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Human Rights (Ont) - Creed. Alexander v. Renfrew County Catholic District School Board ['faithism']
In Alexander v. Renfrew County Catholic District School Board (Div Court, 2024) the Ontario Divisional Court dismissed a JR, here of "a decision of the Suspension and Exclusion Appeals Committee of the Renfrew County Catholic District School Board which denied four appeals by the applicant ... from suspension and exclusion orders".
Here the court considers practical limits of Charter s.2(a) religious freedoms, and similar HRC creed rights:[63] The Committee expressly recognized both the applicant’s freedom of belief but also his ability to express those beliefs and it gave examples of how he could do that. However, it also recognized that there are limits on freedoms. While it may not have expressed itself in the way that the Supreme Court of Canada did in Amselem [SS: Syndicat Northcrest v. Amselem, 2004 SCC 47], the Committee’s reasons as a whole show that it amply applied the principles expressed in Amselem at para. 61:In this respect, it should be emphasized that not every action will become summarily unassailable and receive automatic protection under the banner of freedom of religion. No right, including freedom of religion, is absolute: see, e.g., Big M, supra; P. (D.) v. S. (C.), 1993 CanLII 35 (SCC), [1993] 4 S.C.R. 141, at p. 182; B. (R.) v. Children’s Aid Society of Metropolitan Toronto, 1995 CanLII 115 (SCC), [1995] 1 S.C.R. 315, at para. 226; Trinity Western University v. British Columbia College of Teachers, [2001] 1 S.C.R. 772, 2001 SCC 31, at para. 29. This is so because we live in a society of individuals in which we must always take the rights of others into account. In the words of John Stuart Mill: “The only freedom which deserves the name, is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it”: On Liberty and Considerations on Representative Government (1946), at p. 11. In the real world, oftentimes the fundamental rights of individuals will conflict or compete with one another. [63] This distinction was recently confirmed in a decision of the Court of Appeal for Ontario which quoted Volpe v. Wong-Tam, 2023 ONCA 680, 487 D.L.R. (4th) 158, leave to appeal refused, [2024] S.C.C.A. No. 41041, at para. 42 as follows:The problem with the appellants’ articles was not that they took a position adverse to that of LGBTQ2S+ advocates with respect to Roman Catholic doctrine and education about sexuality. The problem was that they “used derogatory and prejudicial language” to do so, using stereotypes of “predation, pedophilia, and socially destructive behaviour.” This was the aspect of the appellants’ speech that exposed them to the complaint that they expressed discriminatory statements.
Del Grande v. Toronto Catholic District School Board, 2024 ONCA 769 at para.40.
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