Legal confrontations over in-person church services continue to escalate in western Canada.
On a day when the chief justice of British Columbia’s Supreme Court kicked a legal ball down the road in a dispute between health authorities and three churches in the province over whether or not they can hold in-person services, an Alberta pastor was being held in RCMP custody near Edmonton after refusing bail conditions after turning himself in on Tuesday.
The pastor, James Coates of the GraceLife Church, has clashed for months with authorities, who say he is breaking health rules on maximum attendance, masking, and physical distancing.
Recent Sunday services have had up to 300 members, and Coates was charged for a second time earlier this month for breaking the rules.
Coates was fined in December and Alberta Health Services ordered the church to close in January, but Coates has ignored the orders.
In an interview with CBC News on Wednesday evening, Coates’s lawyer James Kitchen said Coates and his church’s stance “is not about just wantonly rebelling.
“It is about doing what is intelligent to them and what maintains their freedoms, but most importantly what is ultimately honouring to their god that they believe in,” Kitchen said.
“And they are not going to cease worshipping God as they believe they have been commanded to do, simply because the government says so.”
Kitchen said GraceLife’s perspective is that lockdowns are causing “exponentially more harm” to the community than gathering in groups, saying “nobody has died of COVID at Pastor Coates’ church.”
The Free Reformed Church of Chilliwack is among the churches challenging anti-COVID-19 restrictions in British Columbia. The churches say the restrictions violate several of their Charter of Rights and Freedoms rights, including freedom of religion, belief, expression, peaceful assembly and association. (Free Reformed Church of Chilliwack/Facebook)
Meanwhile in British Columbia, the chief justice of the province’s Supreme Court, Christopher Hinkson, dismissed an application by the province for an injunction against three Fraser Valley churches that authorities say are flouting COVID-19 rules that prohibit in-person services.
The province filed the application after the three churches filed a petition challenging the restrictions, arguing they violate parishioners’ rights and freedoms.
Hinkson listed his reasons for ruling against the province’s application on the court’s website shortly after he issued his decision.
“Given the other remedies available to the respondents, I have reservations that an injunction alone, without enforcement by the B.C. Prosecution Service, would overcome the deeply held beliefs of the petitioners and their devotees,” Hinkson wrote.
“To be clear, I am not condoning the petitioners’ conduct in contravention of the orders that they challenge, but find that the injunctive relief sought by the respondents should not be granted.”
The injunction request–by B.C.’s attorney general and provincial health officer came after the three churches–the Riverside Calvary Chapel in Langley, the Immanuel Covenant Reformed Church in Abbotsford and Free Reformed Church of Chilliwack–were among more than a dozen individuals and churches that filed their petition last month.
The churches say the restrictions violate several of their Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom rights, including freedom of religion, belief, expression, peaceful assembly and association.
Their challenge is scheduled to be heard in March.
With files from CBC News (Jason Procter), The Canadian Press
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