Category Archives: Culture – what’s left of it

The Sean Feucht fuss

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Sean Feucht is an American musician and pastor who has been refused permits to perform in a number of Canadian cities because his performance “goes against the values of inclusion, solidarity and respect.”

He opposes abortion, is less than enthusiastic about 2SLGBTQ+ demands and he is not reluctant to prance around in the political minefield of MAGA. He supports Donald Trump, the embodiment of everything that is shallow, vulgar, crass, and egomaniacal in the American psyche, which is, in my view, a failure in discernment, taste or both.

Feucht has been accused of ethical and financial misconduct by other faith leaders, although, until proved otherwise, the accusations might well be bogus.

It’s easy to have sympathy for Sean Feucht and what he claims to stand for and I am quite sure that he should be allowed a platform in Canada. If he really is as off the wall as his detractors would have us believe, then I’m confident we have the resilience to withstand his onslaught on our religion of diversity and inclusion.

Nevertheless, I question the wisdom of tying politics and Christianity together so tightly, whether it be from the left or the right. I suspect that many Christians who do so would be unable to resist Satan’s third temptation to Jesus in the wilderness.

To end on a lighter note, here is a video of a daft policewoman telling us that those of us who “lean towards traditional values” are on the road to the perdition of extremism. So whatever Sean Feucht is up to, it can’t be all bad.

[fvplayer id=”24″]

Handel’s Queer Messiah

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It took Handel a mere three or four weeks to compose his masterpiece, Messiah.

It’s taken 280 years to make a mockery of it.

London’s Foundling Museum, an enterprise dedicated to being a force for change, is celebrating Christmas with A Queer Georgian Yuletide: Handel’s Queer Messiah, an evening of intellectually-informed fun. Rather like a root canal without anaesthetic.

The Foundling Museum is funded by the UK government, the Arts Council England and takes its inspiration from the Lord of the Flies, Prince of Demons.

Down with the Olympics

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My opinion of sport is much the same as Malcolm Muggeridge’s: nothing brings out unsportsmanlike behaviour as much as sport.

My disinterest in sport is so intense that I probably would not have noticed that the Olympic games were taking place were it not for the satanic opening ceremony and the celebration of a genetic man beating up a woman in a boxing competition.

I didn’t expect much outrage over this from the Anglican Church of Canada and I wasn’t disappointed. We do have this article in the Journal, though, which conveniently ignores the capering of the opening ceremony demons and the gender-based violence against women. Instead, the writer complains that the whole thing cost too much.

She has a point, any amount would have been too much.

From here:

It’s hard to argue with my daughter. When she takes the time to be critical of something, she comes loaded with information and well-reasoned, clearly-articulated arguments.

She thinks the Olympics are scandalous. Her viewpoint on this is bolstered by her experience in our church, where every day we open our doors to feed a staggering number of people in our small city as a means of filling the gaps for the food insecure and unhoused of St. Catharines. It runs entirely on the generosity of donors, who give it time, money and groceries; not one tax dollar funds this essential 365-days-a-year feeding program. It is impossible to see the need in our community, represented in the hundred-plus people coming every day for breakfast, and not conclude that our richly-resourced nation, in not seeing this desperate level of poverty and hunger as the first order of business in the allocation of money and resources, has a huge priority problem. And then it’s not a huge jump to hear numbers like $11 billion bandied about as the cost of the Paris Olympics and conclude that this extravagant outpouring of resources from host countries for events that are so elite and rarified is downright sinful.

Contains tobacco depictions

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I gave up smoking in 1978 when I became a Christian. Or, rather, God gave it up on my behalf. Before that, I smoked cigarettes – Gauloises were my favourite – a pipe and cigars. All inhaled. On numerous occasions I tried to give them up, to no avail.

I started smoking in university in my existentialist phase: life is meaningless, I decided. Smoking was something to do and trying to give it up gave one a purpose, so why not start. I was right to some extent: trying to give it up did give me a purpose; nevertheless, it was an exercise in futility because I couldn’t manage it.

When I became a Christian, one of my first prayers was to give up smoking. The day after, I woke up a non-smoker: I didn’t want to smoke and still don’t.

That preamble is a longwinded way of saying that I think smoking as a pastime is a bad idea. Still, the following is especially silly:

It is the opening screen to the latest Indiana Jones film.

In most films today we are subjected, without notice, to smooching lesbians, actors and actresses frolicking unclothed in bed, blood, gore, random violence, and the imbibing of unspecified drugs though needles, fumes and inhalation. Almost no film is released without a token homosexual, lesbian, bisexual or sadomasochist. But we simply have to be warned about smoking – tobacco, of course, because marijuana smoking, now legal to buy, sell and use in Canada, is completely harmless.

I think I saw just one lit cigarette in the film.

Keeping abreast of other news

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It takes a lot for Oakville to make the headlines in international news.

And in September 2022 there was, indeed, a lot on display in a local high school. A transgender teacher, who seems to want to give a new slant to the “T” in transgender, appeared on Snapchat wearing giant prosthetic breasts.

Unsurprisingly, many parents were not happy about this: there were protests, demands that the teacher be fired, and claims the teacher is sexualizing children.

The Halton School Board has been deflecting all demands that they do something about this – enforce a dress code, for example. Now, finally, the Board has come up with an answer: they can’t do anything because it would violate Canada’s Human Rights Code, it would be discriminatory and non-inclusive. And the board might get sued.

Is this all an elaborate hoax, as some think? An ingenious advertisement promoting home-schooling? Or a sign that our civilisation is flushing itself down the toilet with ever increasing vigour and enthusiasm?

Read it all here:

Many challenges face employers wanting to implement staff dress codes and chances are, should they try, the policy would fail.

That was the bottom line as Sari Taha, the Halton District School Board’s superintendent of human resources, described for trustees the legal complexities in instituting a staff dress code, at the Nov. 9 meeting of the board.

Motivating trustees to seek clarification on such a policy was the global uproar and parental outrage that followed an Oakville transgender high school teacher’s overtly sexual classroom attire. One of the strongest complaints from the community was the board’s lack of a dress code for staff.

There are major challenges the board would face in instituting a dress code: the dress code must be compliant with the Human Rights Code; and dress codes adversely impact women and other groups disproportionately, often leading to discrimination claims and rendering policies unenforceable, he said.

The latest in woke children’s books

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See below for a selection of books from the children’s section in Chapters.

I grew up with Narnia, Wind in the Willows, The Famous Five, Biggles, Winnie the Pooh and Worzel Gummidge, for which I owe an eternal debt of gratitude to my mother.

I’m so relieved I won’t be around to see the results of this: