La Belle Province vs the Human Rights Industry: Saguenay Mayor Leads the Charge

Our father, who art in trouble: Quebec town fights to save prayer

"A Quebec municipality engaged in a crusade to defend the right to pray in public is collecting donations from across the country.

Saguenay Mayor Jean Tremblay said Thursday his city has already raised $15,000 as part of a high-profile campaign to fund his legal battle against citizens who want him to stop reading a prayer at the opening of city council meetings.

Tremblay announced Wednesday he is appealing a Quebec human rights tribunal decision that ordered him to put an end to this practice and remove all religious symbols, such as the crucifix, from the council meeting room.

The devout Catholic mayor will take his battle to Quebec's highest court and called on residents of this small town, located about 200 kilometres north of Quebec City, and faithful from across the province to support him."

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"The human rights tribunal decision handed down last week ruled the prayer goes against people's freedom of conscience and ordered the municipality to pay a $30,000 penalty to the plaintiff.

Tremblay is making a vibrant plea in favour of Quebec's religious tradition. He said Quebecers have become too "meek" in the name of accommodating religious minorities.

"Quebecers don't care about their traditions and their values anymore. We need to wake up and to stand up for what we believe in," Tremblay said.

"Yes, we have to be tolerant with others, but we need to start with ourselves. Why would we respect other religions but disrespect that of a majority?" he added.

Tremblay's message struck a chord with many Quebecers in a province where 80 per cent consider themselves Roman Catholics — even though the level of church attendance there is one of the lowest in the country.

"We are getting hundreds and hundreds of calls from across Quebec and also from the rest of Canada," Tremblay said.

"This is an issue of national importance. If we bend to this, what is going to be next? We'll have to change school names or street names bearing a religious connotation?""

Yup. It's not really about Christianity. It's about the hypocrisy of the human rights industry.

According to Statistics Canada, Saguenay's population as of the 2006 census, was 151,643. Of those, 146,600 were of Francophone origin. I think it's safe to assume that group is Roman Catholic by heritage, if not in day to day practice. That's 91% of the population. Why the hell shouldn't they repeat the Lord's Prayer before their council meetings?

The rest of the population, BTW, is largely English, but also includes persons of various Asian ethnic roots that, by their region of origin, would likely include Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims. Their numbers total 345. souls, or .2% of the total population of the municipality. Yet according to the Quebec human rights tribunal:

"the prayer goes against people's freedom of conscience and ordered the municipality to pay a $30,000 penalty to the plaintiff."

There is no mention in the article of who the plaintiff is. Curious, no? Is he a died in the wool Francophone atheist? An equally died in the wool traditional Anglophone atheist? I doubt it. Perhaps a Hindu? A Sikh? A Muslim? I know what my hunch is.

Wanna drop them a note and lend your moral support? Here's where you can do it: Ville de Saguenay, Cabinet du maire (mayor's office).