The Citizen, 1999-12-22, Page 5THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1999. PAGE 5.
Arthur Black
Canada: made
in the USA
Those who don't learn from
history are compelled to repeat it.
Anon
How much history can you
have in a hundred years?
Bruce Cockburn
Somebody once said that a country defines
itself through its shared history. True enough.
Every American kid knows about Davey
Crockett and Buffalo Bill; Benjamin Franklin
and Johnny Appleseed.
Ask an English schoolkid to name heroes of
England’s past - he’s going to know about
Horatio Nelson and Boadicea; Sir Francis
Drake and Lady Godiva.
And then there’s Canada.
A couple of years ago a firm called the
Dominion Institute conducted a survey of
Canadian youths, aged 18 to 24. Purpose: to
find out how much Canadian kids of university
age know about their own country’s past.
Conclusion: not a helluva lot.
They had no idea who D'Arcy McGee was.
Most didn't know whether Sir Wilfrid Laurier
was alive or dead. Only 14 per cent of them
were aware that Lester B. Pearson had
received the Nobel Peace Prize.
International Scene
A millennium
Christmas
Two thousand years ago (depending on
which calendar you are using) Christ was bom
in Bethlehem and, if he went back to his
hometown for a visit, he found that in many
ways things have not improved too much in
that time span.
The village, which is not really a village any
more, but a suburb of Jerusalem, - is not a
shining model of Christianity, or of any other
faith for that matter. It is wracked by constant
bickering over which part of the area should be
bequeathed to the Arabs, Semitic cousins of
the Jews and which should be kept by the
Israelis.
Christians come and go at their peril and the
Israelis are currently trying to keep any
Christian symbols to a minimum, for fear that
they might prove to be inflammatory.
Now I know how the communists felt when
they had to travel to a capitalist country, Great
Britain, in order to visit the grave of the
founder of their faith, Karl Marx. Currently
such visits are something of an anachronism.
Religion, said Marx, was the opiate of the
people but at least Christianity is still alive and
(relatively) well after two millennia, while
communism collapsed under its own
inadequacies.
Marxist theories were first given voice by
him in 1849, with the publication of the
Communist Manifesto (Workers of the world
unite! You have nothing to lose but your
chains.) After 140 years it was either in its
death throes (Russia and eastern Europe) in
some countries or else altered almost out of all
recognition in others as in China.
But then Christians have no reason to gloat.
Almost half of them - 46 per cent - couldn’t
name Canada’s first prime minister.
How come such a dismal performance?
Some social observers blame the deadening
effect of television; others say it’s the fact that
history lessons are disappearing from the
Canadian high school curriculum, having been
supplanted by computer-literacy or driver
training courses.
Me?
I think the problem is something else. I think
our history has been hijacked.
I’ll tell you why - but first I want to tell you
a little tale out of Canadian history.
True story. ‘Way back in 1904 there was this
gang of guys up in Dawson City in the Yukon
who got together once a week to play hockey.
They called themselves the Dawson City
Nuggets and they were pretty good.
As a matter of fact, they were darned good.
There wasn’t a team in any of the nearby
towns that could beat them.
Part of the reason for that is that there
WERE no nearby towns, but never mind.
These guys were mighty full of themselves
and decided they ought to take on the Stanley
Cup champions down in Ottawa.
Getting from the middle of the Yukon to
Ottawa is tough enough today. In 1904 it was
like going to the moon.
The Nuggets set out on dog sleds. They
grabbed a ride on a ferry. They took a train all
By Raymond Canon
The continual friction in Ireland between
Protestant and Catholic shows little sign of
abating although there is yet another peace
settlement in the offing.
The almost constant clashes between
Catholic Croatia and Orthodox Serbia that
have highlighted the news from that area
during the last decade shows that for many
people, the credo “Peace on earth, good will,
toward all men” is something that is practised
elsewhere.
Yet Christianity does have its real saints.
One of my earliest heroes was the Frenchman,
Albert Schweizer, from the province of Alsace
who, even while writing learned treatises on
such men as Johann Goethe and playing great
renditions of Bach on the organ, went off to
darkest Africa as a medical doctor to
demonstrate his Christian faith.
During the past quarter of a century it has
been the work of Mother Teresa in India that
caught the public’s attention and earned her
the admiration of millions, both in that country
and elsewhere.
But my admiration of the zeal of many
Christians goes back a whole millennium.
About a thousand years ago monks from
Ireland took refuge in a spot in Switzerland
and set up a monastery. It was during what we
now know as the Dark Ages and the monks
were trying to retain their Christian belief and
learning. One of the monks, named Gallus,
gave the location its name and the current city
of St. Gallen, as well as being my Swiss home
town, is the site of a wonderful museum in
which the work of these dedicated monks is
displayed.
