By:  Diane Watts, Researcher, REAL Women of Canada

Thank you, it’s a privilege to be here. And I congratulate the graduating students and all those who had the wisdom to provide you with a Catholic education.

When I asked my colleagues for ideas for this talk, I was told: make sure you tell them to get involved. Then I thought: They’re already involved. Anyone who’s part of Catholic education, the foundation of Catholic culture, is involved.

When we attend Mass as we did this morning, we are part of Catholic culture, not the counter culture. Rather than destroying, we are building what Chesterton called “monuments of peace.”

In future you will contribute as part of a parish, as active or supportive members of organizations, as a voice for good on social media, and primarily in the family – the basic cultural and economic unit of society.

REAL Women has been part of this culture of building. It’s been a privilege for me to be part of it.

 The public narrative in a secular state is often at odds with reality and it is helpful to always distinguish between the two.

Status of Women Canada was an agency formed by the Liberal government in 1972 to change society, it adopted the narrative that women in Canada, some of the most privileged in the world, were not equal and their advancement required paid employment. It initially operated under the Department of Manpower and Immigration. The hidden intent was to double the labour force, and income tax revenue.

Full time motherhood and the traditional family was not part of the new feminist socialist narrative. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has changed Status of Women Canada to prominently include LGBTQ, with funding increasing fivefold, from $35 million in 2015 to $177 million a year and a name change to the Department of Women and Gender Equality.

Some have called feminism “fabricated victimhood”. The wage gap between men and women in Canada is a tiny 5%, the feminist narrative calls this discrimination. But the reality is that economically, according to Forbes magazine data, 70 – 80 % of all consumer purchases are made by women.

Our pamphlet, available on our website, called 35 Years and Still Going Strong, gives a good summary of our response to what has been called The War Against the Family. Working within our democratic process and internationally: we presented over 200  briefs to parliamentary committees, attended United Nations conferences held around the world, made over 30 court interventions on issues dealing with the family, published two books: Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s Great Betrayal, and The Untold Story of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, with an upcoming book on RW and Feminism.

Our position is on record in Canada’s Parliament and National Archives. No one will be able to say that in our time, all Canadians approved of the following legal actions:

Remove legal protection for the child in the womb, remove a father’s legal right to defend the life of his unborn child, re-define abortion and euthanasia as health care funded by the taxpayer, change the legal definition of marriage which the state has no authority to do, legalize street drugs, among others.

All these changes, weakening our Christian culture, were publicly opposed by many groups and individuals. Their statements are on the parliamentary record. The narrative tries to tell us that these changes are a new liberation, the reality has turned out to be quite different. One hopeful sign is the expansion of organizations forming to respond to the fallout from harmful laws, that must eventually be reversed.

 One important change silently occurred in 1994

Prayer recited by Members of Parliament before every sitting of the House of Commons, before 1994, contained the following words: O Lord our Heavenly Father, King of kings, Lord of lords, the only Ruler of princes. Prayer for the royal family ended with: and bring them to thine everlasting kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Adding “that religion and piety, may be established among us, for all generations”. … we humbly beg in the name, and through the mediation of Jesus Christ, our most blessed Lord and Saviour — Amen. This was followed by the Our Father.

In 1994, with no public debate, all party leaders in the House of Commons concurred in a report recommending, quote, “ a new form of prayer more reflective of the different religions embraced by Canadians”. Removed were the words Jesus Christ, Lord and Saviour, King of Kings, the Our Father, etc. There is now only one reference to Almighty God. This new short prayer is recited before each sitting but before the cameras are turned on, not viewed by the public.

This year the Bloc Québécois wanted to go even further and tabled a motion to replace the shortened prayer with a moment of reflection. Thankfully, this was defeated 266 to 56.

But prayer can never be stopped. When we appeared before a parliamentary committee, one MP came to us afterwards and said, “I was praying for you all the time you were making your presentation.” We can all continue to pray for our government.

Who are the those who want to destroy our culture ?

 Mao Zadong’s commanded that his subjects destroy the Four Olds in China, to build a new communist society: old ideas, old customs, old culture, old habits.

 A Canadian LGBTQ editor wrote, in 2012:

Until church and state have been pushed back from imposing morality, and the Christian heritage is wiped from our legal codes… our work will not be done.

A feminist association stated in 2003: It’s important to dissociate the notion of family from man, woman and their children in a married situation. (Assoc of Lesbian Mothers.)

The constitutions of Canada and Ireland provide an important contrast

 John Diefenbaker’s 1960 Canadian Bill of Rights contained reference to the family whereas Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms did not. When RW and a men’s group attempted to have Mother’s Day and Father’s Day officially recognized by Parliament, we were told it was too controversial. These secular celebrations nevertheless continue today. Any move towards the father’s family wage, which frees motherhood, is strongly opposed by the feminist lobby.

By contrast, in 1937, Ireland amended its constitution to follow Catholic teaching in papal encyclicals.

The Irish Constitution states in part:

  • The State recognizes the Family as the natural primary and fundamental unit group of Society, and as a moral institution possessing inalienable… rights.
  • The State pledges itself to guard with special care the institution of Marriage, on which the Family is founded, and to protect it against attack.
  • The State recognizes that by her life within the home, woman gives to the State a support without which the common good cannot be achieved.
  • The State shall, therefore, endeavour to ensure that mothers shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home.
  • The State recognizes the special position of the Holy Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church as the guardian of the Faith professed by the great majority of the citizens.

The Irish Constitution makes reference to God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Trinity throughout the document.

On March 8 of this year, Ireland’s government called a referendum to remove “life within the home” and “mother” from the constitution and use gender neutral language. This was voted down by 74% of voters. Under the guise of expanding the constitutional definition of family, any reference to marriage was to be eliminated. This was voted down by 68%. As a result, the Prime Minister of Ireland resigned.

This event received universal media coverage, hopefully a turning point. False narratives can be easily dispensed with when the real world steps in.

In Conclusion I will quote Chesterton.

In his 1923 book on St Francis of Assisi, he states that “his glory was not in overthrowing men in battle but in building up the positive and creative monuments of peace.”

If we are aware and informed, it is our moral responsibility, and privilege, to be among those who throughout history have defended, not freedom from morality, or a false revolutionary liberation, but freedom that radiates from the Church which enhances state and family as “positive and creative monuments of peace”.

In an address given by Gwen Landolt, our Vice-President and legal counsel, at the World Congress of Families in Hungary in 2017, her first lines describe our opponents: Feminists in the Western world have moved heaven and earth to try to induce women to diminish the role of motherhood, believing that it is detrimental to a fulfilled life. That is why they demand state run daycare programs so that a third party can look after her child so that she not be distracted from her real life, which is in the workplace. The title of her address is The Importance and Sanctity of the Mother. A search for this title on the Internet lands directly on our website, a valuable source of Information.