Senior citizen has accounts terminated by Scotiabank apparently for criticizing DEI policy
Toronto resident ‘Jane’ tells David Menzies that Scotiabank terminated her 20-year relationship with the company because she criticized its diversity, equity and inclusion policy.
Do you remember the good old days when Canada’s big banks were all about… financial services? Savings and chequeing accounts, RRSPs, mortgages, and so on?
Increasingly, these days, thanks to the virus that is “wokeness”, Canada’s big banks are actually “de-banking” certain customers. These are not deadbeat clients nor con artists. Rather, thanks to the unholy trinity of diversity, equity, and inclusion, if a bank deems a client guilty of “wrong-thought”, that customer might very well be “fired.”
This disturbing Orwellian approach to financial services surely hit a crescendo in 2022 when thousands of Canadians had their bank accounts frozen simply for making an online donation to the Freedom Convoy. It was equal parts shocking and disgraceful.
And consider our story last year, in which we drew attention to the case of Gary Duke of Grand Prairie, Alta. He was fired as a customer by his local Scotiabank branch when Gary politely asked if it was possible to remove the rainbow icon from his Scotiabank phone app given “Pride Month” had come to an end.
Those comments were not appreciated nor tolerated, and in the name of “inclusivity”, Gary had his bank accounts terminated.
Our latest example of wokeness driving bank policy is the inexplicable case regarding Toronto senior citizen “Jane” (she doesn’t want her real name used as she doesn’t want to incur further penalization from any other banks).
Earlier this year, a Scotiabank branch in west end Toronto terminated her accounts. But why? Was Jane running a financial scam? Does she have links to a terrorist organization? Hardly.
Jane suspects she was given the axe because she dared make a suggestion regarding the bank’s diversity, equity and inclusion policy. Which is to say, she suggested that the bank should include seniors in its inclusion policy, not just members of the LGBT-etc.-etc. community.
Alas, for having the temerity to make such a suggestion, Jane was sent a letter from bank manager Guy Morin telling her that the bank was terminating its relationship with her.
And get this: we can only speculate what the real reason is for this termination, given that the bank manager would not state anything tangible for Jane getting the axe.
Indeed, this is what Guy Morin stated to Jane in an email:
After careful consideration, The Bank of Nova Scotia… has decided to end our relationship with you. We understand it will take time for you to make arrangements with another financial institution, therefore we are providing you this advance notice of the date on which each of your accounts and other products/services will be closed. Our decision complies with the conditions in the agreements you have with us.
But again, the question arises: what “conditions in the agreement” did Jane breach? We reached out to the manager and Scotiabank’s media relations department and even paid a visit to the branch, but no comment was offered. Of note, even though we are firmly entrenched in the month of August, this branch still had its Pride propaganda on full display.
Please note that our company had been pre-approved for the mortgage by a Royal Bank branch in Calgary. But when it came to rubber-stamping the approval at Royal Bank HQ in Toronto, the mortgage application was denied.
The reasons for the refusal had absolutely nothing to do with the financial wellbeing of Rebel News. Rather, the woke Royal Bank head honchos apparently didn’t care for our editorial viewpoint. Unbelievable…
Lesson learned: Canada’s big banks no longer solely judge clients on their financial merits. These days, the banks want to make certain their clients are not guilty of “wrong thought.” And if you are deemed guilty of harbouring a non-woke opinion, then these big banks will think nothing of declaring you persona non grata.
A law that allows border agents to search personal electronic devices, including computers and smartphones, violates Canadians’ charter rights, Ontario’s top court has ruled, telling Parliament it needs to rewrite the law in six months.
In an Aug. 9 decision of the province’s Court of Appeal, Chief Justice Michael Tulloch and justices Jonathon George and Patrick Monahan said the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms “guarantees everyone the right to be secure against unreasonable searches.”
The decision says one section of the Customs Act “offends this basic guarantee.” It says section 99(1)(a) of the act allows border agents to search “some of the most private information imaginable on the lowest possible standard to justify a search,” based merely on suspicion “in the border officers’ own minds.”
The charter requires more, Tulloch wrote in the decision. “A reasonable search in this context requires a reasonable suspicion,” which means the suspicion must be based on facts indicating reasonable possibility officers will find evidence of law violations on the device, the chief justice said.
“I conclude that the law infringes s. 8 of the Charter and is unconstitutional,” Tulloch wrote, noting that the Crown failed to show that the law’s low requirement to justify a search was necessary, because a higher threshold is already in place for similar situations.
