Sssh! Single Issue Voting Not Encouraged By Canadian Catholic Bishops

One of the problems bedevilling many elections is the phenomenon of 'single issue' voters. The issue is usually a very worthy one such as 'healthcare' or 'care for seniors' or 'right to life for the unborn' or 'education' or 'immigration' or 'jobs' or 'the environment' or 'higher/lower taxes' or 'crime and punishment' or 'national security' or (your pet issue here). The trouble is that real life is never about one single issue even if that appears to be front and centre at a point in time for you and me.

It seems to me that voting on the basis of a single issue is very much like choosing a particular expensive gourmet restaurant over other candidate restaurants based purely on the fact that the restaurant of your choice is the only one that offers Pacific Blue Fin Tuna in its third course, and without regard to what is in the other courses at that or any other competing restaurant. Don't you care that your Valentine partner will have ethical issues with Confit Foie Gras? It seems silly, doesn't it? But isn't that what single issue voters do? I've had emails from well-meaning friends urging me to join this or that political party and then vote for this or that person to be leader of that party because he/she is the 'only one' taking a stand on a pet, controversial issue.

Contrary to what many people might presume, the Canadian Catholic bishops are not single issue voters. I know this because I have read their Guide for the 2015 Federal Election. As with previous federal elections the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops has issued an 'Election Guide' for Catholics. I get the impression that it is meant to be kept a secret as I never hear anybody talk about it and no priest of my experience has ever mentioned it, privately or publicly, in my hearing. If it was not for the fact that I have an email subscription for new publications from the bishops' conference I myself would have no idea of its existence.


The email begins: (CCCB – Ottawa)... With the federal election campaign underway, the Commission for Justice and Peace of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) has issued a guide inviting Catholics to vote with discernment. In its "2015 Federal Election Guide", the Commission lists some basic principles from Catholic moral and social teaching to help voters analyze and evaluate public policies and programs.

It then provides this link to their web page titled Guide for the 2015 Federal Election.
http://www.cccb.ca/site/eng/media-room/4243-guide-for-2015-federal-election

How incredibly circumspect, inviting Catholics to vote with discernment, Obviously the bishops do not want to alienate anybody by being forceful in any kind of way about Catholic moral and social teaching! The web page in turn provides three more links which I reproduce below for your convenience and invite my family and friends to read with discernment - and anybody else who cares to. I expect you will find, like me, that none of our political parties measures up. Sometimes the way to find the best is find the least worst.
Link to the Guide of the CCCB (PDF)
Link to the Guide of Development and Peace
Link to the Guide of The Canadian Council of Churches

Seduced by Mrs Cardinal

Looking out of my kitchen window earlier today I saw Mrs Cardinal. She is such a tart. I am totally seduced by her bright orange lipstick, orange top-knot and two-toned mascara'd eyes. I used to prefer Mr Cardinal, dressed all in bright scarlet with his darker cape and black masquerade mask but have come to be totally enchanted by Mrs Cardinal's more subtle body colouring. For me, if not for you, making love dressed like that would be decidedly kinky, but I guess kinky sex is the norm for this couple starting with how, every now and then, he puts food in her mouth during mating season. I feel a tinge of jealousy every time I see him do that. Little wonder they are monogamous for life and Mr Cardinal spends a good part of each day proclaiming his territory with melodious love songs to keep other Bimbo Cardinals away from his beautiful wife.

Seventeen Years in Canada

Toronto Jan 1999

This past July marked my 17th anniversary of landing in Canada. Ingrid, Judith and Stephen, who arrived five weeks after me, mark the date this August. Miriam, Mark and Sean came five months later in the winter that Mayor Mel Lastman called in the army because of the record breaking cold and snowfall.

On the one hand, it is difficult to believe how time has flown. What happened to the years? On the other hand, it is amazing how many life events got packed into what feels like such a short span of time.

We've done the Canadian thing and cut down our own Christmas trees, and made snow angels. We've been through the rigmarole and frustrations of all the applications and registrations for official documents and schooling, the pain of unemployment and the joys of finding jobs, had high school and university  graduations and professional certifications, had people accuse us of 'putting on' our accents and other people 'loving' our accents. I've waited at bus stops when the temperature was 19C below before the wind-chill, and minus 38 degrees after, reminding myself that I did not come to Canada for the weather. I've tried driving after an ice storm and learnt that a car with all-season tyres doesn't go where you want it to go or stop when or where you want it to stop.

Actually, those first winters were a special joy for me, not because I'm a masochist, but because they reminded me that I and my family had really come to Canada against so many odds. That thought made me feel very warm inside. Canada has been very good for us as a family.

We have made many new acquaintances and some lasting friendships, notably three marriages which have brought other entire families into our own family sphere and vice versa. And, of course, Ingrid and I now have grandchildren - three girls and two boys - all of them the delight of our eyes.

We have also had sickness and ill health. Many Canadians complain about Canadian healthcare. Most of those who do have had bad experiences as patients, or know somebody else who has. Or they work in the healthcare establishment as nurses, personal support workers or other frontline staff. The story of healthcare in Canada is really the story of healthcare as administered by the various provinces making up the Federation. However, speaking for the McCann clan's experiences of the Ontario healthcare system thus far, it would be ungrateful for us to complain considering the wonderful treatment we have received for cancers, hip replacements and surgeries, not to mention countless trips to the ER, walk-in clinics and family doctors for 'lesser' problems and regular check-ups.

Right now it is summer for us. Many places in the world are experiencing first hand the extreme and nasty effects of global warming, especially in poorer nations. It is almost with a tinge of guilt that I have to say that this first-world place in Ontario, Canada where we live is like a little bit of heaven.

A little bit of heaven

Perhaps it is to assuage that guilt somewhat that I try to raise awareness of the twin, related issues of global poverty and the global environmental crises. Pope Francis and Bishop Desmond Tutu are my inspirational champions for the moral imperative imposed by these inseparably joined twins which are poverty and the environment.