Canadian court rejects mother’s lawsuit to ban Aboriginal celebration at children’s school | Canada

Canadian court Reject claims again A mother said that Aboriginal cultural events at her children’s school violated their religious freedoms, and she was ordered to pay the costs after revealing that her lawsuit was secretly funded by a Christian activist organisation.

Candice Servatius, Evangelical Protestant, She complained in 2016 after a senior held a smearing demonstration at her children’s school in Port Alberni, western British Columbia. As a prayer collar dancer said while performing at the school assembly.

Prior to the event, parents received a message advising that students would participate by carrying a cedar branch to “feel the hairs… to remind them that they are alive and well” and that smoke from sage plants would be spread to “cleanse” the students and classrooms. When Servatius went to school, she found out that the ceremony had already taken place.

Notwithstanding Servatius’ claim that “her children were forced to participate in a religious ceremony,” BC Supreme Court I judged her In 2020. Justice Douglas Thompson concluded that the events were intended to teach students about Aboriginal culture and that attendance was not compulsory.

In his judgment, Thompson also found that while the students observed ritual smearing and a hoop dance, they “had no cedar boughs nor were they smeared or otherwise cleansed.”

This week, an appeals court Agreed with the lower court, describing it as “uncontroversial” that public educational institutions such as schools would participate in reconciliation efforts with indigenous communities. The school is located within the traditional Nuu-chah-nulth territory and approximately one-third of the students in the school district are indigenous, according to the British Columbia Court of Appeal.

Justice Susan Griffin wrote: “Great efforts have been made to repair the historical legacy of schools being an unsafe place for Aboriginal children and to help achieve better outcomes for Aboriginal students.”

She also referred to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, adopted by the province three years ago, which calls for indigenous culture and traditions to be reflected in the province’s schools.

When he ruled in 2020, Thompson sued Servatius was not forced to pay the costsbelieving her family lacked the funds to compensate the school district for litigation.

But after she challenged the decision, the appeals court learned her case was funded by the Calgary-based Justice Center for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF).

Justice Griffin wrote that the revelations from the group secretly funding Servatius “highlight the importance of transparency regarding who is the real party funding the litigation” and concluded that the JCCF’s role “isolated” Servatius from the costs associated with “wasting judicial resources on petty complaints. This does not usually warrants a lawsuit.”

The Court of Appeals ordered Servatius to pay the school district’s costs—for both the Supreme Court and appeals court hearings.