In this paper I present my research on the Ontario Election of 2007 as a window on conflicting interpretations of the public role of religion in the volatile contest over the extension of government funding to non Catholic faith based schools. I am particularly interested in the political uses of the "secular -religious" binary to construct both public space and moral legitimacy for religion by advocates for both stated funded schools and privately funded faith based schools. The opposition between the secular and religious has been formalized in law and regulation under the categories "education about religion" and "religious education" with important implications for political recognition and the distribution of government resources. The overall impact has been the marginalizing of faith communities who see both religion and education as fundamental to the construction of identity and the transmission of collective memory. While faith based schools have achieved some success in addressing concerns with the Ministry of Education, the Election of 2007 demonstrates that there continues to be a great deal of anxiety about the preceived threats to social cohesion represented by religious voices claiming public space, including in education. I draw on the theoretical framework proposed by Kim Knott (2005) in her spatial analysis of religion to shed light on the structure of the contest in Ontario''s educational politics. I draw on the discourse analysis used by Lori Beaman (2008) in her examination of harm for my research methods in this presentation.
