A Cape Town jeweller is in trouble with LGBTQIA+ activists after citing religious beliefs as the reason preventing him from making and selling an engagement ring to a same-sex couple.
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According to Candice van Eck from Nelson Mandela Bay, the owner of Craig Marks Diamonds, Craig Quinton, turned down her request to make an engagement ring, claiming that marriage should be between a man and woman.
While the incident happened earlier this year, Van Eck only came forward with her complaint recently, saying that she did not want to taint her engagement celebrations at the time of the incident.
“It made me feel that we are not good enough,” she told the Weekend Argus. “It’s meant to be something special, and he made me feel that I’m doing something completely wrong.”
The couple eventually got engaged in Greece with another ring after the Melkbosstrand jeweller refused their business.
The incident has since seen LGBTQIA+ activists urge the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) to take a stand against service providers “who use their religious beliefs to treat LGBTQIA+ members of the public as second-class citizens.”
OUT LGBT Well-being’s LGBTQIA+ legal clinic has offered its support to Van Eck, with human rights manager Lerato Phalakatshela calling the jeweller’s actions a violation of the Constitution’s Bill of Rights and the Equality Act.
“These beliefs cannot be brought into their professional and public capacities and used as an excuse to discriminate against a protected group,” she said.
Speaking to the Weekend Argus, Quinton said that he had addressed the issue on his website as well as on his company’s Facebook page.
“While we will gladly accept an order from a homosexual customer to design and manufacture any other form of jewellery, our conscience before God prohibits us from designing and manufacturing rings for the purpose of marriage, which, according to the Bible, has a very specific definition and meaning,” read the statement on the website.
Quinton said that for him to design and manufacture covenant rings for (and thereby participate in or celebrate) a same-sex marriage would be to dishonour and disobey God, and this could potentially have “eternal consequences”.
“Obey God rather than men,” he quoted Scripture, adding that he was unwilling to compromise his faith.
A similar accusation of discrimination by the company was also made in 2019 when Craig Marks refused to sell an engagement ring to another same-sex couple.
SAHRC Commissioner Andre Gaum said that while the commission had noted the incident and would investigate, Van Eck was still encouraged to lodge a complaint.
Gaum added that the incident was similar to the Beloftebos wedding venue matter from 2020, in which the venue refused to host a same-sex wedding.
“In any event, we will look into it, but it would be helpful if they complained officially. Our view is that you cannot use your religious or cultural beliefs in a way that affects the rights of others.”
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