Protestant salutes John Paul the great.

"New age? Dark age? Twenty years of Pope John Paul II." Under this headline, Toronto's independent Catholic New Times of September 27, 1998, printed an attack on the Holy Father by the chaplain of Carleton University in Ottawa, Father Don McLellan.

Under this pope's tenure, the priest maintains, the vision of the Church in the modern world inspired by John XXIII and articulated in the Second Vatican Council has been systematically dismantled. Voices critical of the direction the Church has taken since 1978 have been silenced; far from being a champion of democracy, the Pope has used an iron fist. While he calls for the transformation of oppressive political structures, similar structures exist in the Church itself. He allows no discussion on discriminatory policies, such as the issue of gender, or the insistence upon a male, celibate clergy. In this new age, Father McLellan writes, "I have seen the suppression of the abundant gifts of talented lay people because they did not fit the clerical model of a church resistant to change." So "It is still a dark age!"

Catholic Insight has a different view of the Holy Father which we now present by means of an address by a man descended from "a long line of Scottish and Irish Calvinists." It was given on May 21, 1998, in St. Peter's Cathedral in London, ON, as one in a series of twelve presentations in a series "Celebrating the 20th glorious year of the Pontificate of John Paul II." Let us thank God, Leishman says, for the life and writings of "his true, his faithful, his brilliant and loving servant, Pope John Paul the Great."

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I am most honored to have been invited to take part in this distinguished series of lectures celebrating the 20th glorious year of the Pontificate of John Paul II. I am descended from a long line of Scottish and Irish Calvinists. Honoring popes has not been a long-standing family tradition. Why, then, have I come here tonight to salute Pope John Paul the Great?

While a public explanation of my enthusiasm for the Pope might get me into trouble with some of my more implacable fellow Calvinists, I should have no compunction about affirming to anyone that this Pope is a great Christian leader. All of us Protestants would do well to emulate the highmindedness of Pope John Paul II. In his 1995 encyclical Ut unum sunt (That they may be one), he expressed regret for the complacencies, indifference, mutual misunderstandings, and prejudices that have divided the Body of Christ. On behalf of the Roman Catholic Church, he acknowledged that "elements present among other Christians can contribute to the edification of Catholics." (1)

Search for unity

One of my purposes this evening is to outline some of the many ways in which Pope John Paul II has contributed to the edification of us Protestants. Despite some honest doctrinal differences, Catholics and Protestants have much to gain from learning and cooperating together. The Pope insists:

"Ecumenism implies that the Christian communities should help one another so that there may be truly present in them the full content and all the requirements of the heritage handed down by the Apostles. Without this, full communion will never be possible. This mutual help in the search for truth is a sublime form of evangelical charity." (2)

In this ecumenical spirit, Bishop Sherlock welcomed us Protestants to his opening address in this lecture series. He expressed the hope that by the Grace of God, his remarks would serve to strengthen us in the faith. Having spoken with several Protestants who were in that audience, I can assure Bishop Sherlock that we were all inspired by his learned, eloquent, and impassioned sermon on the transforming powers of the Holy Spirit.

The first time my wife, Caroline, and I heard Bishop Sherlock preach was about 15 years ago when he gave an impressive address to a lecture series at Metropolitan United Church in London. At the time, the senior minister at Metropolitan was the Rev. Dr. Maurice Boyd. He was born, raised, and educated in Northern Ireland. He staunchly affirmed the historic doctrines of the Methodist Church. He admonished us that the Sixth Commandment--Thou shalt not kill--is no less binding upon all of us today than it was upon the people of Israel 3,000 years ago. In conformity with this commandment, he forthrightly preached from the pulpit of Metropolitan that all human life is sacred from conception to natural death--a truth not generally understood, and still less proclaimed, by clergy within the United Church or, sad to say, within my own Presbyterian Church.

