13/01/2025 | Writer: Kaos GL

Following President Erdoğan's declaration of 2025 as the "Family Year" and targeting LGBTI+ people, the Religious Affairs Directorate (Diyanet) targeted LGBTI+ community in Friday sermons delivered in mosques across the country.

Religious Affairs Directorate targets LGBTI+ community in Friday sermon Kaos GL - News Portal for LGBTI+

Following President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's declaration of 2025 as the “Family Year” and targeting LGBTI+ persons, the Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) also took action. In the Friday sermon of the Diyanet on January 10, titled “To protect the human nature is to protect the family”, the expressions of ‘desexualization’, which are frequently used by the government to target LGBTI+ persons, were included:

“Today, one of the greatest threats facing humanity is the attempt to erase the natural essence of men and women. One such effort, known as desexualization, seeks to distort the spiritual and physical characteristics of human beings, aiming to transform women into men and men into women. It is an endeavor to disregard divine will and reduce humanity to an entity devoid of identity. It is an act of encouraging alcohol consumption, drugs, and illegitimate relationships, leading generations toward disaster by exploiting children, and darkening the future of humanity.

“Desexualization is a major threat that not only targets the identity of individuals but also darkens the future of societies. The greatest strength we have against this threat is the family. The family is a home of mercy and compassion, established by a man and a woman who possess the spiritual and physical maturity deemed legitimate by our religion and appropriate by our laws, in the presence of witnesses through marriage. The family is the most valuable treasure we can have to nurture healthy generations. It is a school of knowledge, wisdom, and understanding for our children. It is a fortified fortress, a strong shelter that safeguards our generations from harmful tendencies and evils.”

The directorate sends this sermon to all the mosques around the country to be read to the congregation before the Friday prayer, a weekly religious activity attended by Muslims. Nearly the entire sermon focused on targeting the LGBTI+ community without explicitly naming it.


Tags: human rights, family
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