(LifeSiteNews) — Two young Christian men from Canada are speaking out after police ticketed them for preaching “too close” to a drag queen story hour in Calgary.
Today on The John-Henry Westen Show I interviewed Nathaniel Pawlowski, son of the persecuted Canadian pastor Artur, and Deklan Friesen, asking them to tell their story and share their thoughts on how to successfully defend Christian truth in an age increasingly hostile to it.
Pawlowski and Friesen, founders of the True Dominion Canada advocacy group, were detained and ticketed by Calgary police because they preached Bible verses outside a drag queen story hour at a public library in April.
Police told the young men they were violating a relatively new city bylaw that prohibits “insulting or demeaning behavior, including unwanted sexual advances, or harassing anyone on the basis of age, race, sexual orientation, disability, gender, gender identity or gender expression, among others.” The bylaw does not allow such “specified protests” to take place within 100 meters of city recreation centers or libraries.
Although Pawlowski said he could still face charges, they have not yet been brought against him. He told me the event actually went much better than expected because they had anticipated getting arrested. Still, the police held them to a different standard than pro-LGBT, Antifa counter-protesters.
“We asked [the officers] several times … if they would be applying this law to the other side, to the Antifa activists, and they assured us that they would be enforcing this law impartially and they’re going to go investigate them,” Pawlowski said. “So we stayed till the end. We waited for these officers to go cite them just like they charged us. And they didn’t do that. So it shows a clear double standard.”
READ: Pastor Artur Pawlowski’s son detained in Calgary for preaching against drag show targeting kids
The son of pastor Artur Pawlowski could be facing massive fines and jail time after he preached Bible verses outside a drag queen story time held at a public library over the weekend.
Nathaniel Pawlowski was detained and ticketed on Saturday by Calgary Police Service (CPS) because he was preaching too “close” to the drag event, in an apparent violation of a new and oppressive bylaw.
SIGN: Nathaniel Pawlowski MUST NOT be fined or jailed for protecting kids from Drag Queens
Pawlowski said that he was outside the event to “preach, read the Bible and just speak.”
Video of the incident shows Pawlowski along with his friend Deklan Friesen speaking to a crowd outside the library.
Calgary City Council last month passed a new “Safe and Inclusive Access Bylaw” that disallows “specified protests” both inside and outside all city-owned and affiliated public buildings. Mayor Jyoti Gondek put her full support behind the buffer zone bylaw.
Please tell Mayor Gondek that the bylaw violating Charter freedoms is both unjust and absurd
The bylaw means pastors or concerned parents protesting pro-LGBT events at public buildings are barred from getting within 100 meters of any such location.
Top constitutional lawyer John Carpay recently blasted Calgary City Council for going to “war” against Canadians’ freedoms by using bylaws to target people’s ability to protest events at public facilities, including drag queen performance directed at children.
In an opinion piece published on March 17 in the Western Standard, Carpay said “freedom of expression is meaningless if citizens are only allowed to say what’s approved by the government, or if expression is banished from public spaces.”
Pawlowski noted that his ticket has no penalty listed yet, as police must “review the evidence on me and that they will be stopping by my home to issue charges.”
His ticket does have a mandatory court appearance date. Each charge under Calgary’s bylaw carries a maximum fine of up to $10,000 and up to a year in jail.
SIGN: Nathaniel Pawlowski MUST NOT be fined or jailed for protecting kids from Drag Queens
Pawlowski had asked the police officers if they would also be enforcing “the same law on to the other side with the Antifa protesters”, but nobody was served a ticket except for he and Friesen.
In June 2022, Calgary City Council, under its left-leaning Mayor Jyoti Gondek, amended the city’s bylaws to “specifically prohibit insulting or demeaning behavior, including unwanted sexual advances, or harassing anyone on the basis of age, race, sexual orientation, disability, gender, gender identity or gender expression, among others.”
In February, Gondek vowed to use the bylaw to go after drag queen story hour protesters after some of the events were postponed by pro-family objectors.
In early March, fulfilling her promise, Calgary City Council then passed the bylaw that banned protesting against drag queen story hours or any other “LGBTQ” events held at public facilities.
SIGN: Nathaniel Pawlowski MUST NOT be fined or jailed for protecting kids from Drag Queens
Carpay noted that while there are limits to free speech, “Canadians have every right to express their views in public places, regardless of the content of the expression.”
