Juno News - August 01, 2026


Liberals BAN references to God from military ceremonies


Episode Stats


Length

14 minutes

Words per minute

172.85

Word count

2,497

Sentence count

85


Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
00:00:00.000 Well, the Carney government is taking God out of its military ceremonies. The Canadian Armed
00:00:11.720 Forces has ordered its chaplains to deliver non-religious spiritual reflection instead of
00:00:18.720 prayer. That means no reference to God at official military ceremonies like Remembrance Day and
00:00:25.360 graduations, changes of command. This post by conservative MP Andrew Lawton. This is absolutely
00:00:32.900 egregious. The liberal government has issued a directive barring military chaplains from doing
00:00:39.120 prayers at military ceremonies. Instead, they're permitted only to do a non-religious spiritual
00:00:46.180 reflection that cannot mention God. Some see this as just the latest government attack on people of
00:00:52.720 faith, particularly Christians. During a debate on Bill C-9 last fall, Heritage Minister Mark
00:00:59.560 Miller described certain religious texts as hateful. Clearly there are situations in these
00:01:05.200 texts where these statements are hateful, they should not be used to invoke or be a defense,
00:01:12.280 and there should perhaps be discretion for prosecutors to press charges.
00:01:16.200 Our guest today is Andrew Lawton, Conservative Member of Parliament for Elgin St. Thomas,
00:01:20.920 London South. Welcome, Andrew. Hey, it's good to be with you again, Mark. Thanks for having me.
00:01:26.320 It's great to have you on the show once again. Let's go through your post on X. This is absolutely
00:01:32.540 egregious. The Liberal government has issued a directive barring military chaplains from doing
00:01:38.380 prayers at military ceremonies. Instead, they're permitted only to do a non-religious spiritual
00:01:45.840 reflection that cannot mention God what is going on here your guess is as good as mine I mean this
00:01:51.960 is Mark Carney finishing the job that Justin Trudeau started we know this process was put
00:01:56.940 into motion in the Canadian Armed Forces a couple of years ago and there was a lot of backlash so
00:02:02.340 they they really held off on on formalizing it now they have formalized this policy and they've
00:02:08.400 also broadened it where even a military chaplain who's asked to give a prayer at another event
00:02:15.060 like perhaps a Remembrance Day ceremony, is not allowed to do that. They can only offer a
00:02:20.820 non-specific, non-religious, spiritual reflection that can only talk about things like values and
00:02:28.460 experiences, but not real spirituality, which involves faith. And this is, I think, a significant
00:02:34.560 restriction on the religious freedom of army chaplains and military chaplains. It also is,
00:02:40.420 I think a very misguided attempt to, you know, if I can be blunt on this, to really go after
00:02:48.120 religious freedom in a way that we've seen consistent with this government's approach
00:02:51.400 and other legislation too. How is this not an attack on our charter rights? I thought we were
00:02:57.100 free to worship as we choose. Well, and it's funny because the military in its directive that was
00:03:03.680 published says that this is protecting the charter rights because no one is forced to hear someone
00:03:09.780 utter a prayer if they don't want to hear it that's effectively how they're spinning this
00:03:14.360 and you know the problem that I would see with this is that we don't protect religious freedom
00:03:20.880 by just eliminating all religious expression it's about understanding that people have different
00:03:26.600 religious beliefs there are Muslim chaplains Jewish chaplains Christian chaplains all of them
00:03:31.200 are now barred from in public ceremonies doing what they were hired to do so they're still able
00:03:38.140 have services they're still able to pray for people individually but at military ceremonies
00:03:43.500 now at events that all soldiers are asked to be at apparently the only way to protect their
00:03:48.460 charter right is by not having a prayer from the chaplain they seem to have a long history
00:03:54.140 of attacking christians though i mean let's face it going right back to their summer jobs programs
00:03:59.980 where if you were associated with the group that opposed say abortion that your organization would
00:04:07.660 be prevented from accessing that program this is going back to the trudeau years right through to
00:04:14.140 bill c9 of course and suggestions that that bill may very well be anti-christian or anti-people of
00:04:24.700 faith where you had mark miller the heritage minister come out and suggest that certain
00:04:30.620 passages of the bible bible or other religious texts were hateful and so these people seem to
00:04:37.740 be obsessed with going after people of faith am i reading something here that's not there or or not
00:04:46.060 well look i i think there is a double standard in in some pockets of the country and certainly in
00:04:50.620 some political leaders uh you know one notable example of this about five years ago uh we had
00:04:56.540 Justin Trudeau mentioned when someone asked him about churches being burned, and Juno News has
