Point of order, Mr. Speaker: I seek unanimous consent that, notwithstanding standing order 67, the time for debate on Bill 174, Supply Act, be allocated as follows: 56 minutes to each of the recognized parties and eight minutes to the independent members as a group.

It would be great for the 15 members of the independents to be able to discuss how the government is spending the people’s money.

Oh, my gosh.

It’s a pleasure to speak to this bill creating Orthodox Christian Week. I want to congratulate the member from Humber River–Black Creek for putting this bill forward.

These bills are very important. They’re very important because we need to recognize and acknowledge the diversity that’s amongst us. I’m a Roman Catholic. I went to Catholic schools. I didn’t really begin to understand Orthodox Christianity until I became a politician—that shouldn’t be. We live in communities. In my community, there are people from 125 different countries. They speak 90 languages, and there are dozens of faiths. And our children are together—they play together; they go to school together. We all live together. So understanding and knowing the rich traditions and beliefs of the other are really important.

I want to thank everyone who is here today for coming here to support the member from Humber River–Black Creek, but most importantly for giving your children the gift of faith. That’s something that’s really very important in this world. To uphold that, to celebrate that, and to be proud of your heritage and your faith is something very special, and I want to congratulate you for that.

I’m from Ottawa South, and I only have one Orthodox cathedral in my riding: St. Elias Antiochian Orthodox Cathedral. It’s a place that I’ve been going to for years for a whole bunch of different reasons, but the one that really sticks out is—and it happens at many Orthodox communities and Orthodox churches—they have a festival every year, the Lebanese festival in Ottawa. It’s a massive festival. Actually, I put forward a bill very similar to celebrate Lebanese heritage month, because I believed that was important. I always say, with these festivals, they combine the five Fs, and I hope I can remember them: Faith, food, friends, family, and fun—not necessarily in that order, but faith always comes first. I’d just like to give them a shout-out right now, because it’s in my riding.

Father Nektarios and the Very Reverend Ghattas Hajal, thank you for the work that you’ve done in our community to support things like the children’s hospital and the heart institute, and having a festival every year that brings people together.

My mom passed away last year. She would go to every festival. She would go to the Ukrainian Orthodox festival. she would go to the Greek Orthodox festival. We’d have to take her out all the time, and then when she couldn’t get out of the house, we had to get the food and then bring it back. It was something really central to her. She was a person of deep faith.

Again, we’re Catholics; I was going to say we prefer bingo—but not as much anymore.

So here’s the thing, and this is why it’s important for us to celebrate and recognize Orthodox churches and all religions: We live in a country—and when I say 125 countries, 90 languages, dozens of faiths, we just accept that; we embrace it. We don’t always know as much as we should know. But people can practise their faith. There are a lot of places in the world where people have to hide their faith because they fear for their lives. I think it’s important that our children know and understand that, because they don’t know anything different. Go into our schools, and everybody is there. That just doesn’t happen everywhere.

So creating an Orthodox Christian Week, recognizing the rich traditions and the role that these faith communities play in our community, and the struggles that they have and had that made them come here, that made them immigrate here—I think that’s why it’s important, too. I don’t think we can forget the struggle that happened, or the struggles that are happening right now in too many places in the world.

I want to thank you for your time, Speaker.

Again, thank you so much for being here and for supporting the member from Humber River–Black Creek.