Well, just in case anyone should think this is idle speculation and thought experiment, consider news coming out of Canada today:

A Canadian court is assembling an unprecedented set of testimonies and legal briefs about the pros and cons of polygamy. The goal is to answer the question of whether Canada’s anti-polygamy law is constitutional.

But, as the story reveals, there is still cause for hope. The case to legalize polygamous unions faces an uphill battle, against some formidable forces -- for example, the scholarship of Professor Joseph Henrich from the University of British Columbia.

Henrich has written of monogamy that it is "one of the foundations of Western civilization, and may explain why democratic ideals and notions of human rights first emerged as a Western phenomenon."

This much, at least, is not news to us. Let's hope that the Court recognizes this fact enshrined in the tradition of marriage, too.

A Supreme Court of Canada decision that upheld Quebec's laws which provide rights to married couples that do not apply to couples merely living together has been applauded by pro-family organizations as a recognition of the unique and distinctive role that true marriage plays in society.

In what has become known as the Eric and Lola case, pseudonyms designed to protect the couple’s three children, the court ruled that the Quebec law that excludes cohabiting couples from receiving spousal support in the event of relationship breakdown is constitutional and does not discriminate against couples who choose to live together without the benefit of marriage.

In a close 5-4 decision, Chief Justice Beverley McLaughlin wrote, "Those who choose to marry choose the protections, but also the responsibilities, associated with that status. Those who choose not to marry avoid these state-imposed responsibilities and protections."

The Institute of Marriage and Family Canada (IMFC) says that the decision accurately reflects the social science research which shows marriage to be substantively different from living common law.

Today the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that Quebec can exclude cohabiting couples from receiving spousal support in the event of relationship breakdown.

The Institute of Marriage and Family Canada applauds this decision because it accurately reflects the fact that social science research shows marriage to be substantively different from living common law.

“There is great consensus from social scientists, no matter their political stripe, that marriage is different from living together,” says IMFC Manager of Research Andrea Mrozek. “Unfortunately, the statistical reality is that people living together break up more readily – even if they do eventually wed. They are more likely to have multiple partners. Their children face more problems – higher rates of school dropout, more drug use and an earlier age of sexual initiation. And single parents – typically mothers – are more likely to be poor. These are some of the harsh statistical realities of living together versus getting married, and it is wise to acknowledge this difference,” says Mrozek.

Marriage protects against poverty and remains the most stable manner in which to raise children. Some researchers have even identified that a new class division is emerging along married versus unmarried lines. This is the message of author Kay Hymowitz’s book, Marriage and Caste in America.

"The effects of same-sex civil marriage in Canada—restrictions on free speech rights, parental rights in education, and autonomy rights of religious institutions, along with a weakening of the marriage culture—provide lessons for the United States."

Q Why are you, as a Canadian, appearing in American election ads about gay marriage?
A I think it’s important in this day and age, especially for people of faith, to stand up for what they believe in — especially something as organic as marriage being defined as between one man and one woman. I think it’s vitally important in a free society to be able to not only express your deep-held beliefs but to also not be afraid to appear in a commercial or take to Twitter and social media.

Q And how are those ads performing?
A We are grossly being outspent, but from what we get on the ground, there is a major grassroots support for marriage being between a man and a woman. We feel confidently that, as it’s been done in the previous 31 states, that we’ll go four for four.

Q Now you’ve had some backlash in the past week since the ads came out — were you surprised by that?
A Not at all. The hate is still there, but as I’ve tried to calmly state on social media and in emails, there’s nothing that’s going to deter me. Being called names is not going to stop me from partaking in the awesome privilege of expressing myself.

Public Education Advocates for Christian Equity Phil Lees gives Minnesota For Marriage and the Minnesota Catholic Conference (MCC) an exclusive interview detailing the consequences of redefining marriage and the effect that has had on schools, education and children in Canada.

His exclusive interview is a part of an event sponsored by MCC giving Minnesotans an idea of "What the future looks like if marriage in Minnesota is redefined -- A Canadian Perspective."

"Panelists included The Most Reverend Terrence Prendergast, Archbishop of Ottawa, Ontario; Damian Goddard, a celebrated former sportscaster from Ontario who was fired for simply tweeting his support for traditional marriage; Phil Lees, founder of Public Education Advocates for Christian Equity; Albertos Polizogopoulos, Lawyer and Advocate, and Dr. Steve Tourloukis, a Christian parent who experienced firsthand the selective erosion of religious freedom and parental rights in the Canadian education system after the struggle to defend traditional marriage was lost."

You can view the full 30 minute video here.

"To start, there have been hundreds of Canadian proceedings in courts, human rights commissions and employment boards, against critics and opponents of same-sex marriage. Religious groups and leaders have been punished. For instance, the Archbishop of Calgary was forced to answer to the Alberta human rights commission for preaching the Church's teaching on marriage."

A few years ago, when the gay-marriage bandwagon got rolling, some of us argued that “if the sex of the participants is no longer relevant, why should the number be?” The same-sex-marriage crowd swatted the polygamy shtick aside as utterly irrelevant, even though there are far more takers for polygamy than there will ever be for gay marriage, and it is, de facto, already recognized to one degree or another by multiculti types in the British Government pensions department and the French welfare system.

So here we are in 2012, and the Toronto District School Board has a new poster called “Love Has No Gender“, full of happy couples but also happy triples. This poster is in every Toronto grade school.

Statistics Canada has admitted that “there may be an overestimation” in the number of same-sex ‘married’ couples from the 2011 census, after the government agency mistakenly counted some same gender roommates as gay couples.

Stats Canada warned that the census data should be “used with caution.”

While same-sex couples — both ‘married’ and common law — accounted for merely 0.8% of all couples in 2011, the numbers showed same-sex ‘married’ couples nearly tripled: that is, until analyzers realized that many of the “couples” polled may have been migrant workers who were splitting rent with other migrant workers of the same gender and who both happened to be married, but not to each other.

Statistics Canada noted today that it may have overestimated the number of same-sex ‘married’ couples by 4,500.

“We observed that there was a possible over estimation of same-sex families,” said census manager Marc Hamel to The Globe and Mail. “The counts for some smaller communities seemed too high.”

Hamel noted that the number of ‘married’ same-sex couples seemed especially high in places like Alberta and Saskatchewan where rent sharers who left a wife back home could have been counted as a couple.

“We seem to observe that [trend] in more transient communities where we have a lot of temporary workers coming in. So it could be people living together, for example, and reporting each other as married, but not necessarily to each other.”

One of the Ontario government’s lead trainers and advisors on its controversial equity and inclusive education strategy says attempts by parents to withdraw their children from objectionable classes on sexuality is an “attack” on inclusivity in the schools.

The comment was made to the Toronto Star Monday by Chris D’Souza, the chair of the Equity Summit Group, a former teacher in the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board, and an equity trainer who has led sessions in over a dozen Catholic school boards across Ontario.

This LifeSiteNews reporter questioned D’Souza about the comment Tuesday, asking also his view on policies adopted by the Toronto District School Board and the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board that forbid parents from withdrawing children from classes dealing with homosexuality.

In reply, he said simply: “Here is your quote Patrick: You are all clutching at straws and have lost the battle.”

A Church of Christ minister who has been responsible for civic marriage ceremonies at Cambridge city hall for the past 15 years is facing the axe if she doesn’t agree to perform same-sex “marriages.”

Rev. Jay Brown told LifeSiteNews that city council voted 8 to 1 Monday night on a motion, brought forward by Councillor Donna Reid, that Brown be forced to officiate at homosexual “marriages” or they would issue a “request for proposal” to find a replacement.

Rev. Brown explained that as a minister of the Church of Christ she must follow the precepts of her church, which does not allow homosexual “marriage,” but that she was always ready to accommodate same-sex couples by recommending a designated minister who would be happy to perform the ceremony.

“I have nothing against gay people, in fact a member of my family is gay,” Brown said in an interview with LifeSiteNews, “but I represent my church, which does not allow same-sex marriage.”

“My church won’t allow me to. I haven’t had to make that decision,” she said, adding that in the years since homosexual “marriage” was legalized in Canada she has been asked only a few times to perform same-sex “marriages.”

A judge in this small northern Ontario town has ruled that allowing a biological father access to his 22-month-old son, who is being raised by his biological mother and her lesbian partner, is not in the best interests of the child because of “the risk of there being an adverse affect to the child.”

Citing arguments that introducing the child to his father would cause the boy confusion and insecurity, Justice Norman Karam of the Ontario Superior Court in Cochrane said, “Despite the child’s young age, it is impossible to know what disclosure of [the father’s] status as his parent might mean. All circumstances considered, the risk of there being an adverse affect to the child is too great to ignore.”

Justice Karam said he considered allowing access, but imposing limitations on what the child was told about his father, but decided that, “attempting to enforce such limitations would be virtually impossible.”