I vividly recall one Sunday morning when Dr. Boyd--this Protestant minister from Northern Ireland--avowed at the conclusion of one of his electrifying sermons that he felt a closer moral and spiritual affinity with Pope John Paul II than with the current Moderator of the United Church. I was elated. Dr. Boyd had captured my feelings entirely. I sensed that the great majority of my fellow parishioners in the sanctuary of Metropolitan Church that morning emphatically agreed with Dr. Boyd's remarkable declaration. We admired his good judgment and his courage in speaking the truth.

Dr. Boyd is not, of course, the only Protestant minister who holds the Pope in high regard. Another was my wife's father, Dominee (Dutch for Rev. Minister) Cornelius Plomp. He was a Calvinist minister in The Netherlands and counted among his close personal friends the priest who presided over a neighboring Roman Catholic church. Having survived the Second World War as a chaplain in the Royal Dutch armed forces, Dominee Plomp understood the meaning of devotion to duty and courage under pressure. He esteemed Pope John Paul II.

What, though, prompted Dr. Boyd to express his admiration for the Pope from the pulpit at Metropolitan? As I recall, he was moved to make this pronouncement shortly after the revisionist geniuses at United Church headquarters in Toronto had put out a draft statement on human sexuality which suggested that fidelity in marriage is compatible with the development of "secondary relationships of emotional intimacy and potential genital expression." (3)

Even George Orwell would have been astonished by such a grotesque circumlocution. Dr. Boyd took strong exception to this outrageous notion. In conformity with the historic teaching of the Christian church, he firmly upheld the Seventh Commandment--Thou shalt not commit adultery.

God handed down the Ten Commandments to us from Mount Sinai more than three thousand years ago. What are we to make of these exacting rules for daily living today? Once, when this question was put to the late great Malcolm Muggeridge, he responded that he sometimes wished that the Ten Commandments had been formulated like one of his old school-boy examination papers: here are ten questions--attempt any three. All of us can sympathize with that fantasy.

The Protestant tradition

Like Roman Catholics, Protestants have historically taken the Ten Commandments most seriously. Consider the following extract from the Shorter Catechism--the classic summary of Christian faith which allbright students in Presbyterian Sunday Schools were once required to memorize:

Q. 71. What is required in the seventh commandment?

A. The seventh commandment requireth the preservation of our own and our neighbour's chastity, in heart, speech, and behavior.

Q. 72. What is forbidden in the seventh commandment?

A. The seventh commandment forbiddeth all unchaste thoughts, words, and actions.

While these are exceedingly tough ethical guidelines, no lesser reading of the seventh commandment is compatible with the plain teaching of Jesus:

Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. (4)

In 1984, the Presbyterian Church in Canada issued a new, slimmed-down confession of faith entitled, Living Faith: A Statement of Christian Belief. As modern confessions go, Living Faith is a pretty good document. In a section on the Christian family, it straightforwardly asserts: God's law forbids adultery. (5)

Bishop John Spong

Most liberal theologians reject such unambiguous, Biblically rooted moral teaching. They hold that the fundamental moral rules proclaimed in the Bible might have been appropriate at the time the Bible was written, but need to be updated in the light of modern advances in psychological and sociological understanding. John Shelby Spong, the inimitable Episcopal bishop of Newark, New Jersey, takes this view. He has declared: "I would never seek to solve the ethical problems of the 20th century by quoting a passage of Holy Scripture, and I read the Bible every day. I wouldn't invest a book that was written between 1000 BC and AD 150 with that kind of moral authority." (6)

How anyone can read the Bible every day, yet harbour such heretical errors, is remarkable. Flights of theological fancy, though, are not unusual for Bishop Spong. In a commentary on the wedding feast at Cana, he asks:

"Whose wedding was it? The narrative does not say, but the narrative does say that the mother of Jesus was quite concerned that the wine supply was exhausted. . . . Do guests at a wedding become upset about such details? No, but the mother of the bridegroom. . .certainly would be upset. . . ." (7)

On the strength of evidence like this, Spong holds that Jesus was probably married to Mary Magdalene. Who can take such manifestly absurd reasoning seriously? Why do the media pay so much attention to similar nonsense put out by the apostate theologians within the Jesus Seminar?

