Email Address. First Name. Last Name. Phone Number. You may unsubscribe via the link found at the bottom of every email. See our Email Privacy Policy for details. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact. Join Now Donate Now. Humanist Canada Canada's National Voice For Humanism Since Humanism is a world view which says that reason and science are the best ways to understand the world around us, and that dignity and compassion should be the basis for how you act toward someone else.
January 24, to April 11, Given the exponential pace at which we are hurtling towards an almost complete collapse of open and free societies, we need to dispel many myths, delusions, and misconceptions Upcoming Events. We are Canada's National Voice of Humanism. Humanist Ceremonies Ceremonies play an important part in our lives. Become a Member Add your voice to our growing numbers by becoming a member of Humanist Canada. Are you A Humanist? Featured Video. Humanist Canada members share what Humanism means to them.
Our Video Channel. Check out our events and monthly webinar series, and share our video archive! Who We Are. The preaching would otherwise have constituted a clear breach of article C, as heinous speech against an identifiable group. A Jewish association brought the case to the police in March , however we have no indication whether the case was seriously pursued by the state, and the primary suspect had already escaped to Jordan.
A petition to the Federal Parliament e demanded the abrogation of exception C 3 b. However it was rejected by the government on the basis that:. The Court said that the three defences which include elements of good faith or honest belief—namely, paragraphs 3 b , c and d —seemed to negate the mens rea or mental fault requirement for the offence, for only rarely would a person who intends to promote hatred be acting in good faith or upon honest belief.
Between and courts across Canada began ruling that prohibitions on same-sex marriage were unconstitutional and in the federal government passed the Civil Marriage Act, legalizing same-sex marriage across the country.
The Act allows officials of religious groups to refuse to perform marriages that are not in accordance with their religious beliefs. Religious groups have pointed to this provision to justify the exclusion of same-sex couples from evangelical universities and other institutions. The apology was accompanied by a bill to expunge the records of people convicted under historic homophobic laws. Following a victory at the Supreme Court of Canada in by Humanist Canada founder Henry Morgentaler, there are no laws on abortion in Canada and the practice is entirely regulated within the publicly-funded healthcare system.
Access in remote communities remains an issue in some provinces. Health Canada has approved Mifegymiso, the abortion pill, for up to 9 weeks into pregnancy; however there are still concerns about access in remote rural communities. A ban on medical assisted dying was also struck down by the Carter ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada in The law has been called unconstitutional by advocates for dying with dignity as it excludes people with psychiatric conditions, mature minors and those with degenerative illnesses.
A new constitutional challenge has already been launched. The denial of assisted dying for people with permanent suffering but with no «end-of-life» conditions was declared unconstitutional by the Beaudoin judgment in the Superior Court of Quebec Sept. The Quebec government says it will not appeal and the Federal government says it will change the law. Quebec and Ontario have anti-SLAPP strategic lawsuits against public participation laws, meaning individuals and groups can be silenced with the threat of defamation lawsuits.
A bill to amend the legislation, C, was before Parliament as of December , but has been criticized by civil liberties groups for not going far enough. A father, Oliver Erazo , wanted his son, Jonathan, exempt from having to attend religious programmes in a Roman Catholic school in Ontario. The case began in early and a panel of three judges ruled in favour of Mr Erazo in April The law this relates to is Education Act, R. Mr Erazo took the school to court and won the case, he has since set up a website, myexemption.
In October a former Hassidic Jew, Yohan Lowen , living in Quebec, sued the schools and authorities whom he claims deprived him of the capacity to work in a professional job.
The two named schools, according to the formal notice, failed to conform to the provincial mandatory curriculum, choosing to offer instead a program centered on the Torah. The non-compliance of religious schools is a recurrent theme in Quebec with each successive government easily satisfied with empty promises from many guilty schools to correct their deficiencies, for sure, by the next academic year….
Resources Complain to the UN Add to the report. Canada Last Updated 11 November Download this country entry as a PDF. Legal or constitutional provisions exclude non-religious views from freedom of belief. State-funding of religious institutions or salaries, or discriminatory tax exemptions. There is state funding of at least some religious schools. Religious schools have powers to discriminate in admissions or employment. Discriminatory prominence is given to religious bodies, traditions or leaders.
Religious groups control some public or social services. Official symbolic deference to religion. Anomalous discrimination by local or provincial authorities, or overseas territories. State-funded schools offer religious or ideological instruction with no secular or humanist alternative, but it is optional.
Some concerns about political or media freedoms, not specific to the non-religious. Concerns that secular or religious authorities interfere in specifically religious freedoms. No religious tribunals of concern, secular groups operate freely, individuals are not persecuted by the state. Constitution and government. Preferential treatment is given to a religion or religion in general.
Family, community, society, religious courts and tribunals. Freedom of expression advocacy of humanist values. The state is secular, with separation of religious and political authorities, not discriminating against any religion or belief Download this country entry as a PDF.
