Monument is about history and heritage

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 06/07/2024 (427 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Thou shalt honour history. That’s a commandment that never made it in the top 10. Too bad.

Perhaps it would have stopped us from having specious arguments like the one about whether or not Winnipeg city council should return what should never have been removed in the first place — a monument of the Ten Commandments in Assiniboine Park. Those commandments represent a code of behaviour that is in the moral DNA of the world’s Abrahamic faiths.

The code isn’t about trying to spread religious dogma. It is all about reminding us to adhere to what are indeed universal values, regardless of whether you have a scintilla of religious belief in your brain.

I get there are progressive people among us who are faithful members of what I think of as the Church of Diversity. They think any icon associated with any religious belief or practice, represents discrimination, oppression, racism, or all of the above. If they had their own Ten Commandments, just imagine what they would be. Let’s pause that thought for a future column. For now, let’s document that Winnipeg-based philanthropist Gail Asper had the temerity in recent days to suggest the monument of the Ten Commandments which was removed from the Assiniboine Park Conservancy, should be put back. Many people who support her idea feel compelled to start their endorsement with these words “Look I’m not religious, but…”

People follow this ritual because in an age where we are ordered to stigmatize no one and nothing, there are some exceptions to the rules of political correctness. It’s OK to stigmatize the religious and so people feel compelled to shield themselves by declaring that they are not religious.

At this point I too must confess that I am not religious. Many assume I am religious because my grandparents on my father’s side were Orthodox Jews. I never deny my Jewish heritage. I’m a child of Holocaust survivors. My father’s parents were murdered because they were Jews. Unlike the person who may well be sworn in as president of the United States next January, my grandparents committed no crimes. But in the 1940s fascism came to their neck of the woods, peddling the toxic idea that being Jewish was a criminal act. The soldiers for that movement followed a commandment that was not handed down from God to Moses. This one came directly from Adolf Hitler. It ordered his followers to treat Jewish men, women and even babies, like insects. Insecticide was forced into the lungs of my grandparents at Auschwitz. I am alive because my parents were rescued by those who took up arms against fascism, including many Canadians. When O Canada is sung before every Winnipeg Jets game, I am not thinking hockey. I am thinking about my heroes — young men, many of them from Manitoba, who joined the fight against Hitler. I can never thank them enough. Their willingness to sacrifice their lives, saved millions including my mum and dad. I will never dishonour my parents by hiding my heritage or trashing the code that represents their faith — the Ten Commandments.

Are people genuinely offended by commandments telling us to honour our mothers and fathers and the truth? Yes, the truth. The Ten Commandments instructs us to not bear false witness. That’s an ancient way of saying “tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.” Does anyone really have a problem with that?

Here’s an important truth. There are those among us who are so anti-religious that they are even willing to be offended by the idea of respecting the truth if it’s etched in a monument known as the Ten Commandments. I don’t know if the anti-religious whip themselves into a self-righteous lather when being treated at the St. Boniface, Grace and Misericordia hospitals. All were once run by religious orders. Should we tear down some of our finest hospitals, clinics, shelters and schools because religious people founded them?

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Dear Winnipeg city council: the Ten Commandments that were removed from Assiniboine Park were a great gift to all of us. To hide them is an act of ingratitude. It also rejects history and heritage. It honours mindlessness and makes fools of all of us.

Dear Gail Asper, Thank you.