hakim@bigq.enet.dec.com (18-Oct-1989 1046) (10/19/89)
I came across this article in my research few months ago. It saddens me to see that a respected religious leader should write such an article. I hope that such articles does not widen the gap of mutual understanding and friendship between the followers of various religions in the fast shrinking world of today. ================================================================================ PUNGENT AND PERTINENT by Hans W. Zegerius A Thundering Silence "The Ontario Court of Appeal, in a decision released on September 23, 1988, has concluded, on the basis of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, that S.28(1) of Regulation 262 under the Education Act of Ontario is of no force or effect. S.28(1) reads as follows: A public school shall be opened or closed each school day with religious exercises consisting of the reading of the scriptures or other suitable readings and the repeating of the Lord's Prayer or other suitable prayers. At the same time, the Court made note of the experiences and practices of the Toronto Board of Education. Since 1980 Toronto public schools have used a book of prayers and readings, composed by an interdenominational committee, which are drawn from a number of sources, including: Baha'ism, Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, Jainism, Judaism, People of Native Ancestry, Secular Humanism, Sikhism, and Zoroasterianism. The Ontario Education Minister said on October 14, 1988, according to news reports, that the Ontario Government will not appeal the above court decision. Instead, the ministry will draft new rules for opening exercises that reflect the court ruling. The news item further stated that several urban schools have already adopted multicultural opening exercises. It is almost beyond belief that in a number of public schools in Ontario the pupils are being drawn into such a baffling religious mish-mash. It is even more amazing that there has not been a thunderous reaction from Christian churches and parents to it. Most distressing is that the composition of these readings took place, and may still take place, with the co-operation of Christian ministers and theologians. A close look at the sources for the Toronto practices reveals that the concept of God as Judaism and all of Christianity holds it, must become so blurred and contorted as to be unrecognizable. For instance, Secular Humanism if not atheistic, is agnostic. Confucianism presents only the vaguest notion of `Heaven' (t'ien); not that of a divine Ruler or Lord but of a supreme moral-spiritual power. Buddhism does not hold the idea of a god who would be even remotely akin to the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ. Essentially it has no god at all. Have the Christians, co-operating in this enterprise, not even had an inkling of the startling fact, that the Protestant character of the public schools has now been abandoned, and that is the Baha'i religion that has replaced the Protestant Faith? The Baha'is teach that religious truth is not absolute but relative. God is the Eternal Logos. But while the Logos is One, his manifestations are many. They are "prophets." The manifestations of God through the prophets never cease. Every prophet is the `seal' of the preceding ones. Hence the great importance attached to Mohammad, who came after Jesus and whose work, therefore, sealed (superseded?) that of Christ. By the so-called multicultural opening exercises in our schools our children are not just being acquainted with the gamut of belief in our present Canadian society, they are being ushered into the mindset of Baha'ism. Instead of being made conscious of the Christian faith among the other religious beliefs, they are implicitly being taught that all religious truth is relative, including that of Christianity. They are, in fact forced to attend exercises with distinct Baha'i flavour. As it stands now, the trend away from the Protestant character that once was the hallmark of the public school system in Ontario cannot be reversed. However, Christian witness is not therefore muted. It ought to be ringing loud and clear. This is the time, when Christians ought to be determined that our Lord Jesus Christ shall not be immersed in a religious smorgasbord; that his teachings shall become part of an ethical cakemix on which the daily selection from umpteen different religions is the icing-of-the-day. The staggering ring lethargy of Christian leaders and churches ought to stop! Deeply conscious of our unshakable faith that Jesus Christ is the Truth, the Way, and the Life. and that no one comes to the Father but by him, we ought to protest the inclusion of Christian sources, especially of the Bible, in the opening exercises in the public school. Instead of being part of the development of a Baha'i-style set of opening exercises, every Christian should pull out of such futile and divisive undertaking.... It is time that we protest Jesus Christ made into a Baha'i prophet! There must be no Christian content whatsoever in the material that adorns itself with the epithet `multicultural,' but its very nature emasculates