Don Hutchinson
Don is the Principal of Ansero Services, a Canadian charity furthering the task of Christian witness through partnering for religious freedom, and author of Under Siege: Religious Freedom and the Church in Canada at 150 (1867–2017). A graduate of Queen's University in Kingston and the University of British Columbia Faculty of Law, Don has been a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada since 1990. Not coincidentally, he is also a long time member and former board chair of Canada's Christian Legal Fellowship.
Bio last updated January 4th, 2022.
Articles by Don Hutchinson
Time to Challenge and Comply
By Don Hutchinson
January 3, 2022
When it comes to Canada’s recently passed ban on “conversion therapy," Don Hutchinson argues that it’s bad legislation, not good faith religious counselling, that should be put on trial.
It was Minister Lametti’s responsibility to provide Parliament with “a statement that sets out potential effects of the Bill on the rights and freedoms that are guaranteed by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms” before it could legally proceed beyond first reading in the House Because the prohibition on causing another person to undergo conversion therapy may affect the ability of individuals to engage in practices that have a connection with their own sincerely held religious beliefs, it has the potential to engage the freedom of religion In response, faith leaders are encouraged not to rely solely on government prosecutors to respect good faith conversation, or on Canadian courts either to strike down the legislation based on its overly broad nature or to interpret it narrowly to exclude good faith conversation
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The Need for A Stable Influence
Don Hutchinson
December 17, 2021
Christians who cherry-pick Scripture for particular purposes, like the politicians who abuse Parliament by rushing through legislation, need to consider what they’re celebrating, Don Hutchinson writes.
Thus, on December 8, the explosive Bill C-4 became both the first legislation passed in Canada’s 44th Parliament and the first to receive royal assent at the hand of Governor General Mary Simon Conservative MP Rob Moore (Fundy Royal, NB) surprised the House (including members of his own party who we...
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Monsters, Mobs and Me
Don Hutchinson
November 24, 2021
Don Hutchinson writes that whether we have unwittingly become card-carrying members of monsters at work or mobs inc. is best revealed by a look in the bathroom mirror.
The rash rush of mandatory vaccination policies didn’t start with vaccine availability in March, but five months later following a Nanos poll showing a majority of Canadians favoured mandatory vaccination, and subsequent electoral posturing by a sitting prime minister who declared that all federal p...
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Defending Artur Pawlowski’s Dissent
Don Hutchinson
October 18, 2021
Don Hutchinson says the recent court order compelling a Calgary street preacher to reference science in his sermons about COVID is offensive and has to be appealed.
Agree or disagree with Pastor Pawlowski, the response to dissenting thought, belief, opinion and expression in a free society is speech by someone on the other side of the issue, not dictated language as compelled by government or court On October 13, Pawlowski was sentenced for acts of civil disobe...
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The Politics of Red Team! Blue Team!
Don Hutchinson
October 12, 2021
Don Hutchinson notes that when sports and politics overlap we become "fan-atics" cheering for our favourite sweaters and socks.
It showed up in candidate Trudeau’s campaign stump speeches: the blue team harbours right wing extremists; the blue team leader is hiding blue candidates’ vaccination rates and won’t protect you; the big blue tent cultivates a home for those who will make abortion illegal; elect the blue team and li...
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Taking a Jab at Religious Freedom
Don Hutchinson
September 10, 2021
Despite contrary claims, sincerely held faith is a Charter-protected justification for declining to take the COVID shot, Don Hutchinson reports.
On the question of conscience, The Moving Goalposts of COVID Response by several levels of government from ‘stay home for two weeks to flatten the curve’ to ‘70% fully vaccinated will provide herd immunity’ to ‘mandatory vaccines and vaccine passports’ may well be enough to justify anyone being cons...
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Marking Your X With Neighbourly Love
Don Hutchinson
September 2, 2021
Don Hutchinson offers a primer on how to let Christian precepts guide voting choice.
The first I will call Christian political idealism―the idea that a political party has the potential to form a government that will govern based on Biblical principles The second is based on American theologian Reinhold Niehbuhr’s concept of Christian realism―identifying the available political opti...
