If he’d met her at a Catholic singles meet and greet; if she’d been in her mid-twenties… But… nah…
Quebec’s secularizing like mad, adding further restrictions on religious activity/symbols in public settings.
… Bill 21, which was passed in 2019 […] placed a prohibition on ostentatious religious symbols being worn by certain government employees, including teachers, judges, police officers, effectively banning kippahs, turbans, and hijabs. Bill 94, [which is about to pass], extended that ban throughout the entire school system, throughout the entire public education network, extending to cafeteria workers, parent volunteers, daycare personnel, janitors. […] It also imposed a ban on face coverings in the elementary and high school network, as well as banning the use of school property for religious purposes, meaning facilities couldn’t be rented out in the evenings and weekends for religious purposes by local mosques, churches or synagogues. And the Quebec government was very clear that there was more coming.
… [There will be] a total ban on face coverings from daycare through to university. That means no kneecaps or burkas… Parents coming in will not be allowed to have a face covering. That’s being banned. What’s also going to be banned are halal-only food menus for daycares, the subsidized daycares, so that toddlers have a choice in what they’re eating.
As well, another ban on using the property, prayer rooms in colleges and universities: out.
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Nothing scandalous here, if the separation of church and state means a lot to you, as it does to Quebec.
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‘There has been some pushback from the Quebec bishops to the prayer ban. Bishop Martin Laliberté, president of the Quebec Bishops’ Assembly, published an open letter asserting that the “secular nature of the State does not require the secular nature of society.” In an opinion piece for La Presse, Montreal Archbishop Christian Lépine wrote that state secularism does “not require the public erasure of faith in society.”
But in a province where only 2 percent of the Catholic population attend weekly Mass, and the political class is tone-deaf if not outright hostile toward religion, the Church is a weak voice in the “common culture” wilderness. One can hope that the saints of New France are interceding on behalf of the new, secular Quebec.‘
This is from the notorious First Things, vehicle of Vermeuleism, so whaddaya expect? Why, given high-profile nutbags running around calling for burning people at the stake, are you surprised that lots of people feel outright hostility toward religion?
And uh actually yes a secular state is overwhelmingly likely to want a shared public life (call it “society”) as free as possible from overtly religious prayers and parades and meetings and proselytizing and all. I wasn’t terribly happy, as a secular person walking around Salt Lake City, to be repeatedly approached by groups of Mormons inviting me to join their church. But I recognize Utah as a very religious state, and okay. Quebec on the other hand is a very secular province, and religious people there should extend the same sort of courtesy.
Even with the new laws, you are apparently going to be able in Quebec to apply for local permission to hold outdoor religious events. Particular municipalities will probably make their own decisions. ‘Short public events with prior approval are exempt.’
You might just take a gander at my FORMS OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE category to see some of the reasons.
More clarity from the clergy.
A member of Iran’s Assembly of Experts notes the failure of the country’s H-H infrastructure:
“Drought, water crisis, and reduced rainfall are signs of God’s warning to awaken us from negligence and inattentiveness toward Him. The Islamic Revolution is built on the blood of martyrs, and it is not right that our streets become a parade ground for open sin, unveiled women, and public immorality. These behaviors have consequences…”
‘One reason for secularism’s endurance as an issue is that most Quebecers feel passionate about it.’
Respect for all forms and practices of religion is so engrained in us that passionate defenses of secularism may feel bigoted. But for strikingly secular countries and provinces (France, Quebec), the rejection of burqas in the public realm, for instance, expresses a reasonable desire that the lived reality of their laicité, the laicité of the courts, schoolrooms, and streets, be maintained. How secular is your culture if city thoroughfares feature large outdoor prayer?
Some religious practices are disgusting (FGM) but difficult to stop because imams preach their necessity from the pulpit; some are objectionable to modern people (gender segregation, face/body veiling) because of their graphic derogation of women. The reason you see so many European countries banning burqas and arresting people who cut off children’s clitorises is because they feel passionately that some forms of behavior denominated religious range anywhere from unacceptably uncivil to outright criminal.
