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News

Canada replaces the cross with a snowflake

On the same day that the world’s attention was fixed on the coronation of Charles III, Canada’s federal government took the opportunity to show off its new design for our Canadian Royal Crown. As the "Canadian Crown" twitter account noted: “The design replaces religious symbols (crosses & fleur-de-lis) with maple leaves & a snowflake” This crown isn’t a physical crown worn by an official or put on display. Rather, it is an emblem or design, featured at the top of Canada’s Coat of Arms, as well as police and military badges, among other places. Symbols matter, especially when they are meant to represent our leadership and nation. This change came from the top. Our Governor General’s website explains that it was “approved in April 2023 by His Majesty The King on the advice of the Prime Minister of Canada.” The fleur-de-lis symbolizes a king’s divinely-approved authority to rule. “For there is no authority except from God” (Romans 13). Likewise, the cross symbolizes the kingship of Jesus Christ, Lord over all creation. Together, they bear witness to the fact that humanity is not sovereign. God alone is. And He alone gives authority to office-bearers, including our civil governments. It is no surprise that Justin Trudeau has no use for these public reminders of our Sovereign Lord Jesus Christ. But in divorcing the civil government’s authority from God, where does it get its authority from? The new symbols point to nature. How do the snow, leaves, and water give any authority to our government? They are pretty to view, and useful for living, but have no transcendent authority themselves. As snowflakes melt and leaves decay, we can expect the same for any government that finds its authority in itself. It is also ironic that, in an effort to undermine Christ as king, our government has to look to Christ’s creation for new symbols. Instead of anger or ridicule, decisions like this ought to move us to sadness. Justin Trudeau and most of Canada’s leaders think that decisions like this are a move towards an enlightened and “progressive” future, characterized by secularism instead of “religion.” Yet they are blind to the reality that they are no less religious than their forefathers. In many respects, they show even more zeal for their religion of humanism and paganism than many of our forefathers showed for our Lord. Some years ago, I witnessed the leaders of Canada’s political parties, including Justin Trudeau, each piously reading a selection from Scripture at the National Prayer Breakfast. This included a reading from Psalm 2, reminding them Who is King and Who they will one day have to give account to: Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying, “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.” He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision. Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, “As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill…. Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear….”...

Politics

Al Siebring: councillor & Christian

How one municipal politician brings God’s Word to bear on taxes, government budgets and private citizens’ property rights ***** This appeared in the March 2015 edition. What does a Christian perspective look like when it comes to the relationship between faith, taxation, and the role of government? It’s a big question, and one I’ve been thinking on for many years in my role as a municipal councillor in the District of North Cowichan. As with all things, we need to start this discussion with Scripture. Pay to Caesar… The fundamental Scriptural principle when it comes to taxes can be summed up in two words: “Pay them.” In Matthew 22, after referencing the “image” on a coin that was handed to him, Christ urged his followers to “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.” It’s also worth noting the broader context here, which includes the notion that, since we are made in God’s image, we are also to “render unto God what is God’s.” In other words, since the coin had Caesar’s image on it, it should be given back to him, and equally, since people have God’s image stamped on them, they should give themselves in service to Him. Put another way, Christ didn’t get too bent out of shape about paying taxes to Caesar, but instead reserved His criticism for those who refused to pay proper homage to His Father. But are all taxes fair? Are they all necessary and defensible? Of course not. Government, by its very nature, tends towards wastefulness, self-preservation, unwarranted bureaucracy, and empire-building. As someone who’s now spent two terms in elected office at the local government level, I can tell you that much of the problem goes to structures and presuppositions that are endemic to the way budgets are put together. Budgeting 101 In the municipality where I am an alderman, our budgeting process was recently explained to us by our City Manager like this: “We (municipal staff) look at the things Council has told us they want to accomplish in the upcoming year, and then we determine the tax implications based on what that’s going to cost.” This is the paradigm under which many (most?) municipal budgets are prepared. But it has serious tax implications, and I believe it to be fundamentally flawed. This certainly isn’t the way most people budget in their households. They don’t say: “This year, I want to go to Mexico, do a $30,000 renovation to my kitchen, and buy a new car. Now I just need to figure out where to get the money.” No. The common-sense way of budgeting – the way most responsible people run their lives and their households – is by saying: “What’s a reasonable expectation of my income this year?” Once they establish that, they say: “Now, what can I afford to do with that limited amount of money?” But there’s an understanding, right at the very outset, that the amount of money is limited. Not so with government. There’s a perception that the taxpayer has a bottomless pocket. And this can – and often does – lead to indefensible tax increases. Equally, there’s another side to the coin. The Federation of Canadian Municipalities did a study a few years ago to determine the ratio between municipal property taxes and taxes levied by other levels of government. The study found that, (excluding “transfers” of money from senior levels of government for infrastructure projects), municipal government across Canada collected just eight cents of every tax dollar handed over by Canadian taxpayers. With that eight percent of total taxes collected, local governments are expected to deal with responsibilities that include roads, water-supply systems, garbage collection, municipal sewer, recreation, policing/fire services and, in some jurisdictions, affordable housing, public health, and childcare. And that ratio has come down considerably in the last 50 years or so. It used to be in the range of 11 to 15 cents. To be clear, the decline in the ratio isn’t necessarily because municipalities have become that much more efficient at service delivery. Rather, it’s a testimony to the proportionately increasing tax burden imposed by other levels of government, combined with the fact that 50 years ago, most local governments were in the throes of a huge infrastructure boom. Back in the 50’s and 60’s, everyone was putting in new roads, bridges, and municipal water and sewer systems. Those systems are now starting to wear out, and some are in dire need of replacement, which doesn’t bode well for future tax pressures at the local government level. The $20-an-hour fry cook But there are also historic inefficiencies in local government – inefficiencies which will take considerable political courage to correct. Labour contracts are a prime example. There is no faster way to get a municipal politician running for the exits than to suggest that the fundamentals of their staff’s union contracts need to be re-examined. Most of these contracts go back to when local government workers first got the right to “organize” – they are built on economic presuppositions which were prevalent in the 1970’s when there was no end in sight to the boom years, and everyone instinctively understood that a “COLA” (Cost of Living Allowance) Clause was an insult to the intelligence and industriousness of the workers. In my jurisdiction, for example, this led to a situation where we had high school students coming in to work the concession stand at our local hockey arena. These kids were “on-call” – the minimum payment per their union contract was 4 hours, often for a shift which was considerably shorter than that. And, when all perks and benefits were considered, they were making close to $20 dollars an hour to flip burgers, a job that would be considered minimum wage in the private sector. It also created a situation where the “food services” division at that Recreation Centre was swimming in about $180,000 dollars of red ink every year. But, because it was government, no one thought it necessary to correct the situation…or, at least, not until I took over the chairmanship of the board that runs the facility. Not to blow my own horn, but I told the rest of the board members that as chair, I would happily face the TV cameras – with a picket line behind me – to explain the facts of life to the taxpayers should the issue lead to a strike. The union folded like a house of soggy cards, and that concession stand is now run by a private operator. All of which is to say that the matter of “taxation” can be complicated. My fundamental worry, though, is that many local government leaders are losing sight of their central responsibility to be “stewards” of the public purse. Instead, many of them make their tax-related decisions based on political agendas ranging the full gamut from extreme environmentalism to a rampant pro-development stance that cannot be sustained. Not to mention fear of retribution at the ballot box at the hands of those whose vested interests might be detrimentally affected by one decision or other. As an aside, this brings to mind a quote that Ronald Reagan was fond of using – a quote originally attributed variously to Alexander de Tocqueville and Scottish historian Alexander Tytler: A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largesse out of the public treasury. From that moment on the majority will always vote for the candidate promising the most benefits from the treasury, with the result that democracy always collapses over a loose fiscal policy. Property rights There are many other issues that could be discussed in the pursuit of a Christian perspective on (local) government. Let’s look at the one where civic politicians and staff expend most of their political capital and regulatory authority: land use. Our municipality regulates all new development through a policy it calls “smart growth.” The idea is to encourage what’s called “in-fill” – making sure the areas that already have residential, industrial, or retail development on them are fully built out before new areas are explored for development. On the surface, this makes sense. The infrastructure (roads, water, sewer services and the like), are already in place for those existing developments, and it certainly seems quite stewardly not to waste a bunch of money running these services into new areas when there’s still undeveloped potential in the existing “growth centres.” The problem, of course, is that this process necessarily involves drawing arbitrary lines on a map. And there are people with land just outside of these lines – sometimes literally across the street – who are ineligible to have their various expansion projects approved because of “smart growth.” And while the policy may seem to make sense at first blush, I believe it has the potential to violate a basic biblical principle; the notion of private property rights. (If you have trouble with those “rights” as a biblical concept, simply ask yourself how the 8th Commandment can forbid “stealing”? You can’t steal anything from anyone if they don’t have an inherent right to own it in the first place.) If we truly believe in property rights, landowners should have considerable freedom to do what they want with their property, as long as that freedom isn’t paid for through the general tax bills. For example, we might be justified in charging a special development fee to hook into the sewer and water lines because a particular address is outside the proscribed growth boundaries. But to live and die by a policy against any development whatsoever on this land restricts the landowners’ freedom to enjoy (and profit from) his property, and minimizes his ability to exercise “dominion” over that land (Gen 1:28). So I would argue that if someone wants water or sewer services for a project that’s five, or six, or even twenty miles outside of the “growth boundaries,” they should have the option of tapping into that infrastructure…at their cost. Practically, of course, that cost would be so prohibitive as to make the development completely untenable, but the principle should stand on its own. This issue provides an example of how governments should base their decision-making on commonly accepted (and Biblical) principles, rather than on a well-intentioned but arbitrary set of “rules” that are totally intransigent and often defy common sense. Conclusion We are often critical of our governments at all their levels, and we do have some reasons to be. But we should also consider what Romans 13 tells us about how we should respond to government, where it says: …rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good.” That principle, combined with repeated Scriptural injunctions to pray for leaders (I Tim. 2:1) and for the “peace of the city” (Jer. 29:7), should guide our actions as citizens, and our relationship with governments at all levels. This is from the March 2015 issue, when Al Siebring had just been re-elected to a third term as Councillor in the District of North Cowichan, BC (pop. 30,000). That was followed up by a stint as mayor, after which he moved to Southern Alberta for a very different job: grandpa. Then, in the beginning of May, 2023, he had a chat with Real Talk's Lucas Holtvlüwer, which you can watch below. You can also find this episode on your favorite podcasting platforms by clicking here. ...

Politics

The Rhinoceros Party: politics has always been absurd, but 30 years ago, even more so

