The Moncton Herald

Thanks for reaching out to us with your question. Just to provide some context, since 2021, over 100 churches have been vandalized or set on fire in Canada, mostly in the western provinces. This comes as a response to the claims that 200 unmarked graves of children who were subjected to neglect and abuse from residential schools notably in Kamloops. These abuses certainly did happen but the graves were proven to be empty.

It’s undoubtedly disappointing that the majority of media outlets and political parties throughout our great country however have largely been noiseless, with a few statements of condemnation but little outrage. Keep in mind that many of these churches/denominations had nothing to do with the Kamloops Residential School et al. and the denominations that did take part have acknowledged their guilt and have been apologizing since the 1980’s.

We think there is a deeper issue.   If this was simply a reaction to the church’s participation in the residential schools, why attack without discretion and why hasn’t Parliament been set ablaze for the Federal government’s contribution to this atrocity? While the vengeful activits are the problem, we believe that another side to the problem lies in the church’s reputation in society which, in some ways, it painted for itself.

Christians in Canada have obliged worldviews to seem nice, tolerant and reasonable. They failed to understand the impact of the antithesis of secular philosophies and loose morality. Not only did they turn a blind eye to them, but in some cases even participated in them. Christians were told to live and let live, that they needed to be impartial, and they had no business in imposing their beliefs upon others. Christians were made to be ashamed of their beliefs in the scriptures and in return felt it necessary to hold their beliefs in private rather than a public forum. The natural tendency for the majority of Christians in Canada when a conflicting view arises is a retreatism. They retreat to the inner walls of their churches. Now the enemies of the church are coming to our doors and at this point, there is nowhere else to hide.

As a response to all this, firstly, we’d admonish that retreating is the wrong approach entirely. Instead, get outside and let the citizens in our country hear the gospel. We need to baptize and disciple them in righteousness, that includes the activist who is burning your church and the Prime Minister who is letting it happen. The gospel affects things. It stirs the proverbial pot and causes change. Secondly, the church also needs to stop pandering to a pluralistic society and be comfortable in it. God has not called His people to live comfortably in pluralism, but that we keep the way of the Lord amongst them (Judges 2:21-22). Finally, the Christians whose churches burned have generally set up camp in a different location but was this not the appropriate thing to do? In the case of an African pastor whose church had been burned to the ground by Muslims, he didn’t rent the local YMCA to continue their meetings. He and his congregation stood in the very ruins of their church building, in open air, and worshipped the Lord their God. Our churches need to do the same! Return to the building with a large sign that says: “You only set ablaze our church building, but the church still stands!” What an opportunity has been given for your community to see and hear the church openly and without walls”.