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On 1 July, the Greens Party of Tasmania introduced a “Conversion Practices Prohibition Bill” into the Tasmanian Parliament.

This bill has devastating ramifications for the Church here, and has caused much concern among faithful Christians.

We need to talk about the situation in Tasmania and how we desperately need prayer.

Here are five of these grave concerns with the Greens’ extreme bill.

1. Restrictions on Prayer, Preaching, and Pastoral Counselling

The bill is designed to ban “conversion practices” that seek to change, suppress, or alter one’s “sexual orientation or gender identity” (Section 5, page 9).

While personal opinions, even religious doctrine, are protected by law, attempting to compel anyone to make a change is prohibited. To put it simply, you are allowed to say what the Bible teaches about “sexual orientation or gender identity”, but calling someone to repent of sexual sin would be forbidden.

The draft legislation further states that prayer is considered a conversion practice if you are praying for someone to change, suppress or alter their “sexual orientation or gender identity” — this even includes with the knowledge and consent of the person you are praying for.

So, if you advise, counsel, or call someone to repentance or pray for someone to repent of sexual sin, you can be charged under this legislation. This is the case even if the person you are praying for or the counselling asked you to help them.

Preaching is also a grey area. While it seems that religious doctrine is protected, faithful preaching — which requires application — could run afoul of the legislation (Section 5, page 10).

2. Removal of Parental Authority Over Children

If you thought what was just said was draconian, then the parental rights component comes next.

It will be illegal and punishable as a criminal offence to deny your child the ability to transition their self-declared ‘gender’ and to try to dissuade them.

In other words, you could be a convicted criminal for telling your son he is a boy, or your daughter she is a girl.

You read that correctly: parents will no longer have parental authority over their children, nor will they be able to dissuade their child from the potentially lifelong consequences of their actions or from doing themselves potential harm.

This will be treated as a “conversion practice” and potentially charged criminally (Section 5, page 10; Section 9, page 10).

3. A Three-Fold Penalty for Breaking ‘Conversion Practices’ Law

Pastors and churches face a three-fold penalty under this proposal.

Firstly, an individual can be sued through the Anti-Discrimination Commissioner. If the lawsuit were successful, you’d be liable to pay damages.

Secondly, your church or denomination can also be sued through the same commissioner for money damages.

Thirdly, there is the possibility of criminal charges (where the government prosecutes you, not a private person suing) for engaging in (so-called) “conversion practices” — meaning you face fines or imprisonment.

Pastors are exposed on all three fronts. They can be personally sued for money, their church could be sued for money, and they can also face criminal charges with potential jail time. These aren’t either/or scenarios — they can all happen at once (see Sections 5, 9, 10, 13–15, 16–22 for detail on the criminal and civil litigation process.)

4. Retroactive “Historical Child Abuse” Provisions

The bill has a “Historical Child Abuse” component. It means that if you engaged in what the law defines as “conversion practices” with someone under 18 — even years ago, before this law existed — you could be sued for “Historic Child Abuse”.

This has the potential to have massive consequences for the Church as an institution in Tasmania.

Basically, pastoral advice from 30–40 years ago could now become subject to litigation (see Amendment to Civil Liability Act of 2002, pages 63–64).

5. Democratic Denial

Those who disagree with and are concerned about this legislation are, in large measure, being locked out of the political process. Many politicians just aren’t granting meetings to those with concerns.

The “conservative” party here in Tasmania will, by a large majority, support this bill. There are very few politicians wishing to take up the mantle here and fight back.

The situation in Tasmania is dire, and we need much prayer.

We need to stand fast in an evil day.

We need to be faithful to Christ above all.

We also want this most severe threat to the Church and parents not to come to pass in this state.

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