Mr. Speaker, I want to be very clear that the issue is not whether or not a person can foment hate. I do not think there are any religious communities in this country that want to foment hate. The issue is who gets to decide what is and is not acceptable speech, because I do not trust the minister of heritage to decide what clergy in my church can and cannot say.
I believe these communities should be free to have their own conversations and their own debates. By all means, people should debate religious ideas. They should be free to criticize and disagree with religious ideas, as religious people sometimes do among ourselves, but the government should not be telling imams, rabbis and pastors what they can and cannot believe in the context of reading and sharing religious texts.