Topic
How a BC Christian junior college grew to be a key provider to Stephen Harper's power structure.
Tory Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl is a TWU graduate.
Insiders say he's changed his image, not beliefs.
Right-wing guru urges melding religion and money making.
[Editor's note: Previous excerpts from The Armageddon Factor detailed the rise of Bible-based schooling in Canada and the way a parallel movement in the U.S. has established a small but remarkably influential university, Patrick Henry College, which was a key source of Christian conservative interns and graduates for the administration of President George W. Bush and the Republican network in Washington. Today: Canada's own elite Christian university, Trinity Western, appears to be pursuing a similar role.]
Driving north from Langley, British Columbia, past ragged woodlots and weathered horse barns, it's not difficult to miss the turnoff to Trinity Western University. No triumphal gates mark the entrance to the country's leading evangelical institution of higher learning tucked away in this rural pocket of the Fraser Valley.
Vancouver is half an hour's drive to the west and Ottawa seems light years away, but it was here in the rolling fields of the former Seal Pak Dairy Farm that the elders of the Evangelical Free Church planted their vision of a Christian institution of higher education unlike the countless Bible colleges dotting the country: a private liberal-arts college with a distinguished reputation and an undisguised political aim -- to "develop godly Christian leaders."
It was a grandiose goal for a school whose beginnings were humble in the extreme. Making its debut in 1962 as Trinity Junior College, its first 17 students took lectures in the old farmhouse and played sports in the refurbished barn. The only new structure on the grounds was a gull-winged chapel that doubled as a dormitory and library when not in use for the mandatory daily prayer service. Now, nearly 50 years later, on a manicured campus strewn with bustling low-rises -- each bearing some wealthy benefactor's name -- the chapel sits condemned, fenced off like some mid-century-modern relic of the school's long struggle for respectability.
That struggle entailed decades of government lobbying and a lawsuit before the Supreme Court, but today most of Trinity Western's 4,000 students sail between classes blissfully unaware of the controversy that dogged its ascension to a unique niche in the country's academic pantheon.
On the road to university status
Most are drawn by its cozy communal atmosphere and a top spot in the Globe and Mail's annual ranking of small universities where it has scored an A+ for quality of education and faculty interaction -- with no class larger than 20 students -- but a D for its proximity to the nearest pubs.
For many evangelical parents, that lack of temptation is precisely the reason they dispatch their offspring to a school that requires every enrollee to sign a 13-page Responsibilities of Membership agreement that bans smoking, drinking, swearing, drugs and dabbling in the occult, while noting that the university "does not condone dancing at clubs where alcohol is liberally consumed." Abortion is included in the list of forbidden activities, as are all coed living arrangements, even off-campus, and the separate dorms reserved for men and women have regulated hours for commingling. "Sexual intimacy is to be practiced only within the context of marriage between a husband and a wife," the agreement states.
It was precisely those stipulations that kept Trinity Western University classified as a two-year junior college for more than a decade, and in the 1970s, with B.C.'s New Democratic government adamantly opposed to recognizing any private religious institutions, that status seemed unlikely to change. The school's only hope lay in a private member's bill sponsored by a Social Credit MLA, which had been put off until the last day of the spring legislative session in 1979.
Then, with 20 minutes left on the clock, the premier, Dave Barrett, suddenly stood up and walked out. It turned out that Barrett, who'd been educated by Jesuits, had agreed to support the measure but felt philosophically compelled to sit out the vote. As cries of "hypocrite" and "mugwump" flew across the chamber, the bill squeaked through in what Bob Burkinshaw, Trinity's dean of social sciences, hails as "one of the most significant religious events in a century."
Most of the country's major universities had been founded as religious institutions, Burkinshaw points out, but all have since been secularized. "It was the first time in a century there was a new university in Canada that was confessional," he says. "Basically, it broke the state monopoly on higher education."
'Evolutionism' as enemy
Still, it would be another five years before the powerful Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada would confer its official imprimatur on Trinity Western.
