http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/news/comment/story.html?id=07e805f2-bd27-4aa4-8274-4dedb2172b10
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
This week, the Senate is expected to pass an amendment to the Criminal Code that will limit religious freedom and freedom of expression in Canada. Bill C-250, a private member's bill introduced by Svend Robinson, MP for Burnaby-Douglas, will make it a crime to "communicate statements in any public place" that "wilfully promote hatred against any identifiable group," including gays. Observant Christians, and others who view homosexuality as immoral, worry the new law will serve to ban the Bible, the Koran and other holy texts as hate literature and criminalize sermons that condemn homosexuality as sinful. Given the ambiguous wording of Mr. Robinson's bill and the recent willingness of Canadian courts and human rights tribunals to shove aside religious liberty whenever gay litigants complain the dogma offends them, C-250's opponents are right to be worried. Whatever one thinks of gay rights or same-sex marriage, it is unconscionable in a democracy that one side should succeed in using the law to shut up the other.