... Rene deBlois, the biological father of the boy, had requested interim access to his son in January, 2011 pending the outcome of the trial scheduled for October 22, 2012. That trial will look into the paternity rights muddle created when deBlois and the boy’s lesbian mother, Nicole Lavigne, entered into a home-made written agreement that deBlois, who had known Lavigne since childhood, would provide sperm so she could artificially inseminate herself, with the understanding that he agreed to relinquish his paternity rights.

According to a National Post report, part of deBlois and Lavigne’s agreement was that Lavigne would provide deBlois with a child of his own using his sperm following the birth of the first child. deBlois alleges that Lavigne reneged on her offer to carry a second child for him because it was not part of the written “Donor Agreement” that he signed.

In his application to the court for paternity rights, filed three months after his son Tyler’s birth in October, 2010, deBlois stated that he had been coerced into signing the Donor Agreement by Lavigne, who he described as a “bully” who forced him to sign “under duress.” -- LifeSiteNews

"The news media is full of examples of negative consequences as a result of Canada's redefinition of marriage. Some examples: recently a national sportscaster, Damian Goddard, was fired for tweeting his support for traditional marriage. Bishop Frederick Henry of Calgary was investigated by the Alberta Human Rights Commission for doing little more than writing about the Catholic Church's teaching on homosexuality in a newspaper column. Several court cases have been fired challenging Canada's laws against polygamy, using the same arguments that led to the imposition of same-sex marriage. A study commissioned by then-Prime Minster Paul Martin concluded that 'laws banning polygamy are discriminatory' and should be repealed."

She adds many more examples:

In Canada, where same-sex marriage has been legal for seven years, activists took their Chick-fil-A protest even further, ordering food they refused to pay for, even though they had the wrong company!

In America, when one gay marriage activist was exposed for harassing a Chick-fil-A employee, he was fired by his company.

In Canada, the employees simply had to take the abuse and harassment:

Christian owners of a bed and breakfast in British Columbia have been ordered to pay around $4,500 in damages after they refused to rent a room to a homosexual couple.

Brian Thomas and Shaun Eadie had reserved a room at the Riverbend B&B in Grand Forks in June 2009, but owners Les and Susan Molnar cancelled the reservation after realizing they were homosexual.

“To allow a gay couple to share a bed in my Christian home would violate my Christian beliefs and would cause me and my wife great distress,” Lee explained in tribunal documents.

Thomas and Eadie filed a complaint with the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal, which ruled in their favour on Tuesday. Tribunal member Enid Marion ordered the Molnars to “cease and desist the discriminatory conduct,” though they closed the B&B down in September 2009 as a result of the incident.

Marion agreed with the two men that the Molnars violated section 8 of the B.C. Human Rights Code, which states that it is a discriminatory practice to “deny to a person or class of persons any accommodation” because of “sexual orientation.”

"In his speech at the CLC pro-life Forum, Damian Goddard gave a riveting, very personal account of his firing from Rogers Sportsnet after having ‘tweeted’ in support of the true definition of marriage.

Goddard, at first continues from Part 1 to describe how the 911 “act of terrorism… harnessed me to get re-acquainted with my faith to re-connect with the ‘whole why am I here?’” Emphasizing that he “loved being a sportscaster” while on this spiritual journey, Goddard then said, “fast forward to May 10, 2011”, the date of his infamous tweet."

YouTube link here.

In what they are touting as a “world first,” a Quebec homosexual activist group has launched a “registry of homophobic acts” with support and funding from the Quebec Government’s Justice Department. Standing alongside Montreal Police Chief Johanne Paquin and Commander Alain Gagnon, the leadership of the group Gai Ecoute launched the anonymous tipster registry at a press conference today.

Included in the definition of actions classified as “homophobic” and deemed worthy of reporting to the registry are: “any negative word or act toward a homosexual or homosexuality in general: physical abuse, verbal abuse, intimidation, harassment, offensive graffiti, abuse, injurious mockery, inappropriate media coverage and discrimination.”

A press release from the group says that anyone who has experienced or witnessed an act of homophobia “must” report it to the registry of homophobic acts.

Funding and support for the venture comes from the Quebec Justice Ministry’s department of “The Fight Against Homophobia.” The Justice Ministry was tasked with fighting homophobia in 2008 and last year pledged $7 million to ‘anti-homophobia’ activities. --LifeSiteNews

In the wake the passage of Ontario’s “anti-bullying” Bill 13, Christian parents and leaders in the Hamilton area are demanding that their school board address what they say are instances of Christian children being bullied for their beliefs in public schools.

“There is a sincere need for anti-Christophobia efforts in the public schools of the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (HWDSB),” said Jim Enos, president of the Hamilton-Wentworth Family Action Council to LifeSiteNews. “Children from traditional biblically moral homes need to be offered a safe environment at public school.”

The issue of Christian children being bullied was brought to the attention of board members during a meeting Monday evening. Father Geoffrey Korz, Dean of Ontario for the Orthodox Church in America, and General Secretary of the Pan-Orthodox Association of Greater Hamilton, told an HWDSB committee that according to Statistics Canada, hate-motivated attacks against traditional religious groups increased by 55% over the past two years.

... He said that Christian parents can “only imagine” what it would be like to see their children’s values and beliefs being affirmed and promoted in public schools in the same way that the LGBT community’s values and beliefs are currently being affirmed and promoted.

“You’d see things like Christian Celebration week and Christian heroes specifically identified in school curriculum. You’d see Christian celebration posters in the hallways and Christian-safe classrooms with the cross posted on the classroom doors as an identifier. Finally, you’d see things like mandatory attendance of students and staff to anti-Christophobic assemblies where everyone would be able to listen to Christian speakers and to gain understanding of the biblically moral Christian community.”

“And this is just the short list,” Enos said. -- LifeSiteNews

In Canada gay marriage activists are threatening to go into schools to get that "crap" --i.e. Catholic teachings about sexuality and family-- out of them, at least when it comes to anti-bullying clubs:

"As Catholic bishops in Ontario scramble to figure out how to square McGuinty’s new law mandating Gay-Straight Alliances (GSAs) with Catholic teaching on sexual morality, homosexual activist groups say that they are prepared to challenge Catholic doctrine in court come September.

After Catholic Bishop Fred Colli of Thunder Bay made statements last week that GSA clubs in Catholic schools would be “true to the teachings of our Church”, Ontario Gay-Straight Alliances Coalition lawyer Doug Elliott told the omosexual news service Xtra! that if Catholics “driven by the position of the Vatican” think they have found a loophole in the legislation, then they will be hauled before the courts.

“If the schools try to play games with kids …. the law is clear. We won’t put up with any of that crap come September,” Elliott said. “If you’re not complying with the law, then we’re going to take you to court. It’s that simple.” -- LifeSiteNews

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/24334/feed 34 http://www.nomblog.com/23786 http://www.nomblog.com/23786#comments Sun, 03 Jun 2012 13:00:02 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=23786 The Christian Post:

The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Anglican Church in North America affirmed core teachings of the Christian faith they share and expressed hope to jointly fight some key social challenges, including homosexuality, abortion and secularism, after concluding the first round of theological discussions.

The cooperation between the two denominations is a reason for joy at a time when "there is a widespread failure to recognize the biblical teaching regarding the creation of man and woman and their biblical roles, life-issues, and other grave challenges that society faces," LCMS President the Rev. Dr. Matthew C. Harrison said in a statement Friday as the two bodies released a joint report summarizing the areas of agreement.

There are some differences in doctrine, Harrison agreed, but quoted a Lutheran theologian as saying that churches who can honestly discuss where they have disagreements in doctrine are in fact closer to each other than churches who cannot discuss such matters.

The dialogue, aimed at increasing the level of mutual understanding and affirmations between the church bodies, led to a joint affirmation of core Christian teachings the two denominations share. The discussions, which took place during four meetings over the past 18 months beginning the fall of 2010, also included a representative of the Lutheran Church-Canada.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/23786/feed 10 http://www.nomblog.com/23754 http://www.nomblog.com/23754#comments Sat, 02 Jun 2012 13:00:04 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=23754 LifeSiteNews:

Dalton McGuinty’s government threw down the gauntlet Friday as they announced that they will force Catholic schools to allow student clubs called “gay-straight alliances.”

The move is expected to spark a court battle with Ontario’s bishops as they defend Catholics’ denominational rights over the Catholic schools enshrined in Canada’s constitution.

Minister of Education Laurel Broten told reporters at a news conference Friday afternoon that she is introducing an amendment to the controversial homosexual anti-bullying bill that will require schools to let students name the clubs what they want.

In an address to the annual general meeting of the Ontario Student Trustees Association, Broten said her amendment will state that “neither the board nor the principal shall refuse to allow a pupil to use the name gay-straight alliance or a similar name.”

The move is a direct rebuke to Ontario’s Catholic bishops who have gone so far as to allow homosexual clubs, but drew a line in the sand over the GSA name.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/23754/feed 25 http://www.nomblog.com/22215 http://www.nomblog.com/22215#comments Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:00:50 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=22215 Peter Baklinksi of LifeSiteNews:

An organization in British Columbia that champions the natural family, parental rights, and the sanctity of life has filed a human rights complaint against the Vancouver School Board (VSB) for using in its meetings, policies, and schools what the group calls “hateful, defamatory, and demeaning terminology.”