Some idea of their devotion can be realized
from the fact that all their efforts were done
four centuries before printing was invented.
In Christmas we have a great heritage. The
the way across the country.
After 23 days, they finally made it to
Ottawa, strapped on their skates and took on
the Stanley Cup champion Silver Seven.
I’d love to tell you that the boys from the
boonies deked the pros out of their jockstraps,
but in fact the Dawson team got clobbered.
Still, a wonderful story, is it not? And talk
about Canadian - you’ve got the Stanley Cup
... the Yukon ... a showdown in Ottawa -how
much more Canadian can you get? Man, if
there was ever a movie about Canadian history
crying out to be made, this would be it.
And you know what folks? That movie has
been made. A couple of years ago, Hollywood
moguls, recognizing the box office potential of
the Dawson City Nuggets saga, dispatched a
team of researchers north to the Yukon. There,
they interviewed old timers, checked the
archives.
They even shot a whole bunch of movie
footage not too far away - in northern Alberta.
That film is making the rounds of North
American movie theatres even as I speak.
It’s called Mystery, Alaska.
That’s right - the Yanks took a true chunk of
Canadian history, glitzed it up and transferred
it to a mythical town in Alaska. Pierre Trudeau
once said that living next to America is like
sleeping next to an elephant.
Sometimes it’s more like living next to a
Central Vac.
rampant secularism which now insidiously
menaces it is only the latest of the many
threats it has warded off during those two
millennia. Still others, as yet unknown, are to
be faced.
However, if we maintain the durability and
depth of our convictions, we have every right
to hope that our descendants will be
celebrating the birth of Christ at the end of the
third millennium.
I Christmas Police
Prayer
Please make this a silent night,
This one night of the year.
No sirens wailing through the dark,
No shouts of hate or fear.
No crumpled cars and twisted steel,
No blood and tears that spill.
No messages of grief to take
To homes that suddenly grow still.
Please, King of Peace, no drunken fights,
That wreck the family tree.
And all the dreams of some small child,
Who clings, in fear, to me.
Let travellers tread the tinseled streets,
Safe from assault and harms.
On this night, this special night,
No red lights, no alarms.
I'd like to be at home, Oh Lord,
Where spice and cedar scent the air.
I hope the children don’t wake up,
Until I can be there.
JI
I
Please make this, Lord, a silent night,
No hate, or hurt or crime.
But if this cannot be, Oh Lord,
Help me get there in time.
The
Short
of it
By Bonnie Gropp
No doubt, this year
it will be different ,
So this is Christmas, and what have we
done?
Another year older, a new one just begun.
— John Lennon
There is probably no other time of year that
inspires such introspection and reflection as
Christmas. We are now inclined to consider
our lives, our blessings, ourselves.
It can be a bittersweet experience as we
acknowledge the swift passage of time, how
brief the span between putting the decorations
back into storage and hauling them out again.
We may be surprised by the changes a brief 12
months can bring, yet recognizing how little it
alters our day to day existence. Inevitably, we
go even further back in time paying
sentimental homage to long ago Christmases,
remembered loved ones no longer with us,
revisiting places no longer seen.
We also study what we have accomplished,
what we have failed to do. It can be humbling.
Looking back at the previous year and
admitting what we want to be different can be
eye-opening. Did we accomplish anything?
Did we help anyone?
At Christmas, too, we recall that amidst our
joy, are those for whom the season is difficult.
Christmas is a season of family and love for
some, a time of loneliness for others. It is a
time of goodwill and prosperity for most, a
time of bitterness and poverty for others.
Expectations can be high and with high
expectations often come disappointment.
I am currently reading This Year it Will Be
Different, by Maeve Binchy. It is a collection
of short stories that recounts not just the good
aspects of the holidays, but the bad. Yet in
each the author reminds that every year also
brings change, new hope, new memories.
They may not end in happy-ever-after, but
there is optimism, an inspiration for new
beginnings.
Generally, we acknowledge, however, that
much of what occurs in our lives is out of our
control. And yet, that each situation brings a
change or in some way makes a difference is
unarguable.
This Christmas our family received a lovely
gift, as we welcomed our first grandchild.
While the circumstances of his birth, may
perhaps not have been ideal by some
standards, new life is always a celebration and
we know we have been blessed. The purity
and beauty of this tiny child has made our
family’s holiday season even more
wonderful.
So as I look back on my previous year, it is
with the typical feelings. There is nostalgia
with memories dear, but touched with some
sadness. There is a touch of regret. But mostly
there is much joy and gratitude for I need not
search far to find my blessings.
And with the addition of our newest one,
there is also the certainty that this year it will
indeed be different.
And so Happy Christmas, we hope you
have fun.
The near and the dear ones, the old and
the young.
— Lennon