Canada Just Repealed Its ‘Bible Defense’ Against Hate Crime Charges
TL;DR: Canada has passed a bill repealing the religious text defense against hate crime accusations, effectively empowering the state to criminalize the public expression of biblical teachings.
The freedom to speak biblical truth in public is not guaranteed, and this week, our neighbors to the north took a significant step away from that freedom.
Here in my home office, where I build FaithGPT and try to keep up with the news, my heart sank as I read the reports. Canada’s Parliament has just passed Bill C-367, a piece of legislation that amends the Criminal Code. The most alarming part of this bill is what it removes: a specific legal defense for individuals accused of the “wilful promotion of hatred.”
For years, Section 319(3)(b) of Canada’s Criminal Code provided a crucial protection. It stated that no one could be convicted of promoting hatred if, in good faith, they “expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text.”
That protection is now gone. The bill passed its third reading in the House of Commons and is on its way to becoming law. In short, quoting the Bible in a way the state deems “hateful” could soon become a criminal act in Canada.
What this change means for Christians
As a software developer, I think in terms of logic and consequences. If this, then that. The logic here is chilling.
Imagine a pastor preaching through the book of Romans. He arrives at chapter 1 and explains what the Apostle Paul teaches about sin, including God’s condemnation of homosexual practice. Or imagine a street evangelist calling people to repent and believe in Jesus Christ as the only way to salvation, which inherently critiques other faiths. In the past, if someone accused them of promoting hatred, they could point to the Bible as the good-faith source of their statements. That defense has been vaporized.
This places a new and powerful weapon in the hands of those who wish to silence Christian teaching. The state, not the church, now becomes the ultimate arbiter of which parts of the Bible are acceptable to speak in public. This isn't just a theoretical problem. It creates a direct threat to the public witness of the church and has a profound chilling effect on anyone who believes the Bible is the authoritative Word of God.
This legal shift in Canada isn't an isolated event. It reflects a growing pressure on Christians globally. While it's a far cry from the violent, physical attacks our brothers and sisters face elsewhere, such as the ongoing persecution in Nigeria, it represents the legal and cultural front of the same spiritual battle.
The strongest counter-argument
Of course, proponents of Bill C-367 don’t see it this way. They would argue, with sincerity, that this is about protecting vulnerable communities from genuine hate speech. They would say that religion has been used as a cloak for bigotry and that this law simply closes a loophole that allowed hateful people to escape justice.
Their argument goes like this: No one should be able to incite violence or promote hatred against a group of people and then simply say, “My holy book made me do it.” We can all agree that speech intended to incite violence is evil and has no place in civil society or in the heart of a Christian.
The problem is not the desire to stop hateful rhetoric. The problem is the redefinition of “hate” to include historic, orthodox Christian beliefs.
Where the argument falls apart
Christians are commanded to speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15). Calling sin “sin” is not hateful; it is the necessary first step before sharing the good news of the gospel, which offers forgiveness and transformation to every single person, regardless of their background or struggles. True biblical love warns of danger; it doesn't affirm it.
Here’s the critical distinction:
Biblical Conviction · Hateful Rhetoric
Calls individuals to repentance from sin, addressing all people equally. · Dehumanizes a group of people, calling for their harm or exclusion.
Upholds the dignity of every person as made in God’s image (Genesis 1:27). · Denies the personhood or worth of others.
Offers hope and redemption in Christ to everyone who believes. · Offers no hope, only condemnation and contempt.
Is spoken with humility, gentleness, and a desire for the other’s good. · Is spoken with malice, contempt, and a desire to injure.
This new law erases that distinction. It empowers the state to treat biblical conviction as hateful rhetoric. When a society’s definition of “love” means affirming all behaviors and its definition of “hate” means making moral judgments based on Scripture, the church is placed on a collision course with the state.
We are called to obey the governing authorities (Romans 13), but that obedience has a limit. The apostles gave us the blueprint when they were commanded to stop speaking about Jesus.
But Peter and John answered and said unto them, Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.
Acts 4:19-20 (KJV)
This is the choice that may soon face Christians in Canada. As we think through the implications, our response requires careful thought about our public witness and our understanding of Christian ethics in a post-Christian world.
As a husband and father, I think about what this means for my kids. How do I prepare them to stand for truth in a culture that will call them hateful for it? It means grounding them deeply in Scripture, not just in its stories but in its confident claims about God, humanity, sin, and salvation.
We need to pray for our brothers and sisters in Canada. Pray for their courage, wisdom, and love as they learn to live under this new reality. And we need to prepare ourselves, because ideas—especially bad ones—rarely respect borders.
This is a moment to get serious about knowing what we believe and why. Understanding Scripture's teachings on our relationship with government and our call to be salt and light is no longer an academic exercise. If you want to study these key passages more deeply, you can use a tool like FaithGPT to help you explore and outline the Bible's teaching on our duties to God and governing authorities.
A state that can edit the Bible with a law book is a state that has claimed an authority belonging only to God.
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