German Court Gives Tax Breaks to Gay Couples, Promotes Homosexuality
Under a new constitutional provision, homosexual couples will now be offered some of the same tax exemptions as heterosexual couples because a lawmaker feels "they are living conservative values"- a far cry from what most Christian conservatives believe.
On Aug. 8, Germany's federal constitutional court in a decision ruled that homosexual partners who are registered with the state must be exempt from the land transfer tax, as they are married couples according to the state. The court explained in their ruling that the difference between the tax exemptions was unconstitutional, as in that country they are legally married.
The new tax exemption will be applied in cases where when one member of a divorced couple buys the remaining portion of land that was previously held as jointly owned real estate.
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The case and subsequent ruling comes in the wake of a case brought to Germany's federal constitutional court by two homosexual men who "divorced" in 2009 and had petitioned the court to backdate the exemption.
The change in the tax exemption comes after more than a dozen members of the ruling Christian Democratic Union published a letter in which they proclaimed that "politics time and again has to be ordered by the constitutional court to abolish inequalities," according to lifesitenews.com.
"The suggestion comes at exactly the right time. In homosexual partnerships, people take long-term responsibility for each other. They are living conservative values," Kristina Schroder, Christian Democrat minister for family affairs, told Germany's Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper- a break away from traditional Christian values outlined in the Bible.
While the German parliament is considering on how best to implement the changes to the tax system to please registered homosexual partners, other more conservative members of the Christian Democratic Union are insisting that there must be a separation between gay unions and marriages, as they stick to traditional Christian values.
"The marriage of man and woman is under special protection because it is fundamentally oriented toward creating new life. This is not the case in homosexual relationships." Gerda Hasselfeldt, of the Christian Social Union, said during an interview.
