It’s the most wonderful time of the year – but not, sadly, in Quebec. Or at least that’s what the provincial government would have us believe.

As the region’s secularism minister Jean-François Roberge explained: ‘We can wish someone merry Christmas. We can sing Christmas songs. This is nothing but tradition. But we shouldn’t make any references to the birth of baby Jesus… When we wish someone merry Christmas, we can think of Santa Claus and his elves, but nothing Catholic.’

Generously, Christmas parties are permitted in schools and daycares as long as ‘there is no attempt to transmit religious values’

Roberge was describing the workings of Bill 9, an attempt to expand the region’s secularism laws. The proposed legislation will ban public prayer, force religious private schools to secularise or be defunded, ban chapels and prayer rooms in publicly funded educational institutions, limit religious (including Halal and Kosher) menus in publicly funded institutions and extend Legault’s 2019 ban on religious symbols for civil servants in a position of authority, to private school teachers.

Montrealers will have to watch their thoughts as they head down Boulevard Saint-Laurent, make a left on Rue Notre-Dame, and take Rue Saint-Vincent and Rue........

© The Spectator