The sticking point was a doctrinal statement, which even members of the science faculty must sign, acknowledging the biblical account of creation. A committee of university presidents swooped in to grill Jack Van Dyke, the chemistry professor who then headed Trinity Western's science department, on whether the college taught evolution. "My answer was yes," Van Dyke says, "but you need to understand that we teach evolution within a context and that context is creation. Anybody who says there is no evolution is not opening their eyes -- you just have to look at the mutation of viruses -- but what we at Trinity try to avoid is 'evolutionism,' which is a religion."
That response might have sent shock waves through most mainstream science faculties, as would the university's later "Statement on Creation," which includes a nod to intelligent design, but after a year of heated debate, the association finally recognized Trinity Western's degrees for international accreditation. "They were satisfied that we weren't hiding theories from our students," Van Dyke says.
Still, even today, in an interview with me in the university cafeteria, he admits to a foundational belief that "God created mankind" and vents his pique at newspaper headlines that refer to apes as the ancestors of humans.
So what would he say to those evolutionary biologists who insist that God had no part in the origins of the universe? "Well, I feel sorry for those people!" Van Dyke exclaims, slapping the table. "They've missed the richness of life."
Battle to train teachers
Buoyed by its newfound status, Trinity Western launched a decade of feverish expansion, adding an interdenominational seminary, nursing school and faculty of education, but once again, its Christian precepts threw up a stumbling block. For years, its education students had to spend their final year at Simon Fraser University in order to win certification from the British Columbia College of Teachers (BCCT), but, in 1995, a BCCT committee finally signalled that Trinity Western had met the necessary conditions to grant its own teaching degrees.
Then, at the eleventh hour, one official noticed the definition of marriage in the "Responsibilities of Membership" agreement. While it didn't declare homosexuality a sin, its assertion that marriage was reserved for a man and a woman left little doubt about its implication. At a time when the Correns had just overturned the Surrey school board's ban on same-sex storybooks, the university suddenly found its application rejected on the grounds that the teachers it trained might spread a disapproval of homosexuality in the province's public schools.
As the veto unleashed protests from conservative Christians across the country, Trinity Western filed a lawsuit alleging religious discrimination, which eventually landed in the Supreme Court. Half a dozen evangelical organizations filed supporting briefs, including the Christian Legal Fellowship, represented by Dallas Miller of the Home School Legal Defence Association.
But for Trinity Western, the case also provoked institutional soul-searching. Some uncompromising evangelical allies urged the university to use it as a direct constitutional challenge to the concept of gay rights, and an Alberta group offered to foot the legal bill. Despite the temptation, Trinity Western's legal team declined to turn its quest for academic standing into yet another vitriolic clash in the culture wars.
"We decided we weren't going to go on the attack," Burkinshaw says. Besides, the university didn't need the proffered funds. "We had more donors for that case," he says with a chuckle, "than for any other campaign."
On May 17, 2001, the Supreme Court ruled that the B.C. College of Teachers had failed to prove that Trinity Western students exhibited anti-homosexual bias. Merely holding a belief, it said, did not necessarily translate into discriminatory acts. In Langley, there was jubilation. Now students no longer had to contemplate concealing their faith like some humiliating skeleton in the closet that might block them from their chosen careers, but the ruling also had implications far beyond the campus. In Calgary, constitutional lawyer Gerry Chipeur, who had intervened in the case on behalf of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, called it "the most important freedom-of-religion decision that the Supreme Court has ever made."
Had the B.C. College of Teachers succeeded, he argued, it could have squelched the professional aspirations of evangelicals in every field across the country. "They would basically have kept all Christians out of public service," Chipeur says now. "Not just teachers, but doctors, nurses and lawyers -- even judges."
The ruling came at a convenient time. Months earlier, Trinity Western had embarked on a mission not unlike that of Patrick Henry College in the U.S.: to put more evangelicals on the fast track to jobs in the civil service and the country's political power structure.