00:05:01.820 been on the cutting edge of tracking how many churches have been burned or vandalized. I think
00:05:06.860 it's like 123 now in the last five years. When Justin Trudeau was asked about churches being
00:05:12.380 burned or vandalized, he said it was, quote, understandable. He would have never said that
00:05:17.260 about a mosque or a synagogue being assaulted, nor should he. So I think that some people do view
00:05:23.500 attacked on christianity and on christians as being fair game but i also i've i've been very
00:05:29.260 clear and this was especially true when we were discussing bill c9 their religious freedom for
00:05:34.380 one is religious freedom for all if we don't protect the right for uh christians to worship
00:05:39.420 we're not respecting the rights of jews of muslims of heiks of sikhs of hindus and so on and i think
00:05:45.020 we need to protect all religious freedom that certainly doesn't mean the right for one to
00:05:48.780 impose their faith on another but this idea of declaring neutrality on religion by barring all
00:05:56.660 religious expression in certain contexts is not getting us towards true pluralism and true
00:06:01.740 religious freedom i mean the history of this country is one of christian founders french
00:06:07.700 and english i mean let's face facts here natives were here as well but why don't we respect that
00:06:15.020 It seems to be that, you know, what we're doing is directed at negating what the founders of this country originally thought that we should be.
00:06:26.300 Am I wrong?
00:06:28.260 Well, look, I think all people of faith have skin in the game here.
00:06:31.880 And, you know, with Bill C-9, one of the things that was so important was how different faith groups came together and said, like, none of us are going to be protected from hate with legislation that restricts religious expression.
00:06:45.860 We've seen on the parental rights movement where people from different faith traditions are all in the same boat when they realize that the government is trying to limit their ability to raise their kids and manage their families the way that faith beliefs tell them to.
00:07:01.340 So now one thing I will point out that is interesting, because you mentioned in Indigenous people, this directive that bars religious expression in official ceremonies by chaplains in the Canadian Armed Forces actually carves out Indigenous spiritual beliefs.
00:07:16.480 So those are protected. And my view is we should protect all expressions of it.
00:07:21.200 If an Indigenous chaplain is there, let them speak about things that are significant to them.
00:07:25.240 If a Christian chaplain is there, let them speak to things that are significant to them in their faith tradition.
00:07:29.600 So we're already seeing this, this unevenness and how this policy is being developed.
00:07:34.880 I would imagine this would be demoralizing for some people in the military, certainly persons of faith, but just this ongoing attempt to wokeify the military, you know, with diversity quotas and bringing in more people who aren't even Canadian as members.
00:07:52.940 I mean, it just seems like everything they're doing is designed to destroy patriotism, to destroy, you know, patriotic fervor, such as it exists in Canada.
00:08:06.660 We've never had a whole ton of it, but, you know, and replace it with shame, you know, take away national pride, replace it with national shame, like we should be ashamed.
00:08:15.660 I mean, that episode that you were referring to about Trudeau, him saying it was understandable that all these Christian churches were burning.
00:08:23.060 I mean, that was within the context of the whole mass graves hoax and what took place at the indigenous school in Kamloops.
00:08:32.000 And so it just seems like all these institutions that we have in this country that have supported our country over the decades and made us who we are, are gradually being eroded by our own government.
00:08:43.880 what's that yeah i mean trudeau was the one who said we are a post-national country that you know
00:08:49.760 being canadian means nothing and then we had liberals uh notably over the last several years
00:08:55.200 do everything to denigrate this country to support uh you know dethroning our national founders and
00:09:02.080 heroes of the canadian story uh to associating the canadian flag as being a quote far right symbol
00:09:09.720 to basically knocking down anyone who's proud of the country.
00:09:13.380 And then in the last year, of course, these people decide to pretend to wrap themselves in the Canadian flag
00:09:19.180 and say they're the true patriots.
00:09:20.440 And I think a lot of Canadians see through this.
00:09:22.660 I mean, we need to protect institutions.
00:09:24.380 This is what my conservative colleagues and I have always done.
00:09:27.540 And we know that there has been a recruitment glut in the Canadian Armed Forces.
00:09:31.080 We know there's been a morale problem in the Canadian Armed Forces.
00:09:33.640 And I don't think it's all that surprising when you see how the left over the years
00:09:37.320 has decided to say that canada is not a country worth fighting do you ever ask your liberal
00:09:44.160 colleagues whether they hate the country and if so why well i mean look they claim my maiden
00:09:50.640 speech in the house of commons i i pointed out you know a lot of the liberals uh there that have