He also said a less restrictive alternative—requiring border agents to rely on facts that show travellers could be violating laws, as opposed to “good faith purpose”—“would not jeopardize its mandate.”
“Because the border is not a Charter-free zone, it is also not an almost-anything-goes zone for highly intrusive searches like digital device examinations,” Tulloch wrote.
He further noted, “Reasonable suspicion requires border officers to rely on objective facts supporting a possibility of border violations that courts can independently scrutinize. This prevents border officers from relying on mere hunches, intuition, and uncorroborated tips of unknown reliability.”
The appeals court also noted that about 62 percent of the 31,579 searches of digital devices made by border agents between 2017 and 2020 found no evidence of any border law violations. The invasion of these innocent individuals’ privacy “is a strong sign that the law is unreasonable,” the decision said.
The appeal court’s decision relates to the case of two Canadians, Jeremy Pike and David Scott, whose devices were searched at the border and who were charged with possessing and importing child pornography. Pike was acquitted and Scott was sentenced to 23 months of house arrest.
The two men challenged the constitutionality of Section 99(1)(a) of the Customs Act, and Scott sought to appeal his conviction while the Crown sought to appeal Pike’s acquittal.
“The unconstitutionality of this law does not entitle Mr. Pike and Mr. Scott to acquittals on the serious crimes against children with which they were charged,” the court decision said.
Regarding Pike, Tulloch disagreed with the trial judge’s decision to disallow the content found on Pike’s devices to be used as evidence and to thus acquit him. Tulloch allowed the Crown’s appeal against Pike’s acquittal, admitted the evidence of child pornography found on Pike’s devices, and ordered a new trial on the pornography charges.
As for Scott, evidence found on his devices had been allowed in his trial. Tulloch not only dismissed his appeal of his conviction but also said Scott should have received three years in jail instead of 23 months’ house arrest.
“While the trial judge generally appreciated the seriousness of Mr. Scott’s crime, he overlooked the significant number of children Mr. Scott victimized and the three-decade duration of his offending,” Tulloch wrote.
However, Tulloch declined to impose jail time on Scott at this time, saying that he has already served more than half of his 23-month sentence and that he would likely have received parole by this time if he had received a three-year sentence.”
“This decision’s condemnation of possessing child pornography and guidance for future cases is sufficient to denounce and deter that crime,” Tulloch added.
The UK is currently experiencing a massive attack on free speech, spearheaded by new Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who is encouraging police to use the full force of controversial British laws to crack down on social media posts.The push for more online censorship has spanned many years, and different governments in the UK have gained new momentum with the recent protests and riots.Emboldened by the crisis, officials seem to be using it to step up the already existing, multi-year effort to get social media companies to “cooperate” with the authorities.It has now emerged that the government in London has started flagging content it deems to be “misinformation” – but also something referred to as “concerning content.”X is among those who have been asked to remove posts which British officials consider to threaten the country’s national security; and while reports say Google, Meta, and TikTok are complying with these demands, X is said to be resisting them.The accusations that social sites are “providing a platform for hate” while allegedly unaccountable for that is coming from cabinet members and MPs alike.Science, Innovation, and Technology Secretary Peter Kyle has revealed that he and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper are working to get content they consider “harmful” removed from the internet
.Recent actions in the UK regarding the apprehension of individuals for disseminating “incorrect information” highlight a concerning trend that threatens the very core of free speech—a foundational pillar of Western democracies.These developments suggest an alarming escalation in government and law enforcement involvement in regulating online speech, which traditionally enjoys broad protections under democratic norms.The use of existing laws, such as the Public Order Act 1986, to arrest individuals for their online speech is deeply troubling to civil liberties groups.While maintaining public order is a legitimate concern of the state, the broad application of these laws and combining accusations of “stirring racial hatred” with instances of alleged “misinformation” is supercharging an attack on free speech.The introduction of the UK’s most recent censorship law, the “Online Safety Act” further complicates this, with supporters of censorship like Kyle, suggesting that the already-controversial act doesn’t go far enough.As far as Kyle is concerned, he is looking for ways for the government to be able to control online speech to an even greater extent.
