Login / RegisterElizabeth May sees no evidence that Prime Minister Stephen Harper is a practising Christian
In anarticle I wrote in this week's Georgia Straight, Green Party of Canada Leader Elizabeth May caused an uproar in the comments section by saying she has seen no evidence that Prime Minister Stephen Harper is a Christian.
“I know what a lot of people assert his religious beliefs to be,” she told me earlier this week. “I’ve seen no sign that he is actually a practising Christian.”
May's comment came in response to my question whether or not Harper's refusal to address climate change might be linked to his religious beliefs.
"If he does go to church, I don't think that drives him," May said. "I see no sign of it."
The Green leader is a practising Anglican who attends church services on Sundays.
Journalists have highlighted Harper's Christianity
In 2010, author Marci McDonald examined the influence of the Christian right on the conservative movement in The Armageddon Factor: The Rise of Christian Nationalism in Canada.
In the book, McDonald reports that Harper's old Reform Party colleague, Diane Ablonczy, talked him into attending a fundraising gala at Calgary's Centre Street Church, where he took his future wife, Laureen Teskey, on their first date. It's a Christian and Missionary Alliance church.
Later, according to McDonald's book, Harper attended the Bow Valley Christian Church in a northwestern Calgary suburb. And in Ottawa, The Armageddon Factor maintains, Harper has attended East Gate Alliance Church, where former Chilliwack-Hope B.C. Liberal candidate Laurie Throness served as a spiritual counsellor.
McDonald also cited a book by Christian journalist Lloyd Mackey called The Pilgrimage of Stephen Harper, which purports to lay out the prime minister's religious beliefs. Harper was never interviewed for the book.
Then last March, self-described Christian social-conservative journalist Andrew Nikiforuk wrote a commentary declaring that Harper seems to take climate-change advice from an evangelical group called the Cornwall Alliance for The Stewardship of Creation.
The Cornwall Alliance denies that human activity is contributing to a warming planet.
May isn't convinced by the books and articles
May is aware of McDonald's book and Nikiforuk's article on Harper's religious beliefs. But this hasn't convinced her that the prime minister is developing climate-change policies because of any religious beliefs.
"The problem is—what if the progressive left is solidifying his base among right-wing Christians for him, so he doesn't have to do it?" May stated. "But that's not at all what's driving him."
The Green leader quickly added that there are "2,000 denominations of Christians in this world". And she emphasized that Christianity doesn't have anything to do with her party's policies.
She went on to say that she started wondering about Harper's religious beliefs when he broke the fixed-election-date law in 2008 to call an election.
"There was no compelling reason other than the fact that he saw he could strike for electoral advantage by moving fast," she noted. "There were no external circumstances that made Stephen Harper go to the Governor General on a Sunday morning."
May said she was in Guelph at the time and wanted to attend church services. But she couldn't because she had to reply to the prime minister's announcement and news conference.
That's when she said to her press secretary: "How's he getting to church?"
May maintained that last year when Harper called another election, it was timed so that the advance poll would fall on Good Friday and the following Saturday.
"Nobody bothered to ask how come Stephen Harper—someone we're told is a fanatical Christian—paid no attention whatsoever to having advance polls on a Good Friday," May scoffed.
The campaign period went over the Easter and Passover holidays in the Christian and Jewish calendars. May pointed out that when Paul Martin called an election in 2005, he made adjustments in the timing to accommodate Christmas and Hanukkah, scheduling the vote for mid-to-late January.
Harper, on the other hand, kept the election period to the minimum time period in 2011. May claimed that this was designed to suppress interest in the campaign and drive down voter turnout. Scheduling it over Easter and Passover (not to mention the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton) served this objective.
Despite May bluntly stating at one point that she has seen no evidence of Harper being a Christian, she said at another moment in the interview that she "wouldn't question whether he's a Christian".
"There's no reason to know one way or the other unless he tells us," May stated.
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If you bothered to look into the matter, you'd quickly find that Ms May receives media coverage fully consistent with her small-party status. But she doesn't receive "zero" coverage, because sometimes she has interesting things to say.
Only in a psycho-Conservative World are voices "irrelevant" because they don't have enough seats in the House.
He's doing so much damage to the everyday life of Canadians, just to feather his cap and look good on the world stage.
He scents Obama's demise in the States, and wants to be World Leader #1...
He doesn't seem to care about our civil rights, he doesn't care how guns might kill women & abolished the gun registry, he passed a crime bill which is vindicative & sends grow up operators to jail for longer time periods than child predators. He takes Canada into wars which have nothing to do with Canada which results in huge losses of life & costs at least $28billion.
If one were to consult the Bible or many other holy books you would find Harper violates a whole lot of religious tenants but who cares. We are a secular society & have many religions in Canada. If Ms. May believes he doesn't demonstrate he is a practising Christian, that is her opinion & she is entitled to it.
I don't care who or what he worships. His actions speak volumes about who he is & I just want him gone from office.
Stephen Harper is a pragmatist who doesn't wear his emotions nor his religious beliefs on his sleeve. How refreshing that is, compared to May's constant harping about those who don't follow her power-driven Green Religion. Perhaps she and David Suzuki could get together in a forest vale and chant odes to nature together.
Miguel
How exciting is that?
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