Michael Coren is a newly minted priest in the Anglican Church of Canada. He is supporting the current fad of tearing down statues of people who did not live up to contemporary standards of what is acceptable or not acceptable. I’m not using “right” or “wrong” in case it triggers someone.
Naturally, this amounts to whether the person was a racist or a slave trader. Hence we have Coren’s article applauding the casting of Edward Colston’s effigy into the the sea. I confess, although I am indifferent as to whether Edward Colston spends quality time with the fishes, I am uneasy of the impulse to expunge the parts of history that don’t live up to the expectations of contemporary mores.
Still, back to the headline. The Anglican Church of Canada has admitted that it is riddled with systemic racism. Michal Coren has joined the ACoC. That means he is, at the very least, drawn to a racist organisation; he is simpatico with it – it’s no good, I can’t bring myself to call it a church.
And to think he might have joined ANiC. Good riddance Michael Coren
From here:
Good riddance Edward Colston
Bristol, Liverpool and London were the three main slave ports of Britain in the 18th and early 19th century. It was an inconceivably lucrative business, and financial failure was virtually impossible. Ships sailed off to Africa, loaded up on human cargo, exchanged men, women and children in the West Indies for sugar or in America for cash and goods, and then returned home to sell what they had. Countless people made fortunes, and if slaves died on the voyage—and many did—there were plenty more to steal. And rape, beat and torture.
One of those profiteers was Bristol’s Edward Colston, who in the late 1600s as a prominent member of the Royal African Company transported more than 80,000 people, making what today would be tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars. He was also a moneylender. When he died in 1721 he left a substantial amount to local charities, perhaps out of a guilty conscience. There were oceans of blood on his hands.
It was the statue of this man that was torn down and thrown into the harbour last week in Bristol, and became a pulsating image throughout the world as those protesting against racial inequality had their long overdue say. Ten thousand people demonstrated in the western city of Bristol in a peaceful show of defiance, and when they disposed of the repugnant Colston the local police not only refused to intervene but also explained that they understood.
The Anglican Church of Canada has committed itself to confronting racism in its own life and to acknowledging the place of racism and colonialism in our own nation. That commitment needs to be renewed daily.We have been horrified by the public murder of George Floyd. We are deeply distressed and profoundly disturbed by the images, rhetoric, violence, division, and chaos that has followed. We offer our prayerful support and solidarity with our sister church, the Episcopal Church, as it prays and guides its people while it simultaneously repents of, and protests the sin of racism. Our own house is not in order. Systemic racism exists in every part of Canada. The words of the Anglican Church of Canada’s 2004 Charter for Justice remind us:
I have weighed the matter of same sex marriage in the church carefully and prayerfully, only too aware of the heavy burden that lies on me as the time arrives to make a decision for the Diocese of Algoma. I believe that the decision I have made is the result of my prayerful and attentive listening to Algoma’s corporate discernment over many years and reflects the position and desire of the majority of people in this diocese. I am,therefore,granting permission for duly qualified same sex couples who are part of ecclesial communities and who intend to live in faithful and committed relationships to celebrate the sacrament of marriage in our diocese.
Let me be clear, I support the Black Lives Matter movement. My dear beloved friends, in the name of Jesus, the Liberator, let’s do our work. We are all formed by racism – our psyches are constructed by it from birth. Let’s free our souls so that we can love as Jesus loved.
Last year, in the months before General Synod and the primatial election, an acquaintance told me that she had heard someone publicly share that I am racist. My initial response was to be deeply hurt and to try to find out what I had said or done that would lead to those remarks. How had I acted? What had I said? How could this be when I abhor the thought of racism?
Celebrating Pentecost with Pride