Politics may seem especially absurd these days, but it didn’t start here. In Canada, the wackiness goes back at least a few decades, to the founding of the Rhinoceros Party. Founded in 1963 by Jacques Ferron, this party claimed to be inspired by a Brazilian rhinoceros, Cacareco, who had been elected to a city council in Brazil in 1958. The Canadians needed a rhino closer to home though, so the movement chose Cornelius the First, a rhinoceros in the Granby Zoo near Montreal as their leader. The party existed from 1963 until 1993 when it was officially dissolved, but it was resurrected in 2007, though with an arguably cruder edge to its humor. That edge might reflect the new times in which the party found itself. Big promises The Rhinoceros Party promised what some would say any other party did: the completely impossible. For example, at one time or another the Rhinoceros Party promised to: Abolish the Law of Gravity. They also hoped to give the unemployed the right to strike. They sought to reduce the speed of light since it’s much too fast. The Rhinos wanted provide higher education by building taller schools. They promised to end crime by abolishing all laws. They were in favor of adopting the British system of driving on the left instead of the right. This would be brought in gradually starting with large trucks, then buses, and then small cars and bicycles. They sought to Declare war on Belgium. In one of the Tintin books, the Belgian hero killed a rhino. War could be avoided if the Belgian embassy in Canada delivered a case of mussels and a case of Belgian beer to the head office of the Rhino Party. Interestingly, though the Rhinos never elected a single representative to Parliament, the Belgian embassy did come through on the mussels and beer. They wanted to impose an import quota on cold winter weather. The only seasons that would be allowed were to be salt, pepper, mustard and vinegar. Preying on Canadians distrust of their southern neighbors, the Rhinos promised to count the Thousand Island in case the Americans had stolen some. Perhaps the only promise that the Rhinoceros Party might have kept was that if they were ever able to form the government, they would promptly resign thereby forcing a new election. Just cursing the darkness In its attempts at humor, the Rhinoceros Party sometimes descended into crudity. Arguably, they were no worse than many of the politicians who currently grace the world stage. They did point out the absurdity of the promises made by many politicians who make promises they have either thought out poorly and find they cannot keep, or who may make ones so grandiose they know in advance they’ll never be able to follow through. But while humor points out the absurd and the weaknesses of Canadian parties and politicians, it doesn’t suggest an alternative. The Rhinoceroses in the party tore down the pretensions of the proud, but failed to replace them with anything more reasonable. Retiring the Rhino The original Rhinoceros Party met its demise in 1993. In order to stay a registered party, each party had to run candidates in 50 electoral districts, a feat that was too difficult at the time for the Rhinos. Consequently, in protest, the party chose to abstain from the 1993 election. The chief officer of Elections Canada ordered that the party be dissolved and money from the sale of assets was to be sent to the Canadian government’s Receiver General. Party leader Charlie MacKenzie refused, and after two years of back and forth, Elections Canada declined to prosecute MacKenzie making him Canada’s self-described “least wanted fugitive.” James Dykstra is a sometimes history teacher, author, and podcaster. This article is taken from an episode of his History.icu podcast, “where history is never boring.” Find it at History.icu, or on Spotify, Google podcasts, or wherever you find your podcasts. IF RHINOS JOINED THE CHP by Jon Dykstra One of the best policy proposals the Rhinoceros Party of Canada ever made went something like this: “Currently, convicted murderers get life, and unborn babies often get death. We’ll swap that around.” It was a good policy told with punch, and short enough to fit on a t-shirt. The only problem? I’m not sure it ever happened. I thought it did, but when I started searching for the when and where, I found there’s nothing online to back up my hazy recall. It also strikes me as being out of step with the rest of the party’s generally frivolous stands – it’s too emphatically pro-life. So if it wasn’t the Rhinos, might it have been the Christian Heritage Party (CHP)? They are pro-life – Canada's only pro-life party – but it struck me as a bit too "quippy" for them. It almost seems like a combination of the two parties: a satiric Rhino-ish take but one that doesn’t just tear down, but offers a Christian alternative. And yes, a CHP vet remembers them running something like this in years past. Turns out the CHP has a little Rhino in it.  ...

Assorted

“good” vs. good

Our political leaders think they know what’s best for us. But by what standard are they judging what’s good? *****  Why should Christians participate in political action in the first place? That’s an important question to answer, since Christian involvement in politics is largely misunderstood by the world, and not always clarified that well by Christians themselves. So, again, why should Christians get involved in politics? To advocate for society to be built on Christian principles, since we know these principles are what God commands in His Word. We also want to advocate for the freedom for God’s people to do what He has called us to do. Don’t force your morality on me! Now, the world around us will ask us to kindly keep our religion to ourselves and they’ll tell us we shouldn’t try to force our morality on them. Other Christians can also be among the most vocal opponents of applying an explicitly Christian approach to public policy. You might hear them argue that while God’s Word is authoritative for us and for how we live, it isn’t authoritative for the world around us. Who are we to think that we can apply our faith to public policy? Isn’t it inappropriate to apply biblical principles to those who do not believe? We might be tempted to think that if someone’s choices are not hurting anyone, then do we still need to advocate for Christian policy? This might be particularly so when it comes to the whole area of sexuality: if two men are living together, or a couple is shacked up before marriage, should we really care? Maybe we should just keep to ourselves and avoid any sort of “political” conversations around marriage, or gender, or family.  The “common good” But if we rule out a Christian approach to politics, then what’s left? The alternative typically proposed relies on the idea of “the common good” or “the public interest.” Policies are presented as being good for various groups of citizens. So, for example: decriminalizing abortion is presented as giving women the right to choose legalizing euthanasia is presented as a means of relieving suffering redefining marriage is presented as allowing people to love whoever they want Other examples would include how certain housing policies are presented as strategies to reduce homelessness and policies allowing safe injection sites might be presented as preventing overdose deaths. In these cases, does the government care about the common good? In their minds, yes. But their perspective of the common good is often different from a Reformed Christian’s perspective. The fact is, every policy springs from a particular worldview. Our worldview directly impacts how we define policy issues and how we propose solutions. If I think that choice or autonomy is the ultimate good, then abortion and euthanasia would seem to be good things. But if I know that God’s law places important limits on choice and autonomy, I’ll understand that abortion and euthanasia must fall within those limitations. Policy decisions impact real people, but how we view that impact depends on how we see the world and our place in it more broadly. And we must also examine the worldview of our policy-makers as we consider the policies they champion. A “faith” in science or liberalism or secularism or autonomy or anything else will affect how they view law and policy.  For the true good of our neighbors Because of differing ideas of the “common good,” some Christians might say that we should only advocate for policies based on social scientific evidence that the world can agree with. But if we forget about the biblical worldview behind our evidence, it will often be interpreted in a way that is detrimental to those around us. For example, as governments seek to redefine the family, the prevailing attitude is “all kids need is a loving family - it doesn’t matter what the family structure is.” It can be easy to fall into this thinking. After all, aren’t loving gay parents better than an abusive mother and father? We begin to look at extremes instead of a biblical starting point for the family. And we fail to hold to an objective foundation for what is truly good for the people affected. Christians need to be confident in both the wisdom and goodness of our God, and consequently certain that principles set forth in the Bible will yield policies that are good for Canadians. It is in the Gospel where we find the truth about humanity and the world. Therefore, we should also seek to influence our society with God’s law. As Christian philosopher James Smith explained in his book Awaiting the King, “if we are convinced (convicted) that in Christ and His Word we know something about how to be human, then shouldn’t we seek to bend social practices and policy in that direction for the good of our neighbors?” This applies not just to life issues like euthanasia and abortion, but also when we’re talking about the family, gender, and sexuality. There too, we need to recognize God’s good design for human beings before we can understand what is truly good for our neighbors. And when we know what God thinks, then the facts will fit too – as ARPA Canada explained in a recent policy document, the natural family as God designed it is statistically most likely to produce the best outcomes for children. The world’s “good” exposed As confident as we can be that God knows best, we can also be certain that the world’s “good” will eventually be exposed as anything but. I recently learned about one organization that focuses on trying to help the “survivors of the Sexual Revolution.” That’s language you don’t often hear in the broader culture, because our society views the Sexual Revolution as a beneficial liberation from the constraints of sexual morality. But victims abound, including many who didn’t survive: prostituted and abused women, people who have undergone “sex reassignment” procedures, children who have lost a parent due to divorce, and of course the many aborted children. A recent example of harm caused by the Sexual Revolution is the enactment of a national, criminal ban on conversion therapy. The ban assumes that biblical views on gender and sexuality are harmful to people struggling with their gender or sexuality. In reality, the law hinders people who are struggling from receiving the help they need. This brings us back to the question of worldview. A Christian worldview in this instance presents the truth about God’s design for humanity, the reality of a fallen world, but also the way of restoration. Conclusion The world will criticize us for advocating for biblically based policies, and characterize it as trying to “force our own morality on others” or as “getting involved in something that doesn’t concern them.” Other Christians may even find fault with bringing the Bible to bear in the public square. But it is because we care deeply about our neighbors that we want to share and advocate for what is true and good. And it is because of God and His Word that we know what is true and good. So when we hear of a policy decision, we need to step back and look at biblical principles and what God’s Word says about what is glorifying to God and good for our neighbors. From there, we can analyze whether the government truly understands what is good for our neighbors based on God’s good design. As Nancy Pearcey writes in Love Thy Body: “Christians must be prepared to minister to the wounded, the refugees of the secular moral revolution whose lives have been wrecked by its false promises of freedom and autonomy.” Advocating for Christian policy is not selfish nor oppressive. It is truly for the common good....

Politics

Arrogance: a necessary element of the liberal worldview

In his book Makers and Takers (2008), Peter Schweizer not only sings the praises of conservatives, he exposes the arrogance of liberals. One example is particularly telling – Schweizer writes about the media’s reaction to a Presidential IQ report that looked at the scores for each American president in the last 50 years. The report found that the last six Democratic (liberal) Presidents had an average IQ of 155, with Bill Clinton scoring the highest, at 182. Republican Presidents (conservatives, or at least, more conservative than Democrats) average more than 40 point lower at just over 115. The lowest Republican score was George W. Bush, at 91. Now to give this some context, Albert Einstein’s IQ has been estimated at between 160 to 180, which puts him a shade below Bill Clinton. And George W. Bush’s reported score was exactly half that given for Clinton. If that strikes you as a little suspect, congratulations – that’s means you must not be a liberal, because a host of them did fall for it. The press including “The Economist magazine, the St. Petersburg Times, London's Daily Mirror, radio talk show hosts and liberal bloggers eagerly ran with the story.” Even editorial cartoonist Garry Trudeau swallowed it whole, basing one of his Doonesbury comics on this Presidential IQ report. But while many in the press were ready to believe anything – no matter how implausible – that said liberals were smarter than conservatives (and smarter even than Einstein) the report was a hoax. The only real info the report provided was the illumination it had given on the press’s hard bias against conservatives. Think I’m been a little hard on the gullible media? Not at all, As Schweizer notes: “Imagine if someone had published a report claiming that conservatives had much higher IQs than liberals. Would newspapers and commentators run such a story uncritically? To the contrary, they would likely first check on the results and subject the findings to serious scrutiny. In short, the bias in favor of ‘smart liberals’ seems widely accepted in our society.” Why did they fall for it? While it might seem odd that liberals are so ready to think themselves much smarter than conservatives, this arrogance is an integral part of the liberal worldview. Or, at least, it is central to liberalism in as far as liberals believe in bigger government, with the government taking an increasingly prominent role in education, healthcare, the arts, childcare, and, of course, all aspects of the economy including the arts, agriculture, forestry, tourism, and sports stadium construction. Government on such a grand scale is going to require some astonishingly brilliant leaders if things are to be run competently. So if one presupposes, as liberals do, that bigger government is the answer to many of our problems, it is necessary for them to also presuppose that the super smart, near-all-knowing administrators that would be necessary to run it, do actually exist. Or to put it more succinctly liberals overestimate their intelligence, because they need to, to maintain their trust in big government. Conservatives, on the other hand, have historically thought that such a huge responsibility is beyond any one person, or any one group’s competence, no matter how smart, or how knowledgeable. This insight was at one time based on – and still today aligns with – what God tells us about ourselves, that He is the infinite all-knowing God, and that we are not. So conservatives, and particularly Christians, want the government to take on only the limited responsibilities, like those of justice and defense, (Romans 13:4) which God has specifically assigned to it. Conclusion While liberals think conservatives to be of limited intelligence, conservatives think this true of both liberals and conservatives – everyone, even the smartest among us, have only limited intelligence and no one has the omniscience that would be needed to competently oversee all that Ottawa and Washington are involved in today. This touch of humility is as central to conservatism as a sense of arrogance is to liberalism. A version of this article first appeared in the June 2011 issue of Reformed Perspective....