Grooming for public service
On a flight from Ottawa to Vancouver, a Trinity Western official got a confidential tip from his seatmate: an historic mansion in Ottawa was going on the market for a song. For Don Page, the dean of graduate studies at the university, the news was the answer to a decade-old prayer. A former Ottawa mandarin, Page had been lured to Trinity Western to groom a new generation of Christians for the federal public Service -- a determination fuelled, in part, by his own disenchantment.
As a senior policy adviser in the External Affairs Department, stickhandling international crises, he had been appalled when some of the country's most promising young diplomats were caught smuggling contraband and accepting bribes. "These were not stupid people," he recalls, "but they didn't see anything wrong with what they were doing. In fact, they'd rationalize it: 'You aren't paying us enough so we have to make money on the side.'"
To Page, who had started a Bible study group at External Affairs and inspired prayer cells in 30 other departments under the Public Service Christian Fellowship, there was only one solution: to enlist more people of faith in the government. "I realized we had to find a better class of public servant," he says, "and Trinity Western was the only university that was committed to doing something about it."
But for more than a decade after his arrival, as he lectured on servant leadership in every faculty and laid the groundwork for a master's degree in the subject, Page had watched the essential ingredient of his scheme -- a hands-on internship program in Ottawa -- bog down in a bizarre tangle of interprovincial red tape.
He was ready to shelve his dream when he got the news that the Metcalfe Street mansion built by J. R. Booth, the lumber baron who had supplied the timber for the original Parliament Buildings, had been put up for sale by the dwindling membership of the elite Laurentian Club. Not only was it an ideal location for Trinity Western's interns, it was an architectural gem -- a certified national historical site which would give the obscure western university a prestigious satellite campus in the capital.
Moving into God's mansion
In March 2001, Trinity Western took possession of its new Laurentian Leadership Centre for less than $2 million, and for Page, the million dollar renovation became a labour of love. In the summer of 2002, he and his wife camped out in Ottawa with an interior decorator to put the finishing touches on the restoration, polishing the mansion's eight marble fireplaces and its antique sterling silver sconces, even handwashing all two hundred crystal pendants in the giant chandelier that Booth had given his daughter as a wedding present.
Still, it wasn't those palatial digs alone that turned the Laurentian Leadership Centre into an unprecedented evangelical training ground.
Contacting MPs and former colleagues across the capital's bureaucracy, Page rustled up three-month unpaid internships that have become the envy of other student programs in the capital. Under the contracts he drafted, every intern receives a semester's worth of real work writing speeches or policy papers with no fear of being used as a glorified secretary.
In September 2002, the centre's first class of 23 students fanned out to assignments in almost every government department and key capital power centres like the Ottawa Citizen and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Nearly a dozen found themselves on the staff of MPs, including Stephen Harper and Stockwell Day, and two of their most eager bosses were Chuck Strahl and Diane Ablonczy, both of whom are Trinity Western alumni.
So intent was Page that his charges make a good impression, he gave them tutorials on etiquette and office dress codes. Not that he was worried they would show up for work nursing hangovers: for once, Trinity Western's moral code was a plus. "They recognized they were going to get a student with strong moral values," he says. "That's what every MP wanted to know: can I trust this student with documents?"
'Onward Christian soldiers'
To run the centre, Page enlisted Paul Wilson, who had arrived in Ottawa in 1994 to work as director of research for Preston Manning's Reform Party, and stayed on to perform the same duties for Stockwell Day.
Later, Wilson would serve as senior policy adviser for one of the most hard-line evangelicals in Harper's new government, former justice minister Vic Toews. But before he left the Laurentian Leadership Centre for that post, he helped organize Manning's first Ottawa conference on faith and politics, coaching the newly elected crop of evangelicals in Harper's caucus on how to navigate the pitfalls facing Christians in public life.
At the time, Wilson was furious at press reports that compared the Laurentian Leadership Centre to Patrick Henry College. "This is not a political training program," he told the Ottawa Citizen. "It's about understanding citizenship and faith."
Not everyone at the paper appears to have accepted that disclaimer.
