The Christians are coming! The Christians are coming!

That's the gist of this Globe and Mail story, the first of what will certainly be many Globe and Toronto Star articles warning us of Stephen Harper's secret plan to turn Canada into "Gilead" from Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, which says right-wing "Christian activists" have won the Conservative Party nominations in eight federal ridings:

Christian activists have secured Conservative nominations in clusters of ridings from Vancouver to Halifax -- a political penetration that has occurred even as the party tries to distance itself from hard-line social conservatism.

At least three riding associations in Nova Scotia, four in British Columbia, and one in suburban Toronto have nominated candidates with ties to groups like Focus on the Family, a Christian organization that opposes same-sex marriage.

But organizers say many more will be on the ballot during the next federal election, a feat achieved by persuading parishioners, particularly new Canadians, to join the party and vote for recommended candidates.
[...]
John Reynolds, the retiring Conservative MP who ran the party's nomination process, said the fact that social conservatives have won his party's nominations is simply a function of democracy.

"I don't believe in appointments and neither does our party, so we get some real battles," Mr. Reynolds said. "People say, 'Can't you do something about these guys running?' and I say 'Hey, you can do something: go out and sign up some more people.' "

That said, Mr. Reynolds is offended by attempts to paint the Conservative party as a harbour for religious zealots.

"There were three dozen Liberals who voted with us on the same-sex thing," he said. "Nobody is going after them and saying, 'Look at these far-right Christians that got into the Liberal Party.' "

If reporters who write about Christian fundamentalists taking over his party were to "insert the word Jew everywhere you've put Christian, do you think they would let you print it?" he asked. "I doubt it."

As a same-sex-marriage-supporting, nominal Anglican who only goes to Church on Christmas Eve, I guess I'm expected to find this development terrifying. But it's an open secret that Liberal, Conservative and NDP nomination meetings in Canada's major cities are often dominated by members of one ethnic and/or religious group. Instead of being condemned, it's hailed as official multiculturalism in action. What reason, aside from sheer anti-Christian bigotry, is there to savage Christians for doing the same thing?

If you're ready to criticize all "religious" involvement in politics - including political activity from followers of other faiths, and "progressive" activism from Canada's "mainstream" Churches (no one on the left gets upset about this kind of "Christian activism", or this, or this.) - then at least you're being consistent. Otherwise, you're a hypocrite who believes "pluralism" and "diversity" only apply to beliefs you agree with.

Alas, as with so many other issues, I suspect I'm in the minority of Canadians in believing this. Most would agree with John Downing, who basically argues that "Born Again Christians" should be expelled from the Conservative Party. In the name of tolerance, of course.

Posted by damian at May 27, 2005 06:25 PM | TrackBack