I honestly don't think we're that far apart. You've got a more patient outlook in some ways than I do. I think a lot of my impatience comes from having religion shoved in my face in school - public schools, all of them - when we were expected to lean to the side of Christianity and participate in prayers if the teacher wanted us to.
Even in my first-year B.Ed. practicum in college, I couldn't tell the regular teacher, "Stop ordering me to participate in morning prayers, because you're violating my Charter rights" - because the Charter of Rights didn't exist at that time. It was still a year in the future. If this had happened a couple of years later, I could have told her, "No. I'm not Christian, and I will not take part in a ritual I don't believe in." And there wouldn't have been a damn thing she could have done to force the issue. As it was at the time of my practicum, this teacher had the say over whether or not I would get to continue in the B.Ed. program. So I stood for her prayers (didn't say the words), and tapdanced my way through an astronomy class when one of the kids asked how the universe started.
The later generations of students don't - or at least shouldn't - have to contend with public teachers pushing their personal religious agendas on kids. But it's an uphill thing. Just last week on CBC, I had to correct a poster who thought that it's compulsory to swear on a bible in court. The fact is that it's not.
I once had a conversation something like this with my grandfather, except it was on the topic of communism. The part of what I said that he agreed with was that if you want to change a system to get people to believe in it instead of what they already believe, you have to start with the kids - before they've started school and before their parents have taught them anything different.
I think there was some report on the CBC website that the Liberals are planning to repeal a lot of the old, outdated laws. This is what I found regarding blasphemy:
Source.
This law would never stand up to a Charter challenge. Good thing too, or I'd be spending the next few centuries in prison based on what I've said on several Richard Dawkins/Lawrence Krauss YT pages alone. My arguments are in good faith, but my language... well, it wouldn't pass the inappropriate language rules here on CFC.
The other reference I found to "blasphemy laws" in Canada concern the recent motion regarding Islamophobia. I have to admit that I'm not in favor of that. I don't blame some people who are saying that it marks one religion as more "special" than another. The truth is that we already have hate laws, which should be adequate to cover anything that might be said about the Syrian refugees and the asylum seekers who have been sneaking across the border from the U.S. to Manitoba and Quebec.
