{"id":28189,"date":"2019-03-26T16:54:03","date_gmt":"2019-03-26T20:54:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cccc.org\/news_blogs\/?p=28189"},"modified":"2019-03-26T17:13:00","modified_gmt":"2019-03-26T21:13:00","slug":"%ef%bb%bfthank-you-for-your-prayers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cccc.org\/news_blogs\/cccc\/2019\/03\/26\/%ef%bb%bfthank-you-for-your-prayers\/","title":{"rendered":"\ufeffThank you for your prayers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Thank you for your prayers for Monday’s presentation to the Special Senate Committee on the Charitable Sector about the public benefits of Advancing Religion. We believe that your prayer support will result in a good outcome when the Committee’s report is issued in the Fall. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our Goal<\/strong>
CCCC asked that the Committee’s report endorse Advancing Religion as a charitable purpose because of its many public benefits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Appearance<\/strong>
CCCC CEO Rev. John Pellowe was accompanied by two staff members from the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada who came as observers. All agreed that the presentation appeared to be well-received by the senators. While CCCC was prepared for challenging questions, the committee members did not present any. This likely indicates they found no points to challenge in the written and oral presentations, and they did not find our request controversial. This is good news. It is apparent that the Committee is in a learning posture, genuinely wanting to hear from the charitable sector.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our Strategy<\/strong>
Why did CCCC feel it necessary to promote religion’s public benefits?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There were three reasons:
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. There was a specific recommendation to the committee that needed a response. The B.C. Humanist Association recommended the removal of Advancing Religion as a charitable purpose on page 4 of their brief, which can be read here: https:\/\/sencanada.ca\/content\/sen\/committee\/421\/CSSB\/Briefs\/CSSB_BCHumanistAssociation_e.pdf
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  2. This Committee is studying the impact of the voluntary sector and is ideally placed to get our story into government records and out to public servants and politicians. Various groups are becoming more and more vocal in their calls to eliminate Advancing Religion as a charitable purpose and we need to present a counter-argument to generate an alternative narrative. The following are examples of recent calls to take away charitable status for churches and religious organizations: