Summary: The Ontario Supreme Court ruled that a Christian law school’s Community Covenant does not give everyone a fair chance to apply or attend the school.
Christian law schools can be denied accreditation for having Christian policies, according to a Canadian court ruling. Trinity Western University, a Vancouver, British Columbia evangelical Christian university filed a lawsuit after being denied accreditation by the Law Society of Upper Canada. A three-judge panel of the Divisional Court of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice sided with the Law Society.
The issue was the university’s Community Covenant that requires faculty and staff to refrain from “sexual intimacy that violates the sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman”. The covenant goes on to explain that everything about the university, including their core values, mission, community life and curriculum are based on the work of Jesus Christ in the Bible. The covenant also calls for members to refrain from “gossip, slander, vulgar/obscene language, stealing, misusing or destroying property belonging to others, drunkenness, under-age consumption of alcohol, and the use or possession of illegal drugs.”
The court decided that the covenant excludes certain people from being eligible to attend the school. Trinity Western is fighting accreditation problems in other provinces as well. The Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society rejected their accreditation but this time the Nova Scotia Supreme Court sided with Trinity Western.
Justice Jamie S. Campbell declared that the “society’s resolution and regulation infringe on the freedom of religion of TWU and its students in a way that cannot be justified.” She noted in the ruling that those that are not religious see religion as something that is in the way and needs to be removed.
Trinity Western gained approval from the Supreme Court of Canada in 2001 for their teacher education program.
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