Egregious as Spong is, he has plenty of fans in the pulpits, if not the pews, of the Anglican, United, and Presbyterian churches. Liberal clerics like him do not just maintain that the kind of absolute and universal moral rules proclaimed in the Ten Commandments are outdated: they also insist that these laws are much too rigid. In the opinion of many of these liberals, all morality is conditional. Sound moral reasoning depends on the specific circumstances of each particular situation. According to this liberal view, it may be that adultery is usually wrong, but under some circumstances, a husband or wife might justifiably maintain a secondary relationship with potential genital expression.

Catholic heretics

Is it only apostate Protestants who hold such heretical views? Consider the arguments expressed in a 1979 Roman Catholic study entitled Human Sexuality: New Directions for American Catholic Thought. This work was commissioned by the Catholic Theological Society of America and written by a team of scholars under the direction of Father Anthony Kosnik.

Father Kosnik listed himself in the book as the dean and professor of moral theology at a Roman Catholic seminary in Michigan. He earned his doctorate in sacred theology from the Angelicum University in Rome--the same university, by the way, from which Pope John Paul II also earned his doctorate in Christian ethics. Here is what Father Kosnik and his colleagues had to say about "co-marital" sexual relations and "mate swapping":

"The empirical data does not as yet warrant any solid conclusions on the effects of such behavior, particularly from the long-range point of view. Traditional Catholic teaching considers all such cases unjustifiable, as contrary to the nature and purpose of marriage. Others would acknowledge at least the theoretical possibility that such an arrangement could uphold the principles of true human growth and full integration. In practice, however, such relationships would seem to contradict many of the characteristics of wholesome sexual interrelatedness, and, above all, to compromise the `covenant fidelity' presented by Scripture as an ideal. Thus, while remaining open to further evidence from the empirical sciences, we would urge the greatest caution in all such matters, lest they compromise the growth and integration so necessary in all human activity." (8)

Isn't that amazing? Here we have a prominent Catholic priest and theologian advising that we should indulge in spouse swapping only with the greatest caution, although it's conceivable that further evidence from the empirical sciences will reveal that there is little cause for concern. Given that bizarre opinion, it's hardly surprising that Father Kosnik and his colleagues went on to argue that "all else being equal, a homosexual engaging in homosexual acts in good conscience has the same right of conscience and the same rights to the sacraments as a married couple practicing birth control in good conscience." (9)

This passage raises an elementary issue of moral significance: what are the rights of conscience? With regard to artificial contraception, Father Kosnik explained:

"The position of Humanae vitae regarding the objective evil of artificial contraception and its consequences should be clearly stated by the confessor or counselor. Then the arguments of those who deny the inevitability of these consequences and see artificial contraception in some circumstances as fostering positive values should also be carefully considered. The final decision and verification as to whether the use of contraceptive means is morally disruptive or preservative of greater values ought then to be left to the consciences of the individuals concerned." (10)

This is the quintessential liberal position on moral theology. It relates not just to contraception, but also to fornication, adultery, sodomy, and every other moral issue. Liberal theologians counsel: feel free to ignore the plain teachings of Scripture; go ahead and flout the historic edicts of the Christian Church; in the case of Roman Catholics, disregard even the most solemn moral pronouncements of the Pope and the magisterium of the Church; in all cases, simply let your conscience be your guide. This approach to Christian ethics, ladies and gentlemen, is a prescription for moral anarchy.

The secular types

Secular critics of the Pope typically lay emphasis on the claims of reason rather than conscience. They argue that we are now living on the brink of the Third Millennium so it's about time that we finally set aside the Bible and create a modern, coherent, and persuasive moral code on the basis of reason alone. They reflect the value-relativism that prevails on and off campus today--the notion that you have your values; I have mine; and there is no reasonable basis for deciding between them.

