This article about religious liberty in Canada is from Vancouver Sun. (H/T Glenn)
Excerpt:
Ontario’s top court has dismissed an appeal from a private Christian university that forbids sexual intimacy outside heterosexual marriage, denying its proposed law school accreditation in the province.
The ruling from the Ontario Court of Appeal on Wednesday dealt a significant blow to Trinity Western University in a legal battle which pitted freedom of religion against equality rights.
A panel of three appeal court judges found that while the university’s religious freedom had been infringed upon, the institution discriminated against the LGBTQ community.
Trinity Western — which is fighting similar cases at appeal courts in Nova Scotia and British Columbia — expressed disappointment at the ruling, saying it would be taking its fight to the Supreme Court of Canada.
The Ontario case saw the Evangelical Christian institution based in Langley go up against the Law Society of Upper Canada after the regulatory body voted not to accredit the university’s planned law facility.
At the heart of the dispute was Trinity Western’s “community covenant” or code of conduct, which all students are required to agree to.
The key point about the code of conduct is that it doesn’t discriminate against any particular group, e.g. – LGBT. It also forbids excessive drinking and premarital sex by heterosexuals:
It includes requiring students to abstain from gossip, obscene language, prejudice, harassment, lying, cheating, stealing, pornography, drunkenness and sexual intimacy “that violates the sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman.”
Now read this next part carefully. Although there was no legal support for denying a Christian university religious liberty and freedom of association, there was the hurt feelings of the LGBTQ community:
“The part of TWU’s Community Covenant in issue in this appeal is deeply discriminatory to the LGBTQ community, and it hurts,” the appeal court ruling said. “The LSUC’s decision not to accredit TWU was indeed a reasonable conclusion.”
In Canada “it hurts” means the end of human rights like religious liberty and freedom of association. Why? Because the Christian community in Canada has – for decades – voted to increase the size of government at the expense of liberty, in order to get free stuff. It doesn’t matter if the Christians who wanted a Christian university are hurt. Or that the Christian students at TWU are hurt. Only the hurt of the LGBT community matters, and their hurt changes laws, criminalizes dissent and annihilates natural rights. There are no such things as freedom of religion and freedom of conscience in Canada. There never was free speech, either. Anything that might hurt the feelings of left-wing groups has to be made criminal.
I’ll put this as plainly as anyone can: Canadian “Christians” have been voting to transfer wealth and power to a big secular government for years. They wanted government to cover health care, and now the government thinks that health care is providing free sex changes, free IVF and free abortions. Canadian “Christians” wanted their 30 pieces of silver more than they wanted the freedom to act as if the Bible was true in public. It turns out that the more wealth and power that you transfer to a secular government, the more likely they are to abuse that wealth and power in trampling out any ideology that interferes with their buying votes from their favored special interest groups.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
“Canadian Christians have been voting to transfer wealth and power to a big secular government”
Put “Christians” in quotes, not because a true Christian could not make a mistake and vote liberal, but because the number of true disciples of Christ in the West is much smaller than you realize – perhaps as low as 8% of those who profess Christ – just based on orthodoxy and orthopraxy considerations.
We really are alone out here.
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Indeed, my church has completely abandoned Christianity for a veneer of virtue signalling and humanistic self aggrandizement.
And its ugly underneath the smiles.
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Powerful comment – thanks for posting!
Keep the faith. I am praying for you, Cecil.
And my last line should have been “Except for God and the few, we really are alone out here.”
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I agree that “In Canada ‘it hurts’ means the end of human rights like religious liberty and freedom of association.”
I don’t agree that this is because “Canadian ‘Christians’ have been voting to transfer wealth and power to a big secular government for years” to provide universal health care, etc. I think this is because Canada’s universities, media, politicians. educators, lawyers, judiciary, medical professionals, etc. (i.e., its cultural elites) have embraced a consensus (cf. F.A. Schaeffer’s warnings) of politically correct secular fundamentalism (with a small minority of dissidents).