00:09:55.440 these canadian flags that are still creased because they just came out of the package where
00:09:58.920 i noted that you know the people i know have been flying their canadian flags for a long time and
00:10:03.100 and will continue to i think a lot of these people look i they they may uh say they they love canada
00:10:09.500 now but they have spent a lot of time knocking down this country and knocking down the institutions
00:10:15.580 and the people that make up this country and and i don't think we should allow that to stand
00:10:20.700 have you spoken to faith leaders people in the christian community and others
00:10:25.820 about this i mean do they find this alarming are they troubled by it what do you think i
00:10:32.700 This was something that I just learned yesterday. The policy just came out this week. I haven't had
00:10:37.340 the opportunity to canvass faith leaders. I have had a bunch of emails about it that I still have
00:10:42.380 to get through if I find some time today or over the weekend. I will say though that when I spoke
00:10:47.820 to a lot of faith leaders across the country, because I was leading the conservative response
00:10:51.580 to Bill C9, a lot of them identified what you alluded to as well, that there is a long history
00:10:57.020 from this Liberal government of policies that erode religious freedom and take aim of people
00:11:02.060 of faith it isn't just the canada summer jobs problem from i think seven years ago but even a
00:11:07.740 couple of years ago when liberal and new democrat members of the finance committee recommended
00:11:12.380 stripping charitable status away from faith institutions uh ignoring the huge philanthropic
00:11:18.700 work that faith organizations do across the country from food banks to affordable housing and now we
00:11:24.940 have bill c9 and and this latest announcement that prayer is no longer permitted at military
00:11:30.940 ceremonies by by military chaplains whose job it is to nurture the spiritual welfare and well-being
00:11:37.420 of soldiers and sailors it's absolutely disgraceful yeah i mean at some point you
00:11:43.020 would think the next move would be to get rid of these christian chaplains altogether and replace
00:11:49.260 them with i don't know new age people or you know what i'm saying i mean well i mean i look i i
00:11:55.020 should say that not all chaplains are christian i mean we we have people from different faith
00:11:59.660 groups in the armed forces and i think all of them deserve access to spiritual support
00:12:04.300 but it's this idea that there is a new ageyness to what the liberals are doing because in their
00:12:08.700 directive they talk about how spirituality can exist outside of a religious context so it's like
00:12:14.460 they're trying to have the benefits of religion without dealing with that without acknowledging
00:12:21.580 that religion is at the root of that and religious belief people's faith traditions that attach them
00:12:26.540 with whatever background or belief system they have.
00:12:30.400 But it's a very asinine thing.
00:12:32.460 And look, I wouldn't be surprised to see
00:12:34.100 if you follow this to its logical conclusion,
00:12:36.640 them doing away with this entirely.
00:12:39.560 Yeah, I mean, last question.
00:12:41.580 It just seems that for all the problems of this country,
00:12:45.280 so much of this government's energy
00:12:46.940 is focused at going after either people of faith
00:12:50.260 or trying to restrict speech,
00:12:53.860 you know, all these types of things.
00:12:55.980 You know, they seem focused on an area where, you know, why?
00:13:00.340 You know, this was not a burning issue when they took power when they first came in in 2015.
00:13:05.120 It was not a major area of concern that Canadians were crying out for attention.
00:13:10.900 And yet these people seem laser focused on trying to undermine the very things that have made Canada what it is.
00:13:18.400 And sadly, I think the longer they're there, the more success they have in destroying us.
00:13:23.780 Last word to you.
00:13:25.320 No, I just want to say, like, when I ran over a year ago in my election, I knocked on with my team tens of thousands of doors and not one person ever said, you know, Andrew, it's not the cost of groceries I'm worried about.
00:13:37.040 It's not the cost of rent. It's not the rampant crime on the street.
00:13:41.220 You know what? What really grinds me is, you know, these chaplains praying with our soldiers that, you know, that's the thing I want you to fix in Ottawa.
00:13:50.100 not one. And I think you'd be hard-pressed to find one single Liberal member of Parliament that has
00:13:54.260 said they have a constituent that's been pushing for this either. Yeah, very strange indeed. Andrew
00:14:00.000 Lawton, thank you so much for coming on the show. Appreciate it. Thank you, Mark. Always good to
00:14:04.000 talk to you. Andrew Lawton, Conservative Member of Parliament for Elgin St. Thomas, London South.
00:14:11.000 All right, my friends, hope you enjoyed the show. And if you did, consider supporting great
00:14:15.400 independent journalism by becoming a premier member of Juno News, please go to junonews.com
00:14:21.040 backslash straight up. You can find the link below. It helps us do what we do. Thank you so
00:14:25.800 much. We'll see you next time.