But McGill University historian John Zucchi warns the charter could be a tactic by the separatist Parti Quebecois government to drive a wedge between Quebec and the rest of Canada.
Details of the proposed charter were leaked to a Montreal newspaper Aug. 20 and have not been denied by Parti Quebecois officials. Religious symbols would be banned from public institutions, though the crucifix at the National Assembly would be permitted to remain as a symbol of Quebec’s heritage. Employees of public institutions would not be permitted to wear any identifying religious symbols such as Muslim headscarves, Sikh turbans, Jewish skullcaps or kippahs or “ostentatious crucifixes” though discreet versions on a chain would be allowed.
Zucchi said he found it odd the Quebec government would move on the charter after the province had been ridiculed internationally over a decision to ban Sikh turbans from the soccer pitch.
The charter “reflects the nihilism” of a group of ideologues within the Parti Quebecois who “want to get people to believe all Quebeckers think this way,” said Zucchi. “These ideologues see religion only in terms of myth and symbol and can’t see the cross I carry on a chain around my neck is there because it is something dear to me, means something to me, not just a symbol I want to show off, but has something to do with my identity.
“The ideologues want Quebec to be distinguished from Canada,” he said. Part of that is asserting there’s “a Quebec way of thinking which no one ever defines carefully.”
Quebec’s Bill-52 that would bring in euthanasia is another example of Quebec’s distinguishing itself, he said. Then if the federal government or a federal institution such as the Supreme Court of Canada opposes either euthanasia or the proposed charter, the Parti Quebecois ideologues can say “federal institutions are once again lording it over Quebec, or hitting back at Quebec,” he warned.
The Journal de Montreal, the paper that first leaked the charter details, posted the results of a Leger survey Aug. 26 showing support for its measures fall along linguistic lines. Francophone Quebeckers are behind the proposed charter by a 65-per-cent majority while only 25 per cent of Anglophones and 33 per cent of Allophones would support it.
Zucchi said he wonders if the charter is an attempt to “divert attention” from “real” economic and political issues, including the euthanasia bill. The tactic might be to “get people riled up over the charter but quietly go ahead with euthanasia,” he said.
The Assembly of Quebec Bishops (AECQ) will not be making an official statement on the charter until the actual legislation is made public and the bishops meet for their plenary assembly Sept. 17-20, according to AECQ spokesman Bertrand Ouellet, who noted the Quebec National Assembly reconvenes Sept. 17. The Quebec bishops, however, issued a document in January 2013 entitled “Catholics in a Pluralist Quebec” that addresses many of the principles likely to appear in an AECQ response. The document addressed the concept of “laicity.”
“An institution is described as non-confessional, and is characterized by laicity, if it is independent of any religious belief,” the document says. “It neither favours nor discriminates against any church or religious group in particular. For their part, churches and religious groups have no power within such an institution.” But the document stresses “laicity” applies only to institutions and not society as a whole.
AECQ president Rimouski Archbishop Pierre Fournier told Quebec’s Le Soleil: “You cannot have an official atheism, no more than you can have an official religion.”
“Official atheism becomes like another religion, a form that does not respect our history or our patrimony,” he said.
“In a society that guarantees religious freedom, it is difficult to see how such a sweeping ban could withstand a constitutional challenge,” said the Catholic Civil Rights League. “Canada’s understanding of secularism, among other elements, is that the state does not favour any one religion, but rather welcomes all.”
Charles Taylor, co-author of the Taylor-Bouchard Report on Reasonable Accommodation, told Radio Canada the charter “is something that we would expect to see in Putin’s Russia. It’s exactly the same sort of thing, that people cannot publicly be seen to be gay, they cannot have a gay pride parade, because it’s against the law. In that type of society, we expect to see that, though we protest strongly and properly. But in a liberal society like ours, it is almost unthinkable.”
Rights league executive director Joanne McGarry noted Quebec has been struggling with the question of reasonable accommodation for a number of years. It comes out of a consciousness that the French Canadian cultural identity is being threatened, she said. Though McGarry acknowledges opinion polls show a high degree of support for these measures, follow up questions usually show the real priorities are issues like health care or the economy.
At stake is more than interference in religious freedom, but “the imposition of a kind of conformity” by the state, she said.