Religion and the Liberal State: Lecture & Discussion Series

Dates/Times:
Sunday November 11; 3-5 pm
Sunday November 18; 11 am – 1 pm
Sunday November 25; 3 – 5 pm
Sunday December 2; 3-5 pm
Location: Auditorium, Noor Cultural Centre
Admission: $5

Sunday November 11; 3-5pm

Mixing God and Public in the US:  Not always What It Appears to Be
By Mark Toulouse
In American public and political life, the use of language involving God is a rather routine occurrence.  In some ways, this is a tremendous irony.  America is the only major nation in the world today that constitutionally separates church from state.  Yet, no nation’s public rhetoric is more religious than that found in the United States.  This discussion will address how that rhetoric is used, and describe how its use is generally misunderstood by many of its hearers in America, and certainly by most Canadians who experience it mostly on the television.

Mark Toulouse, PhD, is the Principal and a Professor of the History of Christianity program at University of Toronto’s Emmanuel College.

Sunday November 18; 11am – 1pm

A Garden of Legality?  Religious Pluralism in Canada and the Problem of Law
By Benjamin Berger
For many communities, in a variety of ways, law is an important aspect of belief, identity, and ritual.  Popular images of what it means to live in a secular state often revolve around the simplifying assumption that “law” equals “state law” and that this law is more or less singular.  If, however, law is something closely tied to the beliefs, identity, and rituals of various communities, the terrain of law becomes much more plural, varied, and rich.  In a world in which state law enjoys special privilege and power, does religious multiculturalism demand regard for these non-state legal systems?  The Canadian legal system has struggled with this question in recent cases involving issues ranging from the judicial enforcement of the Jewish get and whether Islamic law can be the basis for family arbitration. This talk explores the relationship between the rule of law and legal pluralism, between secularism and the lives of religious communities, and the way in which Canadian law has managed minority legal systems.

Benjamin Berger is an Associate Professor at York University’s Osgoode Hall Law School.

Sunday November 25; 3-5pm

Religious Pluralism and Islamic Law: Dhimmis and Others in the Empire of Law
By Anver Emon
Anver M. Emon will speak about his most recent book, entitled Religious Pluralism and Islamic Law: Dhimmis and Others in the Empire of Law (Oxford University Press, 2012). As argued throughout this book, an inescapable, and all-too-often painful, bottom line in the pursuit of pluralism is that it requires impositions and limitations on freedoms that are considered central and fundamental to an individual’s well-being, but which must be limited for some people in some circumstances for reasons extending well beyond the claims of a given individual. A comparison of the dhimmi rules to recent cases from the United States, United Kingdom, and the European Court of Human Rights reveals that however different and distant premodern Islamic and modern democratic societies may be in terms of time, space, and values, legal systems face similar challenges when governing a populace in which minority and majority groups diverge on the meaning and implication of values deemed fundamental to a particular polity.

Anver Emon, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law.  He specializes in Islamic law.

Sunday December 2; 3-5 pm

Limiting Religious Expression in the Liberal State: The Niqab Ban at Citizenship Ceremonies
With
Audrey Macklin
Anna Korteweg
Azeezah Kanji
This panel discussion will explore the recently-announced ban on face veils at Canadian citizenship ceremonies from the perspectives of Canadian constitutional and administrative law, comparative law, and feminist theory.

Audrey Macklin is a Professor at University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law.
Anna Korteweg, PhD, is an Associate Professor at University of Toronto’s Department of Sociology.  Her research focuses on Muslim immigrants in Canada and elsewhere.
Azeezah Kanji is a final-year student at University of Toronto’s Faculty of Law.  She serves as Programming Coordinator for Noor Cultural Centre.