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MONTREAL, Quebec, June 1, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Quebec parents and daycare providers filed a lawsuit Tuesday in the Quebec Superior Court against new provincial directives for the province’s massively-funded daycare system that ban mention of religion and God.

They say the directives, released in December, violate their freedom of religion guaranteed by provincial and federal Charter rights.

Under the directives, which take effect Wednesday, Quebec’s subsidized daycares are not allowed to offer any activity that aims to teach “a belief, dogma, or practice of a specific religion.”

“I want young Quebecers who attend our daycare services to do so in a spirit of openness to others and diversity,” said Quebec’s Family Minister Yolande James previously. She called the daycares “places of socialization and integration.”

Daycare providers, however, say the new directives are a complex system nearly impossible to decipher.  A child may initiate and continue a religious activity, but instructors can have no part in the action.  Religious leaders, such as a priest or imam, may visit a daycare, but are not permitted to give any type of religious instruction.  The director of a Catholic daycare was even instructed that the popular song ‘Au clair de la lune’ could be sung as long as the final line — Pour l’amour de Dieu (For the love of God) — was dropped.

Oddly, religious symbols, such as Christmas trees, crucifixes, and menorahs will be allowed as cultural expressions, but staff will not be permitted to explain their religious significance.

“According to this new doctrine, Noah’s Ark is something you couldn’t have in the classroom any more,” said Sandy Jesion, co-chair of Quebecers for Equal Rights to Subsidized Day Cares (QERSDC), the group filing the suit. “The story about the flood is not a problem, but the fact that God spoke to Noah and told him to build the Ark is religious, and under the directive you can’t do that.”

Launched on May 26, QERSDC already supports more than 200 Quebecers of Catholic, Jewish, and Egyptian Copt communities and is formally endorsed by organizations such as the Association of Childcare Centres of the Jewish Community, Federation CJA, and the Association des Parents Catholiques du Québec.

The group is challenging the directives as unconstitutional and seeking an injunction to delay the implementation of the directives while the matter is before the courts.  Daycares, they argue, are an extension of the family home and parents should be allowed to enrol their young children in programs that reflect the family’s culture and beliefs.

“This is a fundamental question,” said lawyer Marie-Josée Hogue who represents QERSDC. “The benefits of the law should be the same without distinctions like religion and belief.”

However, Family Minister Yolande James says the system was the product of considerable thought.  “Society has accepted that the teaching of faith is not in the public school system, and the same principle is applicable here in the subsidized daycare system,” she said in a recent interview. “Contrary to private daycare, the teaching of religion is not appropriate.”

The government’s decision is part of a decades-long process of radical secularization in the formerly Catholic province.  It follows the banning of religious instruction in schools, which came after the deconfessionalization of the school system in 2000.

In the daycare system, created in 1997, Quebec parents pay a mere $7 a day to enrol their children in subsidized daycare programs, while government funds supply approximately $40 more in subsidies.  Of about 2,000 subsidized daycares, approximately 100 offer some religious content in Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, and Greek Orthodox faiths.

Danielle Sabbah, president for the Association of Childcare Centres of the Jewish Community, and spokesperson for QERSDC, said it is nearly impossible to decide what is allowed or forbidden because there are no concrete examples.  The directives, she said, present a major problem for the Jewish community.

“The problem is that in the Jewish religion, traditions, culture and the religious aspect are mixed together. This will be paralyzing for our educators. They are emotionally broken. For them it’s like punishing the children,” said Sabbah, who represents 17 daycares serving 3,000 children. “In Jewish culture it’s very difficult to separate religion, tradition and culture.”