The retired pastor in Northern Ireland will be in front of a hospital for “open-air service” that carries out abortions

Clive Johnston, a retired Baptist pastor, is prosecuted in Northern Ireland

Mr. Johnston, 76, held the service on July 7, 2024 in front of the Causeway Hospital in Coleraine. According to the public prosecutor, the sermon against the law on abortion services (Safe Access Zones) had violated 2022, which makes it a crime that individuals in the buffer zone outside a facility that performs, “hindered, recorded, influenced or caused or caused harassment, alarm or stress”.

The former pastor was accused of being “protested with the intention or being ruthless whether it had the impact to influence a protected person in the hospital,” reports the Belfast Telegraph. He was also accused to follow the police instruction to leave the area.

The public prosecutor's office, PPS, informed the Belfast Telegraph that “all PPS decisions are unartrent, independent and strictly with the code for the public prosecutor”. “

The indictment takes place as laws that criminalize protests in buffer zones near facilities in which abortions are carried out and the critics say that they are an attack on freedom of speech have come into force in the entire United Kingdom. In some cases, the accused did not even mention abortion. In October, a British man, Adam Smith-Connor, was sentenced and instructed to pay more than $ 11,000 in penalty fees for tacit abortion clinics.

In February, a 74-year-old grandmother, Rose buterty, became the first person to be charged with the Scottish version of the law on the Scottish version of the law on abortion. It faces a fine of up to £ 10,000 or almost $ 13,000.

In 2023, a preacher, Stephen Green (72), was followed because of a sign with a Bible verse outside of an abortion clinic in London. The sign contained the words of Psalm 139: 13, which is: “Because you had my reins: you covered me in the womb.” He was charged according to the anti-social behavioral, crime and police law. In February 2024 he was convicted and ordered to pay $ 2,426 more than $ 3,100.

A Christian charity organization with a legal defense fund that Mr. Johnnston, in the recent case, represents the Christian Institute, says, says Mr. Johnston “one of the most famous” good news “in the Bible” Sermon [John 3:16] Near a general hospital. “

John 3:16 reads: “Because God loved the world so much,[a] That he gave his only son that everyone who believes in him should not perish, but has eternal life. “

It is clear that the former pastor has not been accused of mentioning abortion in his sermon or on banners or posters that were stopped during the service. In addition, the institute said that Mr. Johnston was “simply warned”, not arrested on July 7th and “later informed about a summons about law enforcement measures”.

The deputy director of the Christian Institute, Simon Calvert, said: “The persecution of someone who preached John 3:16 near a hospital on a quiet Sunday is an unbearable restriction of religious freedom and freedom of speaking.”

Mr. Calvert said about a dozen people visited the service that “separated on a piece of grass, separated from a dual lane from the Causeway Hospital” or separated. He said there was a wooden cross, and Mr. Johnston led the participants to the “singing of known hymns on a ukulele”.

“It is simply not reasonable or rational that preaching the gospel without an indication of abortion is a protest against abortion.” We talk that has nothing to do with abortion should not be criminalized as if it is an anti-abbreviation protest.

Mr. Calvert said that the Christian Institute defends Mr. Johnston because there is an “important principle on the game”.

Mr. Johnston is to appear in court on March 21st for a preliminary hearing and could be occupied by pounds if he is convicted.