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So, today we asked Stirm if he and the other church leaders who insist that the ruling opens the door to other gay rights challenges are simply misrepresenting the facts. He told us that the leaders of the National Evangelical Association of Belize has gotten numerous legal opinions to back their assertion, and so they firmly believe that they are not misinforming anyone:

Pastor Scott Stirm - VP, NEAB
"Any person could look at this. We have at least 7 different senior counsel attorneys together with us that have been vetting all of our processing and there is more out there that are contacting us as well. Every one of those senior counselor attorneys has said "yes you're exactly right, all of those things have been preapproved, they are just awaiting the lawsuit" So when they say that this has absolutely nothing to do with same sex marriage, that just absolutely not true. The same thought processes and rational that was used to have section 53 declared unconstitutional will now be used to go after the marriage act, to go after every other law that they consider is now discriminating them, because the Chief Justice expanded in his ruling which we believe he jumped the tracks when he did that - that sex is to include sexual orientation. I'm sorry, in other countries when they tried that, they had to change their constitution to get that. I don't believe that the Chief Justice has the authority to make that decree for us as a nation."

Daniel Ortiz
"Do you fear that the position you've taken as the politicians have accused you all are misleading the rest of the church to take that view?"

Pastor Scott Stirm - VP, NEAB
"When you have at least 7 senior counsel attorneys that are saying yes this is exactly accurate, then its starts to raise the question of who's misleading. All we are trying to say is to stand for the truth. It doesn't even take a senior counsel attorney to look at that ruling and see that everything is been preapproved. In all respect to the Prime Minister, he is one of the most intelligent and sharp legal minds in the whole Caribbean, I would trust he should be able to look at that ruling and be able to make that deduction."

And in related news, unions representing the 3 utility companies, namely the Belize Communication Workers Union, the Belize Energy Workers Union, and the Belize Water Services Workers Union, sent out a joint press release which says that they are also disappointed that the Government will not appeal the ruling.

Their statement says, quote, "The Unions... hereby express our grave dissatisfaction and concern with the Government's response to the Judgement against Section 53 of the Criminal Code... This recent Judgment and the Government's failure to react and respond in defence of its people clearly brings to light the fact that the ill will of a few are being forced down the collective throats of the masses in our society that we were led to believe was ruled through democracy." End quote.

The utility unions share the view of the church and their statement continues, "Take heed that once precedence is established in Belize, it will only be a matter of time before the same is imposed on the rest of the Caribbean nations. We therefore urge all concerned organizations, governments and the entire people of the Caribbean Region to join us in our efforts to defend our values and our way of life...we pledge our support to the Churches as they prepare to appeal the case through the courts, and we call upon all Belizeans to stand in solidarity in defence of our country's moral values for our people and all the generations that will follow." End Quote.