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So many out of touch with the general population
To hear disgraced former televangelist Jim Bakker tell it, his ex-wife Tammy Faye "is now in heaven with her mother and grandmother and Jesus Christ, the one who she loves and has served since childbirth."
Jim Bakker, as you likely know, headed directly to jail on numerous charges relating to the collapse of the multi-million empire that he and the makeup-manic Tammy Faye created in the 1980s.
It was never clear to this correspondent why Tammy Faye, who was as much a part of the sham ministry as Jim was, didn't go to jail along with him, but she did ultimately divorce him in 1992 - while he was in prison - and in 1993 married Roe Messner, the chief builder of Bakkers' Heritage USA Christian theme park near Fort Mill, S.C. Two years later, Messner was convicted of bankruptcy fraud and he too was sent to jail for two years.
As for Tammy Faye, she died of colon cancer late last week and her ashes were interred at a private family service.
Whether someone with her sketchy record of using religion to con people out of their hard-earned money did indeed head to heaven as her ex-hubby claims is a matter of considerable conjecture, but it does raise the whole issue of heaven, and hell, and whether such concepts are still alive and well.
At first blush, it might be easy to dismiss these concepts as an anachronism from a past age. After all, a quick glance at this week's Canadian bestsellers list in the Sunday Toronto Star tells us that the two leading non-fiction books at the moment are both outright attacks on these Christian concepts.
In first place is "God is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything," by Christopher Hitchens, and in second, "The God Delusion," by Richard Dawkins. What's more, Al Gore's latest book, "The Assault on Reason," another publication promoting the new religion of environmentalism, is listed at number five.
Still, despite the best efforts of our stridently secular media and academia to discount religion - and despite the abuse of religion by scam artists such as the Bakkers - it seems that Canadians, while not as religious as Americans, still cling to the view that the earth wasn't strictly a scientific creation.
Indeed, a recent Canadian Press-Decima Research survey found that 60 per cent of those Canadians who were surveyed do believe that God had either a direct or indirect role in creating mankind.
Only 29 per cent said that they believe that evolution occurred with no help from God, while 34 per cent believe humans developed over millions of years under a process guided by God and 26 per cent believe God created humans alone within the last 10,000 years or so. Pollster Bruce Anderson told Canadian Press that, "These results reflect an essential Canadian tendency. We are pretty secular, but pretty hesitant to embrace atheism."
Anderson, perhaps, should read his own poll more carefully. We're not "pretty secular" at all according to his numbers - less than 30 per cent ruled out God's role in creation - yet this is typical of the kind of stuff we constantly read in the media.
You'll recall a few years ago when Stockwell Day was leader of the Alliance Party of Canada how savagely the media - not to mention Liberals and New Democrats - attacked him for daring to say that he believed that God created the earth.
And here we are, years later, reading a poll which tells us that the majority of Canadians - including this one - actually agree with Day. Imagine that.
These numbers pale by comparison, of course, to our American neighbors, where a recent poll found that only 15 per cent of the respondents felt that God played no role in creation, but they also supplement other polls that have found that, despite falling church attendance - particularly in the more "liberal" mainstream churches - the vast majority of Canadians still tell pollster that they do believe in God.
This is but one of a host of areas where much of the media, academia and the political elites are completely out of touch with the general population. But it certainly has become fashionable in recent times to pooh-pooh those who believe in God the Creator and to argue that even those who cling to these archaic beliefs should realize that they have no legitimate place in our political discourse.
The naysayers - no doubt convinced of their own infallibility - nonetheless might be well advised to consider the results of this poll, and others like it, before writing off the concept as old news.
Who knows, they may even find themselves secretly seeking heavenly help. If Tammy Faye really can make it to the kingdom then there's hope for them too.
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