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The Haitian LGBTQ community deserves better than a religious community that is indifferent when they are killed, but incensed at the thought of measures being taken to protect them from harm.

Last week, hundreds of Protestants took to the streets in Haiti to protest a new penal code published by the Jovenel Moise government last month. The protest came soon after a petition that was published by Shekinah, an extremely popular Haitian American church in Florida, standing against a number of the articles in the new penal code. 

The government headed by Jovenel Moise continually proves itself to be untrustworthy so any actions taken by it should be met with skepticism. Due to this government’s failure to organize elections, there is currently no parliament as deputies and senators’ terms expired before successors could be voted in. This means that Jovenel is basically a one-man government with the power to do anything by decree without having to go through the votes of a parliament first. This is not the first time we’ve seen this. 

The petition, in its original publication, included strong rebukes to changes to some understandably taboo issues, namely: the age of consent, bestiality, and incest. However, a few of these paragraphs confused the criminalizing of certain things as the legalization of them. One example is Article 305, which penalizes incest when people who are grandparent and grandchild, parent and child, siblings, and half siblings knowingly engage in sexual activity. The petition inaccurately stated that the penal code “reinforces” these things. The petition was revised days later to clear up a few of these misinterpretations. It now only says, in reference to Article 305, that the code supports sexual relations between cousins, and aunt/uncle and niece/nephew (since it does not include those categories in its definition of the offense). 

Yet, it is another matter entirely within the penal code that drew the most ire from churchgoers. 

Shekinah’s petition, which currently has more than 120,000 signatures, vehemently denounces the articles that seek to protect people from harm based on sexual orientation. The petition stated  “we stand against” the following articles: 

• Article 208, which says that the punishment for a crime or infraction done against someone because of their sexual orientation is increased, making it not a “normal” crime. If the crime is preceded by, accompanied by or followed by any words, images, writings or actions that harm the victim or group of people that the victim is a part of based on their sexual orientation.
• Article 248, which increases the punishment for someone who has committed murder on the basis of someone’s identity, including sexual orientation, along with ethnicity, race, religion, political conviction, among other things. 
• Article 275 which increases the punishment for violence that has resulted in mutilation or permanent disability when committed on the basis of someone’s identity, including sexual orientation, along with ethnicity, race, religion, political conviction, among other things.
• Article 362 defines which categories of identities that, if targeted, constitutes discrimination, which now includes sexual orientation, along with origin, sex, physical appearance, age religion, race, disability, among other things.
• Article 363, which defines what acts constitute discrimination including: the refusal of services based on any of these identities, refusal of employment based on any of these identities, refusal of participation in public contracts, and the spreading of a harmful and false campaign targeting any of these identities.

The petition was recently edited, removing every mention of the articles that protect LGBTQ people from physical attack. I assume someone told the drafters of this petition that standing up for the right to harm, and, dare I say, even kill people because of their sexual orientation with impunity is not a good look. But someone also should have told them that the internet is forever. A simple Google cache shows the original version that was still up as of July 13th saying that the church stands against article 208. However, it continues to say that the penal code seeks to force religious leaders to marry individuals of the same sex.

Contrary to what the petition, protestors and Whatsapp broadcasts insist, there is nothing in this decree that claims to force priests and pastors to marry people of the same sex. As explained above, Articles 362 and 363 make discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation (among other things) a punishable offense. How then, could that be taken to mean that any church would be forced to perform a ceremony that isn’t even legal in Haiti? Simply put, choosing to center the church in a sensationalist interpretation of a decree only incites violence. What happens when an institution as powerful and large as the Haitian Church targets a marginalized group who is already constantly vulnerable to hateful acts of violence as a threat? Does this not invite more harm to them?

The Church’s blatant hypocrisy about what they choose to speak on hasn’t been lost on many who’ve come out to criticize the institution’s newfound outrage. There is a laundry list of issues pushing the country to the brink that church leaders continue to turn a blind eye to. The Haitian Gourde is at a historical low, which means hunger and poverty are at historical highs. Donald Trump notoriously referred to Haiti as a “shithole.” Jovenel Moise and his predecessor’s names have been implicated in the disappearance of funds that were meant to build hospitals, schools, stadiums — things that could have greatly improved people’s quality of life. Recent reports by leading human rights groups in Haiti revealed that gangs that have been terrorizing impoverished neighborhoods with massacres and arson for the last few years, are actually being armed by people in the government and being used for political purposes. And we can’t forget the gun violence and kidnapping that continues to take so many lives with impunity. Gun violence that kills people of all ages and religions, including a baby as young as 8 months old recently. Why hasn’t the Church come out against any of this?

