The phrase “politics makes for strange bedfellows,” originally stated as “misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows” (Shakespeare, The Tempest), crossed my mind in reflecting on some events of recent days.
One part of this blog actually flows from the Valentine’s Day blog (who could resist tying Valentine’s Day to “strange bedfellows”?) about the CBC Radio-Canada TV broadcast on the French language news program Enquête. The EFC’s “Valentine’s” complaint about Radio-Canada’s vilification of Canadian Evangelicals notes that the Christian expressions used in the imagery of the program “are not representative of Canadian Evangelicalism as a whole.” This is not meant to suggest that the imagery is not representative of a component of the diverse expression found in Canada’s broader Evangelical community.
Someone suggested to me over the last week that the complaint “threw Faytene Kryskow under the bus.” On, the contrary, there are issues on which we find ourselves on the same bus – to turn the metaphor around. Faytene is a sister in the faith. Like my sisters from birth, sometimes we agree and sometimes we don’t but our relationship remains.
And the reference to “many faith-based groups participating in the democratic process in Ottawa are in full compliance with the legislation, rules and policies surrounding this activity, without seeking out special access or privileges” is fair comment on the misrepresentation made in the Enquête piece, not a reflection on the Parliamentary access identification available to those who work – paid or as volunteers – on Parliament Hill. It is surprising to me that so much has been made of these security passes by some Bloc Quebecois MPs and the media when there are clear guidelines in place for their issuance by MPs and Senators … and the Parliamentary Press Gallery.
“Canadian Evangelicals have a long history of positive contribution to this country and its people through organizations such as The Salvation Army, World Vision Canada and Compassion Canada [and there are many more – see these current EFC affiliates as further example] and tend to give more, in terms of time and money, to both religious and secular charities than other Canadians. … Evangelical Christians, comprising approximately 12% of the Canadian population, share core beliefs with all Canadian Christians.” (Also from the complaint)
As the co-author of Canadian Evangelical Voting Trends by Region, 1996-2008, I can vouch for the fact that, “Evangelicals hold a wide diversity of beliefs on matters of public policy and substantially support Canada’s major political parties in roughly the same ratios as their non-Evangelical neighbours.”
It is this wide diversity that takes me from the more charismatic expression of Evangelicalism featured by Enquête to the perhaps less charismatic expression of the Evangelical members of KAIROS, an organization that engages those Evangelical communities with some of those other Canadian Christian communities with whom we share core beliefs.
I count myself privileged to have been invited, along with several other non-KAIROS affiliated organization representatives, to attend an appreciation dinner held this past week with the KAIROS board of directors. On behalf of the EFC, I received a small memento of “Courage and Hope in Action” as an expression of thanks from KAIROS for this blog, written quite some time ago, and some follow up efforts. KAIROS has been hampered by the discontinuance of its funding by the federal government, but it and its partners have continued to do what they can do with what they have. I won’t get into the story, which is still making headlines, beyond that.
As the complaint about the CBC also notes, for the EFC “areas of interest include: global and domestic poverty, child pornography, human trafficking, environmental concerns, freedom of religion, freedom of conscience, freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, abortion, euthanasia, and genetic technologies.”
These areas of public policy engagement have brought us into cooperative conversation and action with members of the Conservative Party of Canada, the Liberal Party of Canada, the New Democratic Party of Canada and the Bloc Quebecois along with the RCMP, Toronto Police, Canadian Police Association, Hindus, Jews, Sikhs and Muslims (to name but a few).
When one operates based on principles, in our case biblical principles, “strange bedfellows” (as William Shakespeare suggests) should not seem a surprise to anyone but rather a reflection of pursuing a diverse range of objectives for the common good, unhindered by politics.