosecutors appealed the lower court’s ruling. One prosecutor took issue with her description of homosexuality as “sin,” and argued that while she is free to cite the Bible, “it is Räsänen’s interpretation and opinion about the Bible verses that are criminal.”