Christians in politics

Re: Fighting Canada’s Secularist Tide, Lorne Gunter, Sept. 26. I agree with Mr. Gunter’s assessment that social conservatives in Canada have fewer mechanisms with which to gain influence than their U. S. counterparts. Our current first-past-the-post electoral system, for example, has meant that the Christian Heritage Party, a small party that caters specifically to the interests of conservative Christians, has no chance of getting members elected to parliament because its support base is not concentrated enough on a riding-by-riding basis. At the same time, the Conservative party, which garners substantial support from socially conservative voters, has to water down some of its principles on social issues to accommodate potential voters who may not have conservative moral viewpoints.

If Canada were to adopt a system based on proportional representation, social conservatives could become significant power brokers in a new parliamentary framework, where coalition government would be the norm. Your article on what Christians need to do to stem the rising secularist tide curiously omitted the only political party in Canada with that as its main goal — the Christian Heritage Party. Having the word “Christian” in one’s party doesn’t seem to have stopped political parties in Germany, Norway and the Netherlands from gaining power. Watch for our resurgence in the next election. I quibble with Mr. Gunter’s intermingling of the terms “Christians” and the “religious right.” Most Christians I know would be shocked to be thought of as supporters of the religious right. Perhaps the biggest problem of mainstream Christians is a belief that most problems can be fixed by throwing money at them. This is certainly not the stance of the religious right.