In Canada, freedom of speech has become a topic unfit for polite company. For a country that talks endlessly about its Charter of Rights and its values, it is sad that some rights are now less popular – and less protected – than others. While all Canadians enjoy human rights, not all rights are created equal. And, while Christians are overtly being persecuted in Third World, a more insidious anti-Christian campaign is happening here at home.
In Canada, “the court of public opinion” rules and the now infamous human rights commissions are, in a sense, the embodiment of this metaphor. They are society?s expression of what a psychologist might call “transference”: in punishing Christians for the charge of “exposing someone to hatred,” these pseudo-legal entities actually commit this very crime. HRCs are not a remedy for hatred, but are, indeed, a vehicle for hatred against Christians courageous enough to oppose misguided modern mores.
Mark Twain once wrote: “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.” But it is a painful irony that those Canadians most in need of protection from the majority are the now its victims. Those who promote sexual licence cast themselves as victims in order to persecute those who defend traditional Christian norms. Our “liberated” generation enforces powerful taboos on speech. Rather than tolerate the unpopular message of Christians, Canadians have allowed HRCs to enforce the decorum of a false consensus. But at what cost?
Despite their deeply Christian character, human rights are generally seen as the child of the Enlightenment. Thus, the famous aphorism attributed to Voltaire: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” But, in Canada, the right to free speech is not absolute. In Canada, all rights are balanced. Like the false mother who pleaded with King Solomon for the possession of the disputed child, the so-called advocates of freedom were willing to see the child split, so long as they were assured the bigger half. Since then, radical Muslims have exposed the internal contradictions of this double standard and, using the same tactics of intimidation and censorship, have advanced their medieval agenda. Canada?s social liberals cannot seek protection in laws they themselves have broken.
Saint Stephen, the Protomartyr, preached to the people, “They were cut to the heart and they gnashed on him with their teeth ? they cried out with a loud voice and stopped their ears and ran upon him with one accord” (Acts 7:54-55). The reaction of those people is eerily similar to what we see today. Yet, in the face of violent opposition, Stephen continued to preach the Gospel, at the cost of his life. Stephen, then, shows us both the high cost, and also the sublime calling, of speaking the truth to a wayward world.