Book excerpts, Book Reviews, History, Human Rights, Politics

The bad king that prompted the Great Charter

How Robin Hood’s nemesis Prince John was the impetus behind the Magna Carta In this excerpt from “A Christian Citizenship Guide” by André Schutten and Michael Wagner, we go way back to the time of the fictional Robin Hood and the very real Prince John to learn about the development of the Magna Carta, which has been described as “the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot.” ***** Once upon a time there was a king named Richard the Lionheart. He became king of England in 1189. The time before this date, in English law, is known as “time immemorial.”1 Important legal and political developments occurred in this “time out of mind” and contributed to the development of the system of law and government that we have today.2 While important and formational, those developments can’t be covered in detail here. However, we must begin the story of our constitution somewhere, and so we will begin the day after time immemorial. Most storybooks suggest that Richard the Lionheart was a good king, but that’s really quite debatable. All we know for sure is that his brother John was worse. Richard was a military man and mainly used England to fund his military exploits. He spent all but 6 months of his 10-year reign outside of England fighting various battles and pursuing various exploits. Once, on his way back to England, King Richard was kidnapped in a German territory and held for ransom. His brother John, temporarily ruling England in his place, not only refused to pay the ransom but offered the kidnappers money to keep his brother in custody! (You get a sense of John’s character, don’t you?) King Richard eventually returned to England but died shortly thereafter and, because he had no children, his younger brother John officially took the throne in the year 1199. King John ruled as an absolute monarch, as had most of the kings preceding him. He was the ultimate law maker and the final judge of any legal dispute, and he set himself above the law. King John was also a particularly cruel and greedy king, which is where the tales of Robin Hood come in. His excessive taxation impoverished the people and united the factions opposed to him. All sectors of society rose up: the barons, church leadership, merchants, and commoners. Signed not just twice or thrice In early 1215, a group of 39 barons (out of a total of 197) openly revolted against the king, with the blessing of Stephen Langton, the archbishop of Canterbury. The barons successfully took over the city of London and more barons came to their side. By midyear, King John knew he had to negotiate. And so, on the 15th day of June, 1215, in an open meadow known as Runnymede, the barons and the king signed a truce negotiated and drafted by archbishop Langton. That truce is known as the Magna Carta, or the Great Charter, and it is quite possibly the most significant legal document in the history of English law. Lord Denning, one of the greatest English judges in history, once described the Magna Carta as “the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot.”3 Lord Chief Justice Bingham wrote that “the sealing of Magna Carta was an event that changed the constitutional landscape in and, over time, the world.”4 The Magna Carta stands for the rule of law that all free men must be treated fairly and that no one is above the law, not even the king.5 By signing the Magna Carta, King John swore that he, and subsequent kings, would not be able to order the execution of his political enemies or any other citizens that displeased him without a proper criminal trial, heard by an impartial jury. Nor could he exact taxes from the people without first consulting with a council of barons (the very beginnings of a Parliament). And, often overlooked in modern political textbooks, the very first clause of the Magna Carta guaranteed the freedom and protection of the church.6 This was particularly important because King John wanted the power to appoint only those who agreed with him to be bishops of the church. The ecclesiastical leaders were known to speak out against the excesses and abuses of the king and often paid a steep price for doing so. King John’s father, King Henry II, infamously had archbishop Thomas Becket murdered inside Canterbury Cathedral in 1170 for standing up to the king on matters of church independence. While most parts of the Magna Carta have since been replaced or repealed by subsequent statutes, the ancient Charter has enduring value. One clause still in force today is Clause 40 which states: “To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay right or justice.” This clause is an expression of the principle of equality before the law, cemented into Canada’s Constitution in section 15(1) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms 767 years later. The Canadian version reads, “Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection of the law and equal benefit of the law without discrimination.” If you’re wondering whether the Magna Carta was a particularly Christian document, the answer is, “Yes!” Not only does the Magna Carta open and close with declarations about the church’s independence from state interference (the beginnings of constitutional protections for religious freedom), but the author, archbishop Langton, was the leading churchman in all of England. His legal training in Europe was in canon law (or church law), and he applied this legal training and the scriptural principles of law to his drafting of the Magna Carta. He had “a scripturally informed conscience from which emerged truth’s uninhibited voice in Magna Carta encourages proper and good government, resulting in increased justice.”7 Unfortunately, the signing of the Magna Carta didn’t restrain King John’s excesses all that long. Three months after signing it, the devious king had it annulled by the pope, and England was plunged into bloody civil war. But thankfully (for the English people anyway), King John died the next year from excessive diarrhea8 and the war came to an end. The Magna Carta did not die with King John. John’s nine-year-old son Henry III became king and reigned for the next 56 years. With the advisors and supporters of the young king seeking stability and an end to the civil war, the Magna Carta was reinstated in 1216. And when Henry reached adulthood in 1227, he reissued the Magna Carta again as law, though a shorter version of it, in exchange for the barons’ consent to a new tax. In 1253, in exchange for another tax to fund his battles in France, King Henry III swore on pain of excommunication “and stinking in hell” to uphold the Magna Carta.9 A decade later he broke his oath, imposing yet another tax, which sparked a rebellion known as the Second Barons’ War. That war concluded in 1267 with a peace treaty that required King Henry III to reaffirm the Magna Carta yet again (if you’re counting, that’s the fourth time).10 The development of the Parliaments King Henry III eventually died in 1272, and his son Edward I became king. Edward I (a.k.a. Edward Longshanks, because he was quite tall) did much good from a constitutional perspective, despite his depiction as a particularly cruel and cold-hearted English king in the Mel Gibson movie Braveheart. Edward I instituted a major review of political corruption and the abuse of power by citizens who held substantial power. In 1275, he passed The First Statute of Westminster to put on paper many of the existing laws in the country. He also worked to strengthen the policing system and restore public order. One of King Edward’s biggest contributions is that he initiated the first official Parliaments in England, calling about 46 Parliaments in his reign. The first Parliament, in 1275, included members of the nobility, clergy, and the election of two county representatives and two representatives from the towns or cities to attend.11 Twenty years later, this form of representative parliament became standard practice, known as the Model Parliament, and all future Parliaments, including Canada’s, are based on it. The nobility and clergy make up the House of Lords (comparable to Canada’s Senate), and the elected representatives of counties or towns make up the House of the Commoners (or House of Commons). Importantly, before the king could increase taxes, he had to gain approval from Parliament. Parliament was also a check on the absolute authority of the king in other respects. After another dispute over taxes between the king and Parliament between 1294 and 1297, the Magna Carta was amended and passed by Parliament as a statute for the first time and signed into law by King Edward I. This 1297 version of the Magna Carta is the officially recognized legal text in English law today and remains a part of the constitutions of Britain and Canada. Over the next one hundred years, Parliament continued to pass statutes (known later as the Six Statutes12) that clarified and expanded on sections of the Magna Carta, constantly working to restrain by law the otherwise unlimited power of the monarch. These statutes ensured that any action taken against a subject, whether taxes, fines, evictions, imprisonment, or execution, had to be done by trial or due process of the law and not at the whim of the king or his officials. Some of these constitutional principles developed in the 1300s13 are enshrined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.14 The passing of the Magna Carta as a statute in Parliament marks a significant shift in the understanding of the power and authority of kings. The kings from the Norman Conquest (William the Conqueror in 1066) until the establishment of Parliaments believed “they ruled by means of their force and will (vis et voluntas), not by the grace of God or legal right.”15 Most people accepted this at the time, but cultural developments shifted toward “the principle of the supremacy of law.”16 The law was no longer a tool used by the king to get his way; rather the king himself was bound by the law and under the law. This shift did not happen by accident. Many of the legal rules and procedures that developed around this time were adapted from canon law (church law) which the king’s lawyers would have studied in the universities, which were also run by the churches. In the canon law tradition, “the idea that the rule of law was antithetical to the rule of men lay dormant.”17 To read the rest of the story, order a copy of André Schutten and Michael Wagner’s “A Christian Citizenship Guide” available for a suggested donation of $25. Email [email protected] or visit arpacanada.ca/CitizenshipGuide. Watch a conversation between the two authors below.  Footnotes 1. “A time out of mind” or “time immemorial” refers to a point beyond which legal authorities believed it was impossible to speak with certainty. See Ryan Alford, Seven Absolute Rights: Recovering the Historical Foundations of Canada’s Rule of Law (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2020), pp. 79-80. 2. This includes the Law Code developed by King Alfred the Great (r. 871-899) which incorporated the 10 commandments into the laws of England, the tradition of the coronation oaths of the Anglo-Saxon kings, the Norman Invasion of 1066 led by William the Conqueror and the Charter of liberties his son King Henry I (r. 1100-1135) instituted. 3. Danny Danziger & John Gillingham, 1215: The Year of the Magna Carta (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 2004), at p. 278. 4. Tom Bingham, The Rule of Law (Penguin Books, 2011), at p. 11. 5. Clause 39, still in force today, states: “No free man shall be arrested, or imprisoned, or deprived of his property, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any way destroyed, nor shall we go against him or send against him, unless by the legal judgment of his peers, or by the law of the land.” The only other clauses still in force today are Clause 1, which guarantees the freedom of the church, and clause 13 (renumbered clause 9 in Magna Carta, 1297), which guarantees the ancient liberties of the City of London. 6. The first clause reads in part: “First, that we have granted to God, and by this present Charter have confirmed for us and our heirs in perpetuity, that the English Church shall be free, and shall have its rights undiminished, and its liberties unimpaired.” 7. Brent Winters, Excellence of the Common Law (2008: self-published), p. 554, note 1383. 8. We are not 100% sure, but this may be why toilets are called “johns”. Some observe that, because King John was so despised, no king has ever been named after him. There has only ever been one King John, and he was bad enough. 9. Alford, Seven Absolute Rights, note 2, at p. 84 10. The Magna Carta was reconfirmed by various kings dozens of times, having last been confirmed by Henry VI in 1423. Ben Johnson, “The History of the Magna Carta,” Historic UK: The History and Heritage Accommodation Guide, online 11. Some might argue that King Edward’s father, King Henry III, instituted the first Parliaments. However, those earlier assemblies were more a collection of barons as advisors than a Parliament. Henry III did issue the first summons of parliamentum generalissimum to 24 barons to convene in January 1237, though only 18 attended. This evolved over time into the House of Lords. King Edward I was the first to have elected representatives from the towns and counties to attend. Those elected representatives evolved into the House of Commons. 12. See discussion on the Six Statutes in Alford, Seven Absolute Rights, note 2, at pp. 885-88. 13. These principles were developed by Parliament in the 1300s but are borrowed from canon law developed in the 1200s. For example, Pope Innocent III maintained that “a prince could not abolish the judicial process or ignore an action, because he was bound by natural law to render justice.” See Alford, Seven Absolute Rights, note 2, at p. 89. 14. These rights include the right not to be arbitrarily detained (s. 9 of the Charter), the right to a fair trial (s.11(d) of the Charter) and a trial by jury in serious offences (s.11(f) of the Charter). 15. Alford, Seven Absolute Rights, note 2, at p. 87. Alford further explains, “The expression of royal anger and ill will (ira et malevolentia) was integral to royal status. Vassals had to accept the possibility of their destruction at the king’s hands as a fact of life.” 16. Alford, Seven Absolute Rights, note 2, at p. 88. 17. Alford, Seven Absolute Rights, note 2, at p. 88....

Adult non-fiction, Book Reviews

The Political Consequences of Unbelief: a review of Groen van Prinsterer's "Unbelief and Revolution"

