A Christian priest who reached retirement age and had to vacate the church apartment asked the court to determine that his date of birth was 1947 and not 1946. The court rejected his request.
This is a man who held many positions in the church, and in his last position he served as a priest of the Christian community in one of the cities in the north of the country.
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In his claim, he claims that in accordance with the confirmation of birth, baptism and verification from the matron of the Catholic Church, it is recorded in the book of baptisms that his date of birth is in 1947 and not in 1946 as it appears in the population registry.
According to him, over the years he did not attach any importance to the mistake, since no problems arose due to the mistake and there was no need to correct the date of birth in the population register and the identity card.
The pastor noted that his family members usually celebrate his birthday according to the year 1947.
prevent the evacuation
The pastor first applied to the Ministry of the Interior with a request to correct the date of birth, but the Ministry of the Interior's answer was that according to the date written on the application form, the birth name was not found in the birth registers at the Ministry of the Interior.
After the Ministry of Interior's answer, the priest went to court to correct the registration, and accordingly his date of birth.
According to him, the incorrect registration of the date of birth in the population registry was done before the establishment of the state - a registration that was manual and unsupervised, and led to inconsistencies, errors and inaccuracies in the dates of birth, especially when it comes to home births.
The purpose of the lawsuit was to prevent the eviction procedure, since if the court grants the lawsuit and declares that the applicant's correct date of birth is 1947, i.e. one year less than the date recorded in the population registry, the applicant will be able to stay in the apartment for another year.
Unreliable and inconsistent testimony, with many contradictions (illustration), photo: getty images
The state opposed the request and petitioned to order the dismissal of the lawsuit.
According to the state, as part of the proceedings conducted by the plaintiff against the archbishop of the head of the Greek-Catholic ministry, the priest stated in the statement of claim that his date of birth is 1946 as it appears in the population register.
The state claims that a party cannot assert contradictory factual claims in two different legal proceedings, especially when the conflicting claims are the ones that form the basis of the proceedings.
The judge did not accept the priest's version and his testimony in court, noting that his testimony was neither reliable nor consistent, and contained many contradictions.
"The court tends to trust clerics, but when the cleric submits several versions regarding the reason for his request for correction, does not bring evidence to prove his claims and does not invite relevant witnesses to prove his claims - the obvious conclusion is that his version should not be believed and his claim should be dismissed," wrote the judge.
He further added: "The entire purpose of the applicant in the lawsuit is a clear economic interest in order to receive benefits, rights and grants. First the purpose of filing the lawsuit was to obtain housing rights in the lawsuit he was conducting against the church, and then to obtain citizenship in France, which without any doubt may grant him rights and grants, and that is why I arrived To conclude that the claim must be dismissed."
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