In a historic meeting that took place today in the Vatican City, global LGBTI leaders and the Roman Catholic Church have met as an unequivocal call was made to take action in the face of violence, discrimination and criminalisation against LGBTI people.

The occasion came as Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin was presented with the preliminary findings of a research project regarding criminalisation of sexual relations between persons of same sex in the Caribbean.[1] On receiving the research, Cardinal Parolin pointed out that the Church is against all forms of violence, and supports respecting the dignity of all persons. He also vowed to convey all information to the Holy Father to continue the dialogue.

Together with representatives of governments and multilateral organisations, ILGA World – the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association – was in attendance together with Pedro Paradiso of ILGALAC, the ILGA regional body in Latin America and the Caribbean, home to about a third of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics. ILGA World represents its global membership of more than 1,500 LGBTI organisations from 152 countries and territories worldwide.

The research presented investigates the legal and social situation in the Caribbean where – as ILGA’s State-Sponsored Homophobiareport points out - 8 countries still criminalise consensual same-sex acts between adults, but where recently Trinidad and Tobago repealed such a law. Read more via ILGA