Opinion
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December 18, 2017 (Human Life International) – The assault just keeps coming for our pro-life brothers and sisters in Canada, which should cause each of us pause and great concern. A few days ago, the Canadian Liberal Government – possibly the most pro-abortion government in Canadian history – unveiled a disturbingly discriminatory policy banning government funding for summer student jobs for any employer that doesn’t actively support abortion, gay “marriage,” and transgenderism.

A witch-hunt against pro-life groups

First a bit of background: The Canadian government has for years had a program funding a number of student summer positions in each federal political district, known as a riding. The purpose of the program is to help create employment for students during their summer breaks. Which groups get approved for the funding has, until now, been left entirely up to the discretion of the Member of Parliament in charge of each riding.

Like any other employer, various pro-life groups have applied for the summer student funding. Sometimes they got approved, sometimes they didn’t. Some of the pro-life groups who did get approved included the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform, Campaign Life Coalition, and LifeSiteNews.

But earlier this year, one of Canada’s most radical pro-abortion organizations, the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada (ARCC), which supports abortion through all nine months of pregnancy without restriction, “exposed” the fact that some pro-life groups were being funded. Joyce Arthur, the Executive Director of ARCC, called for the government to stop funding “anti-human rights groups” – a curious way of describing organizations whose sole mission is to stop defenseless human beings from being ripped apart in the womb.

What ensued amounted to a national witch-hunt against pro-life groups.

URGENT: Tell Justin Trudeau you oppose this attack on freedom of conscience. Sign the petition here!

The media dutifully ran with their highly-skewed version of the story, which reached its peak when a spokesperson for the Liberal government declared the funding of pro-life groups an “oversight” and promised that no such groups would receive the funding moving forward. Even though there was absolutely no policy on the books requiring an ideological purity test for groups to receive the funding, the government pulled tens of thousands of dollars in funding that had already been approved. That left pro-life groups like the Canadian Centre for Bioethical Reform struggling to make up a sudden, huge budget deficit.

A ‘jaw-dropping’ act of discrimination

Now, the Liberal government has followed through on their promise to block pro-life groups with the release of a formal policy. Except, the policy is stunningly sweeping, going far beyond merely banning funding for pro-life groups. To qualify for funding, the government requires that “both the job and the organization’s core mandate respect individual human rights in Canada,” including “reproductive rights” (which inevitably includes abortion) as well as freedom from “discrimination” based upon “sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression.”

Even more disturbingly, the Canadian government has announced that it will prioritize jobs with groups that “provide services and supports for the LGBTQ2 community,” in the words of Global News. The Canadian government said it is concerned about kids as young as 15 being “exposed to employment” with pro-life groups, but is actively pushing for those same kids to work at LGBT groups, where they will unquestionably be exposed to a dangerous sexual ideology.

So who does this new policy exclude from receiving funding? Well, just about any organization anywhere in Canada that includes as part of its mission defending the traditional family or the rights of the unborn child; in other words, practically every single traditional Christian, Jewish, or Seikh, or Islamic organization in the entire country. Meanwhile, radical abortion groups like Planned Parenthood, which have received funding in the past, will be able to qualify moving forward.

Jack Fonseca, who works for Canada’s largest pro-life group, Campaign Life Coalition, accused Trudeau of turning the Liberal Party into “a hate group against Christians.” “This is a jaw-dropping act of discrimination against faith-based employers and non-profits,” he said.

‘Tolerance’: The left’s cover for totalitarianism

Every day we’re seeing more and more powerfully that many of the leftists’ call for “tolerance” is just a cover for a lurking totalitarianism. Radical social liberals appeal to “tolerance” in order to create a groundswell of public support for their cause (i.e. transgenderism, same-sex “marriage”), and then once they have that support, they rapidly begin the process of demonizing and marginalizing anyone who doesn’t agree with them. Dissent from the leftist agenda, it turns out, is the one thing that will not be “tolerated.”

It’s happening all over the place these days. Recently, for instance, the EU threatened Poland with serious sanctions because Poland has been taking strong measures to defend the unborn. A resolution by the EU warned Poland not to pass a proposed law that would prohibit aborting disabled babies, and to repeal another law banning over-the-counter sales of the abortifacient morning after pill. These are totalitarian strong-arm tactics that undermine the right of a sovereign nation to take reasonable measures to defend the most vulnerable citizens. I will have much more to say about Poland’s heroic struggle to defend its Judeo-Christian roots in coming weeks.

In some recent cases, however, pro-abortion and anti-family activists have overplayed their hands, by trying to clamp down on freedom and free speech about highly contested issues, like whether or not people should be forced by law to use new, made-up “transgender” pronouns like “xe, xir, and zem.” Many Canadians, such as famed professor of psychology Jordan Peterson, have pointed out that the science on transgenderism is not only unsettled, but a huge amount of it strongly undermines the agenda of the sexual revolutionaries. And yet, the sexual revolutionaries are trying to label as “hate speech” anything that even questions the radical transgender ideology – no matter how respectfully or calmly put!

In response to this blatant totalitarianism, a surprisingly broad coalition of conservatives and liberals has begun to speak out: Jordan Peterson, for instance, as I pointed out a couple weeks ago, has received support from people like “married” gay podcast Dave Rubin, not to mention his own hundreds of thousands of social media followers.

I suspect that the Canadian government has likewise gone too far this time. My hope is that people all around the world will let Justin Trudeau and the Canadian government know that blatantly discriminating against pro-life and Christian groups like this is beyond the pale. Two different Canadian organizations – LifeSiteNews and Campaign Life Coalition – have started petitions demanding that the government rescind their “purity test” for the funding. I hope you will sign them. (Click here, and here)

I have written about events in Canada several times in the past two months, and the reason why is this: when it comes to the attack on life and family, Canada is just a few years “ahead” of the United States, and many other countries that are following suit by embracing the sexual revolution. What we are seeing in Canada – in this case, explicit, unapologetic federal government discrimination against people and organizations with pro-life and pro-family values – is precisely what we will in the next few years, if we are not careful.

As threats to the freedoms of pro-life and pro-family activists all across the West grow and throughout the world, it’s crucial that we all stay informed and involved, ensuring that the voice of people of conscience is represented in the public square.

Reprinted with permission from Human Life International.