Culture Guard filed the complaint with the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal last Wednesday claiming that the school board’s use of the terms “homophobe, homophobic, and homophobia” is “offensive” and discriminates against beliefs and values held by certain groups.

“Such terms are designed to promote hatred and contempt,” stated Culture Guard president Kari Simpson in a press release. “They are used to isolate, marginalize, and belittle individuals and groups that hold opinions at variance to those of the sex activists within the education establishment.”

Simpson told LifeSiteNews that the complaint was filed not only on her own behalf but on behalf of Chinese Christians residing in Vancouver who, according to Simpson, were verbally assaulted when they raised concerns over the ‘anti-homophobia’ policies that were being enacted in their school district.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/22215/feed 12 http://www.nomblog.com/22227 http://www.nomblog.com/22227#comments Sun, 29 Apr 2012 14:00:22 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=22227 Canadian courts side with a biological father who wants to care for his daughter, after her mother dies.  This is not a case of IVF.  They just made a baby together the old-fashioned way, but on the understanding he would not interfere. Courts do not normally respect agreements like that. But the contours of legal parenthood are becoming blurry:

A single woman’s decision to conceive a child with the help of an ex-boyfriend has led to a chaotic court battle over who possesses parental rights over the child, after the mother died from cancer.

The unmarried Montreal woman, 36, whose identity is subject to a publication ban by court order, desired to raise offspring a few years ago, reported the National Post. The woman reportedly explored the option of using the services of a fertility clinic that would artificially inseminate her with sperm from an anonymous donor. But when the expensive procedure proved beyond the woman’s budget, she turned to her ex-boyfriend and employed his services to help make a baby.

The woman reportedly paid the ex-boyfriend $1400 for what she considered to be a sperm donation, a service that he rendered to her through sexual intercourse. The woman considered herself a single mom, but allowed the father of the child to visit his daughter occasionally.

Three years after the child’s birth, the mother succumbed to cancer and left her young daughter in the legal care of grandparents. -- LifeSiteNews

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/22227/feed 21 http://www.nomblog.com/21841 http://www.nomblog.com/21841#comments Thu, 19 Apr 2012 12:00:51 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=21841 LifeSiteNews:

Catholic schools will no longer be allowed to teach the Catechism’s doctrine that homosexual acts are “intrinsically disordered,” says a cabinet minister in Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty’s government.

As politicians debated a bill that would force Catholic schools to launch gay clubs on March 29th, Member of Provincial Parliament Glen Murray (Toronto Centre) lashed out against Ontario’s bishops over Catholic teaching on homosexuality.

“I have to say to the bishops: ‘You’re not allowed to do that anymore,’” said Murray, an open homosexual who serves as McGuinty’s Minister of Training, Colleges and Universities, according to the Hansard transcript.

“I’m not allowed to say to the Catholics—nor should I—or to other Christians or Muslims or Jews, that because of your faith you’re intrinsically disordered,” he continued.

“I would never say to you that anything that goes on in your family with the person you love—can you imagine me describing a husband-and-wife relationship as inherently depraved?” he added.

Suresh Dominic of Campaign Life Catholics said Murray’s comments “amount to a declaration of war against the Catholic Church and all people who support traditional moral values.”

“We’ve been saying all along that McGuinty wants to dictate what the Church can teach in its schools and here it is straight from the government’s mouth,” Dominic added.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/21841/feed 26 http://www.nomblog.com/20747 http://www.nomblog.com/20747#comments Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:00:54 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=20747 LifeSiteNews:

A self-proclaimed ‘lesbian’ whose two children attend a Catholic school near Peterborough is demanding that the Peterborough Catholic school board remove a Catechism quote dealing with homosexuality from a school pamphlet. Ann Michelle Tesluk has started an online petition to pressure the board to action and describes her activities as gearing to make the Catholic Church into an “openly gay friendly church.”

The pamphlet in question, however, is controversial from more than one perspective. While quoting the Catechism that the homosexual inclination is “objectively disordered”, the pamphlet also misrepresents Catholic teaching in numerous ways. The pamphlet calls on schools to highlight homosexual role models and familiarize students with terms like “LGBTQQ” and “two-spirited.” It indicates that Canada legalized same-sex “marriage” in 2005 without mentioning that the Church opposes such unions.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/20747/feed 13 http://www.nomblog.com/20879 http://www.nomblog.com/20879#comments Sat, 24 Mar 2012 17:00:31 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=20879 LifeSiteNews:

The protest against the inclusion of the Alberta Human Rights Act in Section 16 of the province’s proposed new Education Act (Bill 2) is escalating, with over 2000 attending a peaceful protest at the Alberta Legislature on Monday, March 19.

Paul Faris, president of the Home School Legal Defense Association, attended the protest and told LifeSiteNews that the rally was “a huge success.”

“With at least 2100 people attending, this rally was amongst the largest in Alberta history,” Faris said.

... Faris observed that “it wasn’t just homeschoolers there, but lots of private, Catholic and public schoolers, so it’s becoming a very broad-based movement of parents who are concerned that the government is taking away their freedom in education.”

The focal point of the protest is the possibility that home and private schools that teach the precepts of their faith could be prosecuted by human rights tribunals for “hate crimes” under the Alberta Human Rights Act (AHRA). The AHRA has been used in the past to prosecute conservatives and Christians, most notably pastor Steve Boissoin, who was found “guilty” by a tribunal of “hate speech” against homosexuals after he published a letter to the editor in a local newspaper. That conviction was subsequently overturned by the court system.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/20879/feed 8 http://www.nomblog.com/19817 http://www.nomblog.com/19817#comments Tue, 28 Feb 2012 13:00:14 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=19817 The Editors of LifeSiteNews editorialize on the disturbing story we reported last week:

...In the past week we have witnessed the Supreme Court of Canada dismiss the appeal of a Quebec family for permission to exempt their child from that province’s controversial ethics and religious culture course, which critics say is “relativistic,” and teaches that all religious are equally valid. And we have heard a spokesperson for the Alberta education minister state that under the province’s new Education Act even homeschooling parents will no longer be allowed to teach their children traditional Christian sexual ethics.

... We who have witnessed the slow but steady drumbeat of Canada’s soft tyranny know by now that “tolerance” increasingly applies only to those who hold to the official state-sanctioned opinions, or who remain silent; “multiculturalism” is only deemed a virtue insofar as the cultures in question jettison any part of their heritage that might be deemed “offensive”; while “diversity” is mainly a celebration of superficial differences whilst demanding a deeper ideological similitude.

... By explicitly targeting homeschoolers, and/or by explicitly forbidding the right of parental opt-out, the Quebec, Ontario and Alberta governments have played their hand. They have made it clear that they will tolerate no dissent, and that, as the source and symbol of freedom, they fear the family. Perhaps this all sounds eerily familiar. It should, if you have studied any history. Every attempt to create a totalitarian regime begins with this attempt to eradicate, or at the very least mitigate the influence of the family: to tear the roof off the family home and to reach the fingers of the state inside.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/19817/feed 6 http://www.nomblog.com/19715 http://www.nomblog.com/19715#comments Fri, 24 Feb 2012 16:00:15 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=19715 LifeSiteNews:

Under Alberta’s new Education Act, homeschoolers and faith-based schools will not be permitted to teach that homosexual acts are sinful as part of their academic program, says the spokesperson for Education Minister Thomas Lukaszuk.

“Whatever the nature of schooling – homeschool, private school, Catholic school – we do not tolerate disrespect for differences,” Donna McColl, Lukaszuk’s assistant director of communications, told LifeSiteNews on Wednesday evening.

“You can affirm the family’s ideology in your family life, you just can’t do it as part of your educational study and instruction,” she added.

Reacting to the remarks, Paul Faris of the Home School Legal Defence Association said the Ministry of Education is “clearly signaling that they are in fact planning to violate the private conversations families have in their own homes.”

“A government that seeks that sort of control over our personal lives should be feared and opposed,” he added.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/19715/feed 40 http://www.nomblog.com/19367 http://www.nomblog.com/19367#comments Tue, 14 Feb 2012 21:30:42 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=19367 Patrick Craine of LifeSiteNews interviews Damian Goddard, our Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance spokesman:

Should Canada’s Christians have the right to defend their beliefs without losing their job?

Damian Goddard plans to put this question front-and-centre in May as he heads to the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

Goddard was fired as the host of Connected on Rogers Sportsnet in May 2011 after he defended the long-standing definition of marriage through his Twitter account.

He told LifeSiteNews on Monday that while he misses the job, he stands by the tweet now as much as ever. “I tremendously miss being a broadcaster. But I will never regret tweeting the words ‘I completely and wholeheartedly support the traditional and TRUE meaning of marriage.’ Never,” he said.

... In the fall, Goddard became a spokesman for the U.S.-based Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance, a project by the National Organization for Marriage that was founded by Maggie Gallagher to support pro-family citizens who face threats for expressing their views.