Unbelief and Revolution by Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer  translated by Harry Van Dyke 1847/2018 / 280 pages As explained in the Encyclopedia Britannica, “Revolution, in social and political science, a major, sudden, and hence typically violent alteration in government and in related associations and structures.” We use the term “revolution” for various political and social changes in history, the most recent being the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s. In Canada, and the West more generally, we’ve seen evidence of a social and cultural revolution as our society increasingly rejects the Christian values and principles on which our nation is founded. To respond appropriately to modern revolutions, we need to understand what forces are behind them. Guillaume Groen van Prinsterer addresses the idea of revolution in his book Unbelief and Revolution, which explains the thinking behind the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century. The French Revolution was a violent political and social revolution which resulted in tens of thousands of deaths. The events of the French Revolution may seem in the distant past, a one-time event, never to be repeated. Instead, “the central message of the book is that the French Revolution is not actually over but lives on in its ideas, and these ideas are dangerous for society.” These ideas were dangerous to van Prinsterer’s society in 19th century Netherlands and remain dangerous to 21st century Canadians. While certain components of Unbelief and Revolution are understandably contextual to van Prinsterer’s time, many of the ideas live on and provide a way for contemporary Christians to think about faith, freedom, and revolution. Three Problems  Unbelief The main idea of Unbelief and Revolution is that “the cause of the Revolution lies in unbelief.” This unbelief was evident theologically, as it sought to remove God’s Word as an authority and replace it with human reason. But it was also seen politically, as the French Revolution replaced the sovereignty of God with the sovereignty of man. The Revolution was an anti-Christian revolution; Instead of looking to the Bible for truth, men trusted in their own reason. With the removal of God came the removal of a foundation for morality. Lest we think this was just a one-time event, van Prinsterer seeks to demonstrate how these ideas became increasingly accepted throughout the course of the 18th century, culminating in the events of the French Revolution. The revolutionary ideas also lived on after the French Revolution. Decades after the French Revolution, he wrote, “For all its excellences, modern society, having fallen into bondage to the theory of unbelief, is increasingly being seduced into a systematic repudiation of the living God.” To van Prinsterer, it’s not just about the French Revolution. Rather, unbelief led to the French Revolution, and continued unbelief would lead to further atrocities as men continued to replace God with themselves. Liberty One of the main ideas behind this systematic unbelief was a false theory of liberty. It was believed that liberty could be achieved by giving power to citizens, who would then grant authority to whomever they chose. Instead of viewing the state as receiving its authority from a sovereign God, the state was viewed as a delegation which was given authority by the majority of citizens. Those who received authority from the people then had the power to protect and rescue the people from their political and social problems. However, when political authority is not viewed as coming from a sovereign God, it instead leads to tyranny. A government that sees its power as given by the people could result in one of two things: anarchy or tyranny. Either the rights of the citizens would be destroyed through tyranny, or the rights of the state would be destroyed through anarchy. The State In the French Revolution, the state indeed became absolute. Take for example the Reign of Terror in 1793 and 1794. The focus became the: “unconditional promotion of the common good or public safety … public safety – a fatal expression, which implies sacrificing morality to what they are agreed to call the interest of the state, that is to say, sacrificing morality to the passions of those who govern.” Everything became about the well-being of the state, and since the people had given authority to the state, everyone was expected to submit to the accepted majority opinion. And what was the majority opinion? Essentially, it was whatever the state determined it to be. That also meant exterminating any opposition and justifying anything that pursued the goal of the common good. In reaction to the Reign of Terror, people wanted an orderly society, so they simply gave up their liberty to maintain order. In one phase of the French Revolution, the people sought liberty without order, and in the next, they sought order without liberty. Although one of the principles of the Revolution was liberty, the result was the destruction of liberty. In the end, the French Revolution is but one example of what can happen when society rejects the authority of God and His Word. Contemporary Similarities Secularism But this isn’t simply a book about various interesting facts surrounding the French Revolution. Although it was written nearly 200 years ago, we can see the dangers of unbelief today as well. Modern-day Canada is a post-Christian and increasingly secular society. We too have largely removed God and His Word as a basis for morality and truth and have raised man to the place of God. Our laws are increasingly disconnected from objective truth and a moral foundation. We “want to retain the conclusions while abandoning the premises.” We want the good that our Christian foundation has given to society, while discarding the Christian foundation itself. This discarding of the Christian foundation might start in a way that seems harmless to much of society. It starts as an effort to be "neutral," to not enforce a particular morality or religion.  First, God is removed from lawmaking and governance. Next, any objective standard for the structure of the world and of government is discarded. At the same time, objective truth and ethical standards cease to apply. The result is that those in power can essentially choose what is right and wrong and apply it as they see fit. When we abandon the premises, the conclusions also fade away. Right and wrong become arbitrary. Liberty and Equality As in the time of the French Revolution, our society has a false idea of liberty and equality. While Christians might understand that the government receives its authority from God (Romans 13), we often talk in a way that indicates a belief that state authority comes from the people, through our democratic processes. We see a heightened emphasis on liberty, particularly sexual liberty to do as one pleases, as well as increased attention to social inequalities. And, in so many ways, our society relies on the government to protect that liberty and equality. Advocates of sexual liberty want the government to endorse their choices, and this is happening because we have removed any foundation for morality. In terms of equality, the government is seen as the saviour from racial or sexual discrimination, whether through laws or through the courts and human rights tribunals. As people suffer the consequences of their unbelief and their immoral actions, they call on the state to save them from their problems. The State and Neutrality When so many focus on the government as the source of their liberty, by permission of the people, the government also chooses what is acceptable and what is not. One area where we can see this clearly is in conversations about hate speech legislation. Ultimately, it will be the government deciding what is, and what is not, hate speech. Van Prinsterer writes about various freedoms that were developed in the century leading up to the Revolution. These included freedoms such as equality, liberty, property, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion. But each of these were also subject to limits. “That the rights are restricted does not offend me; this is inherent in every right,” writes van Prinsterer. “The cause of my complaint is that whereas rights used to be circumscribed and confirmed by the unchangeable laws and ordinances of God, they are now made to depend on the good pleasure of the State.” Our modern Canadian society emphasizes neutrality. The idea is that you cannot let your religion influence the law, because that would not maintain neutrality. Yet we cannot escape the fact that everyone is shaped by their beliefs, no matter what those may be. Unbelief in itself is a particular perspective of the world which shapes how people act. The idea of tolerance of differing ideas, or “just getting along” is challenged by the direct opposition of belief and unbelief. In our current context, revolutionary ideas of liberty and equality are increasingly common, and the majority has supposedly given the government power to determine what those look like regarding sexuality, speech, and human life and dignity. Three Key Takeaways The only solution is belief The problems of the French Revolution, and of the revolutionary ideas in general, happened because of unbelief. The solution to these problems, then, is belief; returning to the truth of God’s Word and His sovereignty. In contrast to the ideas of liberty in the Revolution, the Protestant Reformation properly understood liberty; “a liberty that is grounded in submission. Liberty is the consequence, the principle is submission.” We are able to submit to the truth of God’s Word and to legitimate authority, as well as maintain the freedom to fulfill our duties. Our liberties are based in God’s Word and His sovereignty. Additionally, since He has given authority to our government, that authority is limited by what He commands. As van Prinsterer writes: “then we see that apostasy from him who has said, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life,’ was the cause of the whole Revolution. Then we see that the active confession of the only Saviour is the means of restoration and salvation.” Likewise, the solution to secularism today lies in a recognition of God’s sovereignty and in the infallibility of His Word. Ideas have consequences It is also important to remember that ideas have consequences. The people behind the events of the French Revolution, such as Robespierre during the Reign of Terror, truly believed in the ideas they were fighting for. They were convinced by ideas and philosophers that had come before them and carried out those ideas in practice. “Let us henceforward be mindful of the connection between thought and deed, and never again forget that theory leads to practice.” The same is true of believers who put their trust in Christ and rely on God’s Word as truth. When we understand the biblical perspective, this shows itself in how we act. We can take action As much as I find the French Revolution fascinating, it is discouraging to see the evil perpetrated, particularly along with van Prinsterer’s argument that this is a natural consequence of unbelief that lives on today. Van Prinsterer was concerned about the ideas of the Revolution, and that also led to a period of political action and political change. As he writes, “Even in unfavorable circumstances, however, one can witness to the truth; and this continuous witness itself is already a real application and a powerful practice.”We too can be anti-revolutionaries, in the sense that we oppose unbelief and proclaim the truth of God’s Word. “Let us be faithful, each in his station” (p. 246), and let us pray for revival in Canada so that faith will prevail over unbelief. “Let us always remember that the cry, ‘Help thou mine unbelief!’ is preceded by the shout of joy, ‘Lord, I believe!’.” And as we do so, let’s also remember the words of Christ telling us to “be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33b). Daniel Zekveld is a policy analyst with ARPA Canada....

News

Pro-life Leslyn Lewis comes third in Conservative leadership race

On September 10, Canada’s Conservative Party announced that their new leader would be Pierre Poilievre, taking 71% of the votes cast on the first ballot. It wasn’t a surprise that he won, though the margin of his victory – 59 percentage points better than the second-place finisher – was stunning. His total percentage was better than any Conservative leadership candidate before him. But what of the only pro-life candidate in the race? How did Leslyn Lewis do? She finished third, a placing that was celebrated by some social conservatives. She was neck-and-neck with runner-up Jean Charest, finishing less than 2,000 votes behind with 11.1% of the votes compared to his 11.6%.  She could also celebrate increasing her vote total from the 2020 leadership race – she got 3,000 more first ballot votes this time around. But even as Lewis did better, things got much worse for the unborn. The Conservative Party has shifted enormously since the 2020 leadership race, where the two pro-life candidates, Lewis and Derek Sloan, combined to receive 40% of the first-round votes. Two years later, Lewis, now the lone pro-life candidate, got just 11%. Only 1 in 10 of the ballot-casting members of the Conservative Party believed the unborn should be a priority. While we might wish things were otherwise, we need to put to rest any notion that there might yet be “hidden pro-lifers” in the party. Couldn’t there have been some pro-lifers who voted for Poilievre because they were worried that otherwise Charest might win? No. Under the ranked ballot used in this race, there was simply no reason for a pro-lifer not to support the only pro-life candidate. If Lewis had gotten eliminated early on, and a second ballot was still required, then any who’d voted for her could still have had their ballot count against Charest by listing Poilievre as their second choice. There was no strategic reason to do anything other than vote pro-life if you cared for the unborn; Lewis’ 11% is an accurate representation of the sum total of the Conservative’s pro-life membership. That’s it, and that’s all. The temptation here is to despair. The only major party open to pro-lifers is stacked against us 9 to 1? But there is something we can thank God for, even in this defeat. Hasn’t He freed us from a very different temptation, the temptation to silence? We can know for certain now that the politicians and major parties aren’t going to try changing any hearts and minds about abortion. So, if the unborn are going to have defenders, it’s going to have to be God’s Church, and God’s people. Instead of succumbing to despair, we can thank God for this clarity. And we can ask Him to give us the courage to: Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly;   defend the rights of the poor and needy. – Prov 31:8-9 Photo by John Balca and used under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license....

Politics

Why the Right always drifts Left

"O’Sullivan’s First Law" states: "All organizations that are not actually right-wing will, over time, become left-wing.” Coined by journalist John O'Sullivan back in 1989, it described the leftward tilt that we see happen among politicians, parties, and organizations of all sorts whenever they refuse to loudly and clearly establish their conservative bona fides. A recent example happened in the last Canadian election, when Conservative leader Erin O'Toole led his party so far leftward they shared the Liberal's positions on abortion, euthanasia, and all things LGBT. Then, once the campaign started, O'Toole also flipped his position on conscience protection, again adopting the Liberal Party position. This isn't simply a Canadian phenomenon, as this video highlights. However, as insightful as O'Sullivan's First Law is in its diagnosis, it doesn't point us to a cure. He might have thought he did: actually be right-wing! But O'Sullivan first wrote his Law in National Review, a magazine as firmly rooted as any conservative organization could expect to be (it was, at one point, described as "the bible of American conservatism"). Yet today the publisher is a man "married" to another man. They drifted too. The fact is, stopping the drift requires a firmer foundation than mere "conservatism." The need for a firm footing The weakness of conservatism is that it isn't even a foundation to stand on. At best it's an anchor that can be thrown out to slow down our rate of descent. O'Sullivan is partly right that the more energy a group expends in defining their brand of conservatism, the more weighty the anchor, and the longer they may be able to hold out. But to actually make headway back up the slope again requires a firm foundation to push off of, and that's something that mere conservatism doesn't offer. Conservatism is rooted only in human thought. A firm footing can only be found in God's thought, and in His Word. Conservatism is moveable; only God is not. So, O'Sullivan got us off to a good start, but we can take things further by riffing off of Matt. 12:30: "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." The result is "O'Dykstra's First Law": "Those who are not unabashedly Christian, will over time – along with the organizations they make up – become unabashedly anti-Christian." The diagnosis is once again well established. Universities (Harvard and Yale), mainline denominations (the United Church of Canada), and charities (Bethany Christian Services), that were founded to spread God's Word, got embarrassed by parts of it, got quiet about those parts, and are now, in this way or that, actively opposing God and His law. So how about us? Are we embarrassed by God's Word? How often do you hear Christians – not simply politicians, but anyone at all – speaking in the public square and unashamedly presenting God's thoughts on an issue as God's thoughts? Conservative arguments have no foundation That doesn't really happen. Instead: When Christians defend the unborn they'll most often do so without any mention of the biblical principles involved, as they're found in Ex. 20:13, Gen. 1:27, and elsewhere. Instead, we'll focus on how the fetus can feel pain, or on when its heartbeat begins. We'll oppose euthanasia without mention made that our lives are not our own to dispose of as we wish. We'll instead point to the potential euthanasia laws have for abuse. We'll combat pornography, but not because it violates God's plan for sex, but because of its linkage to mental health issues like depression. We use these godless arguments because our target audience is a godless culture. We do it in the name of strategy, effectiveness, and common sense but, in an ironic twist, it is none of those things. Consider the arguments we just made, and how easy it is to rebut them. Abortion is wrong because the fetus feels pain? Implicit in this objection is the approval of abortion for children who don't yet feel pain. Did we mean to do that? The world says our value comes from what we can do, and they justify abortion because the unborn can't do much. We'll adopt the very same "able-ism" ideology to tout what the unborn can do. But the same argument protecting a 21-day-old unborn child because his heart has just now begun beating out its rhythm, is the same argument that condemns a 20-day-old who can't do it yet. If euthanasia is wrong because it can be abused, that's only an argument for more safeguards. It's, at best, just an anchor slowing the decline, with no effort directed at an actual reversal of course. Pornography is bad because it causes mental health issues? Well, that all depends on what we mean by "mental health." Some among the LGBT lobby have touted pornography for its mental health benefits since those who partake are more open to their "alternative" lifestyles. Standing unmoved Why is it so easy to rebut these conservative arguments? It's because they have no foundations. Abortion is wrong, not because the unborn can do this or that, but because the unborn are made in the very Image of their Creator, just like you and me. It's only when we offer up God's own Truth that we get to the heart of the matter. It's only then that we're actually countering the lie with Truth. It's only then that we're standing with feet firmly planted. Will the world listen? That's not in our control. But by setting our own feet firmly on God's Word, we can stop our own drift. When we profess His Name, and find our confidence in the victory He has already won, then the world won't be able to move us. And who knows how God might make use of our faithfulness?...

