KITCHENER, Ontario (LifeSiteNews) — Pastors for Trinity Bible Chapel, a large Christian church that had its doors closed by health officials in 2021 for breaking COVID rules, had charges brought against them for protesting COVID mandates “stayed,” but the church is still on the hook for thousands of dollars in fines for violating gathering restrictions.
“This outcome is a reflection of Ontario Courts’ failure to protect and uphold religious freedom. My clients and I strongly disagree with the Courts’ decisions with respect to their Charter protections but accept that the decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal is binding on them,” said attorney Chris Fleury, according to a press release from the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF).
“My clients are happy to finally put these tickets and events behind them, and to do so in a way that ends the prosecution of other religious leaders who were ticketed in the Kitchener-Waterloo jurisdiction.”
The JCCF noted that COVID-era charges against eight pastors from Trinity Bible Chapel in Waterloo have now been “resolved” against them.
The JCCF, who helped represent the church along with its religious leaders, stated that Trinity Bible still must pay about $38,800, for violating gathering restriction limitations imposed by the Reopening Ontario Act, which was in place from late 2020 to 2022. During the Acts’ most restrictive phase, church services were limited to 10 people.
JCCF-backed lawyers argued that the violations against the church pastors went against their freedom of conscience and religion and their rights to expression, association, and peaceful assembly, and thus were not justified. The JCCF noted how the freedoms are “guaranteed protection by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.”
The pastors’ lawyers, as noted by the JCCF, negotiated “agreement whereby all charges against the elders of Trinity Bible Chapel have been stayed, along with all charges against religious leaders Michael Thiessen, Nathaniel Wright, and Jacob Reaume in connection to protests in Kitchener-Waterloo.”
“Trinity Bible Chapel will have one year to pay a $38,800 fine,” the JCCF said.
Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice and Court of Appeal in previous rulings has upheld the constitutionality of the province’s gathering restrictions.
Reaume, Trinity’s lead pastor, along with other church members faced major fines upward of $85,000, for allegedly breaking COVID regulations in 2020 and 2021.
Its fight against COVID charges hit a wall last year. In August, LifeSiteNews reported that Canada’s Supreme Court refused to hear two Ontario churches’ constitutional challenges to COVID-era restrictions, one of which was Trinity.
On August 10, the Supreme Court of Canada dismissed a further appeal from the Aylmer Church of God and Trinity Bible, which argued that the Ontario government violated their Charter-protected right to religious freedom through its COVID regulations.
The church had its doors shut by Ontario Justice John Krawchenko on April 30, 2021, because it would not follow the local COVID rules in place at the time which banned in-person worship.
The Centre pointed out the hypocrisy of placing 10-person limits on worship services while essential retail was permitted at 50 percent capacity with “social distancing.”
COVID-era mandates, which were in place in most of Canada from late 2020 until 2022, saw many restrictions placed against places of worship. As a result, many pastors who defied the mandates were jailed and others fined thousands of dollars. Charges against many pastors, however, were dropped in court.