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 Pray
for Public Hearings, Constitutional Amendment, House of Traditional Leaders
There are three things to pray for over the next week: Parliament Public
Hearings on the Civil Union Bill; The House of Traditional Leaders; the
Constitutional Amendment process.
PARLIAMENT PUBLIC HEARINGS
Public Hearings on the Civil Union Bill are scheduled for Monday 16th and
Tuesday 17th October 2006.
If you are able to make them, to listen, they will be held in Committee Room
V454, Old Assembly Wing 9:00 to 16:00 at Parliament. You need to bring an ID
book to get into parliament and arrive at least 30 minutes early to get through
security.
The submission will be based on written submissions - see web links to
either download them
http://www.esnips.com/web/2006Parliamentsubmissions
or read them online at:
http://defendmarriage.blogspot.com/
Please pray for those of us presenting at the oral hearings.
HOUSE OF TRADITIONAL LEADERS
i. The Bill has been referred for comment to the House of Traditional
Leaders.
ii. This will delay parliament voting on the Bill for about another three weeks.
Those of you who would like to make submissions to the House of Traditional
Leaders, please send them to:
Mr Abraham Sithole
sitholeam@dplg.gov.za
Please do not send him any of the submissions posted on the web sites above, as
he already has them.
Please pray for the House of Traditional Leaders.
CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT
Steve Swart ACDP MP will be presenting the case for parliament to consider a
Constitutional Amendment on Tuesday 17 October 06 at 13:00 to the Chair of the
Comittee on Private Members Bills and Petitions. Please pray for the committee
and in particular Ms Mentoor who is the Chairperson. The Bill has to be
approved by this committee first before it can be considered further by
Parliament. We are also racing against time to pass this Constitutional
Amendment before either the Civil Union Bill gets passed or alternatively
'same-sex marriage' is automatically legalised on 1 December 06 as a result of
last year's Constitutional Court ruling. Please also pray for this process to
move forward as rapidly as possible.
COMMENT
The referral of the Bill to the House of Traditional Leaders has delayed the
Civil Union Bill by a month and thus allows some time for the Constitutional
Amendment to catch up in terms of the political process. We also expect to get
the support of the vast majority of Traditional Leaders in rejecting this
Bill. The government was originally not planning to consult the House of
Traditional Leaders. The government decided to do so after we sent all
parliamentarians a letter objecting to them not doing so. It is thus a small
victory. The provincial public hearings mostly strongly rejected the Bill.
Thus we can praise God for these successes.
The only province with a significant 'pro-same-sex marriage' contingent was Cape
Town, which was perhaps to be expected given the larger homosexual population in
this city. What was very disturbing at the Cape Town hearings, were the number
of 'false prophet' church ministers and others who pretended to be Christians,
while supporting homosexuality and 'same-sex marriage'. Please pray that the
true Christian message would be heard above their noise and that God would
frustrate them.
Parliamentarians are not just interested in the 'marriage argument'. Other key
issues which parliamentarians sensitive to include:
* Effects of homosexual adoption on children. (Answer: This is already legal
through the courts, but Civil Unions or 'Same-Sex Marriage' would undermine
this. The argument helps us, and is a valid concern.)
* Whether changing the Constitution would set a precedent that would lead to
other Constitutional Court changes that would undermine the CODESA
negotiations. (Answer: No. In this case we are not really changing the
Constitution, but just affirming its original meaning, to stop some
anti-democratic activist judges).
* The biggest issue: Whether the Civil Union Bill should be supported because it
is a lesser evil than the Constitutional Court ruling. (No. The Civil Union
Bill has no hope anyway because it doesn't comply with the Constitutional Court
requirements. Also, it includes other problems like
domestic partnerships. It is just a distraction from the Constitutional
Amendment that is needed.)
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