They let her husband in. They cancelled hers. That tells you everything.
Päivi Räsänen is a Finnish MP and former interior minister. She wrote a pamphlet for her church back in 2004 called Male and Female He Created Them. It set out traditional Christian teaching on marriage and sexuality. Nothing new. Nothing secret. Just the Bible applied to modern life.
In March the Finnish Supreme Court split three to two and convicted her of making material available that insults a group. They cleared her on a Bible verse tweet. She must pay a fine. She is taking the case to the European Court of Human Rights. As Räsänen put it, the ruling failed to properly take into account the freedoms of speech and religion that the European Convention on Human Rights guarantees.
Then came the UK twist. She applied for an Electronic Travel Authorisation. Automatic approval on 17 June. Cancelled on 30 June with the message that the information provided suggested she was not eligible. Her husband got his at the same time, no problem. The only difference is her conviction for quoting Christian doctrine.
She had to reroute her flight home from the United States to avoid London Heathrow. Her planned trip to Northern Ireland in August now hangs in doubt. She was due to speak at the Northern Ireland Assembly on faith, freedom and the future and at the Bangor Worldwide Missionary Convention. According to Evangelical Focus she wrote to the Home Office and to Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood asking for reconsideration. No reply.
Think about that for a second. A democratically elected politician from a friendly country, invited to speak in our own parliament building about faith and freedom, gets turned away because she believes what Christians have believed for two thousand years. What exactly are we afraid of?
