Yves Engler and supporters hold rally outside St. Paul’s Bloor Street
St. Paul’s Bloor Street Anglican Church in Toronto approved, then revoked a booking by NDP leadership candidate Yves Engler for a room to host a political rally—after what both Engler and the leader of a Zionist group said was a pressure campaign by pro-Israel activists to cancel the event.
Three days before the event, scheduled to take place on Sept. 18, St. Paul’s event manager Beril Karasahin told the Engler campaign in an email, “after further review, we cannot proceed with hosting your upcoming event at St. Paul’s due to the political nature of the event, which places it outside the scope of what we can support in our space.” St. Paul’s refunded the money Engler’s campaign had paid to rent space at Cody Hall inside the church.
Engler, a vocal critic of Israel’s actions in Gaza, said the church notified a pro-Israel email account of the cancellation before informing the campaign itself, and posted emails on his website that he said support this claim.
Responding to the cancellation, Engler said in a statement, “I am deeply disappointed and outraged that the Diocese of Toronto and Anglican leadership are bowing to pressure from Zionist organizations to cancel my campaign event at St. Paul’s.”
“This would not be a neutral act,” he added. “It would mean the Church inserting itself into the NDP leadership race and Canadian democracy, silencing a campaign that stands with Palestine in the face of ongoing genocide.”
Facts Matter, a pro-Israel account on X, applauded St. Paul’s for canceling the event, calling Engler a “noted antisemite.” Meir Weinstein, former Canadian leader of the far-right Jewish Defense League who now heads the group Israel Now, tweeted on Sept. 15, “Thank you to all my friends and supporters for contacting the St. Paul’s Church to cancel the antisemitic event with Yves Engler.”
Engler pledged to move forward with the event, meeting inside St. Paul’s if the church allowed it, and meeting outside if the church did not reverse the cancellation. St. Paul’s did not change course and Engler held a rally outside the church entrance with at least 60 supporters. Speakers endorsing Engler included Rabbi David Mivasair, a member of the advocacy group Independent Jewish Voices. The Anglican Journal also saw a few pro-Israel counter-demonstrators present, including Weinstein, who subsequently criticized St. Paul’s on X for allowing Engler “to hold his vile antisemitic rally on church property.”
In the days leading up to Sept. 18, legal counsel for the Engler campaign sought a review of the event cancellation. Justin Safayeni, a lawyer representing St. Paul’s, confirmed in a Sept. 17 email to the campaign that the event would not take place at the church. Safayeni said that having the event proceed would be a “blatant violation” of St. Paul’s Bloor Street’s safe use policy, which reads: “The essential functions of SPBS require strict neutrality regarding partisan political activities. Therefore, SPBS will not accommodate any request for a booking by and/or any political party, group, organization or individual.”
In his speech to supporters outside St. Paul’s, Engler sharply criticized the church’s last-minute cancellation of his event.
Stuart Mann, communications director for the Anglican diocese of Toronto, directed any inquiries to St. Paul’s, but neither rector Bishop Jenny Andison (area bishop for the diocese of Toronto until 2021) nor St. Paul’s executive director Kent Williams responded to interview requests from the Anglican Journal.
