Same Sex Marriage
A district court in the northern Japanese city of Sapporo ruled on Wednesday that the state's refusal to legally recognize same-sex marriages was unconstitutional, according to media reports. Japan is the only country in the Group of Seven major industrialized nations (G7) that does not allow same-sex marriage.
The Vatican issued a statement approved by Pope Francis on Monday, saying that the Catholic Church will not bless same-sex unions as they are a "choice" and a "sin" and therefore "cannot be recognized as objectively ordered to the revealed plans of God".
"At the same time, the Church recalls that God Himself never ceases to bless each of His pilgrim children in this world, because for Him 'we are more important to God than all of the sins that we can commit'. But he does not and cannot bless sin: he blesses sinful man, so that he may recognize that he is part of his plan of love and allow himself to be changed by him. He in fact 'takes us as we are, but never leaves us as we are'," the statement read. "For the above mentioned reasons, the Church does not have, and cannot have, the power to bless unions of persons of the same sex in the sense intended above."
The Hungarian Parliament has passed a new law on Tuesday that will expand the executive powers, making it harder for the opposition to challenge PM Viktor Orbán and his party, and lowering the legal threshold for the government to declare a state of emergency.
Further, it introduced a redefinition of the concept of "family" in the country's constitution, stating that the "foundation of the family is marriage and the parent-child relationship. The mother is a woman, the father is a man", resulting in effectively barring same-sex couples from adopting children.
Bolivia's Civic Registration Service (Sereci) has for the first time recognised the "free union" between two people of the same sex in the country, following a long legal battle between the couple, according to a resolution made public on Friday.
Sereci decided to "arrange for the registration of the free union between David Víctor Aruquipa Pérez and Guido Alvaro Montaño Durán", according to this document which cancels another resolution adopted by the same institution in 2018. The deputy of the right-wing party Creemos Samantha Nogales also said that this is an issue that will be evaluated, but that "it is fundamental to understand that human rights move forward and not backward and that in this case, we can show that Bolivians are all equal before the law."
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has published an opinion piece in support of Justice Samuel Alito questioning same-sex marriage. Both had voted against the ruling in 2015 that permitted same-sex marriage.
Thomas stated that "those with sincere religious beliefs about marriage now find it increasingly difficult to be a part of society. The verdict would label those who believe that marriage can only exist between a man and a woman as fanatics. And this although they would only refuse to bend their religious attitudes to current legal beliefs".
During the Russian constitutional referendum, voters backed a constitutional change that would ban same-sex marriage by defining marriage as a union of a woman and a man only. Lawmakers in the Russian parliament have now introduced a legislation draft to implement this change.
In addition to explicitly banning same-sex marriage, couples of the same sex will be prohibited from adopting children. While this is no explicit change in the current practice,s it explicitly outlaws the option. According to one of the Senators, Yelena Mizulina, the changes will also affect transgender people.
On Tuesday night, Costa Rica became the first Latin American country to legalize same-sex marriages, after a ruling of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2018 stating that "all of its signatory countries must allow same-sex marriage". The country has removed the sixth item of article 14 of Costa Rica's Family Code, which prohibited people of the same sex to get married, making marriage equality the law.