Quebec is moving towards banning public prayer in a concerning push to limit religious expression in the region.
Criticised for endangering “basic democratic freedoms”, the move is another step in governing Coalition Avenir Québec’s agenda to promote secularism, or laïcité, on the back of Bill 21, which was passed in 2019.
That legislation received widespread backlash for prohibiting public workers including teachers and police officers from wearing religious symbols at work. Laïcité means a legal and political model based on the strict separation of religion and state. The term was coined in 1871 by French educator and future Nobel Peace Prize laureate Ferdinand Buisson.
