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OTTAWA, Ontario, February 19, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) – Canada’s top court will not hear a case involving a Charter challenge to Canadian law that currently denies the humanity of the child in the womb. The Supreme Court stated yesterday that it had “dismissed” pro-life heroine Mary Wagner’s case, providing no reason as is the custom.
Wagner’s lawyer, Dr. Charles Lugosi, said that while he maintains that their application to the court had “great merit and amply met the legal test for leave,” he speculated that there may be a few reasons why it was refused.
“Parliament retains the power to decide who is and who is not a human being,” he said in an email to supporters. “Parliament’s definition is based upon a political value judgment instead of biological and scientific reality.”
Wagner, who has spent nearly six years in jail for her peaceful attempts to save mothers and their unborn children from the violence of abortion and is the inspiration behind the burgeoning U.S. Red Rose Rescue movement, was challenging Section 223(1) of Canada’s Criminal Code. The code states that a “child becomes a human being within the meaning of the Act when it has completely proceeded, in a living state, from the body of its mother.”
Lugosi intended to argue that this violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms Section 7 that guarantee an individual’s right to “life, liberty and security of person,” as well as the Charter’s Section 15 guarantee that “(e)very individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law.”
The lawyer also wanted the Supreme Court to overturn a lower court ruling that in 2013 had quashed Wagner’s Charter challenge and rejected her legal defense. He had submitted his 155-page application to the Supreme Court in November.
PETITION UPDATE (3/22/2021)
Pastor James Coates has been freed!
The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms, the legal counsel which has been representing Pastor Coates, just issued a statement saying that Alberta's Crown Prosecutors have decided to drop all but one charge against Pastor Coates, paving the way for him to be released soon.
This is a great victory, God be praised!
Please READ LifeSiteNews' latest article on this latest and unexpected turn of events for Pastor Coates.
While Pastor Coates will still have to stand trial for the one remaining charge in May, he will at least be free to prepare for the hearings, and to celebrate Easter with his family and congregation.
Thank you for taking part in this campaign advocating for Pastor Coates' release!
Of course, with a trial still pending, he's not out of the woods, yet. But, this is a gigantic step in the right direction.
During his trial, we will keep you updated as to his status and we will continue to support Pastor Coates.
We will also keep fighting to ensure that Canadian people of faith like him are never persecuted for exercising their right to worship freely.
Until the trial finishes, please continue to SIGN and SHARE this petition in solidarity with Pastor Coates. Thank you!
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PETITION UPDATE (2/24/2021) -
There have been two important, recent updates to the ongoing imprisonment of Pastor James Coates in Alberta, Canada.
First, Alberta's Premier, Jason Kenney has spoken out about Pastor Coates' incarceration.
Please READ LifeSiteNews' article about Premier Kenney's intervention, here: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/alberta-premier-who-jailed-christian-pastor-claims-he-is-protecting-fundamental-freedoms-of-religion
And second, Pastor Coates' wife addressed a crowd of supporters at the jail in which her husband is being held, saying in part:
"People keep asking us what can you do for us? Open your churches. Open your churches! Take a stand for the Lord Jesus Christ and take a stand for the people! Love them, open the doors, that’s what we need to do right now."
To read about Mrs. Coates visit to see her husband at the Edmonton Remand Center and her full remarks, please CLICK on the following news article from LifeSiteNews: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/wife-of-jailed-candadian-pastor-tells-supporters-the-best-way-to-protest-is-to-open-your-churches
Then, please SIGN and SHARE this important petition. Thank you!
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Pastor James Coates of Grace Life Church in Alberta, Canada has been ARRESTED for refusing to comply with extreme and likely unconstitutional government Covid regulations that ban people from gathering to worship in their church of choice.
You read that right: Even churches aren’t exempt from Trudeau Liberals’ all-out attack on peoples' freedoms in the wake of this pandemic.
But, Pastor Coates needs to be released immediately, and MPs must take steps to rein-in the extreme Covid regulations which provincial governments are using as an excuse to trample on essential freedoms.
Please SIGN and SHARE this petition and STAND WITH PASTOR COATES.
Send a strong message to Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau and Justice Minister Lametti, as well as to all Members of Parliament and to Canadian Provincial Premiers, that this CANNOT stand.
Some government officials are hoping to make examples out of faith leaders like Pastor Coates, who refuse to comply with unreasonable government demands to close-off places of worship to their own congregations.
That's why he remains in custody to this day.
But, no Canadian should ever face jail time for exercising their God-given, Charter-guaranteed rights, and action MUST be taken.
Please SIGN and SHARE this urgent petition.
NB: YOU DO NOT NEED TO BE FROM CANADA TO SIGN THIS PETITION.
Pastor Coates, who leads Grace Life Church in Edmonton, Alberta, originally suspended in-person services and church gatherings in good faith and out of concern for his congregants after Trudeau’s government first introduced Covid restrictions last spring.
However, the church reopened over the summer when it became clear that Trudeau’s shutdowns were here to stay, and that congregants would be indefinitely limited in their worship size or again banned from in-person worship altogether under their guidelines.
