Jehovah’s Witnesses challenge refusal of state recognition

Lithuania’s Constitutional Court has begun hearing an appeal by the Lithuanian Jehovah’s Witnesses religious community over Parliament’s refusal to grant it state recognition. The community alleges discrimination, LRT reported. No parliamentary representative attended the hearing.

Laurynas Šedvydis, chair of the Seimas Human Rights Committee, told the court he could not attend because he was on a business trip to the United States. The court decided to proceed without a representative of the interested party.

Lawyer Marius Ruzas, representing the community, called Parliament’s decision discriminatory and said it contradicted the Constitution, the law and the European Convention on Human Rights. He described the case as “a classic case of discrimination on the grounds of religion” and said it was an attempt to narrow religious pluralism, which the Constitutional Court has called a necessary element of democracy.

Ruzas said the Constitution sets two criteria for state recognition of a religious community: support in society, and whether its teachings and practices are consistent with the law and public morality. He said Jehovah’s Witnesses have been active in Lithuania for more than 100 years and were the country’s ninth-largest religious group in 2021, with more members than three traditional religious communities.

According to Ruzas, the Justice Ministry has said the community has the required support in society and operates lawfully. He also said the state had never raised concerns about the community or begun proceedings to restrict or dissolve it. He argued that Parliament had treated Jehovah’s Witnesses differently from recognised religious communities, whose teachings had not been examined.

Addressing Parliament’s concern about the community’s opposition to blood transfusions, Ruzas said practices in other religions can also affect believers’ health, citing Orthodox fasting and circumcision among Jews and Muslims. He said Lithuanian law allows adult patients to refuse treatment, while doctors make decisions about necessary treatment for minors.

Ruzas said the Justice Ministry had consulted four state institutions when preparing its assessment for Parliament and found no case in which a minor had received a blood transfusion against the wishes of Jehovah’s Witness parents.