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Can John Tory Marry Church and State? Ontario Conservative leader John Tory has revived the battle over the separation of church and state with his plan to marry them in a mostly public ceremony. As an election looms he is promising to appoint former Ontario premier Bill Davis to do a report on the public funding of faith-based education. This education marriage will be mostly secular and public as the taxpayer will fund the whole deal. It seems the religious schools won’t be coming with much of a dowry. If the PCs win the election Bill Davis will head a public-education-fairness implementation commission to study the issue. John Tory is promising that the province will spend 400 million dollars to fund Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and other religious schools as it does Catholic schools and public schools. Initially that would bring in 53,000 new students. A few religious leaders have already spoken in favour of Tory’s plan, but there are many reasons for voters not to buy it and I’ve listed some here. 1. The first and most obvious point is that it appears to be an election announcement staged to grab votes. 2. Bill Davis will be hired to do a report when the conclusion has already been reached. Do we really need a farcical public-education-fairness implementation commission that will spend tax dollars consulting the public when John Tory has already stated what he is going to do? 3. There is a definite conflict with the public as many taxpayers don’t want their tax dollars used to fund religious schools. They would have no escape other than to refuse to pay taxes. 4. There is no confirmation that Tory’s new system would be an improvement on the old system but there is a lot of evidence that it would be much worse. 5. As the Liberals are saying, it would probably weaken public education and divide Ontario students along religious and ethnic lines. 6. Ontario is the religious capital of the world. We have the most when it comes to religions and religious groups. There will be more and more religious schools appearing and wanting funding. Where will the money come from and when will so-called equality for all be achieved? Especially when the education system we already have has been one of funding cuts and school closures. Money will have to be taken from the present public schools to fund the new ones and public schools will lose students to religious schools and therefore money under funding formulas. 7. How can the differences on issues like gay marriage, macro evolution or even reincarnation ever be reconciled in a way that will allow for a uniform curriculum? 8. In order to receive public funding, faith-based schools would have to agree to teach the Ontario curriculum, participate in standardized testing and hire accredited teachers. From that perspective a religious school would be teaching the public curriculum, meaning it would exist as nothing more than a tool of segregation. 9. Supporters of the public system have long argued that genuine public schools, not private or religious, are the best schools. The reason being that people of all races and religions attend together and learn to be friends. Toronto is the peaceful integrated city it is because of public education. 10. Many religious leaders want an easy way out and seem to think that salvation is going to come from the Ontario school system and not from God. Everyone from evolutionists to Christians to Hindus thinks that quick public school indoctrination into their belief system is best. They believe it will make them dominant or save them from extinction. 11. Actual experience. I’m a Christian of the protestant variety. I attended a public school and I remember neighbours who didn’t associate with me as they believed they went to a superior or Catholic school. 12. Regardless of faith or origins everyone ends up a Canadian. Assimilation is nearly complete in the first generation and definitely there by the second generation. We are going to be one Canadian culture anyway and attempts to slow that down with divisions created through religious schools will fail. End - Religious teachings belong in the church, for both children and adults. Lord save us from the adulterated gospel of state religious schools.
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