After Alberta’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, enacted new restrictions in November that cap all faith-based gatherings at 15% of building capacity (a major blow to churches that wish to resume worship for their members), Pastor Coates kept Grace Life’s doors open to anyone and everyone who wished to proceed with normal practice of their faith.
However, this simple exercising of congregants’ Charter rights was met not only with governmental resistance, but an unreasonably disproportionate legal response.
Pastor Coates was arrested and then quickly released on February 7th for practicing his faith alongside congregants, and arrested AGAIN on February 16th for the same reason.
Pastor Coates remains in custody today for refusing to allow Alberta Premier Jason Kenney and his health officer Deena Hinshaw to infringe upon his congregants’ civil liberties any further.
Please SIGN and SHARE this petition which calls for the release of Pastor Coates, and asks Canada's MPs to take action to ensure that Canadian people of faith, like him, are NEVER persecuted for exercising their right to worship freely.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
'Alberta govt jails pastor for holding COVID-non-compliant worship services' -
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/alberta-govt-jails-pastor-for-holding-covid-non-compliant-worship-services
Abortion was decriminalized in Canada in 1969 with the passage of Pierre Trudeau’s infamous “Omnibus Bill” that allowed a woman to abort her child with the approval of a hospital's therapeutic abortion committee. The Supreme Court struck down that law in 1988 as “unconstitutional” on the basis that it threatened a woman’s “security of person” — protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms — because of the difficultly of her needing to go before a panel for her to obtain an abortion.
The Morgentaler decision, however, did not give women a constitutional ‘right’ to abortion. The court, in fact, left the “abortion question” to Parliament to “pronounce on and to direct social policy.” Abortion is now legally permitted throughout all nine months of pregnancy for any reason up to the moment of birth. Abortions are funded by taxpayer dollars in every provincial healthcare system. An estimated 100,000 surgical abortions are committed annually in Canada.
Lugosi said to supporters that future generations will look back on these times where babies were denied their right to life by those with power as “barbaric, selfish and unjust.”
“The inherent dignity of every human being in existence is violated daily by the greatest human rights abuse of all time: the mass killing of millions of innocent human beings who are at the mercy of those who hold the power of life and death over them,” he said.
“May God have mercy on those who silenced us and continue to ignore the muffled screams of the suffering dying unborn children. The guilt for the shedding of innocent blood falls upon not just those who directly participate in abortion, but upon all those who permit and perpetuate this horrific crime against humanity,” he added.
Wagner told LifeSiteNews that she was “saddened and disturbed” by the court’s refusal to “hear our plea for the most vulnerable members of our human family, whose own pleas are too weak to be heard.”
“Let us not lose hope, however,” she said.
“In reality, whatever any human court of law pronounces cannot change the truth of what the Supreme Judge has ordained. And, in his eyes, a thousand years are like one day … The same One who listened to the cries of his people and freed them after 400 years of slavery will one day grant Justice for all who are oppressed,” she continued.
“Let us not lose sight of this truth as well: beyond the call to build a just society, ultimately it is not perfection in law that we seek but perfection of heart, which can only come through the love that is not of this world. It is this love that can change hearts even to the point where the law is no longer needed to influence our actions,” she added.
Wagner thanked all those who contributed to the LifeFunder campaign to raise money for her challenge. The campaign, which has now been suspended, had raised $90,000 of a $150,000 goal.
“I would like to thank each person who has so generously contributed to the LifeFunder account, or through other means, especially through your prayer, in support of our efforts,” she said.
Jeff Gunnarson, national president of Campaign Life Coalition, Canada’s national pro-life organization, called the court’s decision to dismiss the case “untenable and unjust.”
“We are perplexed by the fact that it was the Supreme Court that struck down the last vestiges of a law protecting some children in the womb while indicating Parliament ought to come up a law protecting the unborn at some stage of their life. Yet, 31 years later, Parliament hasn’t acted, and the Supreme Court seems to be comfortable with the idea that unborn children still have no state protection throughout all nine months of gestation,” he told LifeSiteNews.
Gunnarson pointed out that the court’s criteria to grant cases “leave to appeal” is that, in the words of the court, the “case involves a question of public importance or if it raises an important issue of law (or an issue of both law and fact) that warrants consideration by the Court.”
Commented Gunnarson, “What is it about the killing of 100,000 unborn babies per year that does not fulfill the Leave to Appeal criteria?”
“We will continue, on our knees, to appeal the case of justice for the unborn to the Supreme God in Heaven while we agitate for human justice by our political and spiritual leaders,” he added.
Gunnarson praised Wagner for being a “stalwart defender of children in the womb and their mothers.”
“She has spent most of her adult life trying to awaken the conscience of mothers and our society at large. Her efforts remain in our prayers.”
Josie Luetke, Campaign Life Coalition’s youth coordinator, called the court’s decision to toss the case a “bitter” loss.
“Just like how our Members of Parliament refused to re-examine our Criminal Code's unscientific, outdated definition of 'human being' when they voted against former MP Stephen Woodworth's Motion 312, our Supreme Court has similarly once again refused to reckon with Canada's inexcusable failure to legally recognize all human beings as human beings,” she told LifeSiteNews.
“This willful negligence is almost unparalleled in its evil and shamefulness,” she added.