Quebec bans use of classrooms as prayer spaces

Quebec's education minister officially prohibited schools from transforming classrooms into prayer rooms Wednesday, as announced two weeks ago.

"Schools are places of learning, not places of worship," said Bernard Drainville.

The guidelines put out by the Education Ministry say that "the development of places used for the purposes of religious practices" is "incompatible with the principle of the religious neutrality of the state" and "that it is likely to have an impact on the proper functioning of schools."

The minister also says that using classrooms to pray goes against secularism laws, which require that schools respect the separation of the state and religion

The guidelines state that students must be protected "from any direct or indirect pressure aimed at exposing them or influencing them so that they conform to a religious practice."

When an establishment goes against the guidelines, the school's director must take "the necessary means so that the appropriate corrective measures are taken," the document said.

Immediate backlash

Québec Solidaire's spokesperson for education, Ruba Ghazal, denounced Drainville's guidelines on Twitter Wednesday.

"It took [the minister] two weeks to write guidelines that are neither clear nor enforceable," she wrote.

"Are the teachers going to watch the halls and the schoolyards in case [students gather to pray]?"

Representatives from several mosques with the Table de concertation des organismes musulmans expressed their shock and indignation at the decision and said they are looking into legal options to rescind the ban.

The Canadian Muslim Forum (FMC-CMF) said in a news release it "calls on all political parties in Quebec to work together to unify society," and that the prayer-room ban "reinforces the regrettable impression that Quebec students are stigmatized because of their cultural and ethnic origins and that their fundamental rights have been violated." 

It stresses that the use of classrooms for prayer has only happened a handful of times and for a few minutes during breaks, outside school lesson hours and with the permission of the administration.

"This approach places the educational environment once again within the framework of political polarization in Quebec and in the circle of societal tensions by imposing on Quebec students a strong sense of inferiority, injustice and double standards, two measures," said the FMC-CMF.

'Pray silently'

In early April, Drainville commented on a story reported by Cogeco Nouvelles that Laval high schools allowed students to pray in classrooms because they were gathering in stairwells or parking lots.

Claiming that he could not ban prayer at school, he invited the students to do so silently.

"There are all kinds of ways to pray. No, I can't ban prayer. I ban prayer rooms in classrooms. Now if anyone wants to pray silently, that's their basic right ," he argued.

The Parti Québécois had tabled a motion affirming that "public schools are not places of worship" and that "the establishment of places of prayer, regardless of faith, on the premises of a public school goes against the principle of secularism." This motion was adopted unanimously.

The office of the minister of higher education, Pascale Déry, specified that contrary to the decision concerning primary and secondary schools, the government does not intend to cease the use of meditation rooms in CEGEPs and universities in the province.