I'm delighted and surprised by this ruling. Canada, who has so much to say about defending the oppressed in other countries (Egypt, Eritrea, Iraq), oppresses Christians on issues of conscience all the time. If you're in the Knights of Columbus and don't want to rent your hall for a lesbian couple's wedding reception? Outrage and legal action. You're a Cardinal that wants to speak against abortion? Outrage and condemnation. Plurality for plurality's sake and the mantra of relativism vs. the Way and objective truth.
MONTREAL (National Post) - The Quebec government plans to appeal a court ruling that found its imposition of a province-wide ethics and religion course on a private Catholic school “totalitarian” and unconstitutional.
The scathing decision issued on Friday by Quebec Superior Court Justice Gérard Dugré was a victory for Montreal’s Loyola High School, a Jesuit boys’ school that has objected to the controversial course since its 2008 introduction.
Loyola had maintained that its curriculum, including instruction on world religions, already covered the government-mandated course material, albeit from a Catholic perspective. When the school applied for an exemption from teaching the new course, it was denied because its proposed course was not sufficiently neutral.
“In these times of respect of fundamental rights, of tolerance, of reasonable accommodations and of multiculturalism, the attitude adopted by the [Education] Department in the current matter is surprising,” Judge Dugré wrote.
He added that forcing Loyola to teach the course in a secular way “assumes a totalitarian quality essentially equivalent to the order given to Galileo by the Inquisition to renounce Copernican cosmology.” (Galileo was placed under house arrest by the Catholic Church’s Inquisition in 1633 for promoting the theory that the Earth revolves around the Sun.)
Education Minister Michelle Courchesne yesterday called the ruling “excessive” and Premier Jean Charest said the need to appeal the decision is clear. “It’s a subject that has been debated for years in Quebec,” Mr. Charest said.
The course, Ethics and Religious Culture, is mandatory for all children in Grades 1 though 11. Its introduction followed a 1997 constitutional amendment replacing the province’s denominational school boards with linguistic ones and a 2005 law that removed parents’ right to choose a course in Catholic, Protestant or moral instruction.
The course covers the full spectrum of world religions and belief systems, with an emphasis on Christianity, Judaism and aboriginal spirituality. Critics have said it promotes a moral relativism, in which all belief systems are of equal value. In its pleadings before the court, Loyola argued that this relativism trivializes the religious experience promoted in all facets of the school’s teachings.
“Faith is omnipresent in this institution,” Loyola’s lawyer, Jacques Darche, said following a news conference at the school yesterday. “Before football games, they pray. Before a press conference, they pray. It’s quite bizarre that in the one course that you would expect to be a part of a Catholic Jesuit school, the religion program, you’re not allowed to talk about God, you’re not allowed to pray.”
Paul Donovan, the school’s principal, said he is not discouraged by the government’s swift decision to appeal the ruling. “These are very important questions, not just for us, but for society in general,” he said. “These are questions about the role of denominational institutions in a secular society. It makes sense to me that this discussion is going to continue.”
Judge Dugré found that the Education Department was wrong to conclude that Loyola’s religious offerings were not equivalent to the Ethics and Religious Culture course. Furthermore, by imposing on the school a curriculum that is counter to Catholic doctrine, the government violated the school’s freedom of religion, as protected by the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
John Zucchi, father of a Loyola student and a plaintiff in the case, called the government’s approach to Loyola heavy-handed.
“There’s a plurality of views out there, and we’re defending our right to have our own particular view in the public forum,” he said. “There are neutral perspectives out there, there are liberal perspectives, Jewish perspectives, Muslim, Catholic, Marxist, whatever. I think they all have a right to be heard, and there’s no reason in the name of pluralism to silence one of these voices.”
Other parents have gone to court seeking to have their children exempted from the course in public schools but so far have been unsuccessful. In April, a couple from Drummondville filed for leave to appeal their case to the Supreme Court of Canada. Some Catholic parents with children in public school are interpreting the Loyola ruling as a sign that the tide is turning in their favour.
“This decision represents a great victory for democracy in education, for freedom of conscience and religion, for freedom in education and for parental rights,” said Marie Bourque, vice-president of a Quebec association of Catholic parents.
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