A major free speech case in Europe has taken a concerning turn.

Finnish Member of Parliament Päivi Räsänen has been convicted by the country’s Supreme Court for expressing her views on marriage and sexual ethics.

Her comments, including describing homosexuality as a “developmental disorder”, led to a conviction for “incitement against a group”, despite earlier courts twice finding her not guilty.

She has now been convicted and fined in a case that has been running for years and has drawn international attention. The case has some alarming parallels to that of Lyle Shelton in Australia.

This case did not arise from an act or threat of violence, but from an exercise of speech, from the public expression of views on a matter of moral and theological significance.

Räsänen’s legal battle began after she posted a Bible verse and questioned her church’s support for an LGBT event. She was also investigated for a church booklet she had written in 2004.

For these actions, she faced police investigations, criminal charges, and years in court. Even after two unanimous acquittals, the case continued, with the prosecutors appealing the lower court decisions both times.

The Supreme Court acquitted Räsänen for her Bible verse tweet but found her guilty of a charge related to a 20-year-old pamphlet published with her church.

This conviction demonstrates the alarming consequences of hate speech laws. When these laws are used to punish speech based on its perceived impact or “harm”, rather than any incitement to violence, expressing traditional Christian teaching becomes a criminal offence.

In such an environment, the boundaries of lawful expression become unclear, leading people of faith to self-censor.

That uncertainty is not a small problem. It is the mechanism by which free speech is chilled.

Because most people will not wait to be prosecuted before deciding to stay silent, they will self-censor.

This is not simply a European issue.

The same dynamics are increasingly visible in Australia. Vague hate speech and vilification laws, broad definitions of harm, and complaint processes that drag on for years all create similar pressures. HRLA client Lyle Shelton knows where that trajectory leads.

A free society must be able to tolerate disagreement, including disagreement on deeply contested moral and religious questions.

HRLA continues to defend the fundamental freedoms of speech, religion, and conscience in Australia. Because without them, the cost of speaking the truth becomes too high for ordinary people to bear.