Politics

Political tactics 101: reframing the aggressor

The concept of self-defense is easy to understand and its validity is recognized by most people, whether Christian or not. If somebody is attacked, it is easy to understand that fighting back is a proper and even moral thing to do. That’s why people sympathize with the victim in these situations – self-defense seems naturally just. I’m a victim! That’s also why when a political debate is being framed, each side wants to be seen as the side that is being attacked – they want to be the side that is simply fighting back, rather than the bully who is picking fights. So it should come as no surprise then that whenever Christians get politically active, they are portrayed as the aggressors. Every since the 1970s when today’s conservative Christian political movements first began to take shape, Christians have been accused of trying to force our morality on other people. Why, oh why can't we just leave others alone? But it just isn’t so. Christian political activism has been a defensive response to secularist attacks. If we look at things in their proper historical context, it leads to the question, “who was forcing what upon whom?” Did groups of Christians suddenly decide to organize politically to force other people to adopt Christian styles of living? No. The fact is, it was social movements on the Left that began forcing changes that led Christians to respond with social and political action of their own. The other side was (and is) on the offense, and Christians are simply responding. Reactions This was pointed out as far back as 1982 by a prominent American sociologist, Nathan Glazer. He wrote an article at that time explaining the efforts of the then newly-formed Christian political groups that had played an important role in the 1980 American election that saw the rise of President Ronald Reagan. His article was called "Fundamentalists: A Defensive Offensive" and was republished a few years later in a collection of essays entitled Piety and Politics: Evangelicals and Fundamentalists Confront the World. (Don’t be confused by the word “fundamentalist.” It is a common term used to describe conservative Protestants, although in many contexts it is meant in a disparaging way.) Glazer lists the various issues that were (and still are) of primary concern to conservative Christians to show that they are fighting defensive battles. “Abortion did not become an issue because Fundamentalists wanted to strengthen prohibitions against abortion, but because liberals wanted to abolish them.” Pornography did not become an issue because Christians suddenly decided to ban adult literature, but because by the 1970s porn was becoming ubiquitous and prominently displayed in stores. Homosexuality didn’t become an issue because Christians suddenly became obsessed with it, but because the homosexual rights movement began to make big political and legal strides. Feminism also emerged as a powerful political force leading to a Christian response. In each of these cases, the Christian activity was a response to a political offensive from the other side. This leads Glazer to write, “What we are seeing is a defensive reaction of the conservative heartland, rather than an offensive that intends to or is capable of really upsetting the balance, or of driving the United States back to the nineteenth century or early twentieth century.” Due to the initial surge of Christian political activity, many people viewed the Christians as being on the offensive. But even if their activity did amount to an offensive of sorts, its whole purpose was ultimately defensive. In this respect, Glazer calls it a “defensive offensive.” But it’s vitally important to keep the defensive nature in mind. “This ‘defensive offensive’ itself can be understood only as a response to what is seen as aggression—the aggression that banned prayer from the schools, or, most recently, the Ten Commandments from school-house walls, that prevented states from expressing local opinion as to the legitimacy of abortion, and that, having driven religion out of the public schools, now is seeking to limit the schools that practice it.” Conclusion Every society operates within some code of morality. All laws are based on a concept of morality, even traffic laws which protect people from the careless driving habits of others. Conservative Christians have not taken it upon themselves to introduce some new rules upon society but simply to defend the rules that have served well for hundreds of years. It is the other side that is trying to force a new morality onto society, and then accusing the Christians of doing so. Thus not only is their accusation false but it is also hypocritical. Christian activism is a form of political self-defense. Christians didn’t start this fight. They are responding to changes launched from the other side. This first appeared in the February 2011 issue under the title "Political self-defense: some people find Christianity quite offensive – it just isn’t so."...

Assorted

Allies vs. cobelligerents: don't mix them up!

Sometimes we find the most unlikely sorts fighting alongside us. Maybe it’s atheists and Roman Catholics standing with us against abortion, or feminists joining hands with us against pornography, or Jungian psychologists leading the way for us defending freedom of speech. When that happens it is important to understand what sort of combined effort we are making. As Douglas Wilson explains in Empires of Dirt: "An ally fights the same enemy you are fighting, and for the same reasons. A co-belligerent fights them for different reasons.” The danger is in mistaking co-belligerents for allies. When we side with a group like feminists, we have to keep in mind that the relationship between co-belligerents is not that of friendship, but utility – they are with us only so long as we can further their ends. But Paul's warning against being "unequally yoked" (2 Cor 6:14) applies here, because feminists have many ends we want no part of. Take the matter of “equality.” We believe in that too, right? That's why it would be only natural if, after working together against pornography, we mistook feminists for our buddies, and wanted to help them on the matter of “women’s rights” too. The problem is, we aren’t like-minded. Feminists are not our allies. Their understanding of equality is rooted in an ungodly denial of any gender differences. While we can stand side-by-side with them against sexual harassment, and against pornography, and against sex-selective abortion, we have to be aware they’re going to spin it all as being about “women’s rights.” And we have to ensure we don’t make the mistake of “allying” with their understanding of the term. Yes, we believe in equality, but not rooted in sameness. Equality has nothing to do with the genders being interchangeable and indistinguishable. No, God made us male and female and it is an attack on His creative genius to dismiss or demean what makes men masculine and what makes women feminine. On this point we do not side with the feminists, but must stand with the French: vive la difference! Different is good (Genesis 1:31, 2:18) and, in fact, these differences are to be explored and celebrated! So Christians have an entirely different basis for equality. We recognize that we are all unique, varying in our height, weight, hair color, eye color, and skin color, and in interests, abilities and much, much more. Thus the only real basis for equality is in the one thing (and one thing only) we all share: male and female, black and white, tall and short, blonde and brunette, all of us are made in God’s image.  Christians can be co-belligerents with feminists and others, on any number of issues, but we must never make the mistake of thinking or acting like these groups are our allies....

News, Politics

Conversion therapy and silence in Canada

Many concerned readers will remember the federal government of Canada’s effort to ban conversion therapy throughout 2021. The Liberals began their efforts in the spring, with a bill that would ban any therapy that was intended to help change a person's sexual preferences from homosexual or transexual to heterosexual. There were many hearings, some of which I watched, and I was astounded by the clear articulation by so many participants who spoke against the government's broad definition of conversion therapy. The hearings included horrific stories of tortuous attempts of conversion therapy (and these tortures should indeed be banned), but it became clear that the legislation also sought to ban conversations and advice that, for example, a pastor might offer a parishioner who requested their help. While it seemed inevitable that the legislation was going to pass, it would have to do so with much opposition. In June 2021, 62 Conservative MPs voted against this bill at Third Reading, and it moved on to the Senate. However, before they could deal with it, a federal election was called, and the business of Parliament came to an end. The next elected government would have to start all over. That meant there would be another opportunity to continue fighting against bad definitions, godless intentions, and government overreach. Sadly, on December 1, a Conservative Party motion to fast track the government's latest "conversion therapy ban" legislation (Bill C-4), was unanimously approved by the House of Commons. No debate, no discussion, no hearings, no fighting for care and caution. Mr. O’Toole was one of the 51 Conservative MPs that voted for the Bill originally, and he suggested that there were many different ways to expedite the legislative process for the Bill. What’s worse, as reported by the Globe and Mail, we learned: Earlier this week, the Liberal government reintroduced a bill banning conversion therapy. The legislation was wider reaching than a previous version. It was intended to ban the practice entirely for children and adults. Before, the proposed legislation left open the possibility that an adult could consent to conversion therapy. The new bill closes that loophole. (Ian Bailey, Dec. 1 – Surprise Conservative motion sends conversion therapy ban bill through Commons). Silent MPs There are so many different implications with this move that it is hard to comment on them all. What is most disconcerting is the silence with which this Bill was passed. Three members of the Conservative Party, Arnold Viersen (Conservative MP clarifies his stance on “conversion therapy” ban | The Bridgehead), Cathy Wagantall (Second Conservative MP clarifies stance on unanimous vote for “conversion therapy” ban | The Bridgehead), and Ted Falk (Conservative MP explains what happened with unanimous Bill C-4 vote), have expressed regret in not speaking up at that moment, objecting to the unanimous passage of this Bill (can we anticipate more such commentary?). Had only one person done so, the Bill would have had to go through the regular legislative procedures. I appreciate the humility and transparency of Viersen, Wagantall, and Falk and I believe they are sincere in their expression of regret – they are consistent with their previous actions and comments on this topic. Christians excusing silent MPs Another disconcerting phenomenon flowing from this event has been the social media commentary by many Christians dismissing or even endorsing the silence of these and other parliamentarians as being “sheep in the midst of wolves” and thus, being “wise as serpents and innocent as doves” (Matt 10:16). I understand the very real challenge of being a Christian politician, and I would not want to be judgmental. However, if we won’t take a stand on this issue, with relatively little at stake, what issues do we stand up for? One person considered this a lost cause, so “pick your battles.” Sure, there is truth in both statements, but it isn’t that we were going to lose the battle that concerns us, but how we lost it – capitulation and silence; acquiescing and standing by. Today, it is officially the case that there is not a single Member of Parliament who objects to the definition of Conversion Therapy in Canada. A few months ago there were 61. We are going to lose most moral battles moving forward – we don’t have a great track record of wins – but for righteousness’ sake we fight the battles. If we don’t fight because we know we’re going to lose, then whenever there is a Liberal government with support from the NDP and others, we may stop fighting altogether. Rather, let us recognize that some are fighting on the front lines, where the battle is most fierce, tiring, public, and hard – they need our support and encouragement. And when they lay down their weapons in a moment of weakness, we can still be behind them spurring them on to pick up the armory and keep on fighting – they haven’t lost all our support for such a moment. But neither should we say to the frontline fighters, “drop the weapons, stop fighting, late us take this blow so we can fight the next onslaught.” Such a strategy will not work. After repeated capitulation like this, it will only make those in the supporting roles look for others to support. The ban on conversion therapy legislation passed in silence and was celebrated with loud clamor. This was a sad day in Canada’s history and we pray that the Lord will stem the growing tide of secularism that is filling our land. May he also continue to grant strong men and women who can fight these battles where they are placed, to his honor and glory. May he also forgive all of us when we fail to do so. Postscript: Conversion therapy definitions The Bill (needing only Royal Assent now to be law) defines Conversion Therapy thusly: “Conversion therapy means a practice, treatment, or service designed to change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual; change a person’s gender identity to cisgender; change a person’s gender expression so that it conforms to the sex assigned to the person at birth; repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behaviour; repress a person’s non-cisgender gender identity; or repress or reduce a person’s gender expression that does not conform to the sex assigned to the person at birth” There is one point we need to understand. There is nothing in this law that would prevent a practice, treatment, or service designed to change person’s sexual orientation to homosexual; there is nothing in it banning attempts to change a person’s gender identity from heterosexual; it raises no objections to treatments, practices, or services intended to change a person’s gender expression so that it no longer conforms to their biological sex; it does not stand in the way of attempts to repress or reduce heterosexual attraction or heterosexual behavior, etc. It becomes clear then, that this Bill is not about banning conversion therapy, it is about allowing conversion therapy in only one direction – the unbiblical direction. Being gender fluid, transgender, homosexually active, etc. are celebrated and promoted in so many different ways in public schools and communities. There is a strong effort to promote sexual conversions through SOGI 123, and other similar curriculum. This isn’t about creating a safe space for struggling youths – it is about creating a cultural revolution where the standards of God’s Word are continually being tossed aside. ARPA Canada (C-4: Conversion Therapy) and others have commented on the implications of this legislation elsewhere. The next steps, as outlined by Cathy Wagantall, include “working with parents, pastors, and legal experts to develop legislation that protects parents’ and faith leaders’ ability to have conversations with individuals seeking clarity on their personal life decisions.” May the Lord bless these efforts!...

