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CANADIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION TO INTERVENE IN FAVOUR OF 'MARRIAGE' RIGHTS FOR HOMOSEXUALS

OTTAWA, January 23, 2003 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A federal government body, the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC), has requested leave to intervene in court cases challenging the restriction of marriage to heterosexual couples.

LifeSite was forwarded an email originally from Michael Hendricks and René LeBoeuf, the homosexual activist couple who challenged the marriage law in Quebec. In the email they boast that the CHRC will argue in favour of homosexual marriage using the following arguments:

- that the definition reserving marriage uniquely for heterosexual couples constitutes deliberate and direct discrimination against Canadian gays and lesbians;

- that such a definition infringes on the right to equality guaranteed to gays and lesbians by section 15 of the Charter;

- that a contextual analysis leads incontestably to the conclusion that such a rule perpetuates the historical disadvantage and indignity experienced by Canadian gay and lesbians, and continues to stop their blossoming as part of Canadian society;

- that such a definition is not justifiable under article 1 of the Charter because there is simply no reason to exclude gays and lesbians except the simple desire to exclude them, a proposition that is circular and deliberately discriminatory;

- That any justification based on traditional religious beliefs can not apply to a civil institution; granting access to a civil institution quite simply does not infringe on the freedom of a Catholic or a Protestant to marry according to his/her beliefs; and

- The only remedy that corresponds to the constitutional and quasi-constitutional rights to equality that Parliament has already granted to gays and lesbians (the Charter and the Canadian Human Rights Law) is to give the applicants the immediate right to marry.

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