This is a profoundly subversive moral doctrine. It represents a complete break with our Judeo-Christian heritage. Democracy in the Western tradition was built on the solid rock of Biblical morality. Can any democracy long survive on the shifting sands of value relativism?

Zbigniev Brzezinski, the former National Security Advisor to United States president Jimmy Carter, is doubtful. In Out Of Control: Global Turmoil On The Eve Of The 21st Century, he notes that the United States, Canada, and all the other economically developed democracies have each taken on the appearance of a permissive cornucopia. That is to say, they have all developed societies in which "the progressive decline in the centrality of moral criteria is matched by heightened preoccupation with material and sensual self-gratification." (11)

For more and more Canadians, Americans and Europeans, the guiding rule of social conduct is not what is right, but what is legal. If people think they can legally get away with something, they will do it without regard for moral constraints. Such anarchical attitudes, Brzezinski warns, are incompatible with law and order, let alone freedom and democracy. He insists that the United States

"clearly needs a period of philosophical introspection and of cultural self-critique. It must come to grips with the realization that a relativist hedonism as the basic guide to life offers no firm social moorings, that a community which partakes of no shared absolute certainties but which instead puts a premium on individual self-satisfaction is a community threatened by dissolution." (12)

Is Canada any different from the United States in this regard? Does our country not also seem more and more like "a community which partakes of no shared absolute certainties"? Where can Canadians, Americans, and Europeans look for the kind of forthright moral leadership that is essential to sustaining democracy and the rule of law?

Forthright moral leadership

One person among our contemporaries stands preeminent. That person is Pope John Paul II. He is fully alive both to the virtues of democracy and to the evils of value-relativism. In his 1991 encyclical Centesimus annus, he states:

"The Church values the democratic system (that) ensures the participation of citizens in making political choices, guarantees to the governed the possibility of electing and holding accountable those who govern and of replacing them through peaceful means when appropriate." (13)

Granted, the Christian Church has not always upheld democracy. Leaders of the Church have sometimes trampled upon the principles of democracy. That, however, has never been true of Pope John Paul II. There can be no doubt that he has consistently advocated democracy and the rule of law. He has a better theoretical grasp of the moral requirements of democracy than most contemporary professors of political science. In Centesimus annus, he warns:

"Nowadays, there is a tendency to claim that agnosticism and skeptical relativism are the philosophy and attitude that correspond to democratic forms of political life. It must be observed (however) that, if there is no ultimate truth to guide and direct political activity, then ideas and convictions can easily be manipulated for reasons of power. As history demonstrates, a democracy without values easily turns into open or thinly disguised totalitarianism." (14)

Why is that? The Pope explains: "The root of totalitarianism is the denial of the transcendent dignity of the human person who, as the visible image of the invisible God, is by his very nature the subject of rights that no one may violate." (15)

Is the transcendent dignity of the human person--the single most vital principle of democracy--still resolutely upheld in Canada? The woeful answer is obvious: Our society has fully embraced what the Pope has decried as "a culture of death."

For the past 30 years, we have been witness to an unprecedented mass slaughter of babies in the womb. Now our Parliamentarians are talking about legalizing assisted suicide. In 1994, our robed dictators on the Supreme Court of Canada came within one vote in the Rodriguez decision of declaring that a right to suicide is enshrined in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

It does not take genius to discern where all this is heading: first, abortion; then assisted suicide; then voluntary euthanasia; finally outright murder of the aged, the frail, the sick, and the handicapped. An authoritative study in the Netherlands has found that despite the supposedly strict regulations governing euthanasia in that country, physicians admitted to having deliberately killed 948 patients in 1995 without the patients' consent. (16) In plain language, these physicians murdered 948 of their own patients.

