We made four recommendations including

1. Publish the advancement of religion guidance,
2. End the politicization of charitable status,
3. Improve the Canada Summer Jobs program, and
4. Develop and implement a national volunteer strategy

None of these recommendations are new, but they need to be reiterated.

We have written elsewhere about the need to publish CRA’s guidance document, Advancement of Religion and Charitable Registration; we participated in a CSJ study where we first made similar recommendations for changes to the program; the Special Senate Committee on the Charitable Sector proposed a national volunteer strategy in its 2019 report Catalyst for Change.

We have written and advocated extensively about ending the politicization of charitable status. In our 2025 pre-budget submissions, we emphasize how important it is to stop threatening charitable status as a political tactic. We further and specifically call on the government to retract and condemn past budget recommendations proposed by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance in 2024 that threaten both “anti-abortion” organizations and religion as a charitable purpose. We resent our December 2024 letter to the new Minister of Finance and National Revenue, and in a separate letter to the Minister urged a new direction for the Department of Finance in this parliamentary session.

If you want to likewise express your views on the politicizing of charitable status, you can participate in the Department of Finance Pre-Budget Consultations or consider signing a petition to that effect. There have been a number of similar petitions over the past couple years; however, none have yet resulted in a meaningful government response.

We continue to advocate on behalf of religious charities across the country, working with other organizations, and urging the government to recognize and affirm its commitment to preserving charitable status for the more than 32,000 religious charities in Canada.

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