Ohio lawmakers recently approved a bill urging the Biden administration to add Canada to its "Special Watch List" of countries notorious for "violating religious freedom." The resolution was initiated by Republican state lawmakers Reggie Stoltzfus and Timothy E. Ginter because of the arrests of various Canadian pastors like Artur Pawlowski and James Coates and the continued enforcement of burdensome and unjustified orders related to COVID.
Brian Rushfeldt, co-founder and former executive director of a pro-family group in Canada, says the Ohio resolution is right on the mark.
"When we looked at the whole issue of arrests of pastors for holding church in the light of our dictator in Ottawa saying they couldn't, we've seen provinces take actions as well," he comments. "I think we have in many of the governments, both federally and provincially, Christian religion outlawed and banned in many, many ways."
He acknowledges that the sentiment is nothing new, but the pandemic provided the ticket to persecute Christians.
"COVID became sort of the lightning rod for the underlying hatred against Christianity by the Liberal government and even many of the provincial governments," Rushfeldt accounts. "That hatred for Christianity was there before COVID, but COVID has become the excuse."
