LGBT activists for several years already have been on the warpath against “conversion therapy.”
They contend that counselors or therapists talking with people, especially minors, about NOT pursuing any transient gender confusion ideologies must be criminal.
Actually, such therapy and counseling has helped hundreds, if not thousands, of people, including those young people who mostly resolved their issues comfortably in their birth gender if they are not led astray by adults.
The crackdown move has been evident both in the United Kingdom and the United States, and court fights continue over the disagreement.
But now the Christian Institute, in the U.K., is warning government officials they cannot use that theory to make everyday conversations illegal.
In an online announcement, the organization confirmed its readiness to take legal action against the Westminster government if it adopts the anti-“conversion therapy” ideology, because it impacts everyday religious practice.
The statement came on the heels of press speculation that the government is ready to move ahead with a draft bill that would ban such conversations.
In fact, LGBT radicals repeatedly have demanded a law that would limit preachers’ sermons, prayer, pastoral conversations and even parenting.
The Institute explained that leading human rights lawyer Jason Coppel KC previously told the Institute that a broad ban “would be likely to violate” the rights of Christians to express their sincerely held religious belief.
Now, Simon Calvert, the Institute’s deputy director for public affairs, has warned the government again.
“By moving ahead with this bill at all, the government is wading into very dangerous territory. Gay and trans people are already protected, quite rightly, from verbal and physical abuse by existing law. Since those things are outlawed, what is it that this bill will seek to criminalize?”
He said the evidence shows that the promoters of the speech restrictions simply are targeting “conversations and ideas they don’t like.”
“They want a kind of LGBT blasphemy law. This is profoundly illiberal,” he said.
The issue is important to those caught up in the LGBT ideology, as they repeatedly claim that they have those lifestyles because they were born that way.
However, counseling that, over and over, has proven effectively in ridding individuals of unwanted same-sex attractions undermines that argument entirely.
Activist Jayne Ozanne, in fact, has demanded that “gentle non-coercive prayer” be made criminal.
The Institute reported, “Ozanne has also called on the government to imitate the conversion therapy legislation in the Australian state of Victoria, where guidance states that parents who do not consent to their children going on puberty blockers are committing unlawful conversion therapy.”
And, it noted, “Religious leaders are told they are likely to be carrying out an illegal act if they tell people ‘that their gender identity is not real,’ if they say prayers that ‘ask for a person to not act on their attractions’ or ‘talk about a person’s brokenness or need to repent.’”
In Victoria, government officials can fine an offender $120,000, and they already have begun an indoctrination program to “re-educate” church leaders on their speech requirements.
Calvert explained, “MPs and Peers scrutinizing the draft conversion practices bill must ensure that it does not even come close to imitating the terrible mistakes being made in Victoria. We know from leaked U.K. government documents that no evidence has been presented of abuse or coercion that is not already illegal. This is key.”
Poll shows that U.K. residents overwhelmingly, by over 90%, do not consider such legislation a priority.
This article was originally published by the WND News Center.
This post originally appeared on WND News Center.