PORT-OF-SPAIN, Trinidad - The Catholic Church in Trinidad and Tobago has declared its full support for an April 12 High Court decision that paved the way for making sodomy legal in that country.

At this time, it is still a criminal offense that carries a prison sentence of 25 years.

In an April 13 statement, Archbishop Charles Gordon of Port-of-Spain said sodomy “is a serious moral offense, but it should not put someone in prison for 25 years.”

Gordon cited the Vatican’s December 2008 intervention made at the 63rd Session of the United Nations: “The Holy See continues to advocate that every sign of unjust discrimination toward homosexual persons should be avoided and urges states to do away with criminal penalties against them.”

Most of Trinidad and Tobago’s legislation is inherited from its pre-independence days as a British colony, including the “Buggery Laws” - a reference to laws governing sodomy. The Sexual Offences Act of 1987 still contains statutes from the English Buggery Act of 1533.

The Sexual Offences Act does not apply to, “an act of serious indecency committed in private between a husband and his wife” or “a male person and a female person, each of whom is 16 years of age or more, both of whom consent to the commission of the act.”

“It’s really discriminatory, when you think about it,” said Father Martin Sirju, vicar general of the Archdiocese of Port-of-Spain, “because there are heterosexual people who practice this sexual expression, and they are not the ones being targeted in this. It’s just one group.” Read more via Crux