"Onward Christian soldiers," read the headline, hinting that, like Michael Farris, Wilson was bent on grooming Canada's own Joshua generation for government. "Evangelicals are mobilizing in Ottawa to put their stamp on public policy and opinion."
Tomorrow: Inside the Ottawa centre where the Christian Right is polishing its new generation of public servants. ![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
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Camero409
2 years ago
The Christian Right
[OFFENSIVE COMMENT REMOVED. -MODERATOR.]
docleslie
2 years ago
Please God...
... save me from your followers.
zalm
2 years ago
Hmmmmm....
Might have to get the book. It's not as ill-written as I'd been led to believe.
KevinC
2 years ago
Very clever of them to
Very clever of them to emphasise the integrity aspect with regards to the public service. However, this is based on the arrogant and naieve premise that evangelical Christians are morally incorruptible. Look forward to future revelations that these Christian soldiers in the public service are just as fallible on average as their non-secular counterparts.
Booker
2 years ago
Holier than thou
I love it when they do this. What they call "evolutionism" is a religion, and is therefore intellectually suspect. Unintentional irony anyone?
Because they did such a great job in the U.S. Sarah Palin. Tom Delay. George W. Bush. Ralph Reed and all those involved in the Abramoff scandals, and on and on and on...
They claim the storied humility of Christ, yet their sense of moral superiority and hubris seeps from every pore. It leads to the spectacular hypocrisy of figures like Ted Haggard and Congressman George "rent boy" Rekkers. All of this is coming to a theatre near us, in Canada. Get some popcorn.
seth
2 years ago
The deacon
The best example is White Rock MLA and major theocon Trinity Western grad Russ "The Deacon" Hebert recently convicted of spending some $650k transiting his sweety back and forth to Ottawa.
[INNUENDO AND ALLEGATIONS REMOVED. -MODERATOR.]
2wheeldeal
2 years ago
Chuck Strahl is a dropout, not a TWU Grad.
Chuck Strahl attended classes at TWU, but he never graduated. the is a bible school drop out.
White Knight
2 years ago
Marci McDonald has
Marci McDonald has researched well. I had thought it was the Socreds under the Zalm who allowed TWU to become a university.
But what is inherently evil in principled leaders? Why does one commenter call them bugs which must be squashed?
I find most opponents of Christ followers want them to be quiet about their belief. When they teach, they must teach against their own belief, that homosexuality as just another acceptable lifestyle. Failure to do so brings charges of “intolerant!”
Have we forgotten that Tommy Douglas was first a Baptist preacher? Justice was rooted in his Christian faith. They called him a Bolshevik. It didn’t shut him up.
God loves everyone. But he doesn’t like everything we do. That includes sinning Christ followers.
hugo
2 years ago
TWU
A very serious error in this excerpt from Marci McDonald's book: Bave Barrett was not premier in 1979 when TWU's charter came before the legislature, Bill Bennett was. It was the Socreds that sponsored the bill. This error totally undermines the anecdote that follows and gives one reservations about the thoroughness of the author's research.
apathy sux
2 years ago
Principled leaders....
...nothing wrong with them if those principles are shared by the vast majority of the population. In my experience, the principles espoused by evangelicals in whatever form are narrowly focused to develop social policy based on biblical morals rather than humanist kind. The kind that say a woman has no right to abort, homosexuality is wrong, believe in male headship and women as 'helpers', prisons and punishment are the best way to deal with law breakers even if they are addicts and abuse victims. They have no interest in repairing and healing the human soul through any means other than those that based on their interpretation of scripture.
These principles cause more harm than good.
Booker
2 years ago
hugo
You are right -- Barrett was the leader of the Opposition at the time and recused himself from voting. Six NDP members voted against the private members bill, sponsored by a Socred, that was to give Trinity Western degree-granting powers. That error appears in the book.
Booker
2 years ago
errors
All books have them. I think the Barrett one is pretty minor.
kootenay
2 years ago
Education is the Key
Regardless of your political or religious background, educating future leaders is the key to furthering ones' mandate.
