Canadian Muslim Groups Sue over School Prayer Ban

By Staff, Agencies

Muslim organizations in Canada are asking the courts to declare a provincial proclamation in Quebec that bans religious activity in schools as unconstitutional.

Six groups - which include the Muslim Association of Canada, the Canadian Muslim Forum and four local organizations - filed a lawsuit this week asking the Quebec Superior Court to “declare constitutionally invalid, inapplicable, inoperative, or to annul” the order to prohibit all forms of prayer in public schools.

“The plaintiffs request that a declaratory judgment concerning the interpretation to be given to the principles of laicity and religious neutrality of the state be rendered so that these principles cannot be used to order prohibitions of prayers or other religious practices in public places,” the filing reads.

The groups stressed that the order is discriminatory and violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The directive by education minister Bernard Drainville banning prayers in schools was announced on 19 April after there were reports of at least two Canadian schools permitting students to gather on school property for prayer.

Drainville issued a directive that formally prohibited any practices of religious activity, whether it be in schools, vocational training centers or adult education centers.

At that time, he defended his ruling saying that school spaces cannot be used “in fact and in appearance, for the purposes of religious practices such as open prayers or other similar practices’.’

In their court filing, the groups write that state secularism aims to ensure that the state is not religious.

“The resulting obligation of state religious neutrality should not be interpreted in such a way as to favor one religion rather than another or to target, directly or indirectly, one religion rather than another.”

Islamophobia is “deeply” entrenched in Canadian society, and Black hijab-wearing women are the most vulnerable, a Canadian Senate committee report said last month.