President's Blog

Today, in Ottawa, a Canadian National Religious Freedom event, hosted by David Anderson is occurring. Government, media, and denominational leaders are gathering to continue the conversation related to the growing concern that religious, conscience, and assembly rights are being infringed upon in Canada. Please pray for this assembly and our political leaders who are seeking to seriously address this issue in Parliament.

2018 has been a tough year for people of faith. Several battles were lost:

• The Supreme Court’s decision against Trinity Western University (religious freedom).
• An Ontario ruling against five doctors stating they must refer patients to doctors who will help them commit suicide despite the recognition (in the judge’s brief) that this does infringe upon their religious rights otherwise enshrined in the Charter (religious and conscience rights).
• Ontario’s “bubble-zone” around abortion facilities preventing peaceful pro-life activity near any clinic (assembly rights).
• The Summer Jobs Attestation fiasco where approximately 1,500 churches, groups or other organization were refused public funding because they could not “attest” (agree) with the Federal Government’s ideological bias (conscience and religious rights).

The list could continue. People of faith should not only be concerned, we should get ACTIVE. Sitting on our hands is no longer an option.


The Fellowship’s Religious Freedom Communication Campaign (2018-2019)

Our National Council wants our churches and leaders to know more about the realities occurring in our country related to religious freedom and the infringement of Christians’ Charter Rights (religious, conscience, and assembly rights).

A Communication Campaign has been created and will occur between October 2018 and June 2019 to better inform our churches. Your National Council is convinced our pastors, leaders, and churches are not adequately informed on all that is happening on this front.

Over the next several months we will seek to inform you with current and timely information on the subject matter. Our prayerful hope is that our churches will do something with this information. Pray and get ACTIVE.

• Expect several blogs on the subject in my weekly, “A Word from Steve”.
• Religious Freedom will be addressed at our Fellowship National conference (FNC2018) in Richmond, BC in November.
• A brief SURVEY on the subject will be sent soon…please…please…take 10 minutes and participate in this SURVEY.
• A few info-brochures will be sent to you over the next nine months.
• Our spring Thrive magazine will address Religious Freedom issues exclusively, you can look forward to receiving, “ALONE: Christian Amnesia” in the new year.
• As Fellowship President, I am helping to host two denominational leaders gatherings addressing this very subject (October 2018 and April 2019). Action items to follow.
• We’ll end our Communication campaign with a possible fund raiser during the spring/summer of 2019 to support a potential legal challenge surrounding the Summer Job Attestation.

As a Fellowship, we sent $10,000 to the legal defense fund of the CCCCs (June 2018), however further funding may be needed if a court challenge occurs. Stay tuned for more.

We live in interesting days when there is the possibility of regular demands to conform to state-approved beliefs and/or values… “to get “x” you must affirm that you believe what the state believes”. Interesting days ahead.