A public school in Toronto thinks a clergyman can be invited to conduct Islamic prayers at lunchtime on school grounds. As a school trustee explains it, “What we’re doing is what we should be doing as a school board and that is accommodating students’ needs no matter what their religion is.”
A public school in Chester Basin, N.S., thinks a student can be prohibited from wearing a T-shirt with a Christian message on school grounds. As school trustees explain it, “It is expected that students will not wear clothing with messages that may offend others’ beliefs, race, religion, culture or lifestyle.”
Whether religious expression is permitted in schools turns on the meaning given to “freedom of religion” and “freedom of expression.” The confusion over this question calls for a review class on the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Beginning in the mid-1980s, the courts determined that public schools cannot teach religion in a doctrinal way. While they can, and often do, offer history and social-studies classes that survey world religions, the mandatory separation of church and state prohibits them from teaching religion as it is taught to adherents of that religion – i.e., as a matter of belief rather than general knowledge.
