National Affairs
Giving the voters more to believe in
Claire Hoy
Just a few weeks ago, your correspondent was driving his car south along an interstate highway in southern Indiana when the billboard virtually jumped out from the side of the road.

Not literally, of course, since a billboard is rather static.

But there it was, an over-sized billboard, easily viewed from the interstate, declaring that, "Abortion stills a beating heart."

And right behind it, and as far as the eye could see across a field and over a slight hill, sat row upon row of tiny white crosses, a dramatic demonstration of the death toll that easy abortion inflicts upon our society.

The issue here, however, is not the right or wrong of abortion - in the interest of full disclosure your correspondent is decidedly pro-life or, if you prefer the pejorative version, anti-abortion.

It is simply an illustration of the differences between Canada and the U.S. when it comes to political and social discourse in the public arena.

Can you imagine somebody in this country setting up a display of white crosses in this way visible from a major highway? And if they did, how long would it be before they'd be facing a human rights tribunal on the specious - and very Canadian - grounds that it offends somebody's sensibilities.

Indeed, traveling through the U.S., you'd have to be a complete nitwit not to recognize the role that such issues - and religion in general - play in the day-to-day lives of American citizens, and consequently, in the day-to-day politics of that country.

In Canada, any leader who publicly claims his or her heartfelt allegiance to Christianity - or any religion, for that matter - is routinely dismissed as a crackpot at best, and a public menace/hate-monger at worst.

In the U.S., any leader who does not hold religious truths in his or her heart may as well look for another line of work.

Sure, Canadian leaders will play the religious card periodically if they think it will help them. Former prime minister Paul Martin, for example, made sure the media knew that during the election campaign he was taking time to head off to mass at various Roman Catholic churches. He also, in private meetings before the election, assured various Catholic leaders that they had nothing to fear from him in terms of imposing same-sex marriages on the country, and we all know what happened to that promise.

Indeed, various Conservatives, particularly Preston Manning, Stockwell Day and Stephen Harper, have been targeted by the Liberals - and their cheerleaders in the media - for the heinous crime of holding strong religious beliefs. They've been accused of, among other things, harboring a "hidden agenda" based on their so-called wonky religious beliefs, the argument being that it's okay for a politician to hold religious beliefs as long as he/she doesn't try to impose them upon the rest of us.

This same argument doesn't hold true, apparently, for any other set of beliefs. It's okay, it seems, for say a strong union man to get elected and do all he can to strengthen pro-union legislation based on his belief that that would be good for society. It's okay for teachers to get elected and push a teacher-friendly agenda based on their own beliefs and experiences. And so on. The only belief system which is off limits for many, alas, is someone's belief in a higher power.

We also hear the old chestnut about the separation of church and state, and argument ironically made by those who tend to be the most anti-American among us but which, in fact, is an American, not a Canadian concept. There is nothing - not a word - in Canadian traditions or our constitution about the separation of church and state.

There is in the American constitution, but here again, the anti-religious crowd distorts its' meaning. The fathers of confederation in the U.S. wanted separation to protect the churches from the state, not the other way around. Having just fought a war against a society that imposed a state-sanctioned religion (i.e. Britain and the Church of England) the founding fathers of the U.S. wanted none of it. But it did not mean then - and does not mean now - that religion must be purged from the public square. Oh contraire. Which is why, of course, their coins declare, "In God We Trust." Most Americans actually do.

And so do their political leaders. Something that might give Canadian voters a little more to believe in themselves.