Goddard said Gallagher has been a “God-send.” “We are doing amazing things in changing the culture. There are so many stories like mine. Worse stories. But we must continue the fight,” he urged.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/19367/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/17896 http://www.nomblog.com/17896#comments Thu, 12 Jan 2012 18:00:02 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=17896 The Canadian Globe and Mail:

The Harper government has served notice that thousands of same-sex couples who flocked to Canada from abroad since 2004 to get married are not legally wed.

... speaking in Halifax Thursday, the Prime Minister said the issue was not on the agenda for his majority Conservatives. “We have no intention of further re-opening or opening this issue,” Stephen Harper told reporters when asked about The Globe and Mail’s report.

The reversal of federal policy is revealed in a document filed in a Toronto test case launched recently by a lesbian couple seeking a divorce. Wed in Toronto in 2005, the couple have been told they cannot divorce because they were never really married – a Department of Justice lawyer says their marriage is not legal in Canada since they could not have lawfully wed in Florida or England, where the two partners reside.

... Same-sex marriage was effectively legalized by the courts in 2004. A year later, the Liberal government of then-prime-minister Paul Martin passed a bill enshrining it in law. More than 5,000 of the approximately 15,000 same-sex marriages that have taken place since then involved couples from the United States or other countries.

In a response to Ms. McCarthy’s court application, federal lawyer Sean Gaudet tied the federal position to two central propositions. First, he said, couples who came to Canada to be married must live in the country for at least a year before they can obtain a divorce. Second, same-sex marriages are legal in Canada only if they are also legal in the home country or state of the couple.

“In this case, neither party had the legal capacity to marry a person of the same sex under the laws of their respective domiciles – Florida and the United Kingdom,” Mr. Gaudet stated. “As a result, their marriage is not legally valid under Canadian law.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/17896/feed 9 http://www.nomblog.com/17387 http://www.nomblog.com/17387#comments Fri, 06 Jan 2012 14:00:04 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=17387 Robin Perelle, managing editor of the gay magazine Xtra Vancouver, admits the effort to redefine marriage means redefining society's cultural norms, and that one of their ways to do this is to teach kids to view their parents as bigots:

"Just as the black civil rights movement changed the rules of what is and isn’t acceptable for racism, the gay rights movement is shifting norms in Canada. And with that comes a message to those who won’t evolve: your outdated morals are no longer acceptable, and we will teach your kids the new norms."

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/17387/feed 16 http://www.nomblog.com/16673 http://www.nomblog.com/16673#comments Wed, 14 Dec 2011 14:00:44 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16673 A Canadian high school teacher writes:

I decided to open [a class on Ethics] by simply displaying, without comment, the photo of Bibi Aisha.

Aisha was the Afghani teenager who was forced into an abusive marriage with a Taliban fighter, who abused her and kept her with his animals. When she attempted to flee, her family caught her, hacked off her nose and ears, and left her for dead in the mountains. After crawling to her grandfather’s house, she was saved by a nearby American hospital. I felt quite sure that my students, seeing the suffering of this poor girl of their own age, would have a clear ethical reaction, from which we could build toward more difficult cases.

The picture is horrific. Aisha’s beautiful eyes stare hauntingly back at you above the mangled hole that was once her nose. Some of my students could not even raise their eyes to look at it. I could see that many were experiencing deep emotions.

But I was not prepared for their reaction.

I had expected strong aversion; but that’s not what I got. Instead, they became confused. They seemed not to know what to think. They spoke timorously, afraid to make any moral judgment at all. They were unwilling to criticize any situation originating in a different culture.

They said, “Well, we might not like it, but maybe over there it’s okay.” One student said, “I don’t feel anything at all; I see lots of this kind of stuff .”

Another said (with no consciousness of self-contradiction), “It’s just wrong to judge other cultures.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16673/feed 22 http://www.nomblog.com/16642 http://www.nomblog.com/16642#comments Tue, 13 Dec 2011 15:00:01 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16642 Christian Concern:

The government has announced plans to introduce lessons on “transgender equality” in primary and secondary schools across the country.

The reforms, contained in a policy programme entitled ‘Advancing transgender equality – a plan for action’, will add transgender issues to the PSHE curriculum for children aged 5 and above in order to ensure that schools were ‘more inclusive for gender-variant children’.

Published by the Home Office, the programme claims that amendments were necessary to ‘address unacceptable behaviour and ensures that our society becomes more tolerant’, since ‘over 70 per cent of boys and girls who express gender variant behaviours are subject to bullying in schools.’

However, the proposals have attracted criticism on the basis that they permit young children to be exposed to adult issues too early in their lives.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16642/feed 18 http://www.nomblog.com/16590 http://www.nomblog.com/16590#comments Mon, 12 Dec 2011 15:00:22 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16590 Catholic schools are publicly subsidized in Canada, but it is striking that the government is now directly subverting their authority by giving a legal right to students to forms clubs and associations to contravene Catholic teaching.

(In this country school vouchers, or the tax exemption status of religious schools, provides a similar potential lever.)

The relevant language in the "Accepting Schools Act of 2011":

Bill 13 Section 9. Board support for certain pupil activities and organizations

303.1 Every board shall support pupils who want to establish and lead,

(a) activities or organizations that promote gender equity;

(b) activities or organizations that promote anti-racism;

(c) activities or organizations that promote the awareness and understanding of, and respect for, people with disabilities; or

(d) activities or organizations that promote the awareness and understanding of, and respect for, people of all sexual orientations and gender identities, including organizations with the name gay-straight alliance or another name.

Hat tip to the Institute for Canadian Values.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16590/feed 5 http://www.nomblog.com/16443 http://www.nomblog.com/16443#comments Thu, 08 Dec 2011 17:10:32 +0000 Brian Brown http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16443 Dear Marriage Supporter,

An anti-bullying curriculum in the Vancouver public schools points kids to a website featuring explicit videos of gay sex. When school board Trustee Ken Denike learned of it, he suggested periodic reviews of all online resources...and was roundly denounced by community leaders as a homophobe!

True story. See it here.

Our most recent Marriage ADA video features Vancouver School Trustee Ken Denike and mental health professional Sophia Woo, who have been trying to help concerned parents protect their children from an anti-bullying curriculum produced by Out in Schools pointing kids to online "resources" that amount to little more than gay pornography.

The request from Trustee Denike and Ms. Woo? That the school district implement a policy for periodic review of websites referenced in school curriculum, recognizing that website content can change quickly.

The school board refuses to do anything to protect kids from these explicit websites. Anti-bullying teacher Ryan Clayton, who has worked with the Out in Schools curriculum, chalks it up to a politically motivated attack. And for their efforts, Ken Denike and Sophia Woo are denounced as homophobes.

Imagine that—in our neighbor to the north, protecting 13 year old children from being exposed to pornography in public schools is now just a politically motivated attack.

Let's be clear—this is not about a student using a school computer to access pornography. This is about official curriculum recommending students visit a website containing gay pornography—and personal attacks directed at anyone who dares stand up for our kids.

The gay press understands the issue:

This is a moral question, I agree. Just as the black civil rights movement changed the rules of what is and isn't acceptable for racism, the gay rights movement is shifting norms in Canada. And with that comes a message to those who won't evolve: your outdated morals are no longer acceptable, and we will teach your kids the new norms.

"We will teach your kids the new norms." There it is—this is the whole story in eight simple words. No exemptions, no alternatives—just forcing kids to be exposed to government-sponsored porn, in an effort to shift cultural norms and reshape our kids' understanding of right and wrong.

This cannot go unanswered, but we need your help to continue this fight.

You've been a strong supporter of marriage and of NOM's efforts to protect marriage and religious liberty (thank you again), so you of all people understand how our opponents are viciously targeting people's safety, property, and livelihoods—and what we can do to fight back!

If you do one thing this week, watch this video and then make one urgent online contribution to NOM so we can spread the truth about what's going on in America.

Marriage ADA will continue to release—one-at-a-time—a series of incredible new videos about other courageous pro-marriage citizens.

Our goal is to create a community of Americans who adhere to the core Gospel value: "Be not afraid!"

Thanks for acting fast,

Brian S. Brown
Executive Director
NOM Education Fund

P.S. Please forward this email to three friends right now so they can see the truth and get involved. Isolated and alone, we can be intimidated. Together we are too many to be treated as second-class citizens.

Simply visit MarriageADA.org, learn our stories, and make one urgent contribution. Thank you again, and God bless you!

P.P.S. Out in Schools has now voluntarily removed this website from new printed materials in response to concerns raised by Trustee Denike and Ms. Woo.

So their courageous stand has already had an effect!

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16443/feed 22 http://www.nomblog.com/16384 http://www.nomblog.com/16384#comments Wed, 07 Dec 2011 15:00:15 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16384 LifeSiteNews:

All of Ontario’s Catholic and public schools will be required to set up gay-straight alliances if students request them, Ontario’s education minister said Thursday as Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal government unveiled its new bill to crack down on homosexual bullying.

