Fundamentalists and politics don’t mix

By Letter to the Editor on February 4, 2019.

Re: “Tweet read round Alberta,” Jan. 29

The story could have also been headlined “Why Fundamentalists Make Lousy Politicians.”

The UCP candidate for Medicine Hat-Brooks failed to confirm the amount of her church’s utility bill but, in typical fundamentalist fashion, swallowed the erroneous information hook, line and sinker. She does not have the experience or political moxie to represent and has dug herself a deep hole into which she has thrown herself head first.

When one runs for or holds public office, everything about them is open to intense scrutiny. The UCP candidate for Brooks-Medicine Hat in 2019 and the UCP MLA for Cypress-Medicine Hat attend Hillcrest Evangelical Church. Article 7 of the statement of faith of this institution reads “We believe the Holy Bible, both Old and New Testaments, is the inspired Word of God, inerrant in its original manuscripts, and reveals the only true way to our salvation.” This defines these congregants as fundamentalists and this fundamentalism must certainly inform their political ideals.

During the 2015 election, UCP leader Jason Kenney told an evangelical Chinese business group in Richmond Hill, Ont., he believes the “supremacy of God” is more supreme than the authority of Parliament and the courts.

iPolitics (6-8-17) printed this regarding the leader of the federal Conservatives. “(Andrew) Scheer is a Catholic — and not just a Sunday Catholic. Unlike most Catholics in Canada, according to surveys, he adheres to the church’s official teaching on matters of sexuality, abortion and homosexuality, and has voted those views as an MP.”

Literal belief in the bible implants bizarre ideas in the fundamentalist brain. Proverbs 13:24 justifies corporal punishment. Genesis 9:6 justifies capital punishment. Leviticus 20:13 justifies death for homosexuals. Exodus 20:9-10 and Leviticus 29:44-46 justify slavery. Deuterononmy 7:1-6 justifies racism. Genesis 3:16 and 1 Timothy 2:11-14 justify the subjugation of women by men. Genesis 1 and 2 justify creationism.

Examples of profligate fundamentalist belief that defy the standards of modern enlightened civilization are plentiful and it is ridiculous to think they do not profoundly influence the thinking of fundamentalist politicians.

A vote for any of the aforementioned UCP and Conservative personalities is a vote for fundamentalism first and conservatism second.