(Ottawa) The Bloc Québécois can count on substantial support in its crusade to abolish the reading of the prayer in the House of Commons and replace it with a moment of reflection: the president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops is himself even “totally” agree.
Posted at 3:25 p.m.
“Praying to God and voting is a little annoying, it doesn’t seem logical,” summarized Bishop Raymond Poisson in an interview with The Canadian Press.
Being in the place of elected officials, “I would vote for a moment of reflection leaving room for everyone to be able to express their religious or non-religious reference in their internal strength”, he said.
The issue of secularism came back to the fore this week when the Bloc Québécois forced elected officials to vote on a motion to end the custom that takes place at the start of each sitting, but the Conservatives and almost all liberals opposed it.
The Bloc Québécois proposed that the prayer, which begins with “Almighty God” and ends with “Amen”, be replaced by a moment of reflection.
Society has evolved, acknowledges Bishop Poisson. “In 2022, we are in a very multicultural, and multi-religious, multi-religious society, and even there are people who have religious references and others who do not”.
A period of reflection would allow believing MPs to ask for “the help of God or of her religious reference for the decisions she is going to make”, but also to offer others the opportunity to reflect.
The Roman Catholic bishop notes that this would settle the issue that “when you take a moment of prayer, of course, you have to use words”.
But beware of the idea of removing “symbols of history” such as the religious references contained in the Constitution of Canada or the national anthem, he warned, reacting to the idea of bringing other adjustments.
“A national anthem is a rallying anthem, but it is not there just to say today. He is there to say what we were, what we are and what we will become. »
A prayer has been recited at the beginning of each session since 1877, but has only been included in the rules since 1927.
This is not the Bloc Québécois’ first attempt to put an end to it. The formation had failed to obtain the consent of the House in 2019.
After the recent defeat on Wednesday, Bloc leader Yves-François Blanchet has not ruled out returning to the charge during discussions planned over the next few months on the rules of the House.