Education Minister Laurel Broten told Xtra that there is “no more debate” on gay-straight alliances. “If students want a GSA, it must be provided,” she said. “I’m confident our Catholic schools will work with students on this.”

... The move could set up a showdown with Ontario’s Catholic school system. While the bishops have agreed to set up the homosexual “anti-bullying” clubs previously mandated by McGuinty’s government, they drew a line in the sand over gay-straight alliances (GSAs).

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16384/feed 26 http://www.nomblog.com/16336 http://www.nomblog.com/16336#comments Mon, 05 Dec 2011 20:00:06 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16336 From the Alliance Defense Fund:

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16336/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/16284 http://www.nomblog.com/16284#comments Sat, 03 Dec 2011 15:00:18 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16284 Catholic Culture World News:

A leading Canadian newspaper is demanding that the government of Ontario compel Catholic schools, which receive public funding, to allow gay-straight student clubs and alliances.

“The Catholic schools have the right to their beliefs about homosexuality,” according to an editorial in The Globe and Mail,which ranks second among Canadian newspapers in circulation. “But they are public schools and they do not have the right to insist on a second-class status for students who identify as homosexual, or who simply have questions about their identity, or who have gay or lesbian parents. They need to try a little harder to make religious belief and equality work together.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16284/feed 34 http://www.nomblog.com/16110 http://www.nomblog.com/16110#comments Tue, 29 Nov 2011 20:00:45 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16110 The editor of MercatorNet explains what happened:

MercatorNet has a "creative commons" republication policy - nearly all of our articles may be reproduced so long as the original source is acknowledged. This is what Rebekah Hebbert, the managing editor of a Canadian site based at McGill University, the Prince Arthur Herald, did with a recent article on same-sex adoption by Rick Fitzgibbons. (She is also an occasional contributor.)

The outcome was explosive. At least four editors and ten writers resigned from the staff and Rebekah appeared on national television explaining her decision to run what was described by her critics as garbage and bigotry.

... Rebekah's impression was that her colleagues had resigned because of fears that their careers would be tainted by homophobia.

The local McGill Daily adds more to the story.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16110/feed 30 http://www.nomblog.com/16045 http://www.nomblog.com/16045#comments Sat, 26 Nov 2011 18:00:10 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=16045 LifeSiteNews:

The British Columbia Supreme Court ruled today that Canada’s 121-year-old law prohibiting polygamy is constitutional.

“I have concluded that this case is essentially about harm,” said B.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Robert Bauman. “More specifically, Parliament’s reasoned apprehension of harm arising out of the practice of polygamy. This includes harm to women, to children, to society and to the institution of monogamous marriage.”

“Based on the most comprehensive judicial record on the subject ever produced, I have concluded that [there is] a reasoned apprehension of harm to many in our society inherent in the practice of polygamy,” said Justice Bauman.

“This includes harm to women, to children, to society and to the institution of monogamous marriage.”

A decision on whether the ruling will be appealed is expected to be made in December.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/16045/feed 50 http://www.nomblog.com/15946 http://www.nomblog.com/15946#comments Tue, 22 Nov 2011 17:30:10 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=15946 Steve Jalsevac of LifeSiteNews in Canada has kind words to say about the new spokesman for our Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance project:

I met and took part in a lengthy discussion this morning with Damian Goddard, the TV sportscaster fired for a tweet supporting hockey agent Todd Reynold’s tweet defending true marriage. Damian is impressive. He is fearlessly on fire for the truth and so naturally convincing and articulate about the issue that he has became the spokesman for the U.S.-based Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance. If you heard Damian as I did today, I have no doubt you would be as uplifted. Dynamic, young new recruits to the culture wars such as Damian are going to bring about big changes.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/15946/feed 0 http://www.nomblog.com/15932 http://www.nomblog.com/15932#comments Tue, 22 Nov 2011 14:30:15 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=15932 LifeSiteNews:

A TV sports anchor who was fired in the spring after tweeting his support for true marriage says he hopes the case will inspire other Canadians to take up the marriage battle, which is experiencing a lull in Canada six years after Parliament legalized same-sex “marriage.”

Damian Goddard, the former host of Connected, was fired by Rogers Sportsnet in May after tweeting his support for an NHL hockey agent who had opposed same-sex “marriage” on Twitter. In June, he launched a human rights complaint against Rogers, contending that the case affects all Canadians with deeply-held religious views.

“I want to … tell people that what I did wasn’t special at all,” Goddard told LifeSiteNews. “I want to tell people of faith that we are commissioned by Christ to speak boldly for the faith.”

Last week, Goddard became the spokesman for the U.S.-based Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance, a project by the National Organization for Marriage dedicated to supporting pro-family citizens who face threats for expressing their views.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/15932/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/15907 http://www.nomblog.com/15907#comments Mon, 21 Nov 2011 14:30:38 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=15907 Charles Lewis who runs a blog for Canada's National Post writes (this appeared on the front page of the print edition as well):

The firing of broadcaster Damian Goddard, who was let go from Sportsnet six months ago, is turning into a test case about religious freedom in Canada and the right to declare those views in public.

Mr. Goddard lost his job after he wrote on Twitter [“I completely and whole-heartedly support Todd Reynolds and his support for the traditional and TRUE meaning of marriage.”]

“I do not hate homosexuals,” the devout Roman Catholic said in an interview this week.

“But if I remain silent I am consenting to something I don’t believe in. I have 2,000 years of Christian history backing me up on this. I’m good with that.”

On Wednesday, it was announced Mr. Goddard had been hired as a spokesman for the Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance, a wing of the National Organization for Marriage, which is working to stop legalizing same-gender marriage in the United States.

... [a] lawyer, who would not comment directly on Mr. Goddard’s case, said there is now a dangerous atmosphere in Canada in which comments protected under law can be twisted to appear as hate speech.

“Hate speech needs to be related to inciting violence, not hurting feelings,” he said.

“I draw a distinction between ‘hurt speech’ and hate speech, and the culture has shifted in which hurt speech has become hate speech.”

What Damian tweeted is neither hate speech nor hurt speech, it was a civil expression of his civic point of view.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/15907/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/15707 http://www.nomblog.com/15707#comments Tue, 15 Nov 2011 20:15:05 +0000 Brian Brown http://www.nomblog.com/?p=15707

Dear Marriage Supporter,

Meet Damian Goddard.

On May 9, 2011 Damian had it all: a loving wife, two small children, and a dream job he loved as a sportscaster, for the Canadian equivalent of ESPN.

What happened to him is an absolute outrage.

Click here to watch the newest Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance video interview and listen to Damian tell you how the same-sex marriage movement turned his life upside down.

As the battle in New York over same-sex marriage heated up, Damian wrote a note stating his views on his own personal twitter account — to just 175 or so followers: "I completely and whole-heartedly support Todd Reynolds and his support for the traditional and TRUE meaning of marriage."

The next day he was called in by his bosses. He expected a slap on the wrist, maybe a demand he apologize — "How can I apologize for something I don't want to apologize for?" he recalls wondering to himself.

Instead he was summarily fired. "We're terminating your contract."

One of his bosses twisted the knife "Damian do you remember that conversation we had a while ago about the plans we had for you and these other shows at Sportsnet? Well that's not happening now, you're fired!"

Thankfully, Damian is speaking out in defense of marriage and religious liberty. He is refusing to be silenced by the big bosses.

Today we are proud to announce that Damian Goddard has joined NOM's Marriage Anti-Defamation Alliance, to speak on behalf of the rights of decent, loving, law-abiding citizens to speak, to write, to donate, to organize and to act to defend marriage.

Please watch the video detailing Damian's ordeal and meet the newest member of our team!

A decade ago, the courts imposed gay marriage where Damian lives. He remembers being asked by pro-gay marriage friends and relatives, "How will gay marriage affect your marriage?"

Well, now he knows: "Eleven years later I lost my job for saying I believe in one-man and one woman marriage!"

But despite the unjust and heavy penalties, he is paying for speaking up for marriage, Damian has no regrets.

"I would not change a thing. I stand by what I said," Damian says. "The words ‘Be not afraid!' keep ringing in my ears — I cannot shake it. It's so strong... ‘Be not afraid, be not afraid, don't worry — so I'm not afraid."

God, he says, has a plan.

Damian Goddard has two messages for each one of us:

"It's got to stop, we have to stop it from escalating from getting any worse than it is right now...there's a fight under way we each of us have to make a choice: speak up!"

Will you stand with this incredibly brave man by helping us get his message out? A donation of $5, 10, or 100 will help us help him stand up for not only for his rights, but for you and your family's rights.

Speak up! Be not afraid! Damian Goddard is an inspiration to us all!

Sincerely,

Brian S. Brown
Executive Director
NOM Education Fund

P.S. Please help us break the myth that the same-sex marriage movement is about "live-and-let-live." Forward this email to three friends right now so they can see the truth and get involved.

Simply visit MarriageADA.org, learn about the vicious attacks on your religious liberties, and make a generous contribution today. Thank you again, and God bless you!

