 Media Credit: Masha Bogushevsky
A man with an unusual vision
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Religion in the political forum, and the division of Church and State is as relevant today as it ever was – the leader of the Canadian Reform Conservative Alliance Party, Stockwell Day, is a fundamentalist Christian and a lay pastor. Preston Manning, ordained Christian Minister and former leader of the defunct Canadian Reform party (progenitor to the Alliance) was a guest speaker at a recent Canadian Church History class at McGill, and in a question and answer session with the class, expounded upon his views of religion in politics:
Elizabeth: Our professor mentioned your interest in conflict resolution and I was wondering if your political and religious beliefs ever infringed one upon the other.
Manning: I wouldn’t say infringed. My conception of the Gospel is that the biggest single theme is Reconciliation, and that the whole Gospel is about conflict resolution on the big scale, particularly the reconciliation of people to God. Therefore, I think as a Christian, if you really understand that process of reconciliation, you ought to be able to practice some of the principles in lower level conflict resolution. Of course, in contemporary politics, you could also argue that is about all there is. A politician tries to reconcile conflicting interests in order to achieve certain objectives. I was in management consultation before I got into politics. I once tried to develop a system model of reconciliation using the Christian model, where you have a mediator that incorporates and communicates with both sides, and where he sacrifices his own interests in order to achieve reconciliation.
Brian: With respect to your reconciliation analysis, what should humanity’s relationship be to the earth? How might it relate to biotechnology, genome projects or foot and mouth disease?
Manning: That’s a huge question. When I think of Reconciliation, I also think of reconciliation of man to the physical environment. I believe the Christian scriptures teach stewardship role in relationship to the environment — of protecting it, not exploiting it. I don’t think a lot of Christians have carried out [this mandate] to anywhere near the extent that we should. I’ve never been satisfied with the environmental positions of any of the federal political parties in Canada, including our own.
In my generation of politicians, and business decision-makers, the economy and the environment got separated early on in our conceptual framework. We’ve kind of tried to put them together, but it’s not been well done and I think there’s a whole lot of work that needs to be done to develop more realistic and effective environmental policies and a more integrated process. I think maybe your generation will have more success than ours, because many of you kind of got these [economics and environment] integrated in your own minds, that they are not in two separate worlds but all together, which I think is a starting point.
Brian: Do you think it really is a humanly achievable goal? Can people pull themselves up by their bootstraps?
Manning: I think if people think they’re going to perfect the human race through genetic engineering then that is misguided. I think that the perfection of man is achieved through spiritual change within, not through the manipulation of genes. Now having said that, I’m not denying that there’s an enormous potential in that science in dealing with disease and cures. That’s why we have to talk about a framework for the support and regulation of these technologies. It’s not a matter of saying “no, no, no,” and just putting on the brakes.
I think man’s basic problem is spiritual and is rooted in alienation from God, alienation from each other and alienation from the environment, which was your starting point. I don’t think that can be fixed by genetic manipulation. Also when you talk to many of the geneticists and ethicists - and you have some of the best in North America right in this city - they tell the laymen to be very cautious about their expectations about what you can do through genetic engineering. It’s like the Tower of Babel, we think we can build it up to heaven but communications may get fouled up.
Rosalie: Who has the ethical power and authority to make decisions, because you might have some people who believe in God and some who don’t?
Manning: I think you should create standing so that everybody should feel free in a political discussion, for example to articulate their most deeply held values, whether those are religious and God-centered or whether they are something else. I like using the referendum to sort out some of these moral, ethical issues like euthanasia, abortion, whatever... That’s the best way that I’ve been able to figure out how to reconcile both having deeply held values and the right to express them and to bring them to bear on public policy and the protection of the majority, so that the value-driven minority won’t impose or ram their views down the throat of the majority. It’s using the rules of democracy to mediate between the minorities and the majorities.
Professor: [Just] as when you began the Reform Party, giving the power back to the people, there seems to be a coincidence of empowerment, politically and theologically, here. Do you see a parallel between empowering the laity and their sense of alienation from the theological elite and biblical establishment of scholars?
Manning: I think that theological position says that every person you look at, that that person is infinitely valuable and any system that denigrates them, and says they aren’t, is not fitting in with God’s model of things. Now democratic theory says somewhat the same thing: that every citizen is worth something and that their voice ought to be listened to and they ought to be given the chance to effect the big decisions that affect them.
I tell public audiences, ‘Beware of elite who don’t trust you. If they don’t trust you, why should you trust them?’ There are men in parliament who will go out and give these great speeches about how they appreciate your vote, but when they’re talking among themselves, they say, ‘the public is absolutely stupid. They cannot be trusted with their own constitution let alone with something as complex as some of this legislation.’
I don’t have a lot of respect for political people that play the democratic game and in their private councils think that there’s no point to appealing to [people’s] intelligence. People can understand. I’m not deifying the ordinary man — sure there are lots of misunderstandings, but I think we sell the ordinary people short. And it’s our obligation, from the democratic, political side to endeavor to inform the discretion of ordinary people, and it does fit in with the theological view of the infinite value of the individual. So that’s my rant on democracy.
Participants in the discussion:
Elizabeth Anderson, Rosalie Langevin, Brian Neilson, and Professor Norman Cornett
