samedi 19 juin 2010

Ruling slams Quebec approach. Attempt to impose secular focus on teaching compared to Spanish Inquisition

The Gazette of Montreal summarizes Justice Dugré's ruling:

A private Catholic school in west end Montreal has won a court ordered exemption from a provincial government order that it teach a controversial ethics and morality course within the boundaries established by Quebec's Education Dept.

And while the principal of Loyola High School says the Superior Court decision simply confirms what his institution has already been doing -examining other religious and ethical creeds through a Catholic perspective -the judge in the case was withering in his assessment of the Education Department's conduct in its dealings with the school, going so far as to compare the province's attempt to impose a secular focus on Loyola's teaching of the course to the intolerance of the Spanish Inquisition.

"In this age of the respect of fundamental rights, of tolerance, reasonable accommodation and multiculturalism, the attitude adopted by the (Education) minister, is surprising," wrote Judge Gerard Dugre in a 63-page judgment handed down yesterday. "Canadian democratic society is based on principles recognizing the supremacy of God and the primacy of the law -both of which benefit from constitutional protection.

"The obligation imposed on Loyola to teach the ethics and religious culture course in a lay fashion assumes a totalitarian character essentially equivalent to Galileo's being ordered by the Inquisition to deny the Copernican universe." Dugre ruled that by trying to compel Loyola High School, a Catholic institution founded in 1848, to adhere to rigidly secular teaching guidelines, the provincial government violated the school's freedom of religion as guaranteed by the Quebec Charter of Rights.

[...]

"What we had asked for was that all the objectives and all the material ... about world religions and ethical systems -which we had been doing anyway -be adjusted slightly," Loyola principal Paul Donovan told The Gazette last night, "And they told us ... that the minister's decision to say no was essentially because our approach was Catholic."

That approach, Donovan said, would have compelled Loyola teaching staff to treat certain ethical perspectives as being morally equivalent.

"If one student wanted to be a hedonist ... and another student took the perspective of being forgiving to others ... it could never be implied (during the teaching of that course) that one of those perspectives might be a better choice ... and for us, that would be problematic."

Loyola High School's victory yesterday might affect the approach taken by other parochial schools uneasy over the ethics course.





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2 commentaires:

Romanus a dit…

''Loyola High School's victory yesterday might affect the approach taken by other parochial schools uneasy over the ethics course.''

... go ahead guys! Gang up against this undemocratic government!

Anonyme a dit…

Bénis soient les catholiques anglophones ! Partout dans le monde en milieu de langue anglaise, ils ont été toujours été minoritaires ; alors que ce soit au Québec ou ailleurs, ils sont habitués d'avoir à se battre pour leurs droits.

Signé : un séparatiste québécois... opportuniste sans honte, quand il le faut pour la défense de sa foi.