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/15707/feed 54 http://www.nomblog.com/15548 http://www.nomblog.com/15548#comments Fri, 11 Nov 2011 15:00:11 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=15548 Canada's National Post:

Splitting up a pair of potentially homosexual African penguins and pairing them with females might sound anti-gay, but keepers at the Toronto Zoo insist they are simply trying to preserve the species.

Pedro, 10, and Buddy, 20, were brought to the Toronto Zoo this year from Pittsburgh’s National Aviary to “pair-bond” with a couple of eligible females. Instead, the pair bonded with each other. Zookeepers now report seeing the pair snuggling, calling to each other and displaying courtship behaviour.

This week, the Toronto Zoo says it will be forced isolate the pair.

“The two girls have been following them; we just have to get the boys interested in looking at them,” said Tom Mason, curator of birds and invertebrates at the Toronto Zoo.

With Pedro and Buddy’s species on the cusp of extinction, Mr. Mason insists that the Toronto Zoo cannot afford to let a season go by without passing on the pair’s genes. “If [Pedro and Buddy] weren’t genetically important, then we’d let them do their thing,” Mr. Mason said.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/15548/feed 21 http://www.nomblog.com/14757 http://www.nomblog.com/14757#comments Mon, 17 Oct 2011 14:30:12 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=14757 LifeSiteNews:

A case argued before the Supreme Court yesterday, if decided the wrong way, could result in “a virtual open season on anyone communicating a religiously informed position on any matter of public policy,” according to Don Hutchinson, general legal counsel for the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, which intervened in the case - Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission (SHRC) v. William Whatcott.

... The SHRC brought Whatcott before the Saskatchewan Human Rights Tribunal in 2006 over his practice of distributing flyers about the dangers of abortion and homosexuality.

...In an interview with LifeSiteNews today, Hutchinson said that he was “really thrown off” when counsel for Saskatchewan human rights commission, the body charged with assessing what constitutes hate speech under the provincial act, said that reading certain of the writings of Paul from the Scriptures on television would be hate speech.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/14757/feed 13 http://www.nomblog.com/14710 http://www.nomblog.com/14710#comments Sun, 16 Oct 2011 13:00:47 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=14710 LifeSiteNews:

A private members bill introduced into the Canadian House of Commons is seeking to delete the controversial “hate speech” provision in the Human Rights Act that has been used to silence Christians and conservatives who express politically incorrect opinions.

... Critics of section 13 have long argued that the clause creates the precise equivalent to a ‘thought crime.’ The provision defines a discriminatory practice as “any matter that is likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt” if the person or persons affected are “identifiable on the basis of a prohibited ground of discrimination.”

... In the last 15 years, decisions by various Human Rights Commissions have penalized those who adhere to traditional Judaeo-Christian values.

Mayors have been fined for refusing to proclaim ‘gay pride’ days. A teacher was suspended for writing against homosexuality outside the classroom. A printer was fined for refusing to print materials for a homosexual activist group. A pastor was hauled before the courts for publishing a letter in a local paper calling pro-homosexual literature “psychologically and physiologically damaging” to young children. And even a political party was chastised for promoting Christian teaching on homosexuality.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/14710/feed 11 http://www.nomblog.com/14514 http://www.nomblog.com/14514#comments Fri, 07 Oct 2011 15:30:34 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=14514 LifeSiteNews:

Videos showing naked men graphically sodomizing one another - included as “resource material” in an “anti-bullying” initiative for Vancouver’s schools - are “really inappropriate,” says a trustee.

Trustee Ken Denike’s criticism of the Out in Schools program (OIS) comes after parents complained that Burnaby schools were duped into supporting it as an “anti-bullying” initiative when in fact the program is nothing other than a “scam” by “sex activists” to “sexualize students” and “lure” them into “homosexualist culture.”

“I thought it was really inappropriate, especially for a 13-year-old,” Denike told QMI Agency, referring to material from the Health Initiative for Men (HIM) website that was listed as a “youth resource” in the Out In Schools booklet.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/14514/feed 21 http://www.nomblog.com/14366 http://www.nomblog.com/14366#comments Tue, 04 Oct 2011 13:00:41 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=14366 Since when does a national magazine have to apologize and make amends for publishing a pro-family ad?

The Canadian National Post, which until the advent of SUN news network was thought to be the most conservative national mainstream media outlet in the country, has shocked conservatives by apologizing for running a pro-family advertisement. Moreover, the National Post says it will be donating the thousands of dollars paid for the ad by the pro-family group to a homosexual activist group.

The ad, sponsored by the Institute for Christian Values, depicted a large picture of a little girl with the header, “Please! Don’t confuse me.” Below the photo, the youngster said, “I’m a girl. Don’t teach me to question if I’m a boy, transsexual, transgendered, intersexed or two spirited.” The ad specifically addressed the Toronto District School Board’s policy of forbidding parents to opt out of its pro-homosexual curriculum. --LifeSiteNews

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/14366/feed 10 http://www.nomblog.com/14285 http://www.nomblog.com/14285#comments Sat, 01 Oct 2011 13:00:45 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=14285 LifeSiteNews:

As the homosexual agenda continues to infiltrate the Catholic educational system in Ontario under the guise of anti-bullying programs, a newer and potentially more sinister homosexual program has already come knocking at the schools’ doors this fall.

LifeSiteNews.com has obtained a copy of a letter signed by Chris D’Souza, director of Harmony Movement, which was apparently sent to all of Ontario’s Catholic school trustees at the beginning of September. The letter promotes Harmony Movement’s brand of “diversity education” that aims to equip students and teachers in the “fight” against “heterosexism.”

Harmony Movement’s program for schools, under the direction of D’Souza, will train participants to “abolish” and “eradicate” the “mentality of heterosexism” within “youth culture” and “within the school and community.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/14285/feed 40 http://www.nomblog.com/14174 http://www.nomblog.com/14174#comments Mon, 26 Sep 2011 15:55:50 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=14174 Catholic Culture:

A survey by the international development agency Plan International has found that many teenage Canadian boys believe that a woman’s primary role is to care for a family.

About one-third of the boys surveyed said that women’s first duties were at home, while nearly half said that men should provide for the family’s income. Nearly half also said that “to be a man, you need to be tough.”

These results worried the survey’s sponsors. Rosemary McCarney, the director of Plan in Canada, said that the survey results “should also be worrying for all of us.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/14174/feed 23 http://www.nomblog.com/13917 http://www.nomblog.com/13917#comments Sun, 18 Sep 2011 13:00:46 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=13917 LifeSiteNews:

Ontario’s Liberal government will not back down from imposing its homosexualist equity and inclusive education (EIE) strategy on Ontario’s schools, insists Transportation Minister Kathleen Wynne, who oversaw the controversial policy’s development.

In an interview with Xtra last Wednesday, Wynne said the education system is the “single most important” means of tackling “homophobia” among today’s youth.

... public school boards such as Toronto andHamilton have moved to integrate their “sexual diversity” instruction throughout the curriculum while at the same time forbidding parents from removing their children from the classroom during controversial discussions.  McGuinty’s government has failed to enforce a clear Ministry policy allowing exemptions from material deemed offensive by parents.

The government has also forcefully imposed its equity policy on Catholic schools. In July, McGuinty said implementing homosexual clubs is “not a matter of choice,” while the Ministry of Education has insisted such clubs cannot help students “reform their sexuality.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/13917/feed 37 http://www.nomblog.com/12658 http://www.nomblog.com/12658#comments Thu, 18 Aug 2011 15:00:55 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=12658 LifeSiteNews:

After facing criticism from the media and the Canadian Egyptian Congress, Toronto’s Coptic Orthodox leaders have renewed their threat to remove up to 4,000 families from the Toronto Catholic District School Board (TCDSB) should it fail to protect Catholic teaching in the schools.

... News of the Coptics’ warning sparked a vehement media reaction with claims that Fr. Attaalla was “preaching intolerance.”

The Globe and Mail argued in an editorial August 10th that publicly-funded Catholic schools “must abide by the equality principles in the Canadian Constitution – even if they are out-of-step with the church’s own teachings.”

“Students’ welfare and equality rights trump official religious dogma,” they added.

But Toronto lawyer Geoff Cauchi said the Supreme Court of Canada confirmed in 2001 that Catholics’ denominational rights in section 93 of Canada’s Constitution are “absolute.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/12658/feed 11 http://www.nomblog.com/12130 http://www.nomblog.com/12130#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 13:00:57 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=12130 That question forms the core of Margaret Somerville's case against same-sex marriage. She's the director of the McGill Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law in Montreal:

Same-sex marriage creates a clash between upholding the human rights of children with respect to their coming-into being and the family structure in which they will be reared, and the claims of homosexual adults who wish to marry a same-sex partner. It forces us, as a society, to choose whether to give priority to children’s rights or to homosexual adults’ claims. This problem does not arise with opposite-sex marriage, because children’s rights and adults claims with respect to marriage are consistent with each other.