The threat to democracy

Such frightful disregard for the sanctity of human life is perilous for democracy. In 1948, the United Nations issued a Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Since then, we have had the European Convention on Human Rights, the International Convenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In Evangelium vitae, the Pope pointedly asks:

"How can these repeated affirmations of principle be reconciled with the continual increase and widespread justification of attacks on human life? How can we reconcile these declarations with the refusal to accept those who are weak and needy, or elderly, or those who have just been conceived?" (17)

Attacks on the lives of vulnerable persons, warns the Pope,

"go directly against respect for life and they represent a direct threat to the entire culture of human rights. It is a threat capable, in the end, of jeopardizing the very meaning of democratic coexistence." (18)

Historically, the Christian church has always upheld the sanctity of human life from its beginning in the womb to natural death. In a commentary on the Book of Exodus, John Calvin maintained:

"The fetus, though enclosed in the womb of its mother, is already a human being, and it is almost a monstrous crime to rob it of the life which it has not yet begun to enjoy. If it seems more horrible to kill a man in his own house than in a field, because a man's house is his place of most secure refuge, it ought surely to be deemed more atrocious to destroy a fetus in the womb before it has come to light." (19)

What about the Presbyterian Church in Canada today? The General Assembly of my Church has declared that

"an abortion involves a decision fraught with serious moral and spiritual implications. Among these implications must be affirmed the fundamental right to live. This principle must be seen to obtain also for the unborn. There is no point in time when it can be asserted that the fetus does not qualify as human life. It is unseen, unconscious, dependent, and perhaps unwanted, but these are not grounds for its termination." (20)

So far, so good, except that the General Assembly has also declared that

"a danger to the mother's health indicating the likelihood of permanent or prolonged mental or physical impairment (can) be regarded as grounds for abortion." (21)

Here we have a quintessential example of Orwellian double-think: the capacity for holding two mutually contradictory ideas in mind at the same time and believing both to be true. To a rational mind, this feat is impossible. Either a fetus has a fundamental right to life or it does not. The Presbyterian Church cannot have it both ways: it cannot logically insist that the baby in the womb has an unalienable right to life, while also allowing that a pregnant mother who thinks that giving birth is likely to cause her some prolonged mental impairment has a right to have her baby in the womb deliberately killed.

In contrast to the shameful lack of principle of the mainline Protestant denominations on the abortion issue, Pope John Paul II stands together with numerous Evangelical Protestants and Orthodox Jews in forthrightly upholding the sanctity of all human life. He does not suggest that the morality of abortion depends on the circumstances of each situation. He does not counsel men and women to follow the dictates of their own conscience on abortion, regardless of how malformed their conscience might be. Instead, he warns:

"The acceptance of abortion in the popular mind, in behavior and even in law itself, is a telling sign of an extremely dangerous crisis of the moral sense.... Given such a grave situation, we need now more than ever to have the courage to look the truth in the eye and to call things by their proper name, without yielding to convenient compromises or to the temptation of self-deception. In this regard the reproach of the Prophet is extremely straightforward: `Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness' " (Is 5:20). (22)

Look the truth in the eye and call things by their proper name. This admonition brings to mind some people in this audience. I am thinking particularly of my friend John Hoover. John is a national leader within the United Church renewal movement and an extraordinarily well-informed student of theology. While he has often been scorned and sometimes vilified by ideological opponents, I have never known him to respond in kind. He can always be counted upon to express his orthodox Christian convictions with love, compassion, and a firm commitment to the truth. The same can be said about the exemplary Clarkes--Rev. Morley; his wife, Trudy; and their son Stephen. Morley was once nominated by the renewal movement to serve as moderator of the United Church. Also with us this evening are my friends George and Yvonne Dienesch. They are profoundly committed Roman Catholics and two of the most dedicated and effective pro-life activists that it has ever been my honor to meet.