The only thing I'm left wondering is, why aren't the rest of doing duplicating their efforts in support of our own causes?
NDN_Coach
2 years ago
I am a TWU grad
I finished off my degree in 95 in Phys Ed at TWU, and things have changed for me since then. When I was there, I found some peoples attitudes absolutely horrible and those folks are now Harper's minions and support him fully. I was an anomaly as I honestly believed in an all-loving god who loved everyone regardless of colour or sexual orientation. Not sure if that is the case today, but I can assure you that not everyone who goes to TWU is a right-wing wacko. SOme of us vote NDP fervently.
I also feel that perhaps the perception of TWU being a right wing think tank factory is also a little erroneous to a degree. I know for a fact that leadership is emphasized in every faculty and that each students takes leadership classes and is expected/encouraged to serve the community while at school. I chose to spend mine in the hockey rink coaching kids or on the downtown eastside bringing meals to shut-ins and handing out sandwiches to those who were hungry.
BC Mary
2 years ago
I saw it acted out once ...
when a graduate of Trinity Western University came to work in a private teaching situation. I was there. I saw it. And it has never stopped worrying me, having seen how easily a person's mind can be abused.
Halfway through the 3-month course on building construction, the TWU-guy (appointed to do some of the teaching) began evangelizing. His lectures on building construction became heavily larded with holiness and god-reaching. Stated another way: he wasn't doing the job he was being paid to do; and the students weren't receiving the instruction they had paid to receive.
I wouldn't bother telling you this, except for the awfulness of how it split the students up. A very good learning experience broke up into two groups. Either they bought into the God-stuff, or they were shunned. If the TWU-guy shouldn't be giving religious instruction during school hours ... well, why not? wasn't he was a hero (yes, to half the students); but he was an outright nut-bar and a cheat to the other half. It was disruptive and a bit ugly.
TWU-guy got transformational feelings himself, so his solution was to invite the school students to meet with him elsewhere, after hours, where he got even more heavily into evangelism. Working against building construction; working to promote God. (Or, as I've often thought: to promote himself. It must be quite a power-thrill.)
Everyone must choose his/her own religion. But that's the thing: CHOOSE it, personally.
What I saw, was an intolerant state of mind being imposed upon unsuspecting people at a time and place where they weren't prepared for it. By someone in a position of trust. It was, in other words: abuse.
It was not a good scene.
Ever since then, after seeing how disruptive a determined evangelizer can be ... I wouldn't have thought it could be a problem. Or certainly not as big a problem as that one became.
puppyg
2 years ago
TWU is helping shape young
TWU is helping shape young minds... to keep their naughty parts unused and under wraps, I have understood. While taking a science course (of all things) at TWU, I formed a few impressions.
One fellow classmate, a woman in her thirties, developed romantic intentions in my direction, confessed to me that she was under counseling to help her overcome calls to temptation - a sad situation, I thought.
While relaxing in a lounge area, I overheard senior students discussing the realities of the Great Flood, Noah and such - to my mind, a bit regressive for med-school hopefuls.
In passing, I would see young African and Asian students walking on campus, burdened with books and looking desperately lonely - a far cry from the community of village life, I thought. The spirit of inclusion was not in evidence.
My friends had a rather withdrawn son in school who commuted from home and seemed to like the place. He finally found a girlfriend and so, I am certain, the delights of forbidden fruit. Perhaps some young people don't need time away from their parents and opportunities to try on new ideologies, to explore their sexuality. Who am I to preach?
And now I find it so easy to believe that TWU would be the perfect crucible for forging Conservative thought a la Stephen Harper. I must stand by my impressions - TWU is too creepy for me.
Zalm - Who led you to believe that this book was badly written? Do you now question their motives in doing so? Just curious.
seth
2 years ago
The Power
Note how a 36 year old visiting Spanish teacher in Seattle, was charged with having sex with an 18 year male student.
http://www.seattlepi.com/sound/423814_sound98966034.html?source=rss
The law orginated because American religious nutballs thought teachers have too much influence on students, so the age of consent was raised to 21 for student teacher relationships.
