May 17, 2001 - Trinity Western University - a podcast by Stephen Hammond

Supreme Court upholds Christian university’s right to train teachers with an anti-homosexual bias.Trinity Western University is a private institution in Langley, B.C. associated with the Evangelical Free Church of Canada and promoting Christian views. It’s also an accredited member of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada. In the mid-1990s, Trinity offered an education degree, but the institution’s limited resources had led administrators to make an arrangement with nearby Simon Fraser University for education students in their fifth and final year to complete the degree there. Since administrators also wanted the program to reflect Christian views, they applied in 1995 to the British Columbia College of Teachers to assume full responsibility for the final year’s accreditation. The College of Teachers turned down their request on the basis that before entering Trinity, students are required to sign a “community standards” document that forbids biblically condemned practices such as swearing, drunkenness, premarital sex, adultery and homosexual behaviour. The latter stipulation, the College of Teachers stated, promoted discrimination against gay and lesbian students. Trinity took the case to the Supreme Court of Canada, where eight of the nine judges ruled in its favour, saying that when equality rights are at stake (religion vs. sexual orientation), “the freedom to hold beliefs is broader than the freedom to act on them.” The judges also observed that there was no evidence of Trinity graduates discriminating against pupils, and any who did so would be subject to disciplinary measures from the College of Teachers.

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