Rex Murphy: Canada 150 fell flat because national abasement trumped gratitude

Canada is in a state of spiritual crisis.  Those would ask for proof are symptomatic of it.  One could appeal to the absurdity of statistics.  But the malaise has set in far more deeply than the declining numbers of churches, their transformation into upscale condos or venues for strange gods would suggest.

It is because of a deep-seated impiety.

Rex Murphy hits the nail on the head when he cites Luke 18:11, “The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people’…”  Our contemporary social justice culture is but the fashionable form of Pharisaism.  It is white-washing, or to use the contemporary term, virtue-signalling.

C.S. Lewis once wrote an article that appeared in the Guardian entitled “Dangers of National Repentance.”  He observes that “The first and fatal charm of national repentance is, therefore, the encouragement it gives us to turn from the bitter task of repenting our own sins to the congenial one of bewailing—but, first, of denouncing—the conduct of others.”

Canada’s publicly-funded grievance industries have insinuated their way throughout the public sector like leaven through dough, making any natural patriotic feelings of gratitude seem like a subject for guilt.

The fit symbol for this debased sensibility is a gigantic yellow duck.

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