He also wrote how a 1992 Supreme Court of Canada decision in R. v. Zundel “explained all communications which convey or attempt to convey meaning are protected by the Charter [of Rights and Freedoms], unless the physical form by which the communication is made (for example, a violent act) excludes protection.”
“The purpose of the Charter’s free expression guarantee is to promote truth, self-fulfillment, and political and social participation. That purpose extends to the protection of minority beliefs which the majority regards as wrong or false,” wrote Carpay.
According to Carpay, Gondek seems to “believe it is wrong or false to oppose drag queen story readings in public libraries.”
“She is entitled to express her views, but not to impose her views on others by effectively banning peaceful public protests through a so-called ‘Safe and Inclusive Access’ bylaw,” noted Carpay.
There exists a “freedom of expression” which includes the “right” to choose “high-visibility locations to hold up signs or banners, sing or chant, hand out literature, gather signatures on a petition, and have a speaker get up on her soapbox,” continued the lawyer.
“Protests are often held at the locations where injustices (or perceived injustices) are actually occurring,” he added.
Christian pastor Derek Reimer was jailed and charged in early March for protesting a children’s drag queen story hour at a public library in Calgary.
Carpay wrote that the city council’s use of “coercive power to relegate peaceful protesters to obscure locations where they cannot be seen or heard,” amounts to “crushing a fundamental Charter freedom on which our democracy depends.”
“The point of protests is to be seen and heard,” wrote Carpay.
Carpay noted that being forced to stand 100 meters away from high-visibility and high-traffic areas “reduces freedom of expression to near irrelevance.”
“Protecting entrances from obstruction is already taken care of by the Criminal Code, and does not require a bylaw that imposes up to $10,000 in fines and up to a year in jail for peacefully protesting less than the length of four swimming pools away from an entrance,” charged Carpay.
According to Carpay, the Charter’s protection for free speech applies to those at the receiving end of a person speaking out.
“Potential listeners who have the right to hear diverse points of view, and to decide for themselves what is true and false rather than having Mayor Gondek decide on their behalf,” said Carpay.
“Calgary’s ‘Safe and Inclusive Access’ bylaw violates the rights of all Calgarians, speakers and listeners, and attacks diversity of thought and belief.”
Carpay noted that “repressive regimes always take great pains to ensure their subjects are kept ‘safe’ from ideas which the regime believes to be wrong or false.”
“In the past – and still today – those living in communist North Korea, national socialist Germany, theocratic Iran, Putin’s Russia, communist China and many other places have been kept very safe from ideas that the regime dislikes,” wrote Carpay.
Carpay noted that in a “free society,” there is no way everyone can be “safe” from hearing one’s opposing views.
“The ‘safety’ which woke activists on Calgary City Council are promising is attractive to those who support children being exposed to drag queens at public libraries,” wrote Carpay.
“But beware of the erosion of freedom, because the demons of censorship cannot be controlled after their release.”
In addition to Carpay, the Canadian Constitution Foundation (CCF) has also objected to the new bylaw, and has vowed to commence a legal challenge against the “unconstitutional” policy.
SIGN: Nathaniel Pawlowski MUST NOT be fined or jailed for protecting kids from Drag Queens
MORE INFORMATION:
Pastor Artur Pawlowski’s son detained in Calgary for preaching against drag show – LifeSiteNews
Canadian constitutional lawyer rips Calgary law banning drag queen story hour protests – LifeSiteNews
READ: Canadian pastor Artur Pawlowski found guilty on charges related to border protest
I asked the two young men how someone who wants to follow in their footsteps can overcome the intimidation of becoming an unapologetic truth-teller. Here’s what they said.
“Everything on earth, everything in front of your peers, your friends, is very temporary. The people around you in a couple of years, it’s not going to matter. And it doesn’t honestly matter now,” Friesen said. “What matters is that you testify to the truth and that you spoke of God correctly and that your conscience is clear. Honestly, I would rather be embarrassed in front of people than violate my conscience before God.”
“The Bible says if you know how to do good and you choose not to do it, that’s evil in the sight of God. So you have to, even if you don’t have the gift of speech. Well, Moses didn’t either, but yet he was called by God,” Pawlowski added. “So everyone has a part to play in this.”
“We need the young people to start rising up. Every … significant movement started with the young people, believe it or not. University students [spearheaded the] civil rights movement in the United States, [the] Solidarity movement in Poland. You need the students. You need the young people to join this. And that’s what we’re here to talk about.”
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