c. 2003 Religion News Service
Jews, Muslims Unite on Ritual Slaughter
OTTAWA (RNS) Canada’s Jews and Muslims, together numbering more than 1 million people, are calling on the federal government to exempt ritual slaughters from proposed animal-cruelty legislation.
Kosher and halal slaughtering methods have been “a tried and true way for preparing animals for consumption for centuries,” said Manuel Prutschi of the Canadian Jewish Congress.
In an unusual alliance, the Congress and the Islamic Council of Imams-Canada have presented a brief to a Senate committee studying the bill. They recommend the legislation “explicitly exempt Jewish and Islamic ritual slaughter from its provisions or mandate the requirement of the attorney general’s consent for any prosecution under the animal-cruelty provisions of the bill.”
The proposed law recommends amending the Criminal Code’s section on cruelty to animals to impose tougher penalties on convicted animal abusers.
Under the bill, those convicted of causing “unnecessary pain, suffering or injury to an animal” could face jail sentences of up to five years. The maximum penalty for animal cruelty is currently six months.
Imam Abdul Hai Patel of the council of imams endorsed the Jewish congress’s recommendations to the Senate in a letter “as remedies of our shared concerns.”
Presbyterians Ink Deal With Ottawa
OTTAWA (RNS) The federal government and the Presbyterian Church in Canada have signed a final compensation deal under which the church will pay $2.1 million to victims of abuse at the Indian residential schools it ran.
The agreement, signed Feb. 13, requires the church to accept responsibility for the sexual and physical abuse and cover 30 percent of the estimated liability.
Ottawa will cover the remainder of the liability and has committed $1.7 billion over seven years to resolve up to 18,000 lawsuits out of court.
Nearly 12,000 people have sued for compensation for their suffering at Indian residential schools, which were funded by the government and run by churches.
The Presbyterian Church was responsible for the fewest number of residential schools and is the first to finalize an agreement with the government.
The Anglican Church, following ratification by its 30 dioceses, is expected to sign a final agreement soon.
Negotiations continue with the United Church, while talks have stalled with Catholic Church groups named in more than 70 percent of cases.
The deals require plaintiffs to waive the right to future litigation, including claims for language and cultural losses.
Rise Seen in Media’s Anti-Islamic Language
TORONTO (RNS) Canadian media have dramatically increased the use of anti-Islamic language since Sept. 11, 2001, charges the Canadian Islamic Congress.
In its fifth annual media monitoring report released Feb. 13, the congress said that despite a modest improvement between 1998 and September 2001 by some Canadian newspapers, there has been a 380 percent increase in anti-Islamic language among eight top newspapers since 2001.
The CIC said it fears a U.S. attack on Iraq will trigger “a new wave of distorted news coverage.”
The report traced phrases such as “Islamic-inspired terrorist attacks,” “Muslim dictator” and “hard-line Islamic regime” in thousands of articles written in 2002.
For the third year, the National Post was branded the most anti-Islamic newspaper, scoring the maximum of 100 points under a marking system that also factored in placement of stories.
The study said the Post, Ottawa Citizen and Montreal Gazette used the most anti-Islamic language.
Muslims Reach out to Sikhs
TORONTO (RNS) Muslims have reached out to members of Canada’s Sikh community, who are feeling embattled after the guilty plea by one of the men accused of bombing Air India Flight 182 in 1985, killing 329 people.
Inderjit Singh Reyat pleaded guilty Feb. 10 in Vancouver to one count of manslaughter in the bombing and was sentenced to five years in prison, on top of the 15 years he’s already spent in custody since his arrest in 1988.
Reyat, 51, admitted to supplying components that were assembled into bombs.
In a letter the following day in the Toronto Star, Anwaar Syed, executive director of the Canadian Muslim Civil Liberties Association, expressed solidarity and support for “all peace-loving Canadian Sikhs. Although the bombing of Air India Flight 182 may have been carried out by radical, extremist Sikhs, the mainstream Canadian Sikh community need not bear collective guilt for this crime.”
Syed said he hoped the “mistrust, resentment and suspicion” Canada’s Muslims were subjected to following Sept. 11, 2001, do not appear toward Sikhs.
Jehovah’s Witnesses Resist Call on Abuse
TORONTO (RNS) The Canadian wing of the Jehovah’s Witnesses is resisting disgruntled former members who want it to release data on known child molesters in its ranks.
Three former Witnesses, two of them past victims of sexual abuse, want Canada’s lawmakers to force the denomination to let police probe alleged past cases of abuse.
The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Canada Ltd. does keep a list of known abusers on file but will not give it to police, said spokesman Clive Thomas.
Thomas said child welfare authorities are notified when abuse is suspected, as required by law, and they can notify police if necessary, but the denomination itself isn’t legally obligated to report known or suspected abusers.
The three former Witnesses, Kim Sheeler and Lee Marsh of Winnipeg, and Grace Gough of St. Jacob’s, near Kitchener, Ont., sent out more than 1,000 letters to federal members of Parliament and all members of provincial legislatures, asking them to watch a recent CBC television documentary on abuse by Jehovah’s Witnesses and then pressure their governments to investigate past abuses.
Amish Don’t Want Children to Testify
TORONTO (RNS) Amish leaders in Ontario are pleading with the courts not to force their children to testify against a woman charged with a bizarre array of abuses, reports the National Post.
Leaders of the woman’s congregation near the southwestern Ontario town of Aylmer have cited religious beliefs that forbid them from testifying against each other, but prosecutors say they want the alleged victims to testify in court. The five children range in age from 7 to 13.
“To have our children appear in court for this purpose would be in violation of (our) principles,” said a letter from two church bishops to the court.
Doug Walker, the Crown attorney handling the case, said he could not comment, except to say the prosecution would go ahead according to usual procedures.
“(The children) are subpoenaed and they are expected to testify,” he said.
Eileen Miller, 33, faces 19 charges involving sexual offenses, assault with a weapon, uttering death threats, choking and suffocating children, and administering a noxious thing, specifically rotten meat, bugs and worms.
Miller was recently released on $2,000 bail and is to appear in court again March 6.
Center to Help Faith, Science Start Dialogue
EDMONTON, Alberta (RNS) A graduate student in physics and an expert in the relationship between science and Islam have teamed to form the Centre for Science and Spirituality, which hopes to initiate dialogue between faith communities and scientists.
“The idea is not to provide ultimate answers but to get a dialogue going,” said Jason Blackstock, a Ph.D. student at the University of Alberta who started the center with Muzaffar Iqbal, 48, a former professor and now a full-time writer specializing in the relationship between science and Islam.
The center is still in its formative stage and even its name is tentative, Blackstock said, adding it’s not yet known whether it will affiliate with the University of Alberta.
But a need exists, he said, to help science and religion come to grips with each other.
“We’re not out to prove or disprove the Bible. One of the challenges we see is reconciling the origins of the cosmos with (biblical) creation,” he said.
The center held its inaugural event Feb. 2, featuring an address by South African scientist George Ellis, a mathematician from the University of Cape Town and collaborator with renowned physicist Stephen Hawking. Ellis has written extensively on how laws of physics and chemistry alone cannot explain how life evolved.
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