Päivi Maria Räsänen, née Kuvaja (born December 19, 1959, Sonkajärvi), is a Finnish politician. She has been the chairwoman of the Christian Democrats since 2004.
A physician by education, Räsänen got into politics in the early 1990s, running for parliament in 1991. She has been in the Riihimäki City Council since 1993, and in the Finnish Parliament since 1995.
Räsänen is married with five children.
Räsänen has been characterized as a conservative. On October 12, 2010, Räsänen was one of the participants on a live TV debate Homoilta, the guests of which debated over same-sex marriage and LGBT rights in general. The program was followed by an unprecedented exodus from the Evangelical Lutheran Church — in a few weeks, nearly 40,000 members left the Church through the website eroakirkosta.fi. Räsänen was on the show representing her party and herself as a Christian individual alongside with five other opponents of gay marriage, but the resignations were specifically attributed to her by Minister for Culture and Sports Stefan Wallin. Räsänen thinks homosexual acts are a sin and she herself does not consider her views "specifically extreme".
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