Increased Recognition for Romuva in Lithuania

The Lithuanian parliament moved Romuva, its leading Pagan movement, a step closer to state recognition recently.

Here is a Google-translation of the article’s first paragraphs:

46 members of the Seimas [parliament] voted for the recognition of  [by?] the State of Romuva on Tuesday, before 19 were abstained and 18 members abstained.

The project was mostly voted by “peasants” and “policemen”, and abstained – the conservatives and representatives of the Polish election campaign, the votes of the liberals and social democrats on both sides.

There is still one vote on the adoption of the resolution.

MEPs who voted to vote on the project stressed the role of Romuva in Soviet times, the freedom of people to confess their beliefs, argued before the speech that worldview cannot be recognized as a religion.

“I am thrilled to vote for freedom. We often talk about freedom in this room, but in some cases we do something different. Leave people free to decide for themselves, especially since the community Romuva has proven to the public for almost 30 years that it is completely harmless and, on the contrary, nurtures ethnic traditions, ”said peasant Robert Sharknick.

“Peasant” would refer to members of the Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union party, as I understand from this Wikipedia article, while “policeman” means a member of the Order and Justice party.

UPDATE: The final vote did go well. See comments for more information.

5 thoughts on “Increased Recognition for Romuva in Lithuania

  1. Scott

    Unfortunately, the final vote didn’t get the majority they needed. Therefore, in theory, they must wait 10 years to reapply. In the meantime, they will try to catch the attention of the European Court of Human Rights.

  2. Another article on how the final vote when down (in Lithuanian).

    Google translation:

    In the absence of recognition by the Seimas [parliament] on Thursday of the state of the ancient Baltic religious community “Romuva”, her [leader] Inija Trink?nien? claims that human rights are violated in this way.

    “It is a pity that this is because we meet all the requirements of the law that are raised for the recognition of the state as a religious community, and we believe that the Seimas violates human rights in this way. Recognition would be the faith of our ancestors, who is confessed to date and was born on this earth. We call it the natural faith. I believe that it is a matter of honor and dignity for every Lithuanian to maintain this faith. I am sorry that many members of the Seimas do not understand this, ”Trink?nien? told BNS.

    She said that the community would be considering what to do next. According to the crowd, one of the options is to go to the European Court of Human Rights.

    “One option is to go to the European Court of Human Rights. This may be because all the arguments against “have no reason.” There was a great pressure from the church, members of the Seimas received a letter from the archbishop on the eve of the archbishop, where they were given false information.

    Members of the Seimas Interparliamentary Relations with the Holy See received a letter from Archbishop Gintaras Grušas, Chairman of the Lithuanian Bishops’ Conference, before the vote. The Archbishop asked the members of the group to share it with other colleagues.

    The letter states that the recognition of “Romuva” “unreasonably misleads Lithuanian citizens and discriminates against all other religious communities”.

    The Archbishop says that “the Balts are neither a nation nor a culturally-religious group”, and the concept of “Balts” is seen as a scientific construct for classifying related languages.

    40 members of the Seimas voted for the recognition of “Romuva”, there were 31 MPs and 15 MPs abstained. This vote in the Chamber met with some of the applause from parliamentarians.

    “Peasants” [Farmers and Greens Union Party’ voted for state recognition as “Peasants”, and the Conservatives and Lithuanian Poles’ Electoral Action – Christian Families Union abstained. The votes of the other political groups were distributed on both sides.

    If the request of Romuva is not satisfied, the community will be able to apply for the state after ten years of recognition.

  3. Kalinysta

    Once again the [expletive deleted] Catholics discriminate against anyone not Catholic. BTW, as a recovering Catholic, I have every right to criticize them.

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