WHEN the Pope addressed the Vatican ambassadors accredited to the Holy See his speech ought to have made the headlines of every free newspaper across the Western world.
Perhaps we should be grateful that Leo XIV used the word ‘Orwellian’ because that caught the attention of a few commentators. Otherwise, one of the most important papal contributions to public cultural and political dialogue I have ever read disappeared into the fog of international news.
As we enter 2026, Canada’s federal government is quietly but surely transforming Canada’s centuries-old traditions of free speech and privacy rights into something revocable at the pleasure of the CRTC, politicians and bureaucrats.
The U.S. Department of State has announced sanctions against a number of individuals including the British head of the Global Disinformation Index (GDI) Clare Melford, whose organization issued a report this summer listing “digital denialism” of Canadian residential schools as one example of “hate speech” that harms democracy.
Undersecretary of State Sarah Rogers linked to a Sept. 25 GDI report on hate speech in Canada in an X post to announce Melford’s travel ban, saying that GDI has interfered with speech on American platforms, including by labeling opinions that “question” the nature of Canadian residential schools as hate speech.
The State Department is barring five “egregious” European figures in the “global censorship-industrial complex” from entering the US, it revealed Tuesday.
State Department officials contended that those five Europeans flouted a visa policy rolled out in May restricting those who work to censor protected speech in the US from entering the country.
“For far too long, ideologues in Europe have led organized efforts to coerce American platforms to punish American viewpoints they oppose,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared Tuesday.
You commies deserve worse. https://t.co/LbPDtXzKsr
— Blazingcatfur (@fancypants_s) December 24, 2025
Police in England will stop recording so-called ‘non-crime hate incidents’ (NCHI)—statements believed to be “motivated by prejudice” but that don’t meet the criteria for criminal offences—because they are “not fit for purpose” and pose a threat to free speech.
A top Canadian Constitutional freedom group launched a petition demanding that a Liberal government bill that would criminalize parts of the Bible dealing with homosexuality under Canada’s new “hate speech” laws be fully rescinded.
The Canadian Constitution Foundation (CCF) said that Bill C-9, or the Combating Hate Act, “Crosses the Line” and is asking Canadians to sign its petition calling for its demise.
Planned changes to Canada’s hate speech law would criminalise biblical passages, critics have claimed.
Under Canada’s criminal code, anyone found guilty of “wilful promotion of hatred” faces up to two years in jail.
But it also says that prosecution should not apply to a statement made in “good faith” and “based on belief in a religious text”.
Carney’s kid is a tranny so you know where his sympathies lie.
OTTAWA — After a week of delays and uncertainty, the Liberals say a deal is back on the rails with the Bloc Québécois to remove religious exemptions from Canada’s hate-speech laws in exchange for support to help pass the government’s bill targeting hate and terror symbols.
A senior government source confirmed to National Post that the Liberals on the House of Commons justice committee, which is currently doing a clause-by-clause study of Bill C-9, are expected to support a Bloc amendment to the legislation that will remove the controversial exemption during a Tuesday afternoon meeting.
In November, the Daily Sceptic reported that a policeman had told a Christian preacher that some words painted on his van “could be seen as hate speech in the wrong context”. The words were a Biblical verse: Chapter 3, verse 16 of the Gospel according to John, “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”
The future of the federal government’s anti-hate Bill C-9 is unclear after Justice Minister Sean Fraser’s office brokered a deal with the Bloc Québécois without getting it approved by the Prime Minister’s Office, sources tell CBC News.
Bill C-9 proposes new Criminal Code offences, including one that would make it a crime to intentionally promote hatred against identifiable groups in public using certain hate- or terrorism-related symbols.
It would also make hate-motivated crimes a specific offence and crack down on wilfully intimidating and obstructing people outside places of worship.
Smoke and mirrors. That bill will pass.
To secure Bloc Québécois support for its censorious Bill C-9, the Liberals have reportedly agreed to a troubling trade: removing the long-standing religious defence from Canada’s hate-speech laws. This would be a mistake.
Bill C-9, the Carney government’s combating hate act, would expand criminal prohibitions on expression and increase penalties for speech offences, including online speech. Now, the bill may also gut the defence that protects good-faith religious opinion or speech rooted in religious texts.
OTTAWA — Conservatives say a deal between Liberals and the Bloc Québécois to remove a religious exemption from hate-speech laws in exchange for passing a bill targeting hate and terror symbols is an “assault” on freedom of speech and religion.
But the Bloc Québécois said the change was necessary to help prosecute rising hateful and antisemitic rhetoric, often made under the guise of exempted religious speech.
OTTAWA — The Liberals have agreed to remove religious exemptions from Canada’s hate-speech laws to secure Bloc Québécois support to help pass its bill targeting hate and terror symbols, National Post has learned through a source close to the talks.
Currently, the law exempts hateful or antisemitic speech if it based in good faith on the interpretation of a religious text, but that immunity is set to be removed. Additionally, the Liberals are expected to back off plans to eliminate the need for a provincial attorney general’s sign-off to pursue a hate-propaganda prosecution.
Fearless Prediction: Christians will bear the overwhelming brunt of prosecutions and Islamists will face few if any.
From Occam’s Razor
From the UK to Iceland, it seems speech laws are taking over Europe.
What’s worse — this may not just be a trend for our European neighbors, but could also apply to North America — namely Canada.
Canada has free speech laws — known as freedom of expression under section 2(b) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
(Incognito)
Forget terror plots, knife crime, or rampant theft, Britain’s police have bigger things to worry about—Christian street preachers. Shaun O’Sullivan, a 36-year-old preacher at the evangelical Awaken church in Swindon, was acquitted unanimously by a jury last week at Crown Court. He faced charges of racial and religious harassment against Muslims for saying the words: “Pray for the Jews and pray for the Palestinians.” This culminated in a six-day trial, costing an estimated £20,000.
