Examining the hypocrisy of Quebec’s ‘Catho-secularism’

Québécois don’t want to see symbols of any religion, except the one that oppressed them

This was not a good week for religious symbols in Quebec. Well, some people’s symbols, anyway.

In the federal byelection in LacSaint-Jean riding, the New Democratic candidate who finished a strong second in the general election two years ago dropped to fourth place, while losing more than half her 2015 vote share.

The obvious explanation is that Quebec New Democrats were justified in fearing that voters in this province would reject their new national leader, Jagmeet Singh, because of his turban and beard representing his Sikh faith.

In provincial politics, Justice Minister Stéphanie Vallée said that Bill 62, her anti-niqab law promoting the harassment of veiled Muslim women, bars students from class unless they uncover their faces.

Vallée said they could seek accommodations of their religious beliefs, but would remain excluded from class during the application process.

They would each have to apply on a case-by-case basis, and the granting of an accommodation to one applicant would not apply to other students.

The student couldn’t even apply until the government adopts rules for granting accommodations, which might not be until the end of next June.

Maybe this will satisfy those who believe that the veils oppress women, and the solution is to oppress them even more.

Vallée threatened to go to court if necessary to force educational institutions as well as municipalities and other public bodies to comply with the law.

That compliance may be difficult. While the law came into effect upon its adoption, more than a week later it still hadn’t been posted on the web for administrators to consult.

It doesn’t help that Vallée’s explanations of the law change from day to day, and that she’s been contradicted about the extent of its effect on students by the minister responsible for higher education, Hélène David.

Less than a week after passing Vallée’s “religious neutrality” law, the Liberal majority refused even to allow debate in the National Assembly on a motion by the Québec solidaire party about removing the crucifix prominently displayed above the Speaker’s chair.

This was not as much of a contradiction on the part of the Liberals as their insistence, anticipating court challenges on grounds of discrimination, that banning face coverings in a law on religious neutrality and accommodations has nothing to do with religion.

For while Bill 62 generally requires state neutrality, it exempts emblems or place names reflecting Quebec’s “religious cultural history.”

In a Quebec where religious practice has declined to the point that churches are converted to condos, the crucifix placed in the Assembly 81 years ago seems like an anachronism.

But the crucifix is not still there due to oversight. It’s still there because politicians know that French-speaking Quebecers want it there.

This is the hypocrisy of Quebec’s “Catho-secularism”: Supposedly because they were oppressed by the Catholic Church, the Québécois now don’t want to see symbols of any religion — except the one that oppressed them.

But the crucifix in the Assembly, which originally represented

an alliance between Church and state, is not only a religious symbol. It’s also an ethnic one.

Like the elements that make up the Fleurdelisé, the Quebec flag that flies above the Assembly, the crucifix exclusively represents old-stock, nominally Catholic French-Canadians.

And in its place of prominence in the legislature, it is an affirmation of their supremacy; La Presse columnist Yves Boisvert noted this week that the “heritage” argument is also used to defend Confederate statues in the southern United States.

Like the Fleurdelisé in 1948, the Assembly crucifix was introduced in 1936 by conservative nationalist Maurice Duplessis, who was then premier.

That was the same year that Duplessis is said to have first referred to the Assembly as “le Salon de la race” — literally, the Salon of the Race, of and for French-Canadians.

Duplessis’s expression was seldom repeated after the mid-1980s. But the continued presence of his crucifix in the Assembly is a statement that it still applies.