Lawmakers are pushing an agenda right now that would threaten free speech and make some of the verses of the Bible illegal to recite, under the guise of “Combatting Hate.”
The work on Bill C-9 in the Canadian parliament has been outlined in a report from the RAIR Foundation, which recorded speeches from a recent rally against the misnamed plan.
While the bill does contain some things that could be helpful in a free society, such as actions targeting displays of terror symbols, limits on “intimidating people” trying to access religious sites, and restrictions on intentionally obstructing someone from entering a place of worship, there remains a problem.
That’s the agenda to strip out a decades-old religious rights protection provision in Canada’s Criminal Code. Under that precedent, there is a “good faith” religious defense, meaning that those expressing sincere religious expression are protected from prosecution for “hate” even if those views offend “prevailing cultural norms,” the report said.
The removal “collapses a critical constitutional firewall and opens the door to politically motivated prosecutions of pastors, rabbis, religious leaders, teachers, parents, and ordinary citizens who refuse to affirm state-mandated gender ideology or other government approved narratives,” the report said.
Transgenderism has become a hot button topic for Democrats and other leftists in the United States since Joe Biden spent his four years in the Oval Office pushing the agenda that fails on basic science. Being male or female is embedded in the human body down to the DNA level and the administration of chemicals or access to body mutilating surgeries does not make that change.
Hundreds rallied, in an event organized by ARPA Canada, against the agenda.
“Speakers at the rally made the stakes unmistakably clear: this debate is not about ‘balancing rights.’ It is about whether Canada will remain a country where citizens can speak biological and theological truths without fear of state punishment—or descend into a regime where government authorities determine which scriptures, facts, and moral convictions are deemed ‘hateful,’” the report said.
The damage already has started, the report said, with a recent case involving former Chilliwack school trustee Barry Neufeld who was ordered to pay $750,000 for publicly affirming that there are only two biological sexes.
The bill has been debated by the House of Commons and sent to committee. From there it will return for a final vote before going to the Senate.
The foundation report warned there would develop a “state-narrative enforcement—a system where dissent from ideological orthodoxy is punished while genuine threats or acts of hatred are ignored.”
RAIR Foundation said it attended and filmed the March 12 demonstration against Bill C-9.
Speakers included Rev. Joel Dykstra, pastor of Wellandport United Reformed Church:
Conservative MPs Jacob Mantle and Andrew Lawton also spoke:
