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Church fire on Canadian indigenous land on National Day for Truth and Reconciliation

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

RCMP said the September 30 fire at Alexander First Nation’s Roman Catholic church in Alberta was ‘suspicious,’ marking yet another potential attack on Catholics, particularly those of indigenous heritage.

In what seems to be yet another attack on Catholics, the Roman Catholic church on Alexander First Nation in Alberta was reduced to rubble in what police are calling a “suspicious” fire.

On September 30, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) got a call just after midnight that the local Catholic church of the Alexander First Nation was on fire. Soon after, fire crews from the Alexander First Nation, as well as neighboring communities, worked together to halt the blaze. Alexander First Nation is located in northern Alberta near the town of Morinville.

Despite an earnest effort by firefighters, the church was damaged beyond repair and is considered a total loss, police confirmed.  

RCMP said in a press release that the “circumstances around this fire do appear suspicious,” and it is currently investigating the incident further. 

“RCMP will be working to determine the cause of the fire,” said police.  

In a Facebook post later in the day, the Alexander First Nation Fire Department Chief Wyatt Arcand said it was with great “sadness” that the First Nation’s church was lost. 

“It is with great sadness that we confirm that our Nation’s church burned down last night,” wrote Arcand. “I would like to thank the Nation’s Fire Department staff, Public Works and Security and all those who assisted and continue to assist today in ensuring the fire is completely out.” 

The Alexander First Nation church fire is the second church fire in less than a week. On September 28, an Anglican church in Loon Lake, Saskatchewan, was also reduced to a pile of ashes. The fires are just the two most recent in a string of church burnings and vandalism incidents which have plagued the country, particular indigenous Catholics.

Indeed, since the spring of 2021, some 112 churches, most of them Catholic, have been either burnt to the ground, vandalized or defiled across the country.

The church attacks started in earnest in 2021 when the mainstream media and federal government ran with the inflammatory and dubious claims that hundreds of children were buried and disregarded by Catholic priests and nuns who ran schools as part of the now-defunct residential schools system.

LifeSiteNews reported late last month that the Trudeau cabinet’s own data confirms there was a massive uptick in church attacks following the unproven claim that 215 “unmarked graves” were discovered at the Kamloops Residential School in British Columbia. With no bodies having been recovered, and the claims being made based off of soil disturbances found with ground-penetrating radar, Kamloops First Nation has since changed its claim of 215 graves to 200 “potential burials.”  

While the attacks have rocked Catholics as a whole, they have had a particular impact on indigenous Catholics as many of the churches targeted have been located on First Nations.

Despite the devastating impact the dubious residential school claims have had on Catholics, including indigenous Catholics, a backbencher MP from the socialist New Democratic Party (NDP) Leah Gazan wants to criminalize through legislation those who deny the system was a “genocide.”

Anyone with information about the fire but wants to remain anonymous is asked to contact the local Crime Stoppers by phone at 1‐800‐222‐8477 (TIPS), or at www.tipsubmit.com. All others can contact the Morinville RCMP at 780-939-4520. 

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Economy

Taxpayer watchdog warns Canadians to fight against ‘guaranteed income schemes’

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

The House of Commons recently rejected a New Democratic Party-led bill that would have allowed for a universal basic income instead of ‘cutting taxes and letting Canadians keep more of their own money,’ said Franco Terrazzano of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

Canada’s most respected taxpayer watchdog group called on citizens to oppose as much as possible the policies and laws pushed by the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and opposition parties.

“Taxpayers must stay vigilant and keep pushing back against this extremely costly scheme,” Franco Terrazzano, federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF), told LifeSiteNews.

“Bad ideas never seem to go away in Ottawa, so taxpayers must stay alert and continue to push politicians to fight against guaranteed income schemes.”

In recent weeks, the House of Commons voted down an extreme New Democratic Party-proposed law that would have allowed for a universal basic income (UBI) for all Canadians and refugee claimants.

Instead of focusing on handouts, Terrazzano noted, the government should instead be “making life more affordable by cutting taxes and letting Canadians keep more of their own money.”

“The government is broke and is more than $1 trillion in debt so this expensive scheme would mean massive tax hikes for average Canadians,” he told LifeSiteNews.