The primary catalyst appears to be the recent riots and social unrest following tragic incidents, like the knife attack in Southport.Axel Rudakubana is an 18-year-old who has been charged with the murders of three young girls during a knife attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport, England. The victims were Bebe King, aged six, Elsie Dot Stancombe, aged seven, and Alice Dasilva Aguiar, aged nine. In addition to the murder charges, Rudakubana faces charges of attempted murder against a yoga class instructor, a businessman, and eight children, as well as possession of a kitchen knife with a curved blade.Rudakubana was born in Cardiff to Rwandan parents and lived in Banks, Lancashire, England. UK police are alleging that early posts stating that Rudakubana was a Muslim have fueled online hatred and prosecutors are using claims of “misinformation.”Yet while those in the US may be familiar with false allegations being a civil matter, as the First Amendment largely protects citizens from criminal charges for such incidents; in the UK, where free speech is struggling, citizens don’t have the same protections under the current law
.In Cheshire, police have taken anti-lockdown campaigner Bernadette “Bernie” Spofforth into custody for allegedly spreading misleading information on social media about a suspect involved in the Southport killings. According to Cheshire police, she faces charges of inciting racial hatred and disseminating false information. Police allege that her actions are part of a broader issue of online misinformation sparking violence nationwide.The controversy centers on a social media post attributed to Spofforth, in which she identified “Ali Al-Shakati” as the Southport suspect, describing him as an “asylum seeker who came to the UK by boat last year” and claiming he was under surveillance by MI6. The post ominously noted, “If this is true, then all hell is about the break loose.”Chief Superintendent Alison Ross commented on the situation, saying, “We have all seen the violent disorder that has taken place across the UK over the past week, much of which has been fueled by malicious and inaccurate communications online. It’s a stark reminder of the dangers of posting information on social media platforms without checking the accuracy. It also acts as a warning that we are all accountable for our actions, whether that be online or in person.”Even the much-criticized Online Safety Act, a sweeping censorship law, is now not enough as far as Kyle is concerned, as he is looking for ways for the government to be able to control online speech to an even greater extent.
The UK’s new Prime Minister Keir Starmer has announced a forthcoming review of the Online Safety Act. During his visit to a police station on Friday, just before two individuals were imprisoned for using social media to incite attacks on asylum seeker accommodations, Starmer emphasized that social media must not be a “law-free zone.”London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who criticized the legislation as inadequate and in urgent need of revision, also suggested it doesn’t go far enough and more censorship power is needed.“I do agree that we’re going to have to look more broadly at social media after this disorder,” Starmer said. “But the focus at the moment has to be on dealing with the disorder and making sure that our communities are safe and secure.”Starmer further commented on what he believes should be the responsibilities of social media executives, telling them to prioritize community safety. He affirmed, “The first thing I’d say is, this is not a law-free zone. And I think that’s clear from the prosecutions and sentencing. Today we’re due sentencing for online behavior.”And, the government has brought in the National Security Online Information Team (NSOIT) to monitor online activity “discussing the deaths of the three children killed in Southport and the rioting,” as Kyle put it.NSOIT, previously known as the Counter Disinformation Unit, is infamous for its censorship “handiwork” during the Covid pandemic when it flagged accurate posts from politicians and journalists simply for being critical of the government’s policy.Conservative MP David Davis previously called for the unit to be disbanded, but now, he doesn’t mind “deploying” it to once again police speech: “It’s perfectly legitimate for the state to monitor things that might incite violence,” said Davis.Big Brother Watch Director Silkie Carlo writes that Kyle is “reviving Whitehall’s disgraced Counter Disinformation Unit” and warns that it would be a “grave mistake” to further undermine free speech as it would simply “inflame tensions, sow distrust and undermine democracy.”Carlo also warns about “the very neat response of online censorship that benefits elites who have never really trusted us with free and open access to information online.”