Many people who oppose extending the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples do so on religious grounds or because of moral objections to homosexuality. In contrast, my arguments are secularly based and, to the extent that they involve morals and values, they are grounded in ethics, not religion.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/12130/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/11963 http://www.nomblog.com/11963#comments Mon, 01 Aug 2011 16:45:00 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=11963 Patrick Craine at LifeSiteNews draws attention to the fall-out among Catholic schools in the Toronto area as new government policies begin to be implemented:

The Coptic Orthodox Churches in Toronto are threatening to withdraw 4,000 families from the Toronto Catholic District School Board if it does not amend its controversial equity policy to protect Catholic teaching in the schools. According to one expert in Ontario education, if the threat were carried out, the board could lose upwards of $40,000,000 in annual public funding, and over 150 teachers.

... The equity policy, passed earlier this year as part of the Ontario government’s sweeping equity and inclusive education strategy, has sparked an unprecedented mobilization of parents who fear that it will give homosexual activists a foothold in order to further subvert already weak Catholic sexual teaching in the schools.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/11963/feed 1 http://www.nomblog.com/10512 http://www.nomblog.com/10512#comments Fri, 24 Jun 2011 15:23:11 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=10512 LifeSiteNews reports:

A former top sports anchor who revealed to LifeSiteNews Wednesday that he is filing a human rights complaint against Rogers Communications, after the company fired him for publicly backing true marriage, says his termination over his deeply-held religious beliefs affects all Canadians.

“My message to the millions of Canadians participating in social media is that ‘this can happen to you’,” said Damian Goddard Thursday in an official statement. “I was terminated 24 hours after expressing a widely-held opinion from my personal Twitter account - an opinion consistent with the teachings of the Catholic Church. And an opinion that is supposed to be protected by Canada’s constitution.”

... Goddard’s lawyer, William Gale, said his “sudden and very public termination” is “a clear violation of Damian’s freedom of speech and his freedom of religion - two fundamental rights that are supposed to be afforded to every Canadian.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/10512/feed 4 http://www.nomblog.com/9637 http://www.nomblog.com/9637#comments Thu, 09 Jun 2011 15:46:01 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=9637 In LifeSiteNews:

In a major attack on parental rights, and a direct violation of the stated policy of the Ontario government, the Toronto District School Board is forbidding parents from opting their kids out of classes treating homosexuality.

Their policy suggests children are forced to join the board’s comprehensive “anti-homophobia” curriculum that promotes Toronto’s raunchy Pride parade to kindergarteners and aims to transform students into social activists by the end of high school.

... Beginning with kindergarten, children are expected to have an initial grasp of homosexual family structures, and are familiarized with terms such as “gay” and “lesbian”.

... The young students read “Gloria Goes to Gay Pride”, teachers are asked to bring in photos from the parade, and the students are encouraged to make posters for the school board’s parade float.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/9637/feed 10 http://www.nomblog.com/9364 http://www.nomblog.com/9364#comments Fri, 03 Jun 2011 13:00:52 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=9364 Prof. Margaret Somerville, founder of the McGill Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law writes in the Vancouver Sun about the "genderless child" being raised by parents in Canada:

With same-sex marriage, we saw the advent of arguments for "genderless parenting" - the idea that all a child needs is love and it's irrelevant whether the loving persons are male or female. Now we have "genderless kids." Kathy Witterick and David Stocker, the parents of Jazz (5), Kio (2) and four-month-old Baby Storm want to rear and love each of their children, not as their daughter or son, not as a girl or a boy, but as just their child.

... I suggest that we might also gain insights from asking: Are the parents doing this for the kids, as they claim, or are they doing it for themselves? My guess is that they would say and probably believe it's for the kids, but that the main motivation is their own ideological and political beliefs. When the "best interests" of the children and adults beliefs in such regard are concordant in such regards, there is no problem, but when they clash there is. The situation is very similar to a physician asking a patient to participate in a medical experiment. Long ago, as a protective measure, we started to teach patients to ask doctors who approached them to be research subjects: "Are you doing this for me doctor or am I doing it for you?" These kids need someone to ask their parents that question for them.

... There is also arrogance in ignoring millennia of human wisdom of what we need to become as fully actualized persons as we can be.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/9364/feed 5 http://www.nomblog.com/9048 http://www.nomblog.com/9048#comments Sat, 28 May 2011 12:00:25 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=9048 This story was getting the family and feminist blogs all tied up in knots this week. From Jezebel:

A couple in Canada isn't telling anybody the gender of their baby. But paradoxically, their attempt at neutrality may make gender an even bigger deal.

According to Parent Central, Kathy Witterick and David Stocker have decided to keep the gender of four-month-old Storm a secret — only they, their two older children, and a few others know the truth. In an email announcement to friends and family, Witterick and Stocker said,

We've decided not to share Storm's sex for now — a tribute to freedom and choice in place of limitation, a stand up to what the world could become in Storm's lifetime (a more progressive place? ...).

Parental Central (in Canada) has the original story - and more details:

This past winter, the family took a vacation to Cuba with Witterick’s parents. Since they weren’t fluent in Spanish, they flipped a coin at the airport to decide what to tell people. It landed on heads, so for the next week, everyone who asked was told Storm was a boy. The language changed immediately. “What a big, strong boy,” people said.

The moment a child’s sex is announced, so begins the parade of pink and barrage of blue. Tutus and toy trucks aren’t far behind. The couple says it only intensifies with age.

“In fact, in not telling the gender of my precious baby, I am saying to the world, ‘Please can you just let Storm discover for him/herself what s (he) wants to be?!.” Witterick writes in an email.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/9048/feed 20 http://www.nomblog.com/9150 http://www.nomblog.com/9150#comments Thu, 26 May 2011 14:38:41 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=9150 Andrea Doucet is a sociology professor at Carleton University in Ottawa and author of "Do Men Mother?". He writes at MercatorNet:

British researcher John Bowlby first brought to light the unique importance of the mother-child relationship after he observed a consistent pattern of disrupted relationships and later adult psychopathology (Bowlby, 1944). Children who were deprived of maternal care during extended periods in their early lives “lacked feeling, had superficial relationships, and exhibited hostile or antisocial tendencies” as they developed into adulthood (Kobak, 1999, p. 23).

... Study of Early Child Care concluded that not only was maternal sensitivity and bonding important, it is the strongest, most consistent predictor of a child’s cognitive, social, and emotional development (NICHD, 2003).

... Research findings show that children seem to do best when mothers express love through listening to and communicating with them about thoughts and feelings while monitoring their behavior by setting and enforcing appropriate limits.

... Finally, mothers influence how fathers provide their essential contributions to children’s development.

“An ideal world would be one with a father and a mother. We’d be lying if we pretended that wasn’t true. How can there be an ideal world without a mother for the children?”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/9150/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/8929 http://www.nomblog.com/8929#comments Fri, 20 May 2011 18:39:16 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=8929 Via the Vancouver Sun:

A B.C.-born woman has won a landmark court battle to give children of gamete donors the same rights as adopted children to learn about their biological parents, after a judge struck down B.C.'s Adoption Act as being unconstitutional.

Olivia Pratten filed the lawsuit — the first of its kind in North America — to try to get the same rights for offspring born as a result of anonymous sperm, egg and embryo donors as adopted children have to learn about their complete genetic makeup when they come of age.

B.C. Supreme Court Justice Elaine Adair ruled Thursday in a 123-page decision that B.C. Adoption Act regulations were unconstitutional.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/8929/feed 3 http://www.nomblog.com/8853 http://www.nomblog.com/8853#comments Thu, 19 May 2011 13:00:54 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=8853 Via LifeSiteNews (based in Canada):

Debate is heating up over the adoption of a controversial “homophobia/heterosexism” policy in the Burnaby School District of British Columbia.

Concerned parents say Draft Policy 5.45 would promote homosexuality to their children and discriminate against those who oppose a homosexual lifestyle. Trustees, on the other hand, maintain the policy merely ensures a safe and caring environment.

Parents have also expressed frustration that trustees have not met their demands for transparency on the policy specifics.

The draft policy, approved by the board of trustees February 22, 2011, defines “heterosexism” as a “mistaken assumption” that “all people are heterosexual and that heterosexuality is superior and the norm by which all other sexual orientation and gender identities are measured.”  It says it “perpetuates negative stereotypes and is dangerous to individuals and communities.” (For previous LSN coverage click here)

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/8853/feed 26 http://www.nomblog.com/8580 http://www.nomblog.com/8580#comments Mon, 16 May 2011 14:30:24 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=8580 Bruce Hausknecht writing at CitizenLink:

Yesterday I wrote about the repercussions from the issue of same-sex marriage in the lives of Peter Vidmar and navy chaplains.

Today’s headlines concern Toronto, where sports anchor Damian Goddard was fired the day after tweeting this controversial line on his personal Twitter account: “I completely and whole-heartedly support Todd Reynolds and his support for the traditional and TRUE meaning of marriage.”