Religious or cultural practices that deliberately and cruelly harm children must be confronted. No tradition can ever justify torture. A girl’s body does not belong to her father, her family or her community. Her integrity is not a token for tradition, not an ornament for family honor and not a site for control. It belongs to her alone.
Beating women and stoning women, as well, is no special scandal to high-profile Muslim intellectual/rapist Tariq Ramadan. He is far from alone.
So yeah, Quebecers are passionately secular, and this blog doesn’t have a problem with their being so. Details here.
“If there are no changes within the Haredi community that succeed in bringing them into the 21st century and making them understand that without core curriculum studies, a modern society cannot function, in 30-40 years, Israel will be a theocratic state.“
Killing babies and lethally imperiling the rest of the population: The ultraorthodox way.
Responsible ultraorthodox are vaccinating. These people are however unable to stop the insane among their lot from letting children fall ill.
Millions, however, don’t seem to mind the language directed against them which is quoted here.
One did decide she’d had enough, and she threw the thing away.
And wrote about why.
Critics decried the [2018] law as discriminatory, but Denmark viewed it for what it truly is: a defence of secular values, civic participation, and national identity.
Now the ban has been expanded to schools and universities.
Civic life depends on visibility, communication, and engagement. Classrooms are not private spaces—they are the arenas where citizens learn to interact, debate, and participate. Full-face coverings obstruct all of that.
It is confusing to people when the freest, best countries in the world ban face-coverings. One of the reasons these countries are the best is that they ban face-coverings.
Secularism is non-negotiable. Public institutions, particularly schools, must be neutral spaces. Clothing that isolates or excludes individuals from shared norms compromises that neutrality... Visibility is not oppression—it is the foundation of civic life.
These themes are playing out right now in the political and legal wrangling in Canada over proudly secular Quebec’s insistence on some controls over things like burqas and hijabs. This blog is firmly (as you well know if you read me) in the secular camp, and will follow the Canadian story closely.
Scathing Online Schoolmarm says: Especially if you’re a journalist, and especially if you’re referencing a very well-known legal principle, LOOK IT UP. Sheesh.
As to the particular subject matter of this typically INSANE story out of Texas, the state is invited to welcome a brand new city, established by the crazies who live there so they can be free to set their own demento rules. One thinks of the hare krishna cults establishing domains in places like Oregon back in the ‘nineties, until the lunatic excesses of their leaders drew the attention of the police.
The group currently in question is bible-thumping, gun-humping Torch of Freedom – pious shooters blasting their love of the lord 24/7.
Neighbors are seriously pissed (“We hear constant shooting. And when I say shooting, I’m not talking about a pistol or a shotgun. It’s a professional military-type shooting range and they were shooting high-powered rifles, essentially non-stop every day,” said Jim Schaefer, Gillespie County resident. “We cannot sit on our porch and enjoy the evening when they shoot. Sometimes they’ll shoot throughout the weekend.”), and, even though it’s absolutely berserko Texas, it looks as though local authorities also find Spewing for the Savior a bridge too far.
That can’t be true, and it’s one sign among a few others (the article is generally fair) that Macleans – Canada’s leading magazine – reflects non-Quebec social attitudes. Plenty of non-deists are spiritual; we’re talking about religion here.
A large majority of Quebecers indeed opposes hijabs and other religious garb in the public sphere (schools, courts), and restrictions on this garb are currently in place there. As one supreme court decision put it:
[C]itizens should not be able to perceive any religious influence in state services, and … when a government representative is exercising their function, they are no longer a private citizen. Their first duty is to state neutrality, not their private beliefs.
In a few months, the supreme court will revisit Quebec’s secularity bill, and the notwithstanding clause that enables it; and it should be interesting. Issues going to the degree of Quebec’s autonomy are in play here; but more than that, opposition to face covering, for instance, is 76% in Quebec and not far behind (65%) in Canada overall; and though I can’t find federal numbers on the hijab, it looks as though at least half the country would probably follow Quebec.