Meanwhile, Director of Public Prosecutions for England and Wales Stephen Parkinson has told citizens not to reshare posts that are “insulting or abusive (…) intended to or likely to start racial hatred.”Some reports interpret this to mean citizens could be prosecuted even if they are sharing that content as a warning to others.The UK government issued a stern warning to its citizens regarding the risks of sharing potentially offensive content online, particularly in the context of the recent riots. Those who incite “hatred” could face imprisonment, as stated in a post by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) on the social media platform X.“Think before you post!” the CPS advised.But it’s not just UK citizens that officials are threatening.Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Metropolitan Police, said that what he terms “keyboard warriors” could face terrorism charges for their online behavior that incites violence, even if they are based overseas.“And whether you’re in this country committing crimes on the streets or committing crimes from further afield online, we will come after you,” highlighting the extended reach of law enforcement to those instigating unrest from afar,” Rowley said to Sky News.“Being a keyboard warrior does not make you safe from the law, you can be guilty of offenses of incitement, of stirring up racial hatred, there are numerous terrorist offenses regarding the publishing of material, and all of those offenses are in play if people are provoking hatred and violence on the streets and we will come after those individuals just as we will physically confront on the streets the thugs and the yobs who are causing the problems for communities.”Keir Starmer has asserted that criticisms of police and accusations of a two-tier policing system in the UK are themselves dangerous. This could have troubling implications for free speech.X owner Elon Musk, who is facing censorship calls from Starmer, called out Starmer’s hypocrisy, highlighting how the Prime Minister himself criticized police back in 2021. “What a hypocrite,” Musk posted.By framing such critiques as not only unfounded but also hazardous, there’s a risk that public discourse may be stifled.This stance might discourage individuals from voicing legitimate concerns about policing, out of fear that their criticisms could be seen as harmful or destabilizing.It suggests a scenario where the public might hesitate to hold law enforcement accountable, which is a crucial aspect of democratic oversight. The suggestion that voicing concerns about police practices can endanger officers potentially shifts the focus from the need for transparency and accountability in policing to a narrative that prioritizes the suppression of dissent to protect police image and safety. This could undermine the principle of free expression, which includes the right to critique and question government institutions.
Ever since the Paris Olympics triggered culture warriors by dumping drag queens all over the opening ceremony like fleur de sel with a faulty cap, they’ve been on high alert for any perceived attempts by the organizers to further a woke, gender-bending agenda.
When Algerian boxer Imane Khelif defeated Italian Angela Carini in a fight that lasted just 46 seconds, with Carini taking a punch to the head and reeling from a suspected broken nose, it didn’t take long for social media to pick up on Carini’s cry that the match wasn’t fair. Nor would it take long for a debate to emerge along the usual fault lines around Khelif’s gender and for Khelif to become a Rorschach test.
Former competitive swimmer Riley Gaines tweeted that “men don’t belong in women’s sports,” to which X (formerly Twitter) owner Elon Musk replied, “Absolutely.” Gaines has become an activist against men competing in women’s sports as a result of having to face off against transsexual swimmer Lia Thomas in the NCAA college swimming championships. And Musk has recently expressed upset over one of his children’s own gender transitioning.
“The idea that those objecting to a male punching a female in the name of sport are objecting because they believe Khelif to be ‘trans’ is a joke. We object because we saw a male punching a female,” ‘Harry Potter’ author and frequent transsexual issue commentator J.K. Rowling wrote.
Yet there isn’t any credible evidence that Khelif has ever undergone any kind of gender transitioning – something that would be unheard of in Khelif’s native Algeria.
“This is the purest form of evil unfolding right before our eyes,” boxer and influencer Logan Paul said. “A man was allowed to beat up a woman on a global stage, crushing her life’s dream while fighting for her deceased father. This delusion must end.” But then Paul deleted the posts. “OOPSIES,” he wrote. “I might be guilty of spreading misinformation along with the entirety of this app.”
It’s no wonder everyone’s confused. Two sports governing bodies have faced off over Khelif and another athlete competing in women’s boxing, China’s Lin Yu-Ting.
According to the International Boxing Association, the worldwide match sanctioning entity which disqualified both athletes in the 2023 World Championships where they won bronze and gold respectively, “the athletes did not undergo a testosterone examination but were subject to a separate and recognized test, whereby the specifics remain confidential. This test conclusively indicated that both athletes did not meet the required necessary eligibility criteria and were found to have competitive advantages over other female competitors.” Regulations stipulate that proof could be in the form of a DNA test, but no further evidence has been provided to confirm the results – perhaps due to concerns around privacy violations.
In the other corner, the International Olympic Committee calls the IBA’s ruling “sudden and arbitrary,” which can also be true without the results themselves being illegitimate. Accusing its CEO, Chris Roberts (an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for services to British army boxing), of a unilateral decision, the IOC issued a statement related to the latest controversy, stipulating that “as with previous Olympic boxing competitions, the gender and age of the athletes are based on their passport.”
That’s hardly a rigorous test, particularly when there are at least two countries already – Canada and the US – that permit anyone to freely decide the gender that gets listed on their passport.
