HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1976-12-08, Page 1Amen
by Karl Schuessler
truilINAIL
Brussels Post
BRUSSELS.
ONTARIO
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 8, 1976
Serving Brussels and the surrounding community.
Publishbd each Wednesday afternoon at Brussels, Ontario
by McLean. Bros. Publishers, Limited. .
Evelyn. Kennedy - Editor • Dave Robb - Advertising
Member Canadian Community Newspaper Association and
Ontario Weekly Newspaper Association CNA
/ Subscriptions (in advance) Canada $6.00 a year. Others
$8.00 a year, Single Copies 15 cents each.
Clip his t(vings
This week's report from the auditor general ought
to disturb every Canadian. We all • knew that
government spending is very high. What we perhaps
didn't know in detail until his report is how wasteful
some of it is.
J.J.Macdonnell says gone are the days when .a top •
civil servant was one who knew how to cut corners
and save the public purse. These days the deputy
minister who gets rewarded is the one who can think
up expensive new programs to sp6nd more money.
Ironically in a time of restraint the promotions and
the bonuses go to civil servants who can increase
their department's budget, not to those who work
industrially to slash it.
It's not a new trend. Mr. Mcdonnell says waste
and lack of accountability in Federal government
spending has been growing for at least 15 years. He
estimates that it pould take until 1980 to start turning
this trend around. .
No private business could last long if it allowed the
abuses and waste that have been chronicled in the
daily papers since Mr. Mcdonnell released his
report. It would, quite simply, go broke.
Controls on public spending should be tighter, not
looser than those on private business. As the auditor
general says, "I firmly believe that public funds are
in effect, trust funds, and must be treated
accordingly."
it's our money that is being thrown around and it's •
going to take some screa ming, loud and long, from
wounded taxpayer's to stop it.
Everyone who knows a federal civil servant has
heard horror stories about waste and mis-
rnangement, on large and small scales. Then there's
the joke about the civil servant who didn't look out of
the window in the morning. Why? Because he's
saving that for something to do in the afternoon.
It's not fair though to blame individual civil
servants for the problem. Until careful spending,
wide open for the public to see becomes government
policy on the highest level things won't change.
Only a chorus of indignant taxpayers can make a
dint. Perhaps.
To the editor
Critics • invited visit.
To the Editor
It has come to my attention that some concerned citizens of
Brussels feel that two of the patients from Callander Nursing.
Home who frequent the village are inadequately clothed and -
shod.
May I suggest that before yoking opinions, that they be aware
of the underclothing Worn beneath the otter garments. I suggest
that they visit this home and inspect the Wardrobes of the
patients.
Before criticism is levelled at anyone or anywhere, one Should
always have the facts. Accordingly, may I extend an open
invitation to visit this Home at any time when any Member of my
nursing staff or myself Will be delighted to give you a tout of this
Pursing Nine,
Sincerely yours,
Norman Keay, Administrator`
Callander ]Nursing Heine; Brussels.
Let's face it. Who does most of the work
in the church? And the attending?
Someone said if you wanted the church
to pay its own way, you should keep only
two things: the women's group and the
• Sunday morning worship service. They're
the• only two efficiencies -sufficiencies -- in
the church.
I want you to understand. If you've come
a long way, baby, so have I. I was brought
up on Bible proof texts. such 'as "The
women should keep silent in the church".
and "It is shameful for a woman to speak in
church."
But quoting Scripture doesn't
necessarily settle the matter. I can quote
Scripttire too. Take that other verse of St.
Paul's. "There is neither Jew nor Greek,
there is neither slave nor free, there is
n'eighter male or female; for. ou are all one
in Christ. Jesus."
The fact is the Bible has to be.
interpreted. Put into historical context.
That's where all the differences come in.
I realized how far I'd come, when I
visited one of my childhood churches last
summer. That congregation doesn't allow
women to vote. And they're not even
thinking about discussing it. If women
voting is a no-no, then women clergy is a
no-no-no.
When you think of it, that was one of the
issues of the American Revolution.
"Taxation without representation is
tyranny." Yet the women have been
supporting, working and paying for years,
without a vote.
But Christ never chose female disciples
or apostles, someone argues. True enough,
but he never chose Negroes and Orientals
and Gentiles, either. Yet they're
clergymen within the church.
Now, I know: Female clergy do pose
some interesting problems. One man said
he'd. blush if he had to• confess his
carrying-ons to a woman,
And just what do you call your new
female priest? Sister? Mother? Rev.
Mother? Rev. Clergywoman?' Priestess?
Priest person?
And how do you cope with a pregnant
priest? How would thai.' look?
"Not much different,' harrumpfed one
woman, "Hardly any different at all from
all the fat clergy I see walking around in
Once upon a time hi a small rural village, in
the southwest erti part of the province, lived a
small group of shrewd business men, or so the
poor people thought. One day the shrewd
business men decided to build many houses.
The poor people laughed, "How do they
think they will sell all the houses when so few
have been built in the last few years", they
said.
But what the poor people did net knoW was
that the shrewd business men had been told
that PrOsperity wotild wine to the area, and
that the houses soon would be filled, along
with their purses,. So while the poor people
laughed, the shrewd business men built and
planned.
Meanwhile disaster Struck the village, neWs
had tome, that the, building Where the poor
people gathered had been, Coridenitiedi
swollen' robes."
The defenses are out already. The ship
of the church may be entering some heavy
seas. The boat may start to rock and roll,
But. Christ did say, "Launch out into the
deep."
And that, the Anglican church has dared
to do. For this, I applaud the 'church. I say
"Amen".
I just read a chain letter to end all chain
letters. It was in the Anglican Churchman
newspaper.
Hear this:
"Dear Friend,
Now you can have your own kind of
priest. Simply send a copy of this letter to
six other parishes that are tired of their
priest.
Then bundle up your priest and send
him to the parish at the top of the list that
follows. In one week you will receive 16,436
priests and one of them should be a
dandy.
Have faith in this letter. Do not break the
chain. One man broke the chain and got his
old priest back."
Not, bad, eh? Packing off your local
Anglican priest and Tutting him onto the
chain letter circuit. That's about the size of
it. The clergyman you have, is the one you
don't want.
But now there's another option. The
priest you get, may be a woman. Only last
week the Anglicans in Canada ordained six
women into the priesthood.
"It's abouut time" I can hear some men
say. All these years the women have been
getting the breaks. Now the men can take
their turn at having their own safe sex
symbol -- attractive, alluring, yet
untouchable. The profane and the sacred
can produce a strange alchemy.
No longer will God and religion be
- dispensed inmate terms ... on maleterms.
Now it's man's turn: to be preached to,
counseled to, confessed by and forgiven by
... by a female.
And maybe that's not so bad-after all.
Maybe that's exactly what the church
needs. This new dimensibn and spirit
women can bring into the priesthood.
The males have dominated the church
for the last 2,000 years. And I •don't know if
they can brag mubh about how well they've
tended the kingdoin.
While the poor- people mourned and
gathered their Money, the shrewd business
men built and planned.
Because the poor people were not as well
informed as the shrewd business men they
accepted a piece of property and built a new
gathering place.
Soon Prospertiy came. Houses were built
around the gathering place. The shrewd
business men took their newfound wealth and
retired to.a land where the still always shines
and orange trees grow. Meanwhile the poor
people stayed in the village,• now a town, paid
their high takes, and wondered how they
ever got into this mess.
The moral of this story is: Never look a gift
horse in the mouth, But at the Sallie tittle
di:net be t aired for a fide.
MiChael ColiabOY,
To the editor
A bedtime story