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Great article, WK. I agree mostly with your points. Canada and Canadians Christians need our prayers. As one of them, a “Canadian Christian”, I do think that the reason things are they way they are is NOT because Canadian Christians have been voting away their rights for morality in exchange for free stuff. Universal Health Care, for example, was started by a Baptist Minister in the dirty 30’s, based on Christian moral principles. I think that you may be looking at Canadian politics and history from an American vantage point, neglecting to take into account that politically and nationally we function from a different historical context. As a Constitutional Monarchy, we have always had a “big” government and have been more “socialist” in our political leanings in history. Canadians have tended to see the government, as a part of our cultural worldview, as being there to serve and provide services. I am not saying this is right or biblical, but it is a part of our historical identity as a nation, one which still dictates how we see government and our responsibility with it. Therefore, when secular ideologies permeate society and government, this impacts our lawmakers and our leaders. (And I know it is much more complex than this, I just don’t think it is to be chalked up to the votes of the Christians.)
Again, great thoughts and I agree to a large extent with your points, but please don’t lump us Canadians, and our present issues of secularization and loss of true human rights to the same processes and forces at play in the USA. Either way, our only hope, no matter the nation or context is Jesus Christ.
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I’m familiar with the story of Tommy Douglas, and I would not consider him to be a real Christian, especially with his embrace of eugenics:
http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/tommy-douglas
I am thinking more of Canadian Catholics than evangelicals, though. They always seem to want to delegate charity to government programs – much more than Protestants, it seems to me.
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Well-said. Christians do not worship the government – we worship Christ.
Don’t be too hard on Canadian Catholics though – many of them are holding the line just like here.
Of course, half of the Catholic Church voted Obama in America, just as half of the non-Catholic churches did.
I think we would just have to admit that most who profess Christ are not in the fold, and THAT is why our countries are being handed over to our delusions.
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Yes, that’s what I mean – half the Catholics voted for Obama here, and it’s even worse up north. They have no ability to make sense of political principles like federalism. The elections are just 3 candidates promising a horde of barbarians more and more of other people’s money.
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It is really sickening.
We see more and more abortionists claiming they are doing their work for the “lord” too.
Of course, their “lord” is the devil of death and darkness. But, deception is rampant. I do believe Romans 1 had something to say about this.
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Within the recent developments of within the largely conservative supporting provinces; being from Alberta we recently say an extremely socialist government recently be voted into power. You mention “Catholics.” Although I do not identify with them theologically, it has been the Catholics in this province that have stood firm and refused to sign the recent bills tabled by our Monster of Education to provide “a platform for all LGBTQ clubs in any educational facility.” The rise of our power-hungry Monster of Education was to give a voice to the minority groups that suffer very legitimate persecution. Although I can argue we shouldn’t sacrifice the freedoms to resist such authoritarian methods as they have used (like voting against it or developing schools where we are free to pray and bring our bibles to school) we are missing a grander point in the design of God. The problem with government is it is high promise with under delivery. It is as if our hope was placed in man’s ideology of justice instead of Christ Himself (go figure).
It is because we wrestle with the secularist agenda everyday. Although I feel it is justified to state the feelings of the these democratic parties lean towards the largest voting bodies or the largest voices.
Here is my point. When change (hope) is preached it is fundamental to our understanding that we need change. Everyone is crying for it. But to lean heavily on the arm of ideologues as big government is no more wrong than to lean on any arm of flesh (whether in the church or in voting). We are human beings wrestling with a fallen nature praying for redemption and true hope. This message is fundamentally engrained in every human life and withou Jesus, these feelings are manipulated to sustain or ordain new figure heads that will hopefully bring about the change we are after (a new “us”).
Something also should be noted about your article. I think it was well articulated above by “Akat” about our voting system and government structure. In addition, I don’t think anyone would argue that this is what the government can do for the people. Christianity grew in a hot bed of hostility to the Christian church, and the development of some of the largest churches in history has grown directly under the oppressive thumbs of persecution.
As long as I attain the freedom to vote I will practice my liberty to vote in regards to protecting the religious freedoms I DO enjoy (even as a Canadian). But as I don’t wrestle with “flesh and blood” I will continue my prayers for this nation, yours, and it’s people that the only saving message is not the “Invisible hands” of Adam Smith but of Jesus Christ. That is our only saving hope and my commission was to preach the gospel not to overthrow governments.
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