Terrazzano observed how the New Democratic Party’s UBI “scheme” would have been a “disaster for taxpayers, businesses and our economy, and all politicians should fight against this.”

“It would make it harder for Canadian businesses to find and retain talent because if the government pays people not to work, fewer people will work,” he said.

While the New Democratic Party’s attempt at passing a UBI bill into law failed, there is another similar bill before Canada’s Senate that, if passed, would establish “a national framework for a guaranteed livable basic income.”

The cost of living in Canada has risen dramatically over the last few years under the Trudeau government, which continues to overspend and promote its ideologically charged agenda.

In June, LifeSiteNews reported that decades of progress in lowering the poverty rate in Canada has been wiped out in the last few years under Trudeau’s Liberal government.

Terrazzano previously told LifeSiteNews that he urged the Trudeau government to cut spending, balance the budget and “completely scrap” the “carbon tax,” as the best way to help struggling Canadians financially.

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MAiD

Disability groups files legal challenge against Canada’s euthanasia regime

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From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

‘Instead of providing the support and resources we need to live, our government is offering death,’ a coalition of disability advocacy groups said in a press release about its legal challenge to Canada’s euthanasia regime.

A coalition of Canadian disability advocacy groups have banded together to file a “Charter Challenge” against the federal government for allowing the euthanasia of people who are not terminally ill but suffer from chronic illness or disability.

The coalition said its legal challenge, which is before the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, “is about protecting the equality and human rights of all people with disabilities in Canada,” as set out in the nation’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

“Instead of providing the support and resources we need to live, our government is offering death. It’s unacceptable, and we won’t stand for it,” noted National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians with Disabilities (CCD) Heather Walkus in a press release for the coalition released on September 27.  

The coalition is made up of the CCD, Inclusion Canada, Indigenous Disability Canada (IDC/BCANDS), DAWN Canada, and two people who were harmed by Canada’s so-called “Track 2 MAiD” allowances. 

The group said it “opposes” Track 2 of Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) law, “which provides assisted suicide to people with a disability who are not dying, or whose death is not ‘reasonably foreseeable.’”  

The group is claiming in its court challenge that making MAiD available to people who are not dying but may have a serious medical condition is a violation of their “fundamental rights” to liberty and security of the person.  

According to Inclusion Canada’s Executive Vice-President Krista Carr, people in Canada “are dying” as a consequence of the current law. 

“We are witnessing an alarming trend where people with disabilities are seeking assisted suicide due to social deprivation, poverty, and lack of essential supports,” noted Carr. 

When MAiD was first legalized by the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2016 it was restricted to those whose death was considered “reasonably foreseeable.” While euthanasia is tantamount to murder and thus gravely immoral even in cases of terminal illness, as taught by the Catholic Church, the law was loosened further in 2021 with the allowance of “Track 2” cases.

In its press release, the coalition noted that “Track 2 MAiD” has resulted in “premature deaths and an increase in discrimination and stigma towards people with disabilities across the country.” 

“While they are not challenging MAiD Track 1 in this case, they recognize that it too can pose significant problems for people with disabilities. Track 2 MAiD has had a direct negative impact on the lives of people with disabilities.” 

The coalition, which supports “Track 1” cases, is “urging the court” to “strike down Track 2 of Canada’s MAiD law, arguing that providing assisted death solely on the basis of disability is unconstitutional.” 

Despite the immorality of euthanasia in general, and the extra threat posed by Canada’s additional allowance of  “Track 2” cases, euthanasia advocates continue to insist the laws be further expanded.

LifeSiteNews recently reported how the Quebec government said it will soon allow early “advance” requests for euthanasia despite it being disallowed by current federal law. If such a practice were allowed, it would mean a person in Quebec could “agree” to be killed at some point in the future, and thus would not have to give consent at the time of their actual death.

Beyond current “Track 2” cases, Trudeau’s Liberal government has even tried to expand euthanasia to those suffering solely from mental illness.

In February, after pushback from pro-life, medical, and mental health groups as well as most of Canada’s provinces, the federal government delayed the mental illness expansion until 2027. 

Overall, the number of Canadians killed by lethal injection under the nation’s MAiD program since 2016 stands at close to 65,000, with an estimated 16,000 deaths in 2023 alone. Many fear that because the official statistics are manipulated the number may be even higher. 

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