Arguably, the most levelheaded take came from Caitlyn Jenner, who was an Olympic decathlon champion when known as Bruce. She recently explained – in a Netflix documentary about Jenner’s sporting career and life – that it was Bruce Jenner who won those accolades, not Caitlyn. Bruce also had the integrity to keep the dresses at home and not show up in one to compete in the women’s decathlon – and Jenner does not now support any man who would. Jenner has described Khelif as “the Algerian competitor with XY chromosomes,” referencing the IBA test results, and has argued that the IOC has a duty to protect the integrity of women’s sports. The IOC doesn’t seem too interested in actively doing so, however, preferring instead to just take participants’ and countries’ word for it.
It’s unclear what Khelif’s specific case is, but it’s not impossible for a person to have male XY chromosomes yet also possess the sexual characteristics of a woman. The Denmark-based Novo Nordisk Foundation for medical research, including of sex chromosome abnormalities, calls them“hidden men.” According to their research, “one in 15,000 males is born and grows up as a girl. And neither these girls nor their parents know it. These girls do not discover anything different until puberty” when they simply don’t menstruate. And some even reach their 30s without realizing that they are genetically male, with “an extremely high level of testosterone and other male sex hormones.”
Is this the case with these two boxers? First, this has to be ascertained. And the IOC should do that rather than just brush off the IBA’s efforts and sweep them under the rug or attempt to discredit them without specific evidence. Then, rather than stick its head in the sand on gender-related issues that directly impact sporting results, the IOC should decide whether it’s going to in fact allow “hidden men,” in the exact words of scientific medical researchers, to compete against women in various sports. If so, then presumably women’s sports advocates would have something to say about it. But this discussion needs to take place openly and transparently.
The way things are going right now, couch warriors are policing gender in sports from home, with beer and Doritos in hand, because no one really trusts the authorities in charge of maintaining the integrity of the events anymore. It’s hardly unreasonable considering that the Paris Olympic organizers, whose actions are presumably validated or at least monitored by the International Olympic Committee, have already allowed ideology and special interests to trample the playing field.
Athletes in the Olympic Village have complained about the lack of available protein, such as meat and eggs, amounting to forced veganism in the interests of reducing carbon emissions (while increasing profit margins, no doubt). The lack of air conditioning for the athletes’ rooms, in upwards of 35C Parisian summer heat last week, amounted to greenwashing their own cheapness. Then they announced that plan B for the triathlon, if they couldn’t make the Seine river fecal bacteria test results work, was to have the triathlon just self-identify as a duathlon. Which came after having a totally gratuitous depiction of ‘The Last Supper’ in the opening ceremony self-identify as a drag show.
Despite the IOC’s increasingly laid-back approach to the Games, it at least pays lip service to maintaining an even playing field with doping tests, evolving in sophistication along with the cheating methods they’re meant to combat. With all the gender bending being promoted in Western society, maybe it’s also time for DNA tests to be included. Or not. In which case, everyone, regardless of gender, can just get jacked to the max and punch each other in the face for gold without concerning themselves with the details.
The opening ceremonies of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris became the latest in a series of highly controversial events to have occurred this July. I am not going to say much about the others as they have to do with American domestic politics. Nor am I going to say a whole lot about what happened at the Olympics as I am merely using it as a springboard for a discussion of theological aesthetics. That it shocked anyone is rather surprising in itself. What else would one expect from the games that represent the apex of Modern man’s regression into the pagan idolatry of sports, especially when located in the capital city of a nation that at the end of the eighteenth century threw off and murdered its divine-right king and queen, threw off its ancient allegiance to the Church, and paraded a prostitute through said capital telling the people to worship her as the “goddess” Reason? Note that the part of the Olympic ceremonies that included a blasphemous reenactment of the Last Supper featuring drag queens, a celebration of Dionysius the Olympian whose festivals threatened civilization even in pagan days (read Euripides’ Bacchae), and the same sort of tasteless garbage that takes place in those silly parades in honour of the deadly sin of Superbia, also included an honouring of the French Revolution. Despite the glorious events of the ninth of Thermidor, the anniversary of which we just passed, France never recovered from this disaster, not even to the extent that England had recovered from the mother of all left-wing revolutions, the Puritan one, in the Restoration of the previous century and even that recovery, alas, was not as complete as it should have been. Perhaps there are some who might still be surprised that an alphabet soup fest took place at what might reasonably be expected to be a celebration of jock culture. Such have not been paying attention to how the costume and makeup division of the alphabet soup brigade have claimed the field of athletics as their own territory in the last few years.