Insufficient information or detail not included in this report Download this country entry as a PDF. Religious or ideological instruction is mandatory in all or most state-funded schools with no secular or humanist alternative Download this country entry as a PDF. No formal discrimination in education Download this country entry as a PDF. No religious tribunals of concern, secular groups operate freely, individuals are not persecuted by the state Download this country entry as a PDF.
No fundamental restrictions on freedom of expression or advocacy of humanist values Download this country entry as a PDF. No condition holds in this strand Download this country entry as a PDF. Localised or infrequent but recurring and widespread social marginalisation or prejudice against the non-religious Download this country entry as a PDF. Complete tyranny precludes all freedoms of expression and thought, religion or belief Download this country entry as a PDF.
The non-religious are barred from some government offices including posts reserved for particular religions or sects Download this country entry as a PDF. There is systematic religious privilege Download this country entry as a PDF. There is a nominal state church with few privileges or progress is being made toward disestablishment Download this country entry as a PDF.
Religious or ideological indoctrination is utterly pervasive in schools Download this country entry as a PDF. There is state funding of at least some religious schools Download this country entry as a PDF. State-funded schools offer religious or ideological instruction with no secular or humanist alternative, but it is optional Download this country entry as a PDF.
Expression of non-religious views is severely persecuted, or is rendered almost impossible by severe social stigma, or is highly likely to be met with hatred or violence Download this country entry as a PDF. The non-religious are persecuted socially or there are prohibitive social taboos against atheism, humanism or secularism Download this country entry as a PDF.
There is significant social marginalisation of the non-religious or stigma associated with expressing atheism, humanism or secularism Download this country entry as a PDF. Expression of core Humanist principles on democracy, freedom and human rights is brutally repressed Download this country entry as a PDF.
Expression of core humanist principles on democracy, freedom or human rights is severely restricted Download this country entry as a PDF. Expression of core humanist principles on democracy, freedom or human rights is somewhat restricted Download this country entry as a PDF.
Some concerns about political or media freedoms, not specific to the non-religious Download this country entry as a PDF. Religious authorities have supreme authority over the state Download this country entry as a PDF. State legislation is partly derived from religious law or by religious authorities Download this country entry as a PDF. Although French-speaking and English-speaking parts of Canada have been described as linguistic solitudes, they are, nonetheless, two communities which have been joined historically by a very strong tie—their mutual rejection of American-style libertarianism.
Together, they have shared the goal of building ordered and peaceful communities on the northern half of the North American continent based on a system of shared social values. Whatever the eventual outcome of this unity debate, the two communities will continue to have close economic and political ties based on the social values which give them much more in common with each other than either has with their American neighbour. Until a generation ago the English-speaking part of Canada tended to reflect the values of an ethno-centric WASPish elite.
It is a distinction between cosmopolitan and ethnic vi-sions of nation. This transformation to a cosmopolitan worldview has occurred over the past generation in what was English Canada. In a recent study of the Canadian socio-political scene, Richard Gwyn concludes that Canada is emerging as a new kind of nation state on the world scene.
The ceremonial patriation of its constitution from Westminster in symbolized the final shedding of its historic British connection and proclaimed a new Canadian nationalism which, while based on values inherited from its past, is nevertheless distinctive and new. As a result of massive immigration since WWII from continental Europe, the Caribbean, and from Asia, these values are producing the most open, pluralistic, multiethnic, multicultural society on the world scene—and, perhaps, the least sexist and racist in the Western world.
Gwyn suggests that Canada has become the first truly post-modern society, in the sense that it is no longer a traditional nation-state based on common history, mythology, religion or even language. It is probably the first to be based simply on a shared set of social val-ues. Gwyn points out that Canada exists as an act of will, based on the historic goal of its two founding communities and now shared by its other recently acknowledged aboriginal communities—namely, to build a more gentle and ordered society than that of its American neighbour.
For the second year in a row, the Index has found Canada to have a substantial lead as the most desirable country in which to live. The following are examples of public policy issues where the Canadian outlook is substantially different from the American:. There has been a contingent of Canadian peace-keeping troops in Bosnia since , in situations of great danger, and with overwhelming public support.
On a per capita basis, this commitment has been equivalent to that which the USA was only recently prepared to make, with much less apparent support from the American public. Canadian troops have been involved in all international peacekeeping missions since the UN was founded, commitments which are accepted by Canadians as a normal responsibility of world citizenship.
It should also be noted that Canada joined Britain and France in resisting totalitarianism from the beginning of the two World Wars, in and in The isolationism that is so evident a feature of American society has never been characteristic of Canadians.
Like most countries, except the USA and Taiwan, Canada recognized the new Cuban government after the criminal Batista regime was overthrown—and has traded with Cuba ever since. Canadians believe it was the refusal of help from the US under mafiosa Cuban exile pressure that forced Castro into economic and military reliance on the Soviet Union. Each winter since the revolution, tens of thousands of Canadians have holidayed in Cuba. Canadians did not understand, and were often frightened by, the apparent paranoia that characterized American society during the Cold War.
