Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a comment if I may because I participated in the proceedings of that committee. Let me remind the House of some elements that were already announced concerning what we call Prayers.
We have been debating the question for several years and I think the committee has done a magnificent job in trying to unite everyone around one fundamental form of prayer. We all know that Prayers open every sitting of the House; what we have now constitutes a great improvement compared to the previous text which made some members ill at ease on religious grounds.
You know the Chair must open every sitting by determining if there is a quorum before starting to say prayers. Given the general discomfort among members, the committee could not accept that a few of them feel unconcerned by these first moments of the sitting of the House and have no other recourse but to stay outside if they do not feel involved in what is going on. This is the first element of importance.
Our objective was then to include all elected members in the discussions and that prompted us to prepare a text almost free of any references to specific religious beliefs and acceptable to almost everybody. All members also had to feel the House was their place and that this activity was meant for them. Of course my colleague mentioned the reference to the Queen, but above all, our aim was to design a moment of reflection intended for all members of the House.
We are practicing democracy at its best here today in trying to recognize all religions and I think this is very positive and valuable, even more so when you think that prayers do not necessarily have to be a formal text; that is an argument I presented to the committee.
We know that any prayer is something very personal, it is a conversation with what each of us calls God, but one's own personal God, according to one's own values. In that perspective, we are extremely satisfied that all faiths are recognized here through what I would call multiple persuasions.
The second element is that the intimate nature of prayers is recognized by the moment of silence each member of this House will respect and, in so doing, will feel concerned by the very first opening instants of each sitting of the House.