Do Businesses Have the Right to Refuse Service Based on Moral/Religious Objections?

[betenoire]

Originally Posted by Miss Scarlett

No, it isn't right there.

The owner's emotional health and well-being must be considered. Emotional distress is very real and when someone is forced to do something against their core beliefs there is potential for significant emotional trauma/damage.

There is already precedence for this.

In one case a person who performs marriages (but not as part of a church, independently from that) refused to perform a same-sex marriage because of his religion. He lost the case. The gay couple won.

In another case a organisation that provides support to people with physical disabilities (Christian Horizons) fired a long-time employee who realised she was a lesbian. Christian Horizons lost the case.

ONLY Churches get to use "it's against our religion" as a basis for refusing service to gays in Canada. ONLY Churches, because religion is the point of church. That's the law. That flower shop is not a church.

ETA - going to work now.