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Pierre’s Vision Begot a Justin Society
Don Hutchinson
August 27, 2021
This just in: the current prime minister is steadfastly refusing to follow his father’s footsteps, especially on human rights and justice. Don Hutchinson traces the divergent path.
The culminating work of Pierre Trudeau’s designs for a just society is found in the Constitution Act, 1982, which features the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (sections 1 to 34, the Charter), and recognition in section 35 of “existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of...
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Unmasking the Match Lighting Mob
Don Hutchinson
July 23, 2021
Don Hutchinson asks who has fuelled church burnings across Canada, and notes Indigenous leaders from coast to coast have been most stalwart in condemning the two dozen arson attacks.
We call upon the federal government to work with provincial, territorial, and municipal governments, churches, Aboriginal communities, former residential school students, and current landowners to develop and implement strategies and procedures for the ongoing identification, documentation, maintena...
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The Moving Goalposts of COVID Response
Don Hutchinson
May 17, 2021
Faced with pandemic “certainties” that quickly turn out to be up, down, and all around, Don Hutchinson cautions that science can provide estimates but not ultimate truth.
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When Covid Constraints Come to Church
Don Hutchinson
March 4, 2021
Don Hutchinson considers the complementary roles of Church and State vis-à-vis the pandemic and public health.
Third, in 2009 the Court decided the Government of Alberta was justified in requiring photographs on all drivers’ licenses because of national security concerns, even though the requirement violated the religious freedom of the Hutterian Brethren of Wilson Colony, Christians who believe being photog...
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Pandemic Pancake Tuesday
Don Hutchinson
February 16, 2021
On this day before Lent, Don Hutchinson counsels Convivium readers to prepare for the 40 days before Easter as a mix of self-denial and doing unto others as we would have them do for us.
There are two different stories told about William Booth, co-founder of The Salvation Army along with his wife Catherine, sending a telegram containing the single word, Others The second story suggests that in 1911 Booth sent a Christmas telegram to Salvation Army leaders around the world ...
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Call Him Mr. Trudeau
Don Hutchinson
February 2, 2021
We can agree or disagree over policies, but the Prime Minister and other party leaders deserve the respect conveyed by the honorific preceding their names, Don Hutchinson writes.
Trudeau made a campaign announcement on environmental policy at a lakefront from behind a podium that had Green Party green signage instead of Liberal Party red was the day I started writing furiously about this apparent hypocrisy Over the last year, Prime Minister Trudeau has led a government deali...
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Why Not a Notwithstanding Pause for MAiD?
Don Hutchinson
November 27, 2020
Don Hutchinson argues the Trudeau government should consider the Constitution’s Section 33 opt out rather than rush to pass expanded medically assisted dying legislation under a court-imposed deadline.
Then Minister of Justice Jody Wilson-Raybould presented Bill C-14, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and make related amendments to other Acts (medical assistance in dying), as the government’s response to the Supreme Court of Canada’s 2015 decision in Carter v Canadians remain divided, but most had...
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Is Politics Putting POGG on Ice?
Don Hutchinson
November 6, 2020
Canada’s Constitution gives paramountcy to peace, order and good government (POGG), but Don Hutchinson argues bills on conversion therapy and medically assisted death prioritize progressive expediency.
The prayerful direction found in Psalm 72 describes what Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau termed “a just society,” one in which good government brings peace and order to all the people it governs Introducing legislation to include Canadians with disabilities or living with chronic illness, and mental i...
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For Whom the Polls Toll
Don Hutchinson
October 26, 2020
Fixated as Canadians are on soundings of popular opinion that foretell who will govern us next, Don Hutchinson writes, the only poll that counts is in the booth where we mark our ballots on Election Day.
In Canada’s 39th Parliament, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative minority government introduced legislation to establish a fixed election date for federal elections, the third Monday in October in the fourth year following the previous election Whether by lost confidence vote in Parliament ...
