Muslim Judicial Council slated for outlawing homosexuality

Cape Town - Pressure continues to mount on the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) over its controversial religious decree on homosexuality, with the Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation and the Archbishop Tutu IP Trust being the latest to denounce it as “deeply regrettable.”

Their seven-point fatwa, or decree, is that Islam’s primary sources of legislation “unequivocally prohibit same-sex actions and, by extension, same-sex marriage”.

It states that anyone who contests the ruling in this category has effectively rejected the categorical law of Allah. The ruling only applied to those who act upon their feelings of homosexuality, the MJC said.

The Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation said across many religions, homophobia remained ever-present in the behaviour of congregations, or individual people of faith; and often in the leadership of those religions.

In a joint statement, Niclas Kjellstrom-Matseke, chairperson of the Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation and Dr Mamphela Ramphele, chairperson of the Archbishop Tutu IP Trust jointly said: “In that context, the publication by South Africa’s Muslim Judicial Council of guidelines on same-sex relationships, stating that those who engage in the sin of same-sex relationships have ‘taken themselves out of the fold of Islam’, and that ‘our religion teaches us to hate the sin, not the sinner’, is deeply regrettable.”

Asked to comment, MJC's second deputy president Sheikh Riad Fataar said the secretary general, the person assigned to comment, was out of office. No response was received from him by deadline.

The Desmond & Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation and the Archbishop Tutu IP Trust’s joint statement came after the Al-Ghurbaah Foundation, an umbrella body of several organisations such as the Triangle Project also condemned the religious decree, and said the MJC’s Fatwa Committee targeted the LGBTQIA+ community during Pride Month.

“The fatwa committee still went ahead to pass a fatwa without adequate information that informs the fatwa, without consultation with the LGBTQIA+ community around whom the fatwa is made, and without regard for any consequences the statements in the fatwa may have,” it said.

Founded in September 2018, the Al-Ghurbaah provides psycho-spiritual and social support to Muslims who are marginalized based on sexual orientation, gender identity and belief.

“The MJC’s fatwa does not encourage bold and engaging conversation around the complex issue of human sexuality and gender identity. We encourage the MJC to rise and become leaders in critical inquiry and in the development of a functional Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh) for the marginalised within our community.”

Cape Times