FORMER HARRIS CHIEF OF STAFF DEFENDS RELIGIOUS FREEDOM

TORONTO, July 16, 2002 (LSN.ca) – Guy Giorno, former Premier Mike Harris’s chief of staff, criticized the increasing banishment of religion from public events in Canada, in a Toronto Star column yesterday. Giorno cited Prime Minister Jean Chretien, who “personally banned religious symbolism and references from the national service of mourning following the Sept. 11 attacks. Earlier, his office ordered Christian clergy not to mention Jesus or read the New Testament at the memorial for Swiss Air victims…”  Giorno also chastised Keith Norton, Ontario’s human rights commissioner, for attacking the Equity in Education Tax Credit.  “Keith Norton and I part company when he writes that the equity in education tax credit might create ‘racial, ethnic and religious apartheid in our education environment as well as intolerance and ignorance among our children …’ I, too, embrace religious tolerance,” Giorno writes. “However, I do not believe we further that goal by being equally intolerant of all religions. And I fail to see how we respect diversity by obliterating it.”  To read Guy Giorno’s column see: https://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1026143397191&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid=968332188492&call_pagepath=News/News