News, Politics

Bill C-4: the Conservatives did this to Canada

On November 29 the Liberals introduced a bill to ban "Conversion Therapy" that they'd twice before failed to pass. But what the Liberals couldn't do, Conservative leader Erin O'Toole promised he would get done. What was the bill about?  Under the pretense of protecting homosexuals from getting forcibly "converted" from their same-sex attraction, Bill C-4 targeted Christian pastors and counselors and others willing to help those who want out of the homosexual lifestyle. As Jonathon Van Maren wrote: "there were concerns that the deliberately broad definition proposed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberals would ban pastoral conversations between clergy and their parishioners and leave adults with unwanted same-sex attraction unable to receive the counseling they desired. In fact, in some instances parents could be prevented from opposing sex changes for their own children." This was actually the third time the Liberals had introduced such a bill, but the previous two had been derailed by the months-long process that it takes to get a bill approved. The previous attempt, then labeled Bill C-6, was introduced on September 23, 2020, and took nine months, until June 22, 2021, to pass through the committee hearings and the three readings required in the House of Commons. It was then given to the Senate for their own three-stage assessment process, but they didn't have a chance to pass it before the Prime Minister called an election on August 15. His election call meant that Bill C-6 (along with all the other bills not yet passed) "died on the order paper." Bill C-4 might have had to go through this same process, and in the months and even years that it could have taken, who knows but that God might have derailed it yet once more. But on Dec. 1 Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole told the media that his party was going to "accelerate passage" of the government's bill. Later that same day Conservative MP Rob Moore put forward a motion to skip all the House committees and readings, and send the bill directly and immediately to the Senate. His motion required unanimous approval to pass – if a single MP had voiced a nay, the motion wouldn't have passed. How could the Conservatives have expected to get that unanimity when there had been 63 MPs willing to vote against Bill C-6 earlier this year? Of that number 62 were their own Conservative MPs. So why would they expect to have no opposition this time around? Their confidence might have been, in part, due to the timing of their motion. Conservative MP Garnett Genius was the most vocal opponent of the previous Bill C-6, launching the website “Fix the Definition” to put a face to the people this bill would harm. But on December 1, Genuis was out of the country, attending a NATO conference in Latvia. The Conservative strategy also involved pulling a fast one on their own MPs – the motion was made and passed in approximately one minute. They were able to do it so quickly because no one actually had to vote for the motion: the Speaker of the House only asked to hear from those opposed to it. When no one spoke up, it was passed.  While many of the Conservatives were clearly in on this maneuver – as evidenced by the wild clapping immediately afterward – any MPs unaware of what Rob Moore was about to do could have blinked and they would have missed it, it was over that fast. The CPAC coverage of the vote shows that some of the Conservatives were not clapping, and remained sitting and the most downcast of them might have been Arnold Viersen (blue jacket, red tie, three rows from the back on the right side) In a statement he posted to Facebook nine days later, Viersen explained that: "...it was a surprise that caught me and some of my colleagues off guard. I am opposed to C-4 as written and should have said no, but I did not react fast enough. I'm sorry." The comments below his post were filled with thanks for his apology. For almost two weeks it had been a mystery as to why a bill that criminalized the presentation of the Gospel would pass without any Christian MPs objecting. Now we had a partial explanation for the MPs' silence: this had been sprung on them. But even as surprise can be an explanation for what happened in the House, no such explanation was possible for the senators – they has the advance notice of seeing what was pulled in the House, and it made no difference. There, too, it was the Conservatives who put forward the motion to get the bill past all of the usual steps. And once again, not a single representative spoke up. Curiously, in his Facebook post, Viersen suggested that: "Had we won the election we would not be in this situation." In a message fellow Conservative MP Cathay Wagantall sent to ARPA Canada some days later, and let them share publicly, she borrowed this same phrase: "Had we won the election, we would not be in this situation." Let's consider that for a moment. Who was it, that pulled this on us? Wasn't it the Conservatives? We can be relieved that Garnett Genuis and Arnold Viersen have some sort of explanation or apology for why they didn't stand up against this bill, but the Conservative Party overall has no such excuse. Trudeau's Liberals introduced this bill, but it was O'Toole's Conservatives who accomplished what the Liberals never did: the Conservatives got it across the finish line. It bears repeating just how wicked this bill is. As Jojo Ruba noted, while an earlier version of the bill at least "could not prevent consenting adults from having conversations about sexuality with their clergy or their counselor, as long as the counseling was free" this latest version removed even that protection. That's what the Conservative Party has accomplished under O'Toole: they've made the compelling case that they are not the lesser of two evils, but rather the more effective. So where are politically-minded Christians to turn? Aren't the Conservatives still our only option? They are, after all, the only major party to tolerate pro-life Christians. That's true enough, but as the passage of this law highlights, tolerating Christians is very different from siding with them. If Christians are to be involved in the Conservative Party, it cannot be to further the party's agenda. We cannot let them use us for their ends, as happened here. If Christians are to continue in the Conservative Party then they have to do so with their eyes wide open, involving themselves in the party only to use it for our own, godly ends. If it becomes impossible to do that, then that should be the end of our involvement. Christians should have no loyalty to a party that has no loyalty to God, and, indeed, in this latest act, stands in direct opposition....

Culture Clashes

A beginner’s guide to contending

For decades there has been talk of a “culture war” in North America. This is the ongoing battle we’re having over which beliefs our society will use as its foundation, to build atop them our institutions, laws, customs, and even our art and literature. Many books and articles have been written about this war, explaining it in various ways. Some people probably just tune out the controversy, not fully understanding its implications. However, it is possible to provide a summary of the main issues at stake, so that everyone can understand the basic conflict and react appropriately. Such a summary has been written by Peter Kreeft, a professor of philosophy at Boston College. He offers it in his 2002 book, How to Win the Culture War: A Christian Battle Plan for a Society in Crisis. While Kreeft is a Roman Catholic, and his theology openly affects his analysis, he gets the key issues right. 2 major fronts, 1 central issue Since the late 1960s, the two major fronts in the culture war have involved abortion and homosexual rights. There are related but less salient conflicts over pornography, divorce law, and sex education.  Strange as it may seem, all of these matters, in one way or another, involve sexuality. Why is that the case? It all comes down to the traditional family and the “progressive” or left-wing campaign to fundamentally change society. As Kreeft explains: “The most powerful means to destroy society is to destroy its one absolutely fundamental building block, namely the family.” The best way to destroy the family is by destroying its foundation, stable marriage. And the best way to destroy stable marriage is, Kreeft notes, “by loosening its glue: sexual fidelity.” Commitment to sexual fidelity is destroyed by characterizing traditional Christian sexual morality as repressive or confining. The Sexual Revolution of the last few decades has been a campaign to “liberate” people from their obligation to sexual fidelity. Thus the central element of the culture war is a conflict over society’s ethical norms for sexuality – recognizing that is the key to understanding the ongoing culture war. The Culture War is a religious war        In the West our traditional norms have often been rooted in Christianity. The norms of the so-called progressive Left are religiously based too, though some will undoubtedly dispute it. But it is religious in the sense that it a belief system through which they understand the world around them and everything in it. It is in this sense, Kreeft argues, that “sex is the effective religion of our culture” It is this all-encompassing religious basis of the progressive sexual norm that explains its enthusiasm for the murder of unborn children. As Kreeft puts it, the progressives: “don’t defend murder, except murder in the name of sex.... Abortion is backup birth control, of course, and birth control means the demand to have sex without having babies.” This is a key point to remember, especially with the current high-profile controversy over pro-life laws in some American states. The progressives, Kreeft writes, “are now even willing to murder to defend their so-called sexual freedoms. And to murder the most innocent among them, the only innocent among them. And the most tiny and weak and defenseless of all. And in the teeth of nature’s strongest instinct: motherhood!” Of course, humanity’s weakness for sexual temptation has always been a problem and it has led to a multitude of sins over the centuries. It’s not like the Sexual Revolution initiated rampant sexual immorality for the first time: Sodom and Gomorrah were perverse millennia ago. But something has changed in the last few decades. Until relatively recently, sex outside of the confines of traditional marriage was considered to be immoral, even by those who participated in it. Today, engaging in sexual behaviors that were deemed abominable just a few decades ago are considered to be very respectable, even something to celebrate with parades. The Enemy In order to properly fight the culture war, it is vital to recognize the enemy. Kreeft identifies two. “Our enemies are demons. Fallen angels. Evil spirits.” We are in a spiritual war, so naturally we have spiritual adversaries. As Ephesians 6:12 puts it, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (ESV). The second enemy is even worse, and that is sin. It is our own depraved tendency towards evil that must be fought most of all. The greatest enemy lies within each one of us. From this fact Kreeft explains that if, “…sin is the enemy, then the Savior from sin is the answer, and He is infinitely more powerful than his enemy. The weapon that will win this war – this war’s atomic bomb – is saints.” In other words, the key weapon consists of Christians who will commit themselves to live truly holy lives in obedient service to God. Saints Our normal tendency as individuals is to see the political problems we face as somebody else’s fault. The other guy needs to change. He needs to correct his bad behavior and live right. But that’s the wrong way to think about it. We each need to focus on our own sinfulness, not somebody else’s. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we can become the people God can use to bring victory for His cause. As Kreeft explains: “Can you imagine what ten more Mother Teresas would do for this world? Or ten more John Wesleys? No, you can’t imagine it, any more than anyone could imagine how twelve nice Jewish boys could conquer the Roman Empire. You can’t imagine it. But you can do it. You can become a saint.” Kreeft uses the word “saint” to describe a Christian who is fully committed to living a holy life in service to God. This is how he explains what is necessary to be a saint in his terms: “Give Christ one hundred percent of your heart and life one hundred percent of the time, holding nothing back, absolutely nothing at all, anywhere, ever. This means martyrdom – and for most of us, a more extended and difficult martyrdom than that of the noose or execution block. It means the martyrdom of dying daily, dying every minute for as long as you live, dying to all your desires and plans, including your pet plans about how to become a saint.” The best way to fight the culture war, in other words, is for every Christian to be the very best Christian he or she could be. Victory will not be found in certain political parties or laws that get passed. Those kinds of things may be necessary at various times, but the focus must be on how we can live holier lives, not on how we can get something else to change. Conclusion The culture war is essentially a conflict over sexual morality that began with the Sexual Revolution of the late 1960s. Left-wing forces have sought to fundamentally transform Western society by undermining the monogamous, heterosexual family. Liberating people from the strict confines of traditional Christian morality requires legalized abortion on demand and same-sex marriage, with all that they entail. Peter Kreeft explains that the best way to fight the culture war is for every Christian to be the best Christian they can be, by the power of the Holy Spirit. There are no special political strategies that can bring victory, just old-fashioned holy living and service to God. That’s not to say that political and social activism are of no value. Rather, it’s that our first priority must be on dealing with the sin in our own lives. Good things will flow from that. Michael Wagner is the author of “Leaving God Behind: The Charter of Rights and Canada’s Official Rejection of Christianity,” available at Merchantship.ca....

Politics

What is “political success”?