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Throne Speech is a Matter of Confidence
Don Hutchinson
September 23, 2020
Convivium contributor Don Hutchinson sets up resumption of Parliament by explaining the historical significance of the Speech from the Throne – and its potential political pitfalls for Justin Trudeau.
Will Trudeau use the Throne Speech to recalibrate in an effort to buy time, perhaps even for a winter walk in the snow like his father 36 years ago? Will he try to snooker one or more opposition party leaders into unfastening themselves from their parties’ notable political proposals so Liberals can...
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The Unbearable Whiteness of Jesus
Don Hutchinson
August 27, 2020
Questions about the Christian Messiah’s skin colour offer a fascinating complex of archeological, historical, migratory, linguistic and theological answers that ultimately won’t matter, Don Hutchinson writes.
Questions about the whiteness of Jesus, White presence in Bible times, and the whiteness of the North American Church have become widespread in public debate during recent months Does it matter to the mission and ministry of Jesus and his Church whether Jesus was White? Does the gospel change based ...
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Canada Must Boycott Beijing Olympics
Don Hutchinson
August 6, 2020
Ottawa lawyer Don Hutchinson says it’s “beyond belief” Canada would participate in the 2022 Winter Olympics given the Chinese regime’s reprehensible persecution of religion.
Just before Parliament adjourned in June 2008 for summer break the Religious Liberty Commission (RLC) of The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada released a report called Broken Promises: The Protestant Experience with Religious Freedom in China in Advance of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games The invitatio...
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All Men Are Liars. Some Are Politicians.
Don Hutchinson
October 11, 2019
Convivium contributor Don Hutchinson says Andrew Scheer might have been speaking Biblically last night with his inflammatory charge that Justin Trudeau is a liar. The real question is whether that disqualifies the PM from another term in office.
In convoluted statements reminiscent of those he made in regard to SNC-Lavalin, Trudeau has said: i) he became aware of the harm caused by wearing blackface makeup after he was elected to Parliament in 2008; ii) he lied on his application to become a candidate for the Liberal Party in 2007 because h...
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Must Coren Demonize Decency?
Don Hutchinson
July 22, 2019
Convivium contributor Don Hutchinson finds dishonourable fear-mongering at the core of columnist Michael Coren’s recent anti-faith attacks on Conservative leader Andrew Scheer.
But Coren’s recent attack pieces targeting Andrew Scheer for his religious beliefs are dishonourable, including Does Andrew Scheer have a religion problem? and Calling out Andrew Scheer’s religious extremism By all means, reflect on the religious beliefs of Andrew Scheer, Justin Trudeau and others T...
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Crucifixes, Kippahs, and Quebec’s Bill 21
Don Hutchinson
March 29, 2019
Constitutional lawyer and legal commentator Don Hutchinson says it’s “unthinkable” the Quebec government would override Constitutional guarantees of religious freedom to proclaim a State-sponsored doctrine of secularism.
In fact, the treatment of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Quebec was stimulus for much definition of pre-Charter understanding of rights to religious freedom, including juridical definition of the responsibility for government to adhere to the laws and freedoms of the land ...
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Doing Right By Asia Bibi
Don Hutchinson
February 6, 2019
While the Trudeau government has given Canadian Christians little reason to cheer, writes Convivium contributor Don Hutchinson, it deserves praise for its effort to save the persecuted Pakistani woman condemned to death for blasphemy against Islam.
We remember all and are thankful for help given to even one; thankful to God and thankful to politicians who risked and gave their lives, governments who intervened, non-governmental organizations who advocated and called for prayer, Bibi’s lawyer, the judges of Pakistan’s Supreme Court, and Canadia...
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When Diversity Imperils Democracy
Don Hutchinson
August 3, 2018
In the second of his two-part Convivium essay, Don Hutchinson details how the recent Supreme Court decision on Trinity Western University puts Canada on an enigmatic path toward an ill-defined ideal of diversity – and puts foundational democratic principles at risk.
The narrow requirement of responsibility for diversity in the venue of private education, specifically pertaining to equality of opportunity for potential LGBTQ students, was accepted by a majority of the Supreme Court of Canada as a reasonable concern for the two government regulatory agencies to h...