the Christ of God and so discriminate against us who worship him. Perhaps it is our turn to appeal to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Christian witness may take two forms: evangelistic witness and prophetic witness. Evangelistic witness must be winsome and loving. Prophetic witness must be clear and intrepid. The time for Prophetic witness in this matter is NOW in Ontario, and who knows how soon in the rest of Canada. [] The Presbyterian Record January, 1989 Mr. Zegerius is a retired minister of The Presbyterian Church in Canada, living in Guelph, Ontario ================================================================================ For the sake of clarification I'd like to emphasize that my disappointment is not with the the fact that this is the personal view of an individual about another religion. I am saddened to see that a religious leader should convey such feelings. Regardless of the fact that we humans pride ourselves in our natural, and God-given freedom of choice, a great majority of us prefer to be blind followers in one way or another, in order to decrease the burden of excessive mindfulness in our lives. As a result, the views of an individual who is in the position of leadership and authority (especially in a highly emotional area such as religion) becomes very critical in toggling the emotions of the masses of the following believers in a specific way. It is not necessary to analyze the effect of this emotional toggling in this posting, since, the history is full of prime examples of this (i.e. Crusades, Inquisition, persecution of various religious/ethnic minorities in Iran, etc....). Moreover, according to various Scriptures, the leaders of religion have always been in the forefront of opposition to the succeeding revelation, and the primary stirrers of sedition is every society and culture, throughout the history. This is indeed very disappointing. What do you think? Regards, Kamran Hakim hakim@bigq.dec.com Tel#508-568-6925 [For those who don't realize, Kamran Hakim is a Baha'i. I can certainly understand why he would be upset at this article. Its attacks on Baha'i do not seem to contribute to what is being said. However the point it makes is an important one, and could be made without the Baha'i-bashing. There are very serious problems for Christians with participating in non-Christian worship. The potential objections vary with the way the worship is designed. There seem to be two basic approaches. One approach to multi-religious prayer is the lowest-common-denominator approach. This attempts to intersect all religions, and come up with some sort of generic prayer that no possible religion could object to. I could imagine specific contexts in which such a thing might be OK. But we're apparently talking about daily prayer for children. This exercise is going to constitute a rather substantial fraction of their total prayer experience while growing up. While there are no specific magic words that Christians are required to say, prayers are supposed to be in the name of Jesus. There are also specific models that many Christians follow in constructing prayer. I do not like the idea of requiring (or strongly encouraging -- I don't know how strongly participation in these exercizes is pushed) daily prayers from which all specifically Christian ideas were excluded. Another approach is to use a variety of prayers, or single prayers that combine elements from a variety of faiths. The intent here would be to avoid the lowest-common-denominator problem by giving students experience with many religions. I would be happy to have students learn about a variety of religions. However I do not like the idea of requiring (or strongly encouraging) participation in acts of worship based on religious ideas that contradict Christianity. If no such contradiction happens, I'm going to be very sceptical of whether all religious views are really being represented. (Why do I have a feeling that these "multicultural" prayers are really going to be Protestant prayers with the "in Jesus' name, Amen" omitted? If so, of course the objections are of a somewhat different nature...) I think the reason for the Baha'i-bashing in this article is the Christian perception that the Baha'i faith is based on an attempt to construct an intersection of all religions. This may not be an entirely accurate portrayal of Baha'i. (I get the feeling from your postings on talk.religion.misc that it is not.) However Baha'i do seem to be one of the primary proponents of the concept that all religions are at the very least pointing at the same thing, and that one can accept the founders of all the major faiths at the same time. So the policy described sounds suspiciously similar to what Baha'i have been saying. On the other hand, I do not see that the anti-Baha'i attacks in that article add to either its clarity or persuasiveness. I think the space could have been better spent looking more carefully at what sort of prayers were actually being used and what specific problems they raised for Christians. If read carefully, the article contains remarkly little discussion about its purported topic. --clh]