Voters in Switzerland recently decided to legalise same-sex marriages, making the country one of the last in Western Europe to do so. Italy now stands alone in Europe as an ivory tower, where same-sex marriage remains outlawed.
The legislation change in Switzerland seems to be in concurrence with the United States of America standpoint on this matter as evidenced during the Barack Obama regime in 2015 when a Supreme Court ruling legalised same-sex marriage in all the 50 states.
The push for LGBTQ liberties in Africa seems to tilt the balance with more than 22 out of the 54 states having legalised homosexuality. In 2006, South Africa became the first, and remains the only, African country to legalise same-sex marriage. More recently, Angola, Seychelles, Mozambique, Lesotho and Botswana have all passed laws that allow same-sex marriage.
Kenya and Uganda in East Africa, which are heavily Christian in religious perspective, have held that same-sex marriage remains outlawed as they go against the biblical view of marriage. The situation is even worse for gays and lesbians in Islamic countries in the North of Africa, where those involved in same-sex acts face the death penalty as well as in Mauritania, Nigeria (in states where Sharia law is applied), Somalia and South Sudan.
In addition to opening up the option of marriage to all couples, an amendment to Switzerland’s marriage law that was put to voters in a referendum, and approved, grants lesbian couples access to sperm banks and allows same-sex couples to adopt children.
Same-sex couples in Switzerland will now be able to have a civil wedding and will be granted largely the same institutional and legal rights as heterosexual couples. This includes simplified naturalisation for foreign partners, as well as access to fertility treatments and the ability to adopt children making it a safe haven for those who would want to explore this lifestyle.
Globally, many if not all religions maintain a conservative view of marriage. In Christianity, which is the leading world religion with more than 31 per cent of the world’s population, marriage is between a man and a woman. Any other perspective, especially those fronted by the LGBTQ community, is frowned upon as sin.
The same view is held by Islam (25 per cent), Hinduism (15 per cent), Buddhism (six per cent) and folk religion (five per cent), forcing regions globally to rethink and rewrite their scripts on this matter.
What is surprising in religious classification globally is the growing number of a group called irreligious or atheist, which now stands at more than 15 per cent of the world’s population.
Recent findings from Pew Research indicates that atheists favour same-sex marriage by close to 100 per cent. Less than four per cent of the atheists sampled opposed same-sex marriage—a finding that shows a correlation between secularism and LGBTQ agenda that is being fanned across the globe.
It is evident that the more we denounce faith in God, the more we will abandon what the holy book says about this matter and embrace our own desires, cravings and gratifications.
Little wonder then that the seat of the largest church in the world—Catholic—remains the only one standing in Europe.
Communications and media consultant
