A new bill before the Manitoba legislature would scrap antiquated provisions that permit religious instruction and exercises in public schools.

Today, the BC Humanist Association called on the Department of Finance to use Budget 2025 to protect human rights and uphold religious neutrality.

What could your community do with millions of extra dollars?

The Kelowna Atheists, Skeptics and Humanists Association (KASHA) and Adcvocacy Canada are asking this very question, as they challenge the significant financial subsidy that religious institutions in the City of Kelowna receive through property tax exemptions.

On April 15, 2015, the Justices of the Supreme Court of Canada released their decision in Mouvement laïque québécois vs the City of Saguenay. It ended a nearly nine-year battle between atheist Alain Simoneau and the City's Mayor over whether prayers could be said before a municipal council meeting.

The Justices were unanimous: The prayers violated the state's duty of religious neutrality, as guaranteed by the right to freedom of religion and conscience under the Canadian and Quebec Charters of Rights and Freedoms.

The Township of Selwyn, Ontario, has agreed to drop prayers from future inaugural council meetings after a request by constitutional lawyer Donald Bur.

In December, a Parliamentary committee recommended Canada end automatic charitable status for religious groups, mirroring recommendations from the BC Humanist Association (BCHA).

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 BC Humanist Association (BCHA) is joining reproductive justice advocates in lauding an announcement by the federal government to require greater transparency from so-called "crisis pregnancy centres" (CPCs). This move is a significant step towards ensuring that organizations promoting harmful and misleading information about reproductive health cannot exploit charitable tax benefits.

Lawyers argued over the constitutionality of BC's privacy law at the BC Court of Appeal yesterday in an ongoing dispute between the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of BC.

The BCHA was able to bring the voice of those who've chosen to dissociate from religion to the court.

The BC Humanist Association has written in opposition to a forthcoming City of Vancouver Council Members' motion, arguing it runs contrary to the spirit of the City's constitutional duty of religious neutrality.