Apparently raping their minds with religion is fine though. Not too much inflence there!!
John Greg
2 years ago
Onward Christian Hypocrites, Marching Off to War
Rum te tum te tumpty tum, doodle doody doo.
/ahem ... where was I now? Oh yes!
I just loves me some good juicy irony. Puts a shine on the day, 'deed it do.
If only. Oh well, I suppose we can dream. It surely gives me Orwellian Handmaid heeby-jeebies to even contemplate these deluded bigots holding positions of power in our erstwhile nice Country.
We really must get to work on building up the concept of the separation of church and state.
bsmart
2 years ago
TWU's Long Reach
I'm quite sure that I'm not the only one to notice the glaring mistake in the article: Dave Barrett was not Premier in 1979. I believe he was Premier from 1972 to 1975.
kmdyson
2 years ago
TWU
I too take exception to the idea that only "Christians" have a moral code ...the only difference I can see is a superiority complex that allows them to ignore their own faults...
Sunshine Coaster
2 years ago
christian politicians reject Christ's teachings
As far as I can see, the current crop of political christians have completely abandoned the most fundamental teachings of Jesus Christ. Christ's primary message was everyone's responibility to help their fellow human beings who are less fortunate or less capable than they are. But the folks from Trinity Western and similar ilk are clearly in it for themselves. A huge portion of their energy goes into making sure they are "saved" while others perish in a nonsensical apocalypse. The policies they pursue when in government tend towards individual rights, expecting unemployed people to make it on their own, rejecting welfare and other social benefits for the less fortunate and stamping out democratic expressions that oppose their prejudices. Most recently we see them opposing the census because they feel that answering a few questions offends their personal privacy, when it is obvious it is a simple task done for the common good. After all God directed his followers to conduct a census in the book of numbers.
The objective of Trinity Western is to secure political power for an elite group consisting mostly of bigoted,usually older men. Same goes for the Manning Centre for Building Democracy. These folks are NOT Christians as identified by anything Christ taught.
zalm
2 years ago
puppyg
Globe and Mail review a couple of weeks ago. Let's see...
...here it is.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/books/review-the-armageddon-factor-by-marci-mcdonald/article1569099/
Marushka
2 years ago
fundamentalist of any stripe are the problem
Fundamentalists of any stripe - Christians, Jews, Muslims, you name it - will always be problematic. They don't want church/temple/mosque divided from state. They want to ignore reality, science -- they have missed the Enlightenment.
I find it absurd to have to continually hear about these people.
It is unfortunate that atheists, agnostics, and moderate-to-non religious folk haven't yet managed to figure out how to band together in opposition to any government (in any country) who attempts to bring 2000+ year old 'rules' to govern the majority of people who don't really believe in fundamentalist nonsense and are harmed by them.
puppyg
2 years ago
Zalm - Thanks for the book
Zalm - Thanks for the book review... not scathing, but far from complimentary. I am keen to read it and will seek it out.
YaschSiemens
2 years ago
little ol' TWU ? Really?
With respect, I think the author way overstates the reach of TWU here. The idea that a couple dozen interns a year could have any substantive impact in a city that houses thousands of public officials, is a bit rich. And only 2 of the 308 MPs went to TWU. What's next, an article talking about the influence of U of T? Or McGill? I bet there's a couple UBC grads in Ottawa! Gasp!
Frank
2 years ago
YaschSiemens
The article is what it is, you're free to draw your own conclusions about the facts.
According to the next article in this series there's more than two MPs who attended TWU. Mark Warawa?
TWU also seems to hitting above its weight when it comes to internships.
Thus its fair to ask "what is TWU?".
And the more that's uncovered, the scarier it gets as a place that purports to be a bastion of learning is instead a breeding ground for right-wing extremists.
samuidave (not verified)
2 years ago
errors, but message does not change
Barrett being called Premier instead of ex-Premier is hardly critical; it could be an easy editing oversight or a misunderstanding as simple as one erroneously thinking former Premiers were addressed like former Presidents, always Mr President.
