Overview:

• Recognition and registration are amalgamated rather than ideally differentiated; recognition is only possible through a process of legal registration which is itself devolved to the capacity of extending only tax-exempt status.

• The 2019 law prohibiting the wearing of religious symbols for government employees is concerning; its implementation is regarded as caused by a lack of sufficient existential recognition in Canada for persons and communities of different faiths and for the belief systems and denominations themselves.

Positive elements:

• Horizontal recognition is in effect.

Recommendation:

• Establish a recognition system that caters for both existential recognition and legal registration simultaneously; to make this system dynamic, it would need to cater to both traditional or established belief systems and their derivatives as well as minorities and NRMs.

• This system should be complemented by the establishment of an independent recognition agency to ensure the system functions sufficiently and that does not come restrictive.