Stephen Harper’s mistaken understanding changed him from a principled conservative to a power-focused politician  **** People get involved in politics because they’re concerned about the future. They know certain principles need to be defended, for the good of all, even the good of those that oppose those very principles. However, in a pluralistic, increasingly relativistic, country like Canada, it’s hard to get elected while standing uncompromisingly on principle (just ask the Christian Heritage Party!). So compromise on principle and you might win, don’t and you’ll almost certainly lose. How then can we succeed? It’s a key question, but there’s a more important one that we need to answer first: how are we going to define political “success”? The dictionary tells us success is “reaching our goal” but it doesn’t offer any insight into what those goals should be in the political arena. The Bible does. We were created for the glory of God (Is. 43:7) and therefore, whatever we do, we should do it “all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). Now the world defines political success as being elected to office. And because they do, principles are then seen as impediments that get in the way of achieving that goal. But if we define “success” as glorifying God, then we will publicly advocate for His principles, and we will speak out to honor God, and to educate people about what really is right. Then success will be had by having the loudest election campaign possible. Then we will speak out at every opportunity, and without fear, because whatever the election result, we will know we have already achieved God’s idea of success. Can both types of success be had? But what if someone could be principled and get elected? On occasion a man or woman associated with clear principles will seem to make strides towards electoral success. We do have some godly Members of Parliament. However, history seems to show that for a person to reach the highest positions of influence they will need to backtrack from their previous principles. Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper is an example of this phenomenon. Early in his political career, Stephen Harper was considered to be a principled conservative. After serving one term as a Reform Party MP, he became president of the National Citizens Coalition (NCC) in 1997. The NCC is a conservative organization that promotes limited government and individual freedom. Harper pursued this objective passionately and effectively. However, after leaving the NCC in 2001 to become leader of the Canadian Alliance, Harper began to compromise his principles. Gerry Nicholls of the National Citizens Coalition One of the people most surprised by Stephen Harper’s compromise was Gerry Nicholls, a longtime staff member of the NCC. In his 2009 book, Loyal to the Core: Stephen Harper, Me and the NCC, Nicholls provided an account of Harper’s time as NCC president. Initially Nicholls was convinced that Harper was committed to conservative principles. That’s why, after Harper re-entered electoral politics, Nicholls helped Harper’s campaign and was willing to overlook Harper’s initial compromises. Eventually, however, Nicholls saw the writing on the wall. For Nicholls, the straw that broke the camel’s back was the Conservative government’s March 2007 budget. That budget involved what Nicholls describes as “an orgy of massive government spending.” “After that,” Nicholls explains, “I knew Stephen had no intention of providing Canadians with conservative government, or of even paying lip service to conservative ideals. He had turned his back on conservatism.” Professor Tom Flanagan That assessment might sound harsh, but it is shared by Tom Flanagan, a political science professor at the University of Calgary. Flanagan was, for many years, a close companion of Stephen Harper. Flanagan managed Harper’s successful leadership campaigns for the Canadian Alliance and for the new Conservative Party of Canada, and also played key roles in the Conservative Party’s 2004 and 2006 federal election campaigns. After a while, however, Flanagan became concerned about the change in Harper’s political direction. Eventually the two men had a falling out. In 2011 Flanagan wrote a letter to the editor of the Literary Review of Canada where he described Harper’s compromised political perspective as prime minister: Harper has adopted the Liberal shibboleths of bilingualism and multiculturalism. He has no plans to reintroduce capital punishment, criminalize abortion, repeal gay marriage or repeal the Charter. He swears allegiance to the Canada Health Act. He has enriched equalization payments for the provinces and pogey for individuals. He has enthusiastically accepted government subsidies to business, while enlarging regional economic expansion. He now advocates Keynesian deficit spending and government bailouts of failing corporations, at least part of the time. Flanagan, in fact, wrote this letter to reassure certain prominent Liberals that their policies still governed Canada. The “Liberal consensus lives on,” Flanagan wrote, “It’s just under new management.” Stephen Harper’s management. Conclusion In the 2015 federal election, Stephen Harper was clearly preferable to Justin Trudeau of the Liberal Party and Thomas Mulcair of the New Democratic Party. He was the “lesser of evils” among the major party leaders. But that’s not a very high recommendation. In current Canadian politics, conservative principles and even more so, Christian principles, are most often a hindrance to electoral success. The career of Stephen Harper is a clear example of how conservatives and Christians can be tempted by the worldly sort of political success into jettisoning their principles. But the cost of this kind of “success” is very high. What’s the point of attaining power if principles cannot be the guidelines for governing? However, if our “success” is defined as glorifying God by publicly proclaiming truth, then doing so and facing the electoral consequences is a meaningful activity. By this standard, a loud and public Christian Heritage Party campaign that loses would be more successful than all the electoral wins of Stephen Harper’s Conservatives. “I'd rather be right than be president,” said US Senator Henry Clay in 1838. That’s an admirable sentiment that Stephen Harper rejected. We must not make the same mistake. Photo credit: Mike Ridewood/iStockPhoto.com, Oct. 2008, Calgary....

Politics

Compulsory voting is only for show

Should everyone have to vote? This past September the polling group Research Co. asked 1,000 Canadians if voting should be made mandatory in all federal elections. 62% thought it should be. Why would so many want to make voting compulsory? Advocates argue that higher voter turnouts give a government a higher degree of political legitimacy. In Australia, where voting is required, the 2013 election saw roughly 80% of the voting age population cast a ballot.1 To put that number in context, over Canada's last three federal elections we’ve averaged about 65% of the electorate casting a ballot. Compulsory voting could increase those totals. How? By forcing the apathetic to get up off the couch: folks who were too lazy to get educated about their choices, or those who know and hate their choices but who are too sluggish to step up and offer voters an alternative. Now here's a question: do we even want them voting? We can force them out to the ballot box, but nothing we do can force them to get informed. Why would we want to make them eenie, meenie, miney, mo their way through the slate of candidates? Are we really making democracy better when one voter's thoughtful choice can be countered by a guy making selections based on his favorite number? “I’m going with lucky number 4!” Making voting mandatory will inflate the voter turnout, but that’s really only a sham: requiring someone to vote doesn’t mean they will be any more involved. Compulsory voting won't motivate the I-won’t–vote-unless-you make-me sort to also spend time studying the issues and researching the various candidate’s positions. That's why, the very last thing we need to do is force people who don’t care, who haven’t done their research, and who otherwise wouldn’t vote, to now go down and mark their utterly random “x” on a ballot. Endnote 1 The official figure was 93% but that doesn’t factor in that, despite the law, 10% of Australians aren’t registered to vote. When we consider all the people of voting age, and then see how many actually voted, we get 80%....

Politics

Even the world should agree…Christians activism is good for democracy

Many among the Left, and even some on the right would like Christians to just stay out of politics. These are the sort who will chant “Separation of Church and State!” and “Don’t force your morality on me!” We could critique the inconsistency in their thinking – they don’t have any problem forcing their morals on us. But in his book The Democratic Virtues of the Christian Right, Prof. Jon A. Shields rebuts this anti-Christian mob a different way. He notes that there are three main agreed upon measures by which political movements are generally evaluated. And by these measures Christians most definitely have a positive impact in the political realm. Or, in other words, Christian political involvement is good for democracy. Three measures So what are these three measures? 1) Does it foster participation? As Justin Trudeau considers just how he is going to remake Canada’s political process one of the changes that has been suggested is that everyone be required to vote. While that is a very bad idea (do we really want to force those who would otherwise be too lazy or uncaring to vote, to casually and carelessly cast a ballot?) it is based on the thought that the people should have their say. So the first measure, as to whether a political movement is a positive force in a democracy is whether the movement has been successful in mobilizing citizens into political participation... especially citizens who had previously been disaffected or alienated from politics. Is the movement getting more people out to the voting booths? Is it getting more people to visit or write their MP or MLA or city councilor? 2) Does it encourage civil discussions? The second measure is whether the movement encourages its adherents to abide by “deliberative norms.” Some political movements encourage screaming, shouting and even rioting. But if a movement encourages people to speak in a civil manner to their opponents, then we can agree that the movement is, in this respect, a positive force in our democracy. 3) Does it help the common good? The third measure is whether the goals of the movement enhance the common good. Unfortunately, this third criterion is not very helpful because the common good is defined very differently by people holding to different worldviews. Christian political involvement does help the common good but this is not something those on the other side will be likely to concede. So it would be best to focus on the first two criteria, which can be considered separately from the third. Participation Sheilds’ focus is on the American political scene, and there he notes that beginning in the 1970s and accelerating during the 1980s and 1990s, Christian organizations (notably the Christian Coalition) deliberately organized conservative Christians for political activity. This effort had a significant effect. Shields writes, “today conservative evangelicals are not only more engaged in politics than they were in earlier decades, they are also more engaged than other groups that they once lagged behind.” In Canada, we’ve seen the growth of conservative Christian involvement too. In the late 1970s and early 1980s groups like Campaign Life Coalition and REAL Women of Canada were founded. More recently, ARPA Canada has helped get many more active. Considering the first criterion, then, it is clear that conservative Christian organizations (or “Christian Right” organizations as Shields sometimes calls them) have effectively mobilized large numbers of previously uninvolved citizens into the political process. The Christian Right has, as Sheilds puts it, “helped revive participatory democracy.” This is a clear win for democracy. Deliberative norms The second criterion relates to how a political movement’s members conduct themselves in public. Do they treat others with respect and try to reason with fellow citizens? Or do they scream at their opponents? On this point Shields thinks conservative Christian organizations have done a good job encouraging their members to act and speak appropriately in public affairs. He writes that: the most universally taught deliberative norm in the Christian Right is the practice of civility. Christian Right leaders preach the virtues of civility because they want to persuade, not alienate, other citizens. Just as often, movement elites ground this norm in Christ’s command to love one’s neighbor. Pro-life example For his study, Shields focused particularly on the pro-life movement because it is one of the most important and long-standing causes of conservative Christian activism. He found that pro-life organizations frequently try to develop deliberative norms among their members that include “promoting public civility, practicing careful listening and dialogue...and embracing moral reasoning.” Pro-life organizations will help to train their members how to argue for the rights of the unborn. For example, they explain fetal development and why the “pro-choice” position is inconsistent with human rights. In this way, pro-life activists become educated about abortion and how to explain the issue to fellow citizens. This often strengthens the confidence of the activists and their willingness to engage others on this important matter. It makes them more engaged as citizens. The other side’s unwillingness to debate Interestingly, Shields discovered that pro-choice organizations tend to be unwilling to debate. Many pro-choice organizations with college or university campus groups have explicit policies of avoiding such debates. For example, the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) discourages its student activists from talking to pro-lifers supposedly because they won’t be able to change the pro-lifers’ opinions. The Pro-Choice Action Network refuses to debate because it claims that abortion is a basic human right and rights are not up for debate. Dialogue about abortion is therefore not possible. Thus while pro-life groups are instructing their members how to discuss the abortion issue, some pro-choice groups are discouraging such discussions altogether. Shields points out that this situation has: left abortion rights advocates severely handicapped in the context of public debates. When pressed by pro-life activists, they have no ready explanation for why fetuses become persons at any point between conception and birth. This fact may explain why an undercurrent of self-doubt runs through some refusals to debate pro-life opponents. Clearly, by the criterion of deliberative norms, the pro-life organizations are contributing much more to a functioning democratic society. ARPA Canada too On its website, ARPA Canada states that its mission is “to educate, equip, and encourage Reformed Christians to political action and to bring a biblical perspective to our civil authorities.” ARPA’s activities clearly fall in line with the two criteria for political movements that enhance democracy. It encourages participation in the political process. It also encourages deliberative norms by educating Christian citizens on important issues and equipping them to make use of that knowledge in contacts with public officials and other citizens. So a clear case can be made then, that ARPA Canada enhances democracy in Canada through its efforts, even aside from its specific impact on the issues it addresses. Its impact on those issues is above and beyond its positive contribution towards democratic participation. Conclusion Christians who engage in activism tend to become better democratic citizens. They usually increase their knowledge of public affairs and become better able to discuss those affairs with others. They are more aware of matters affecting society and more concerned about those matters. Time spent contacting public officials and discussing the issues with other citizens is time spent trying to make the country a better place. Democratic virtues are manifested in this way, even when government policies are not changed for the better. If the world appreciates everyone’s respectful participation in the democratic process, then they should need to acknowledge that Christian participation is good for democracy....

Economics

What is "Equal Pay for work of Equal Value"?

Canada's Liberal government has announced plans to bring in “equal pay for work of equal value” legislation by 2018. It would apply to almost 900,000 Canadian employees, including not only federal employees, but also anyone working in federally regulated sectors like banks and airlines. To be clear, we're not talking about "equal pay for equal work." That's the idea that if two people are doing the exact same work, and to the same quality, and for the same amount of hours – if it is exactly the same – then the federal government should pay them the same. That makes good sense. But what we have here is the government deciding they are going to intervene in situations where people are doing very different work from one another. And the government is going to figure out how much their work should be worth, and whether they are doing work "of equal value." None of the newspapers reporting on this can spot the huge glaring problem with this - they talk of it as if it is simply a matter of administrating it right. So what is the problem? Who decides how work should be valued? Consider this: how valuable is the work done by a second string back-up goaltender on an NHL team? He might still make several hundred thousand, even a million or two, and yet he's not doing all that much. Meanwhile a good teacher is helping form the next generation of minds – what could be more important? Yet this teacher isn’t likely to make even one hundred thousand. Whose job is more valuable? A bureaucrat might decide it is the teacher. But are we going to start paying our teachers millions to even it up? What we have here is an example of the "diamond water paradox." While water is more important for life than diamonds (we can't survive more than 3 days without water, but we can get by a lot longer without diamonds) water remains much, much cheaper than diamonds. Why is that? As we all know, it's because water is far more abundant than diamonds. Or to say it the other way around, diamonds are more expensive than water because they are rarer...even though they aren't more important or more useful. So something’s price is not always determined by how useful it is. There are other factors involved, and when it comes to jobs, that may also include how ready a supply there is for this position vs. that position. Teachers are in a far more abundant supply than NHL players of any type. That's why the NHL player gets more. If we start arbitrarily deciding this job is the equivalent of that one, and so both should get the same pay, only bad things can result. In our example it would either mean bumping all the teachers' salaries up substantially (which we can't afford) or lowering the goaltenders' salaries to just a hundred thousand. But if these goalies are any good they could make more than that overseas. And so, suddenly, we've created a situation in which there is a shortage of quality second-string goalies because the government restricts what they can be paid. Of course, the government isn't going to restrict goalies' pay – this is a goofy example. But the principles are just the same – the government is going to set up some sort of system of deciding what work is equal to which. And because it's going to ignore simple economic rules (like scarcity driving prices up) it's going to be a mess.  ...

