Tem­po­rary In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor and Sev­enth Day Ad­ven­tist pas­tor Clive Dot­tin yes­ter­day ex­pressed deep con­cern about the rul­ing that sex be­tween con­sent­ing male adults was no longer il­le­gal, say­ing it goes against God’s plan.

While Dot­tin ex­pressed un­easi­ness and wor­ry, the T&T Guardian learnt that sev­er­al re­li­gious lead­ers were en­gaged in a closed-door marathon meet­ing to dis­cuss the de­ci­sion hand­ed down.

Among the re­li­gious heads who at­tend­ed the meet­ing were Coun­cil of Evan­gel­i­cal Church­es pres­i­dent Rev Desmond Austin and Faith-Based Min­istries pres­i­dent Pas­tor Win­ston Mans­ingh.

Weigh­ing in on the is­sue, Dot­tin said such a de­ci­sion will open the flood­gates for im­moral­i­ty and wrong­do­ing, as it would go against God’s will.

“It’s a God­less pack­age. I to­tal­ly dis­agree with it. I am sure there will be a re­sponse from dif­fer­ent re­li­gious groups, in­clud­ing mine, as we in­tend to meet short­ly.”

Dot­tin said his church, which has a spe­cial task force, will ex­am­ine the rul­ing while two in­ter-re­li­gious groups will give their re­spons­es next week.

“We would def­i­nite­ly be look­ing at dif­fer­ent strate­gies. I have al­ways been con­cerned that our ma­jor re­sponse should be a more bib­li­cal mod­el for the fam­i­ly….which means that a mar­riage should al­ways be be­tween a male and fe­male. Go­ing against this would have se­ri­ous con­se­quences.”

He called on right-think­ing peo­ple to stand up for what is right, not­ing such a rul­ing can de­stroy the fab­ric of our so­ci­ety.

But Coali­tion Ad­vo­cat­ing for In­clu­sion of Sex­u­al Ori­en­ta­tion (CAISO) ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor Col­in Robin­son viewed the rul­ing as a clar­i­fi­ca­tion of April’s judg­ment.

Speak­ing from New York, Robin­son said the LGBTQI com­mu­ni­ty was look­ing for­ward to the case mov­ing to the Court of Ap­peal.

Robin­son said they were now “one step clos­er” for equal­i­ty for les­bians and gays. He al­so sent a mes­sage to re­li­gious lead­ers that there was room for all to “share the na­tion.”

Bish­op Kei­th Ram­dass, for­mer chair­man of T&T Cause, the re­li­gious group that staged two protests against the LGBTI com­mu­ni­ty in April, said he dis­ap­proved of the de­ci­sion, adding what was on the law books should stand.

“Bug­gery is still, whether con­sent­ing or not, is still a crime, sin and con­trary to our be­liefs. The peo­ple should have the fi­nal say on some­thing like this,” said Ram­dass, of Re­demp­tion Wor­ship Cen­tre.

He sug­gest­ed that Gov­ern­ment comes up with a ref­er­en­dum so the pop­u­la­tion can de­cide if bug­gery should be il­le­gal or le­gal and not leave it up to the court.

“Let us have a con­sen­sus on the pop­u­la­tion. This is one av­enue we can look at.”

Ram­dass said it was time for all church­es to raise their voic­es against bug­gery.

“Once we keep go­ing in that di­rec­tion, more and more they (LGBTI com­mu­ni­ty) will go to the courts for oth­er things that could af­fect the moral fab­ric of our so­ci­ety,” Ram­dass said.

He promised to press on with his fight through the Coun­cil of Evan­gel­i­cal Church­es.

“It would come down to where it would af­fect our ed­u­ca­tion in schools be­cause the same sex sit­u­a­tion is go­ing to change fam­i­ly val­ues and what we prac­ticed over the years we would see a small mi­nor­i­ty group try­ing to im­pose their im­moral val­ues on an en­tire so­ci­ety.”