.. So Goddard gets sacked. Of course, he lives and works in Canada, which legalized same-sex marriage several years ago. That probably accounts for the speed with which Goddard lost his job. In the U.S. it would take several weeks to be fired or forced to resign, as Peter Vidmar experienced.

... So add this little story to your list of responses for the next time someone asks you: “But how does gay marriage affect you personally?”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/8580/feed 17 http://www.nomblog.com/8574 http://www.nomblog.com/8574#comments Mon, 16 May 2011 13:30:09 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=8574 Steve Buffery at the Toronto Sun begins his op-ed by saying that he supports SSM "wholeheartedly", but goes on to say:

That being said, I also believe people should have the right to oppose same-sex marriage based on their religious beliefs, without being mocked and vilified for it.

Or worse, losing their job over it.

Frankly, I found the backlash directed at former Rogers Sportsnet anchor Damian Goddard and hockey agent Todd Reynolds for their opposition to same-sex marriage this week disturbing. Frightening even.

Neither said they hate gay people. What they said was that they oppose same-sex marriage based on their religious beliefs.

Yet both have been unmercifully attacked and ridiculed, on Twitter particularly. Sportsnet fired Goddard, even though the network insisted he wasn’t fired specifically because of his opposition towards same-sex marriage. Of course, no one really believes that.

There seems to be a double standard here with the message being: If you don’t believe what we believe, we’ll brand you a hater and a bigot and run you out of town.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/8574/feed 0 http://www.nomblog.com/8494 http://www.nomblog.com/8494#comments Fri, 13 May 2011 16:06:30 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=8494 Patrick Craine reports from Canada about Sportsnet firing Damian Goddard after he used his personal twitter account to express his views on marriage:

One of Canada’s leading TV sports broadcasters fired one of its anchors Wednesday after he voiced support for true marriage on Twitter.

Damian Goddard, the now-former host of “Connected” on Rogers Sportsnet, had tweeted his support of Burlington hockey agent Todd Reynolds, who created a stir this week when he criticized New York Rangers hockey star Sean Avery for shooting a TV ad backing gay “marriage.”

Sportsnet had distanced themselves from the comments on their own Twitter account.  They announced Wednesday that Goddard had been fired and did not specify the reasons.

... Nevertheless, Goddard is standing by the comments.  “In terms of what I said, I stand by it,” he told the Toronto Star. “I’m a devout Roman Catholic. It’s not about hate at all.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/8494/feed 15 http://www.nomblog.com/7312 http://www.nomblog.com/7312#comments Tue, 12 Apr 2011 14:54:12 +0000 NOM Staff http://www.nomblog.com/?p=7312 Via the Canadian Press:

The federal prohibition on polygamy is a relic from another time that imposes Christianity on all Canadians and violates their right to religious freedom, says a lawyer arguing against the law.

... [the lawyer] said the Charter of Rights and Freedoms offers two protections regarding religion: laws cannot have a strictly religious purpose, and they can't actively discriminate against people of faith because of their religious practices.

He said it does both.

Even if the law was passed today, under the guise of protecting women and children, [he] said it would still be unconstitutional.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/7312/feed 2 http://www.nomblog.com/7244 http://www.nomblog.com/7244#comments Sat, 09 Apr 2011 22:36:47 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=7244 From LifeSiteNews (which is based in Canada):

Ontario Catholic schools will not be permitted to use the support groups that are being mandated under the government’s controversial equity and inclusive education strategy to counsel homosexual students to “reform their sexuality.” The government revealed the unprecedented challenge to the province’s publicly-funded Catholic education system in comments to LifeSiteNews.

Some Catholics have suggested that the student-led support groups for homosexuals could be used as a means to provide authentic pastoral support based on Catholic Church teaching. But the Ministry of Education told LifeSiteNews that that won’t fly.

“Groups for LGBT students that counsel the students to reform their sexuality or try to stop them from being gay are not considered consistent with the ministry’s equity policy which is to support students,” said Mike Feenstra, press secretary for Minister of Education Leona Dombrowsky.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/7244/feed 14 http://www.nomblog.com/7058 http://www.nomblog.com/7058#comments Tue, 05 Apr 2011 11:00:51 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=7058 From the Canadian Chronicle Herald:

[Opponents of Polygamy] "When that [2004 Constitutional] decision was made, that decision to limit it (marriage) to two is consistent with the charter, that’s the direct quote from the court."

Challengers of the law argue just the opposite, suggesting the same legal rights that paved the way for gay marriage should pave the way for polygamists.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/7058/feed 11 http://www.nomblog.com/7016 http://www.nomblog.com/7016#comments Mon, 04 Apr 2011 03:01:11 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=7016 From the Vancouver Sun:

The B.C. Civil Liberties Association is calling for Canada's polygamy law that bans multiple marriages to be found unconstitutional and "relegated to the scrap heap of history."

In written submissions filed Thursday, the association urged B.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Robert Bauman to find that the law offends fundamental freedoms.

The parties in favour of upholding the law have argued that there are numerous social harms associated with polygamy.

The association says that while harms can occur in plural relationships, there is no evidence that there are harms specific to polygamy.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/7016/feed 34 http://www.nomblog.com/6663 http://www.nomblog.com/6663#comments Mon, 28 Mar 2011 11:00:27 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=6663 Last week we blogged about a Christian woman in Canada who runs a flower shop out of her home in Moncton, New Brunswick, and who refused to provide flowers to a same-sex ceremony.

She told the lesbian couple by email, "As a born-again Christian, I must respect my conscience before God and have no part in this matter."

In response, young activists decided to alert the media and stage a "kindness" protest in front of her home:

As you can see from the video, local authorities did not intervene to stop the protest.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/6663/feed 5 http://www.nomblog.com/6529 http://www.nomblog.com/6529#comments Tue, 22 Mar 2011 16:54:22 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=6529 The Canadian Globe & Mail reports:

A Mississauga Roman Catholic high school's decision to bar students from launching a gay-straight alliance doesn't gel with Ontario's education policy on equity, Premier Dalton McGuinty said Monday.

“We are making it perfectly clear to all our school boards, all our schools, all our principals, all our teachers and all our students that it is unacceptable in Ontario to discriminate based on race, gender, religion or sexual orientation,” the Premier said in Question Period.

... NDP education critic Rosario Marchese also said the Premier's response was a non-answer.

“The policies are quite clear,” Mr. Marchese said, referring to a ministry's memorandum from October, 2009. “There is absolutely no ambiguity and it applies to both public and Catholic schools.”

The memorandum reads that “boards must also help school staff to give support to students who wish to participate in gay-straight alliances and in other student-led activities that promote understanding and development of healthy relationships. Schools must also engage their school councils and student councils to support these student-led activities.”

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/6529/feed 20 http://www.nomblog.com/6499 http://www.nomblog.com/6499#comments Tue, 22 Mar 2011 13:00:32 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=6499 What's notable is the response from a local gay-rights activist, who had this to say:

Eldon Hay, a United Church minister in Sackville and a well-known gay rights advocate, said he still sympathizes with the florist.

"The shopkeeper has every right to her own convictions as long as she is a private citizen in her own house," Hay said.

"But if she opens her doors to sell flowers, then she must be prepared to meet and deal with the public."

According to the New Brunswick Human Rights Act, anyone doing business in the province cannot refuse customers based on race, religion or sexual orientation.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/6499/feed 10 http://www.nomblog.com/4992 http://www.nomblog.com/4992#comments Wed, 23 Feb 2011 16:01:26 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=4992 The Canadian Press:

Aly Hindi, an outspoken imam at Salaheddin Islamic Centre in Scarborough, Ont., said there are more than 200 polygamous Muslim marriages in the Greater Toronto Area alone. The figure is impossible to verify as polygamy among Muslim and other immigrant groups in Canada is often shrouded in mystery.

Hindi believes banning polygamy is harmful to women.

"If the three adults -- the husband, the first wife and (the other) women -- have consent, I don't think the government should interfere in this," Hindi said in a telephone interview.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/4992/feed 5 http://www.nomblog.com/4349 http://www.nomblog.com/4349#comments Fri, 04 Feb 2011 19:48:10 +0000 NOM Staff http://nomblog.com/?p=4349 LifeSiteNews:

Two more Canadian bishops have joined their voices with that of Calgary Bishop Fred Henry in condemning a Saskatchewan Court of Appeal ruling that denied marriage commissioners the right to refuse to perform same-sex “marriages.”

In a new pastoral letter, Archbishop Daniel Bohan of Regina, Saskatchewan has challenged the government to work [to] protect freedom of conscience rights.

“The threat of loss of one’s job and employment certainly raises the spectre of coercion upon a person if it is demanded of that person that he or she do something that they believe to be wrong in order to keep their livelihood,” Archbishop Bohan wrote. “It will take skillful action on the part of our government leaders to guarantee the freedom of conscience of its citizens.”

On the heels of the court ruling, the Saskatchewan government announced that commissioners who refuse to “marry” same-sex couples will be fired.

]]> http://www.nomblog.com/4349/feed 19