On an international scale, who, I ask you, better exemplifies the virtues of looking truth in the eye and calling things by their proper name in these debased times than Pope John Paul II? Skeptics are apt to mock: "What is truth?" It's a familiar question:

Pilate therefore said unto him, "Art thou a king then?" Jesus answered, "Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice." Pilate saith unto him, "What is truth?" (23)

Pilate had no eyes to see, nor ears to hear, the truth. In Veritatis splendor, The splendor of truth, Pope John Paul II has focused on the issue of moral truth. He has artfully woven the entire encyclical around a meditation on the rich young man who asked Jesus:

"Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" (24)

Jesus did not respond: "Love and do what you will." He did not advise the young man to take all the circumstances into account in a given situation and follow the dictates of his conscience, no matter what his conscience might suggest. Instead, Jesus offered some specific advice:

"Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother," and "love your neighbor as yourself." (25)

Let us recall that, at the time Jesus offered this counsel, these commandments were already close to a thousand years old. Unlike Bishop Spong, Jesus did not shrink from affirming that the fundamental moral principles handed down by God to Moses on Mount Sinai are universally binding on all peoples, through all times and in all cultures.

Reason and conscience

What about the light of reason and the rights of conscience? The Pope puts both in their proper place:

"Man is able to recognize good and evil thanks to that discernment of good from evil which he himself carries out by his reason, in particular by his reason enlightened by Divine Revelation and by faith, through the law which God gave to the Chosen People, beginning with the commandments on Sinai." (26)

We are living in a state of moral chaos today because so many of our fellow citizens flout the moral truths revealed by God in the Ten Commandments. Instead of espousing traditional Judeo-Christian morality, liberal philosophers and theologians are attempting to establish a new moral order on the basis of reason alone. They have not succeeded and they cannot succeed in so presumptuous an undertaking. The Bible repeatedly warns against such folly. The Book of Genesis tells us that

"The Lord God commanded the man, saying, `You may eat freely of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.' (27)

Isn't that the truth? We are living in a culture of death today, because so many people in our society have violated this primordial commandment. The Pope comments:

"Some people, disregarding the dependence of human reason on Divine Wisdom and the need, given the present state of fallen nature, for Divine Revelation as an effective means for knowing moral truths, even those of the natural order, have actually posited a complete sovereignty of reason in the domain of moral norms regarding the right ordering of life in this world. Such norms would constitute the boundaries for a merely `human' morality; they wouldbe the expression of a law which man in an autonomous manner lays down for himself and which has its source exclusively in human reason. In no way could God be considered the Author of this law, except in the sense that human reason exercises its autonomy in setting down laws by virtue of a primordial and total mandate given to man by God. These trends of thought have led to a denial, in opposition to Sacred Scripture (cf. Mt. 15:3-6) and the Church's constant teaching, of the fact that the natural moral law has God as its author, and that man, by the use of reason, participates in the eternal law, which it is not for him to establish." (28)

Dr. Boyd used to assure us at Metropolitan United Church that if only we would through the grace of God nestle into the mind of Christ and truly live and move and have our being in Him, we could not go wrong. The Apostle Paul expressed much the same point as follows:

"And be not conformed to this world; but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is the good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." (29)

What does this passage imply? Consider the following commentary:

The world invents its own good works and persuades itself that they are good. But Paul declares that good and right according to the world are to be judged by the commandments of God. The world praises and finds pleasure in its own devices; Paul on the other hand affirms that nothing is pleasing to God except what he himself has commanded. In seeking perfection, the world backslides from the Word of God and goes after new inventions; Paul fixes perfection in the will of God, and shows that anyone who goes beyond it imagines falsehood and falls into delusion. (30)

These are not the words of Dr. Boyd. They are not the words of the Pope. These are the words of John Calvin drawn from his Commentary on Romans. While there are plenty of fine clerics within the Anglican, Lutheran, Presbyterian, and United churches, there is no doubt in my mind that if John Calvin, Martin Luther, and John Wesley were alive today, they, too, would declare that they feel a closer moral and spiritual affinity with Pope John Paul II than with many of the apostate clerics who now confuse the faithful within these mainline Protestant churches.