As for alumni, an attending student satisfies that definition re: Chuck Strahl.
---
So what we have is a university acting as a political baby factory for the future. Hm, I sort of thought that is what most universities did at some level?
It really boils down to the individual being a good and honest person or not. Unfortunately, politics seems to attract the sort of folks who have a propensity to become addicted to power and, in the process, allow themselves to be corrupted while chasing down their next fix.
Frank
2 years ago
samuidave
When an institution produces more than its share of leaders, when its students seem to be fast-tracked ahead of the hoi poloi its fair to ask why that is.
Is it because of the wealth that lies behind attendance at places like Upper Canada College or the Vancouver equivalent (name escapes me). Is it because of the excellent well renowned programs and professors like perhaps Harvard, McGill and so on or is it because of something else. Which seems to be the case with TWU.
YaschSiemens
2 years ago
Nice try Frank
I love that throwing Mark Warawa into the mix -- now there's a heavy weight!!! -- lends more credence to the idea that TWU is taking over the world.
The reason I don't like articles like this is because by focussing on marginal groups, the real power brokers get a free pass.
This is not the land of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. If Christians want to be engaged in public policy, we should all chill out and actually judge them by their merits. Chuck Strahl, for example, is a competent, committed cabinet minister. But don't take my word for it, First Nations leader Sophie Pierre noted that as far as Indian Affairs ministers go, he's "one of the best I’ve dealt with."
I guess she's part of the conspiracy too, eh? Tell me Frank, what specific criticisms do you have re. actual TWU grads in Ottawa? Or is it easier to make blanket condemnations of monolithic groups?
Frank
2 years ago
YaschSiemens
What specific criticisms? I said what by beef was in my post to samuidave. Why are grads from a small school in the Fraser Valley doing so well in the political sphere in Canada?
We know why it happens with places like Upper Canada College. From the article it would appear TWU grads have a little help in getting their jobs with Conservative MPs. Why is that? Do you agree with the reasons given by the article?
If TWU was producing hockey players at a rate higher than anywhere else the papers would be full of articles on why that is, its just as fair to ask why its happening in the political sphere.
As for Mark Warawa, you said there were only 2 MPs from TWU, you were wrong. Then you say he didn't count because he's such a non-entity. Whatever. You also say we should judge TWU grads on their merits. So do so.
I know I've already judged you by your childish attitude and inability to form a coherent argument but I will wait and see if you have anything else to offer.
YaschSiemens
2 years ago
sorry frank, i still think the article way overstates the case
Neither you nor the author have shown that TWU grads are disproportionately represented among public policy makers. So the hockey analogy and the UCC comparison don't hold. Your claim that "they're doing so well in the political sphere in Canada" is evidenced by what exactly? A couple dozen internships a year and 3 MPs who studied there?
My main point is that Bay Street and the Oil Patch hold way more sway on the current govt than evangelicals do. Shining a spotlight on TWU is perfectly legit. Overstating it's influence, however, is problematic.
Cheers
cboo44
2 years ago
Another Example of Reverse McCarthyism
I know this is against current "progressive" values, but there are some parents that send their kids to TWU in order to maintain their achieving attitudes and WORK ETHIC, to give them an advantage in the competition of the real world. Canada doesn't really require more graduates of "Beer Drinking 101" and BA's of "Philosophy and Social Work".
"you're free to draw your own conclusions about the facts." By the same token, we can draw our conclusions about the misinformation and subjective innuendo, in the article, RIGHT?
Frank
2 years ago
cboo44
Yes, you can, but if you wish to quote me then you're arguing with me, not the article.
Simple to understand.
Frank
2 years ago
dum dee dum
Student population of TWU is around 3,000. 40% of which are American or from some other country. So one can presume the Cdn student population is around 1,800.
UBC has about 20 times that number of students.