It’s actually on brand for the Haitian Church to remain mum on the senseless murder of a child. There are countless children being harmed right within their walls that the Church continues to fail to protect. Abusers in leadership roles are denounced by no one, and the masses continue to seek spiritual guidance from them. Wives are shamed into staying with their abusers. Young women are demonized for getting pregnant, while the young men fathering these kids are not met with so much as a negative whisper. Wealthy people heading predatory businesses that feed on the vulnerable sit with their heads held high in the pews. And public officials who abuse their power to steal from private citizens sit among congregants with not so much as a challenge. This begs the question – why are predators so comfortable in these houses of worship?

Church leaders say they take no political stance because Heaven is our true home, but they have, in fact, taken a stance. When nothing is said in the face of the hunger of your people, those who make up your flock, you are, in fact, normalizing mass hunger. When you invite political candidates onto your pulpits to feed your congregation their campaign lies, but then do nothing to hold that politician accountable after he is elected, you have legitimized liars. And when you create a faith-based community where those who would senselessly kill a gay person feel more at home than an actual gay person, you have endorsed murder.

When I was a child, my mother explained to me why she is a Protestant. She told me that being Protestant means being a Christian who is willing to grow and evolve. That being a Protestant means understanding that God is still speaking. She taught me that being Protestant means being willing to read and study the Bible for one’s self, and not simply allowing it to be interpreted for you. That the Protestant church is a church meant to be self aware and aware of the world around it. It is a church that was founded by an act of religious and political rebellion because the Catholic Church at the time was not acting in a way that was for the people. 

German theologian Martin Luther pinned 95 theses to the wall of Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany, to denounce its political leaders’ greed. The Diet of Speyer condemned Martin Luther’s teachings as heresy, a group of princes wrote a letter in protest, hence the name Protestant. Protest is at the very root of the word “Protestant.”. One willing to look at the reality of the world and the church, and decry what isn’t right. Why then must we resign to being a church that no longer embodies this? And for those of you who are my age, why resign to joining those who came before by holding the same backward beliefs and practices, but now espousing them with glossier tools?

The Haitian LGBTQ community deserves better. They deserve better than to be framed as a foreign intrusive entity. Moun sa yo–those people. As if they are intruders banging on our gates demanding to be let in. The Haitian LGBTQ isour community. They didn’t materialize from thin air. We must see them. These are people we went to church with, to school with, your classmate’s sister who was a few years older than you, your friend’s cousin’s ex-boyfriend, the kid that sat across from you in baptism class, that one kid who was so cute, but was always so quiet for some reason, your cousins, your children. What happened for them to cease being thought of as members of the communities they were born and raised in along with you and by you?  And what happened to you to allow you to be comfortable in a society that gladly watches them burn? 

The Haitian LGBTQ community deserves better than a religious community that is indifferent when they are killed, but incensed at the thought of measures being taken to protect them from harm. Haitians in general deserve better than a religious community that remains silent in the face of injustice, but has all the words for what consenting adults do with their genitals.

I’m in the game of imagining a better world, and then fighting to make that a reality. I’m in the game of imagining and fighting for a world where I don’t have to write a piece like this, or at the very least, where I don’t have to spend a week racked with anxiety over typing these words.  One where hurt isn’t ignored, one where the people I’ve decided to follow are voices of truth and reason, one where the vulnerable are protected. So I invite you to join me, and ask yourself what kind of Haiti do you want? In what kind of Haiti would you and your loved ones thrive? In what kind of Haiti can your neighbors feel safe in, and eat in? In what kind of Haiti will hunger and terror no longer be commonplace? In what kind of Haiti could you work and build, and see the fruits of that labor? Close your eyes and picture it, feel it, imagine yourself standing in it. Now open your eyes and ask yourself, does your church as it looks and acts today make sense in that Haiti?

Photo by Carolyn Von Unsplash