Toronto, Canada - With the Ontario election less than a month away, a number of multi-faith groups are calling on the provincial party leaders to take a public stance on religious teachings in secular schools.
"Everyone knows that it is a violation of the Education Act, which bars any religion in public schools," said Muslim Canadian Congress (MCC) founder Tarek Fatah on Monday. "But none of them (party leaders) has the courage to say that. They're sitting like cowards trying to please a fictitious block vote."
So far, Liberal leader Dalton McGuinty, Progressive Conservative Tim Hudak and NDP leader Andrea Horwath have stayed mum on whether they support public tax dollars funding religious studies in the public school system. Earlier this year, Premier McGuinty said that the issue of religious accommodation is up to the school board to decide, and should align with the Ontario Human Rights Code which promotes freedom to practise religion.
But Fatah says the politicians are passing the buck, afraid that they will lose the Muslim vote if they speak out against the prayer service at Valley Park Middle School in east Toronto. The public school has been permitting an afternoon Islamic prayer service in its cafeteria for its students for the past year.
An imam directs the voluntary 40-minute service every Friday, which was started after administrators realized that many students missed class because they had to leave the school to attend the service at a mosque.
The school has come under fire in the past couple of months, after it was revealed that the service segregates male and female students and is not monitored by school officials.
The MCC goes as far to accuse the school of being under the thumb of the local mosque, which Fatah says is run by religious leaders who believe in Shariah law and jihad.
"The public school system has become a prisoner of the mosque," he said.
"Nobody is stopping these kids from going to prayer but how did a mosque end up in a public school? It's ridiculous."
The Canadian Secular Alliance, a public advocacy group calling for the separation of church and state, is organizing a protest at Queen's Park Sunday afternoon.
"Religious indoctrination should not be funded by tax dollars," said the group's president Greg Oliver.
The CSA is calling for the end of the prayer service at Valley Park, but also for funding to be cut from Catholic schools and Gay-Straight Alliance groups to be welcomed in all schools.
"We want to make this an issue for the election," he said. "Unfortunately, the big three parties have been avoiding these issues. We strongly believe that most Ontarians don't think it's appropriate for public funding to be extended to one religious group for schools."
This isn't the first time this has been a contentious election issue.
In the 2007 provincial election, then-PC leader John Tory promised if elected, he would spend $400 million on funding for Jewish, Muslim and other religious schools. The idea resulted in controversy, which some political pundits say cost Tory the election.