Adult biographies, Adult non-fiction, Book Reviews

True Right: Genuine Conservative Leaders of Western Canada

by Michael Wagner 128 pages / 2016 Feeling like you're the last true conservative left in Justin Trudeau's Canada? Then you need to read Michael Wagner's True Right and find out that all through Canada's history great, solid, courageous conservative men have stood up to the socialist hordes. What is a genuine conservative? How’s this for a definition? Someone who knows who God really is, and knows the government ain't Him. That comes out in the book, which is divided into 17 short biographies of political leaders who shaped Western Canada, some of whom were conservative another who were not. There's controversy to be had in the "weren't" camp, where the author places some big and well-loved names...but his reasoning is hard to argue with. Among the 13 who were, their faith in God is often evident. In this latter group most readers will find a pleasant surprise or two, meeting stalwart gentlemen who they'd not previously known. You might differ with Wagner on some of his assessments – I think in noting these men's strengths, he's sometimes overlooked a notable shortcoming or two – but you'll most certainly come away encouraged. Yes, even in Canada there have always been true conservatives, good and godly men, who were willing to stand up and fight, win or lose. True Right can be purchased here and a clip of the author outlining the book can be found below. ...

Politics

First and Second Things: Power is a wonderful servant but a terrible master

Where have all the outspoken social conservative politicians gone? Can we find them amongst Canada's conservative parties? Sometimes there seems reason to hope. In Ontario, the Progressive Conservative's new leader Patrick Brown had a history of pro-life politics, and he once voted against gay marriage. Sadly, he was only a false hope; he's promised to protect the pro-abortion status quo, and now marches in gay pride parades. In BC, recently, there was one politician who spoke up when the province decided to add “gender identity” and “gender expression” to its human rights code. Laurie Throness quietly noted that he and others view gender as being fixed, not fluid. But while this lone voice did speak up, he wasn’t willing to vote against the bill. It passed with 70 votes for and none against – Throness abstained. How about Alberta? Surely in red-neck Alberta there must be an outspoken Christian politician? No. The two conservative opposition parties either won’t speak on moral issues, or agree with the governing New Democrats. The headline of a recent LifeSiteNews.com article put it this way: "No Alberta politician willing to stand up to NDP gvmt’s ‘totalitarian’ LGBT school agenda?" Why it’s so bad Why are Christians so badly represented? We might think it's because there are no Christian politicians, but that's not the real reason. There are plenty of Christian in the Ontario, BC, and Alberta legislatures. The reason we don't hear from them is because they are acting according to a set sort of strategy. They believe: If you want to make a difference, that's easier to do if you get elected. You can’t get elected if you take strong public stands on moral issues Ergo, it doesn’t make sense to take strong public moral stands. This strategy helps Christians get elected, but it's also why we can't find politicians speaking on abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage, transgenderism, gay/straight alliance clubs, sex-ed curriculums and the issues that matter to us most. This is why no one is speaking up in Ontario and BC and Alberta and most everywhere else. For strategic reasons, our elected Christians are silencing themselves.  It's a catch-22: speak up and you won't get elected; don't speak up and you may get elected, but without any mandate to make change, so what's the point? Is there any way out of this seemingly no-win scenario? Put first things first Yes, if Christians voters and Christian candidates reorder our priorities. In his essay “First and Second Things” C.S. Lewis wrote about the damage that’s done when we start treating secondary priorities like they are the most important ones. He gave as an example a man who makes alcohol his focus. While alcohol can be a source of pleasure, that comes to an end when drinking becomes a man's priority. When he overvalues alcohol, then he’s liable to lose his house, his job, and maybe even his family. And, ironically, he'll even lose the pleasure he once got from drinking back when it was a minor matter to him. We need to understand that achieving power isn't our goal – it isn't a "first thing" for us. Our first thing is our message – the change we want to push for. Power, then, is a secondary thing to our message. We want to win a seat to have a platform from which to push for change. Power is a tool, not our purpose. It is an incredibly useful tool – having the platform that comes with being an MLA or MP means we could be heard by far more when we do speak out. But it is still just a tool, and only useful to us so long as we view it as a tool, and we don't overvalue it. If we make it our priority, that's when everything goes wrong. While power is a wonderful servant it is a terrible master. When getting elected is our first priority, then everything else – including our message – must serve that goal. That's when Christian politicians will silence themselves even when advocating for change was the original reason they got involved in politics. If winning is first it makes sense to stay silent on any issues that could lose us votes. In making power our first priority, we lose the ability to wield it in a useful manner. If we do win, we’ll be elected without any mandate for change. And we’ll still have reason to be fearful about talking on controversial issues because doing so will undermine our re-election chances. Like Lewis's drunk who in overvaluing drink loses out on all the pleasures of it, Christians who overvalue power lose out on the ability to use it. When our message is first So that's why there are so few Christian politicians speaking out: misordered priorities. What happens when we put first things first and bump power down off its perch? Then strange and wonderful possibilities present themselves! When our message becomes our first priority, then we can evaluate power, and the quest for it, in light of how it will serve our message. Then we compare it with the other tools at our disposal and evaluate them as to which will best help us be heard. Now, if seeking power requires us to stay quiet, then it seems quite likely some of our other tools are going to be better at getting us heard. But what are those other tools? Well, as we've seen over the last several years, a Christian lobby group - even a small one - can be very effective at getting our message out. Writing letters to the newspaper, talking to our neighbors, visiting MLAs and MPs in their offices, setting up large-scale demonstrations, and funding court challenges are all ways we can speak out loudly and clearly. Running for office is another possibility, so long as power remains a secondary concern. A candidate who isn't fixated on winning can be fearless and creative. That can be quite the contrast when his competitors are maintaining a strategic silence on all the controversial issues. I've been part of a losing campaign where the candidate was the subject of more than a hundred articles, endorsed by one of the city's daily papers, and the subject of TV news and radio reports. He lost, but his message was better served by a loud losing campaign than it could ever have been with a quiet winning one. What an impact a fearless politician can have! But you know what would be better still? Winning loud! It’s hard, but possible. And to see what can be done when a politician wins in a fearless fashion, we need only look at the example of Svend Robinson. This homosexual activist won a seat in Parliament and then used that platform to become Canada's most effective MP. He made his message his priority and that allowed him to use his power to full effect. As MP he advocated for homosexuality and for assisted suicide, and never stopped talking about what mattered to him most. He kept up the pressure, and despite only being a member of the opposition, he got the changes he was after because he would not be quiet. Parties are tools to use, not teams to join We can also learn from the way Robinson viewed his political party. While he was a long-time member of the NDP, he was not a team player. To him the party was another tool to use, not a team to join. It was valuable only is so far as it helped him be heard. Christians need to make this same shift in our thinking. In Alberta, BC and Ontario the most conservative parties want our help, and our contributions, and our vote. They want us to join their team... but they have no interest in representing our views. They are only interested in us in so far as we can be used to further their ends. It's time to turn the tables on them. We need to understand that political parties are only useful to us in so far as they can help us achieve our ends and further our message. Like Robinson we need to see them as a tool to use, not a team to join. If that seems disloyal, it's only because we're again mixing up first and second things. We join political parties as a means by which to do good and godly work – to speak in defense of what God holds most precious. That is our priority, and the party is only useful in so far as it helps us do what we've set out to do. We don't owe them anything. Opportunities to seize? Can parties today still be useful to us? Some certainly are not. On the federal level, the NDP and Liberals have shut the door on pro-life Christians. These are not tools we no longer have any access to. Provincially things are getting difficult too, but there may still be some opportunities. In Alberta, for example, we could target a riding the likes of Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock. It includes at least four conservative Reformed congregations and the current MLA is a Wildrose Party member Glenn van Dijken but no conservative (he supports Bill 10, which requires even private schools to create a Gay-Straight Alliance Club if a student requests it, and he doesn't support the unborn). If we stack the Wildrose nomination meeting with Reformed and other Christians, we would stand a good chance of replacing him. By picking our spots and focusing on locations that best suit our strengths, it's possible we could be loud and still win.  Then imagine the possibilities! For at least the next four years our winning candidate could make use of the platform God gave him to speak out fearlessly, repeatedly, winsomely, creatively and did we mention fearlessly? He could say what no other politicians today have the courage to say, speaking God's Truth to a nation that is in such desperate need of it! Conclusion In making winning our priority, we've made our message a secondary something to be sacrificed if it gets in the way. Since speaking out on abortion, homosexuality, or transgenderism does hurt at the polls, Christian politicians are silencing themselves on these and every other contentious moral issue. It's only when we listen to Lewis and put first things first, prioritizing our message, that we have any chance at being heard. Then a political candidate can speak without fear. Only then can he employ his creativity to present his message as loudly as possible. Only then will he dare address today's most controversial issues. He might not win; he probably won't. But win or lose he'll be heard by at least some. Win or lose the quiet Christian politician is heard by none....

Politics

Electoral Reform: paper and pen beat bits and bytes

As we progress ever farther into the digital age there is going to be an increased push to have voting go from paper to digital, with voting done on, and tabulated by, computers. Part of this push comes from those who just think it a natural progression. After all, isn't everything going digital? Others think it will increase voter turnout, especially if we open things up by allowing voting over the Internet (then you could vote from your own home). But another reason for this push to digital comes from the complicated ways that other countries do elections. In Australia's 2016 federal election, because of their ranked ballot, it took more than a week for the country to find out who had won. If voting had been done electronically this could have been resolved almost right after voting concluded. But there is a problem with electronic voting that makes Canada's present paper and pen voting method vastly superior. If we want people to be involved and invested in the democratic process, then the one thing we need them to know is that the results reported at the end are, without a shadow of a doubt, legitimate. That’s true of the Canada’s present federal system…and in a way that should be the envy of every other country. Our paper ballots leave a paper trail that can be checked and double check and triple checked too. In fact, in most ridings there are people with at least 3 different perspectives counting each vote: the (hopefully neutral) Elections Canada staff a Liberal Party scrutineer a Conservative Party scrutineer In addition there are often scrutineers from the smaller parties like the New Democrats and the Greens (though they don’t have the manpower to scrutinize at every poll). This independent triple check keeps the system entirely transparent – if Elections Canada, the Liberals, and the Conservatives can all agree on the vote total (and they do 99% of the time) then we know that the result are trustworthy. Compare that to United States, where electronic voting tabulates the vast majority of votes and there is no paper trail. Every election there are reports of computer errors – someone voting Republican and their vote being given to the Democrat candidate, and vice versa. Some of these errant votes are caught – one famous example occurred when, in a precinct where just 412 people voted, presidential candidate Al Gore received a negative vote count of minus 16,022 votes. Someone, it seems, had hacked the machine. Errant totals like this are easy to spot, but if a machine can be hacked once, why should we trust all the others? And how many of the other vote totals might be the result of simple computer error? American voters can only wonder how many less obvious errors may have escaped notice. Long ago Joseph Stalin said something to the effect of: "The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything." Americans’ dependency on electronic voting machines means their system is based on trust – trust that the machines our counting properly, and trust that the people making and programming these counting machines are competent and honest, and trust that their security is flawless. Meanwhile in Canada our hand counting approach recognizes that it is foolish to trust overmuch, that we are fallen and depraved creatures. Of course election officials have never stated it in such explicitly biblical terms, but that is the difference nonetheless. Instead of trust, we have verification, with two, three and even more vote totals from the different parties available to check against the official results. From a Reformed perspective then, the Canadian hand count is vastly superior to the American voting machine count. On the federal level Canada currently has the most trustworthy, and therefore best, vote-counting system in the world. We need to let our friends and neighbors know that when it comes to voting and verification, bits and bytes don't beat pen and paper....

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