UBC is also considered one of the top 50 universities in the world and second to perhaps only McGill in Canada. cboo44 of course believes universities are ranked by their proximity to beer drinking establishments and therefore thinks those that rate universities are probably drunks.
Ergo, I would expect UBC to have currently produced more than 20 times as many MPs and have 20 times as many internships.
But for some even asking these questions is engaging in conspiracy theories or McCarthyism because they prefer ignorance over enlightenment.
mbrad
2 years ago
Trinity Western
The NDP government of Dave Barrett was only in power from September 1972 to December 1975. This article states that Trinity Western was created in 1979 when Premeir Dave Barrett removed himself from a private members bill.
The Premier in 1979 was W. R. Bennett (mini WAC). Please be accurate
MacKenna
2 years ago
The presumption evangelicals are uncorruptable proven false...
time and time again.
All you have to do is count the number of politically involved religious zealots in the US who have been caught in all kinds of nefarious acts.
Fundamentalists are blind followers who do as they are told. If their leaders are corrupt - and most of them are self-serving greedy twats - they'll quickly fall into corruption. They rationalize every wrong they do in the name of whatever God or leader they follow.
G West
2 years ago
@mbrad
You're absolutely correct. Macdonald's book - at least that part of it quoted in this article is not accurate. The private members bill in question was passed during the government of BILL BENNETT and not Dave Barrett.
I can't imagine what she was thinking and I hope Tyee will bring this error to her attention.
Des
2 years ago
You're Right,
MacKenna, and your comment brought to mind the old saying, "In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." Fundamentalists are always willfully blind, whether to ersatz religion or to religious politics, making them easy marks for unscrupulous leaders.
Society achieved the separation of "church and state" years ago, but is still blind to that other unholy alliance, "business and state." The amount of corrupt dollars flowing to religious zealots pales in comparison to the ungodly amounts of money being drawn from society by companies "too big to fail" with the full compliance of the political
state. The one-eyed king will lack the depth of vision required to see the truth, but well enough to hide it from the crowd.
Unfortunately, some economists, like our Steven Harper, know how to combine business with religion and slip them both past our blind spot, using the state to entrench their deceptions little by little, unnoticed in the hurly-burly of other daily catastrophes.
elbillug
2 years ago
Wake up SFU & UBC !
The only thing I got out of this article is: shame on you UBC and SFU, for navel gazing and getting punked by tiny little TWU. If our secular universities were hard at work building decent education programs in this area TWU wouldn't stand a chance. They got an Ottawa internship program up and running for 3 million? That's a drop in the pond for UBC and SFU !
zalm
2 years ago
Hmmm...
That's got me thinking - what about Vancouver School of Theology and Regent? How are their grads doing in the political internship race? Can't think of one, and I do know some dozens of Regent grads and students.
Oh well, political activism takes many forms. Some are the Ananias, and some are the Christ; some the quick, and some the dead....
I'm not at all opposed to modestly malignant Evangelicals taking over the national political discourse. What better way to expose their thought, for good and for ill? Reminds me of a history from my own Anabaptist faith tradition, involving a rebellion against the reigning Catholic church in Münster in 1534-5. Perhaps the intentions were good, but the political exigencies of the situation quickly took over the leaders, who made all sorts of radical alterations to civil society, and were eventually killed for it. The lack of forethought, not to mention the reliance on only portions of the Bible for inerrant leadership were just a couple of the lessons learned, and believers who thereafter repudiated a militant Anabaptism thereafter became known as Mennonites, and shunned the use of not only military power and lethal force, but also political power as a "nettle too fierce to be grasped." They became the "Die Stille im Lände" (the quiet in the land), making their communities their success, though it might appear some, like Vic Toews and Russ Hiebert are abandoning this approach somewhat....
morechatter
2 years ago
Lord love a Duck
If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck its a duck only in this country its going to be a dead duck as I was right as Canada has a major spill and there is nothing ducky about it as wildlife are covered in oil as Ontario's oil spills.
Religion and politics isn't that like oil and water they just don't mix.