Long before its defeat in Vietnam, Canadians were appalled at United States involvement there, and they welcomed the thousands of war resistors who came north for sanctuary.
Massive public demand, following the Montreal massacre of , has resulted in the most rigorous gun control laws to be found anywhere. For 30 years, health care has been available to Canadians on an equal basis regardless of ability to pay—as has been the case in most other developed countries except the USA. In Canada, equal access to health care is held to be a fundamental human right, as proclaimed in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and its provision on a universal basis, outside of the for-profit market system, is considered to be an essential value of a civilized society.
Related to this is the virtual unanimity among Canadians that, whatever its circumstances, every family is entitled to the basic necessities of food and shelter. Has not been practiced in Canada since Persons charged with capital offenses in states where capital punishment is used can only be extradited from Canada within agreements that capital punishment will not be used. These observations draw attention to aspects of the Canadian worldview that need explaining to an American audience.
An international consciousness has always set Canadians apart from Americans—due, certainly, to the fact that until WWII Canadian foreign policy was guided by events in Britain and France. Continued strong ties with the Commonwealth and the Francophonie maintain this international outlook. Today, however, Canadian international concerns are dominated by a preoccupation with the affairs and policies of the USA, its largest trading partner. Currently, there is an American attempt to stop Canada and other counties from trading with Cuba the Helms Burton Act , a move that has escalated into a serious confrontation with Canada, Mexico and Europe, and in which the US is alienating its best friends.
Canada did not experience the trauma of the Vietnam War, thus enabling the social revolution of the s to quietly continue. Today, same-sex spousal arrangements are recognized by government and many employers.
Abortion is no longer in the criminal code thanks to Dr. It has been established that rights of personhood do not exist until the moment of birth. There has been good progress, also, in correcting inequalities for women, minority groups and aboriginal peoples, although much more remains to be done in these areas. Humanists consider that pluralism is an essential prerequisite for developing a truly secular society. Also, there must be agreement on the aspects of culture where diversity is tolerable.
As in the USA, diversity may only be acceptable in the narrow sense of private culture, such as in religion or lifestyle. In a truly cosmopolitan state, however, the principle must apply in a wider sense—for example, to include language and nationality. On this question, Americans differ profoundly from Canadians, Britons, and Russians, all of whom accommodate ranges of languages, ethnicities and nationalities within their states.
Canada is pluralistic in the wider sense; it was founded explicitly to be so. The institutions of the Canadian federal state were designed to allow the development of the two distinct Euro-cultures that came together in —expressing a vision that, it is now generally agreed, was remarkable for its time. A century and a quarter later, the French-speaking and English-speaking founding communities have developed into fully modern societies which retain their distinctive characteristics.
Pluralism, practically realized, is an essential foundation for the truly open, secular society that Humanists espouse, where religious beliefs are no longer acceptable as rationalizations for public policy. It is suggested here that the difference in their understanding and practice of pluralism is one of the reasons why Canadian and American religious norms differ—and in particular, why Canadian society is so much more secular in practice.
It should be pointed out, however, that Humanists elsewhere may well disagree. In Canada we have arrangements that are very different from the United States, and which are closer to those of most other countries—and, judged by the results, these have been very successful.
As applied to entire societies, however, it is necessary to invoke a different sense of the term. We choose here to define the secular society in a way that can be applied universally. This requires that we agree to limit the definition to describing a society where the result is assessed, and not how the result is achieved.
Thus, for example, it does not matter whether there is an American-style prohibition on the use of taxes to support religious organizations—or whether, as in Canada, taxes are used to support religious schools as well as secular schools. Let Humanists in each country do what is needed to ensure that whatever system is used, it is fair to them. Nor is our defini-tion of a secular society concerned with the number of its citizens who profess religious belief.
Our concern is with an end result using a different criterion. We define the secular society as one where its citizens, whatever their beliefs, separate out the sacred from the secular in their public lives. People who are secular in this sense respect the sensitivities of others by avoiding all religious references in their everyday affairs—and they expect their institutions to be equally circumspect.
In a society that is secular in this sense, individuals may or may not be religious—only their family and close friends will know. That Canadian society has become secular in this sense is suggested in the poll results at the beginning of this article. This will be further documented in what follows, where the reasons are examined why Canada has developed this secular aspect more rapidly than other countries.
Americans probably expect Canadians to be much like themselves, and in superficial respects this is the case. They share the same continent and relate similarly to its geography; they share a similar although not identical North American language; and they appear to have similar material and lifestyle expectations. But because of their different history, Canadians are really more like Europeans in important respects.
An example is the Canadian political culture which reflects a classic social democracy on the Northern European model—a result of the fact that Canadians never accepted the philosophy of individualism espoused in the American Declaration of Independence. Canada has been a constitutional monarchy from its beginning. The two founding peoples—French-speaking and English-speaking—that came together in to form the Canadian federal state were both monarchist societies.
In effect, both communities of Canadian settlers consciously opted for the traditional, organic view of society.
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