The SJAM Parkway – Acknowledge the Truth

“Canada was founded on strong Christian values,” a statement I’ve heard many thousands of times in my 72 years of life. The old white man who sold huge blocks of sawdust-covered ice on hot summer days when I was a child, said it! School teachers in all the classes I attended, said it. Every politician from municipal to federal governments, say it, gee, I wonder how many times a year. I heard Canada’s current Prime Minister say something to that effect again recently when commenting on what the Russians are doing in Ukraine. If the Canada of my dad’s generation and his fathers before him was truly based on strong Christian values, then I pray to Creator now that such values never enter the hearts of my grandchildren. If it were strong Christian values that created the “Indian Act”, then Christianity is a house whose foundation is built, not on rock but more like on a slow sinking mud hole.

“There never would have been a Canada, if not for John A. Macdonald,” a ridiculous claim made by his adorers. Let us finally agree that Canada was destined to happen, simply because its resources dictated it (the victory of the British and Anishinabe fighters in the War of 1812 over the Americans set the creation of Canada in motion), regardless if John A. Macdonald had ever, even been born. The truth is that Canada’s greatness as a nation would be today, a thousand fold stronger in emotional and spiritual health without Macdonald ever becoming prime minister. The Indian Act, Residential Schools and propaganda promoting hatred of this country’s Indigenous Peoples would never have happened without the influence of Macdonald. He was a cruel-minded, mean-spirited white supremacist! The children who died and suffered in his Residential Schools offered testimony to that effect in the spiritual place they went to after leaving this world.

How many dollars have Macdonald’s sins cost us, as taxpayers? Residential School settlements, programs, dysfunction, imprisonment, the Department of Indigenous and Northern Development, all these things don’t come cheap. You, all of us who pay taxes would not carry this burden today if Macdonald had stayed clear of this country.

Imagine if Dr. Peter Bryce had become Canada’s first prime minister, genocide in this country would never have occurred. The Indian Act would never have happened. A relationship based on honour and respect between the Crown and the First Nations would have been the order of the day. Under the leadership of a human being, the likes of Dr. Peter Bryce, strong Christian values as those taught by Christ, not as those defined by people of Macdonald’s mindframe, would have been at the forefront of this country’s first government.

Dr. Bryce lived and worked alongside of men like John A. Macdonald. Yet, he kept his “strong Christian values” intact! There existed in Macdonald’s day, kind-hearted and fair-minded people. But sadly there weren’t enough of them to overrule the greed and viciousness of the majority.

I believe that if Macdonald’s name stays on the Parkway running parallel to the Kichi Zibi (Ottawa River), it would make a gigantic statement on what kind of people hold positions of power, here on the never surrendered lands of the Anishinabe Algonquin. Strong Christian values? Let’s see if they exist.

Keep the Circle Strong,

South Wind (Albert Dumont)