Across the world, we've seen a resurgence of Christian Nationalism in 2024 that threatens many of the gains that progressive secularists have fought and won over the past few decades. Today, toxic polarization and the rejection of evidence-based decision-making infects so much of the discourse and undermines democratic and humanist values.
Against these headwinds and with your support, the BCHA has continued to advance secularism here in British Columbia and across Canada. Our movement is thriving and making substantive gains at all levels of government. We're well-positioned to continue this work into 2025 but we need you with us.
The Saguenay Project
Our research-based advocacy campaign to end prayers in every municipality in Canada continued apace this year.
Building off last year's report on prayers in BC's 2022 inaugural council meetings, we secured commitments from every municipality that all future meetings would be secular. In the end, we had to threaten to take Parksville and Vancouver to court before they would agree.
Beyond our province, we released two more reports documenting prayers in Alberta and Saskatchewan municipal council meetings. Simply releasing these reports resulted in at least one municipality dropping prayers from its meetings.
Humanism in Court
Early in the year, we welcomed the BC Supreme Court's decision to uphold the privacy commissioner's findings that the Jehovah's Witnesses needed to disclose records they held on two former members to the commission. We'd intervened to argue that religious freedom claims shouldn't trump privacy rights.
The Jehovah's Witnesses appealed to the BC Court of Appeal and we were able to intervene again to argue in court for the importance of the privacy rights of the ex-religious. We're expecting a decision on that case in the new year.
Humanism in the ballot box
Coming into the provincial election this year, we canvassed our members on the issues they wanted us to put to candidates and political parties. Using their feedback, we provided a toolkit to help supporters ask their candidates about those issues.
While some politicians and political parties ignored us and their constituents, we were able to pull information from each party's platform to provide some non-partisan information to help everyone cast their ballot.
Looking ahead, we're eager to work with the new cabinet ministers on the priorities we've been speaking about.
Religious Property Tax Exemptions
This year, we saw a growing number of municipalities begin to rethink the blanket tax exemptions granted to places of worship. Notably, Terrace capped the total exemptions it will grant, Rossland rejected an application from the local Catholic Church and the Supreme Court of BC rejected a claim that a private island should be exempt from property taxes.
We also called for ending religious property tax exemptions in the Edmonton Journal.
Giving Humanist issues a voice
We defended the right to access medical assistance in dying by calling out further delays for people suffering from mental illnesses, criticizing a claimed compromise with St Paul's Hospital and supporting a lawsuit against faith-based obstructions.
Locally, we challenged municipalities and the province for needlessly entangling religion and housing policies.
We put our issues before the federal budget consultation and we supported two bills that would finally ban corporal punishment.
And we drew attention to clear-cut examples of churches engaging in prohibited partisan activities.
We also kept things light with our annual April 1 report.
Building community
This year our members connected through several online meetings and at a guided nature walk around Burnaby Lake. We also spoke to hundreds at the Vancouver Pride Festival again.
We were present at the WeCanReason conference in Calgary and Dying With Dignity Victoria's Community Forum.
Help us keep this up
Behind all of this work are dozens of volunteers, a small board and an even smaller staff team. We are entirely funded by individual members and supporters.
Across every metric, we've grown a lot this past year: Our membership and supporter lists are nearly 20% larger, our social media accounts are taking off with significant new followings on TikTok, Threads and now BlueSky. This has meant healthier revenues, putting us on a more stable financial footing.
However, we still need your support at this year's end to help us meet our fundraising goals. Please consider becoming a member if you aren't yet, or donating to help fund the fight for secular and progressive values in 2025.
All contributions are tax-deductible.
And if you're feeling particularly generous, we also welcome donations of securities and mutual funds, avoiding capital gains tax implications. Please also reach out if you are interested in sponsoring a particular aspect of our future work, such as a specific report or legal intervention.