The Right, You Say?

Marci McDonald, journalist and author of a recently-published book titled The Armageddon Factor: The Rise of Christian Nationalism in Canada, writes of her perturbation at all the fuss her contentious book has received in the Blogosphere. Mentioning also the scathing and fact-supported commentary of her fellow scribes who give her thesis that the far Christian right is stealthily and with purpose aforethought taking over the reins of government a failing grade.
Thanks to the election of that enigma hiding behind the face of an honest man, Stephen Harper.

She professes to be confused, not enlightened one iota by the response to her book's publication. And to righteous indignation that she has been profoundly misunderstood. As a Christian herself, she is certainly not at war with Christianity and those holding Christian beliefs. No, her fears for the future of Canada lie entirely in the power structure and organization of fanatical right-wing Christians. They must be the same Christians determined to bring Christmas out of the social dungeon it has been placed in by 'progressives' like herself.

She speaks of militant 'nationalist' Christians, a minority at present, she concedes, but with a disproportionate influence on the body politic. A minority that has been able, through astute cunning, to organize themselves and hone political connections in a way that clearly threatens the future of Canada. Their dreadful agenda, according to this fearless, clear-sighted defender of the public weal, is to have Canada officially declared a "Christian nation".

What's this? Isn't Canada a majority Christian country? Like most civilized countries that have embraced secular government, setting religion aside as a social, cultural matter, vital to the interests of the majority of people, but apart from politics, Canada, due to its various demographics and its history and heritage is, in fact, a majority Christian country; no need to officially name it so.

The religious identity of the country is Christian, as a reflection of its European settlers who brought their religion along with them. Immigrants that came to Canada from other countries of the world were mostly Christian worshippers. Canada's original inhabitants, its aboriginal peoples, were converted to Christianity through assiduous mission work. As people claiming other religious devotion came into the country, nothing much changed.

Christianity with all it implies, as an ancient faith that grew out of Judaism, sharing many of the moral precepts and scruples of Judaism, reflected the values and the vision of justice that both religions exemplified. In Canada, the majority religion eventually matured, broadened its social inclusion and welcomed diversity. Diversity hit it right in the face with an insistence by those worshipping other religions, that they receive equal status.

Sounds pretty innocuous, since other equalities eventually gained a social and political and cultural footing in the country. But in fact, there was nothing innocently innocuous about these demands; Christianity forced by 'progressive' thought to diminish its presence lest those who worshipped under other religions, reflecting other cultures be offended. Yet in muting the Christian nature of the country, history, culture and politics too surrendered ignominiously to an inglorious spirit of self-effacement.

Canada's Christian community, by far the largest in the country, and the most senior as well, has been placed under siege for far too long. Little wonder there is now a growing unease with this condition, and little wonder that people are suddenly waking up to the injustice of it. Stockwell Day may present to writers and 'progressives' like Ms. McDonald as a religious bogeyman, but he has also proven to be an astute, reliable and in his own way progressive parliamentarian.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is proving his mettle as a skilled politician and a principled actor on the world stage ever more as time goes on. His once-hidden agenda has been revealed to be that of a tractable, practical honest broker intent on performing well as a prime minister and in the process producing a better society through good governance. The purported strategy deleterious to the country's interests, patterned on former President George W. Bush that Ms. McDonald writes of is a figment of her overheated and indignant imagination.

She views America today as a highly-polarized country whose population is at odds with itself; the right and the left, the entitled and the disentitled, black-and-white, no gradients, represents in fact, a huge population representing various demographics through immigration and social and cultural assets that attempt to meld into a workable whole. To make this happen is no easy task, there will always be malcontents, and those who strive and those who make no effort to help themselves.

The only countries of the world that are comprised of entire populations that are mutely acquiescent to the dictates of their governments are those led by totalitarian governments, and even then there exists an underground current of discontent reflecting the dismal misfortunes of those not close to government structure. In healthy democracies there are always deep pockets of civil unrest simply because peoples' interests and their values differ.

Canada is more than ready for debates, reasoned and otherwise, respecting the place of religion within society and how it tempers government. Pointing out the perils of 'religiosity' impacting on government decisions and equating politicians as being intelligent and moderate or devious and sinister because of their religious convictions bespeaks a paranoia that people of the ilk of Marci McDonald appear to embrace as a means by which they can embroider their sensibilities.

In the process seeking public acclaim at their brave tilting at the windmills of atrocious intermingling of religion and politics. Since politicians are human beings with specific backgrounds, experiences and orientations, they are entitled to their beliefs, religious or otherwise. The wise among them are perfectly capable of balancing and evaluating where the personal intersects with the public.

Canadians in general are far more intelligent and perspicacious in their recognition of the kind of intolerance that the writing of those of the ultra-left conflate with the ultra-right; the dread problems of fatalist fundamentalism of biblical dimensions seen in the promise of Armageddon suits the purpose of scare-mongers writing to thrill their natural audience of like-believers.