Canada’s national pro-life, pro-family lobbying group launched a petition in August asking Ontario Premier Doug Ford to drop Bill 163, which came into effect February. The bill prohibits all pro-life witness, including showing “disapproval” of abortion, within 50 meters of Ontario’s eight abortion centers. It also allows hospitals and pharmacies to apply for zones of up to 150 meters in which all [...]
British Columbians will vote by mail in a referendum on what voting system the province should use for its elections. The referendum is being held by mail from Oct. 22 to Nov. 30. All B.C. residents over the age of 18 can vote in the referendum. This is the third time provincial voters will have their say on electoral reform, having [...]
19th century Dutch legislator Groen van Prinsterer For Life: Defending the Unbornby the Ezra Institute for Contemporary Christianity A Nation Founded on Rock or Sand: Groen Van Prinsterer for Todayby Hendrik Smitskamp (translated by Harmen Boersma) Democracy 101by William Baptiste Three recent publications tell a moral and sobering story of what happens when Christian principles and beliefs are abandoned in [...]
Talk Turkey Josie Luetke Chalk it up to our difficulty eking out cultural ground. Whenever a pro-life politician or other influential figure makes it into the spotlight, many pro-lifers immediately make it our personal mission to defend said person against any and every criticism, simply because we’re so grateful to just have someoneon “our side” to root for, and simultaneously [...]
Andrew Lawton This summer marks one year since the implementation of Bill C-16, the legislation that catapulted Professor Jordan Peterson to fame and galvanized a much-needed discussion about freedom of expression in Canada. Though we have yet to see the first public prosecution under the bill, its free speech implications are still very much alive. The bill updated the Criminal [...]
Grassroots pro-life and pro-family delegates scored a number of victories at the Conservative policy convention in Halifax, August 23-25. Campaign Life Coalition vice president Jeff Gunnarson, said, “overall, the pro-life-and-family movement had a hugely successful convention,” despite missing out on what he called “the top prize” of deleting Article 65. That article, added to the policy handbook in 2016, commits a Conservative [...]
Ontario Premier Doug Ford In July, the Doug Ford government confirmed it would repeal the 2015 Kathleen Wynne’s sex-ed program, fulfilling a leadership and campaign promise to rescind the controversial curriculum while the government carried out a new, inclusive consultation process. The rollout was botched, with no details of what the consultations would look like and Education Minister Lisa Thompson [...]
Talk Turkey Josie Luetke Not-so-breaking news: The Progressive Conservatives won the Ontario election and nine pro-life PC candidates whom CLC green-lighted now have seats in the legislature. I’m sure their activities will be closely monitored and reported on over the next four years, so at least for this column I want to direct my attention to those pro-life candidates who [...]
UN ambassador Nikki Haley has followed lead of Trump administration in keeping abortion out of recent statements. A disagreement over abortion between the Trump administration and European governments has set the stage for a showdown in the UN General Assembly this fall. At issue is the inclusion of various phrases used to support abortion in an annual UN resolution on [...]
A coalition of Canadian companies and a Christian student ministry are taking Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government to court over its requirement that they declare support for legal abortion and other political stances in order to participate in the country’s summer jobs program. The Canada Summer Jobs Program offers money to groups that hire students for summer positions. In a break from previous [...]
On June 27, Justice Anthony Kennedy announced he is retiring from the United States Supreme Court, providing President Donald Trump an opportunity to appoint his second judge to the top court. In 2016, Trump appointed originalist and pro-life judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Kennedy was appointed to the Court by Ronald Reagan in 1987 after the Senate rejected his original [...]
On June 15, in a 7-2 ruling, the Canadian Supreme Court found that the law societies of British Columbia and Ontario have the power to refuse to accredit law school graduates of Trinity Western University because the Christian school’s community covenant binds students to a code of conduct, that among other things, includes abstaining from sex outside of heterosexual marriage. The Court [...]
Law Matters John Carpay You know a court ruling is bad when judges deliberately ignore the evidence placed before them. But reality was brushed aside in the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision to repudiate, nullify, and revoke the fundamental Charterfreedoms of Trinity Western University (TWU), its staff, and its students. According to the justices, Charter-protected freedom of religion was narrowed [...]
It is argued that a return to true federalism – i.e., strengthening the role of provinces and regions in Canada – may lead to a more balanced society in the future. While there is no returning to the Old Canada which existed “before the ‘60s,” it is possible that the “New Canada” could reach out to incorporate some better aspects of the [...]
A common strategy employed by “pro-choice” advocates today is to claim that women in Canada have the constitutional right to abortion. For example, Justin Trudeau, speaking in 2014 before he had yet become Prime Minister, said: “Since 1988, the Supreme Court of Canada has affirmed that a woman’s right to choose in this matter is part of her fundamental rights and freedoms…. [...]