Rule of law collapsing

In maintaining that adherence to the historic principles of Judeo-Christian morality is essential to preserving democracy and the rule of law, Pope John Paul II is not alone. In The second treatise of government, arguably the most influential treatise on democracy ever written, John Locke explained:

"The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one; and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind who will but consult it that, being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions; for men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent and infinitely wise Maker--all the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his business--they are his property whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another's, pleasure." (31)

Sir William Blackstone gave eloquent expression to much the same idea in his 18th-century classic, Commentaries on the Laws of England. He asserted that all fundamental human rights, including the preeminent rights to life and liberty, are grounded in natural law. Blackstone emphasized:

"This law of nature, being coeval with mankind and dictated by God himself, is of course superior in obligation to any other. It is binding over all the globe in all countries, and at all times: no human laws are of any validity, if contrary to this, and such of them as are valid derive all their force, and all their authority, mediately or immediately, from this original." (32)

Like most lawyers, law professors, and jurists in Canada today, Chief Justice Antonio Lamer of the Supreme Court of Canada has forsaken the legal philosophies of John Locke and Sir William Blackstone. In the Rodriguez case, Lamer wrote in his reasons for judgment:

"Can the right to choose at issue here, that is the right to choose suicide, be described as an advantage of which the appellant is being deprived? In my opinion, the Court should answer this question without reference to the philosophical and theological considerations fueling the debate on the morality of suicide or euthanasia. It should consider the question before it from a legal perspective ... while keeping in mind that the Charter has established the essentially secular nature of Canadian society...." (33)

Lamer is demonstrably wrong on this last point. The preamble to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms explicitly declares that Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law. In no way does the Charter affirm "the essentially secular nature of Canadian society." Neither has parliament made any such affirmation.

The notion that Canadian society has become essentially secular in nature for the purposes of the law is entirely a fabrication of judges like Lamer. Under this pretense, these activist judges have arrogated to themselves the authority to write their personal values into law. Thus in Rodriguez, Lamer abandoned natural law; ignored the intentions of Parliament in making assisting in a suicide a criminal offence; and contrived, instead, by the light of his own moral reasoning to find that a right to assisted suicide for the physically infirm is implicit in the equality-rights section of the Charter.

Blackstone would have been outraged, but not surprised by such arrogance. He warned:

"Man, considered as a creature, must necessarily be subject to the laws of his Creator, for he is entirely a dependent being. A being independent of any other has not rule to pursue but such as he prescribes to himself...." (34)

Abandonment by the courts of natural law and divine law has worked a revolution in our legal system. One learned commentator observes that

"Canadian law has become anemic, confused, impotent, befuddled: indeed, I go so far as to assert that in some areas, notably the criminal law, law has ceased to exist." (35)

Why is that? This commentator explains:

"Canadian law has become secularized, cut adrift from its moorings in the divine, no longer infused by natural law conceptions, looking for its ultimate validation not in eternal truth, nor even in the two thousand-year heritage of the Judeo-Christian legal system, but rather in a recently minted Charter of Rights, a Lilliputian statute fit for a nation of pygmies." (36)

That commentator is my distinguished predecessor in this lecture series, Prof. Ian Hunter. I urge you to read, if you have not already done so, his brilliant and prophetic treatise: Three Faces of the Law: A Christian Perspective.

"Be not afraid"

Secular critics of the Pope claim that he is a moralizing killjoy who is out to repress sexual pleasures and enslave women. That's nonsense. There is no joy in promiscuous sex. There is no freedom in abortion. Caroline and I know from first-hand experience that there is no escape from suffering in divorce, particularly when children are involved. The moral laws handed down by God on Mount Sinai are intended for our benefit. If we break them, we bring pain and suffering and anguish down upon our own heads. This is not just a matter of faith. Have we not seen it proved time and again in our own lives? "The wages of sin," warned Paul, "is death."

The worst news of our time is that so many of our fellow citizens have abandoned their Judeo-Christian heritage. That's why our country is in such grave peril. That's why we have rampant pornography on television and in the movies. That's why we have so much sexual promiscuity and record rates of out-of-wedlock births, divorce, and spousal abuse. That's why we have experienced an alarming increase in violent crime rates over the past 30 years. That's why so many of our fellow citizens talk about ending their lives in suicidal despair. That's why our freedom of speech has been curtailed, our freedom of religion is under attack, and our very democratic way of life is in jeopardy.

Do we, then, also have reason to despair? In closing, let me cite a sublime passage from Crossing the Threshold of Hope by Pope John Paul II:

At the end of the second millennium, we need, perhaps more than ever, the words of the Risen Christ: "Be not afraid!" Man who, even after the fall of Communism, has not stopped being afraid and who truly has many reasons for feeling this way, needs to hear these words. Nations need to hear them, especially those nations that have been reborn after the fall of the Communist empire, as well as those that witnessed this event from outside. Peoples and nations of the entire world need to hear these words. Their conscience needs to grow in the certainty that Someone exists who holds in His hands the destiny of this passing world; Someone who holds the keys to death and the netherworld, (cf. Rev. 1:18); Someone who is the Alpha and the Omega of human history (cf. Rev 22:13) -- be it the individual or collective history. And this Someone is Love (cf. 1 Jn. 4:8,16) -- Love that became man, Love crucified and risen, Love unceasingly present among men. It is Eucharistic Love. It is the infinite source of communion. He alone can give the ultimate assurance when he says, "Be not afraid!" (37)

I rest my case, ladies and gentlemen. Let us thank God that His love and grace have been so wonderfully manifest in the life and teaching of His true, His faithful, His brilliant and loving servant, Pope John Paul the Great.

Rory Leishman was formerly religion editor, London Free Press.

(1) . Pope John Paul II, encyclical: That They May Be One (May 25, 1995), No. 48

(2) . Ibid, No. 78.

(3) . Cited in Division of Mission in Canada, Draft Statement on Human Sexuality to the 30th General Council of the United Church of Canada, Morden, Manitoba, 1984, p. 48.

(4) . Matthew 5: 27-28.

(5) . Living Faith: A Statement of Christian Belief (Wood Lake Books Inc., 1984), p. 23.

(6) . Quoted in Phillip E. Johnson, Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds (InterVarsity Press: 1997), p. 110.

(7) . John Shelby Spong, Born of a Woman: A Bishop Rethinks the Birth of Jesus (Harper, San Francisco,: 1992), p. 192.;

(8) . Ibid.;

(9) . Ibid., p. 241;

(10) . Ibid., p. 149;

(11) . Zbigniev Brzezinski, Out of Control: Global Turmoil on the Eve of the 21st Century, (Sribeners: 1993), p. 65.

(12) . Ibid., p. 113.

(13) . Pope John Paul II, encyclical Centesimus annus (1991), No. 46;

(14) . Ibid.;

(15) . Ibid., No. 44.

(16) . Cf. H. Hendin et al., "Physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia in the Netherlands: Lessons from the Dutch," Journal of the American Medical Association (June 4, 1997), pp. 1720-22.

(17) . Pope John Paul II, encyclical, Evangelium vitae (1995), No. 18.;

(18) . Ibid.;

(19) . John Calvin, Commentary on Exodus 21:22,23;

(20) . General Assembly 1976

(21) . General Assembly 1977;

(22) . Evangelium vitae, No.58;

(23) . John 18:37-38;

(24) . Matthew 19:16.

(25) . Matthew 19:18-19;

(26) . Pope John Paul II, encyclical Veritatis splendor (1993), No. 44.

(27) . Genesis 2:16-17;

(28) . Veritatis splendor, No. 36;

(29) . Romans 12:2.

(30) . John Calvin, Commentary on Romans 12:2;

(31) . Ibid.

(32) . Sir William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (Reprint of Final Original Edition), Book I, p. 41.

(33) . Chief Justice Antonio Lamer, Rodriguez (1994);

(34) . Op. cit., p. 39.

(35) . Ian Hunter, Three Faces of the Law: A Christian Perspective (Work Research Foundation: 1996), p. 18;

(36) . Ibid.;

(37) . Romans 6:23.