Christian condemnation of the mockery of a key event in our sacred history has come under criticism from two directions. There are those “liberal Christians” who can always be counted on to condemn any act of Christians standing up for themselves and their faith as being “unchristian”, “judgmental”, “hindering the Gospel”, “politicizing Christianity” or some other such balderdash. I place little value on such opinions and do not think them worthy of a response. The other type of criticism is almost the opposite of this. It takes Christians to task for being too milquetoastish in their defense of their faith. The reason people like the performers at the Olympics and those who approved their performance feel free to mock Christianity in ways they would not feel similarly free to mock other religions such as, for example, Islam, is because Christians do not respond with such things as fatwas and jihads when their faith is mocked. A more insightful variation of this would be to say that much of the Christian response to this mockery has been based on liberal principles rather than Christian ones. In other words it has taken the form of “you wouldn’t treat other religions this way, it is unfair that you are treating us like that, this is discrimination” rather than “you have mocked the true and living God, Who will not be mocked, and furthermore mocked Him at a key moment in the history of His having taken on human nature and become Man in order to save us, the world, and yes, even you, from the sins for which we all must repent rather than celebrate as you are now doing, and if you don’t change your sorry ways and seek His forgiveness, you will suffer forever the consequences of mocking Him .”
This incident brought to mind an earlier controversy regarding a depiction of the Last Supper. No, I am not referring to Dan Brown’s silly book but to a painting by Venetian Renaissance artist Paolo Veronese. In 1573 he completed a very large – 18.37 ft. by 42.95 ft. – oil painting that had been commissioned by the Dominicans as a replacement for a painting by Titian of the Last Supper that had been lost to fire two years earlier. The middle of the painting features Christ at the centre of a table with the twelve Apostles on either side of Him much like other familiar portraits of the Last Supper. The setting is clearly not an upper room in first century Jerusalem, however, from the architecture of the room and the skyline of the city in the large window behind them. Then there are all the extras. There are close to fifty people in the painting, including a dwarf in jester’s attire, a few African slaves, German soldiers, and all sorts of other people, none of whom one would have expected to have been present on the occasion even if the factor of anachronism were to be excluded. There are a number of animals there too including a cat peeking out from under the table at St. Peter’s feet at a dog sitting in front of the table and tilting its head to look back at the cat and a parrot on the jester’s arm. These promoted an investigation by the local Venetian branch of the Inquisition which, on the grounds that he had violated the rules regarding religious art that the Council of Trent (1545-1563) had imposed, ordered him to fix the painting, which he did by re-titling it “The Feast at the House of Levi.” Monty Python did a sketch loosely based on this although they switched in Michelangelo for Paolo Veronese and the Pope for the local Inquisition.
A comparison of this incident with the current one brings a few observations to mind. It goes without saying, of course, that the Church was more powerful in the sixteenth century than today. It is also evident that Veronese’s painting was not intrinsically blasphemous like the performance art at the Olympics. Had it been so, the Inquisition would not have been satisfied with a change of title. One conclusion that might be drawn from this is that the Church then took lesser offences in the realm of art more seriously than the Church today takes greater offences. Which makes it interesting to note that this incident occurred ten years after the closing of the Council of Trent. The Council of Trent was the Roman Church’s response to the Reformation. The Reformation primarily had to do with ethical matters (charges of ecclesiastical corruption that began with the 99 theses pertaining to the sale of indulgences) and doctrine (the authority of the Church in relation to that of Scripture, the doctrine of salvation), but there was also an aesthetic element that was intertwined with both the ethical and doctrinal. The Protestant Reformers considered the invocation of the saints and a number of similar or associated practices to be in violation of the second commandment, that is to say, the commandment against idolatry. This is an ethical issue because if the Reformers were right the practices in question are sinful, because idolatry is a major sin, and if the Reformers were wrong, they were guilty of the sin of falsely judging the motives of other Christians. It is also a doctrinal issue, because for the Reformers to be right the ancient Christian doctrine of the Communion of the Saints, that all Christians, whether in earth or in heaven, are members of the one body of Jesus Christ within which there is no veil between the living and the dead because all are one in Christ, would have to be wrong. It was an aesthetical matter as well and became increasingly so as the Reformation progressed and newer Reformers developed traditions within Protestantism that adopted such strict views as that any artistic depiction of God was idolatry or, more extremely, that any artistic depiction of anyone was idolatry, and that consequently Church buildings needed to be stripped of all adornment. That it was the rules of the Roman Church, adopted in the Counter Reformation, that Veronese ran afoul of demonstrates something that a lot of Christians find difficult to grasp today. Aesthetic permissivism is not the only alternative to Puritanism, the extreme version of Protestantism that stripped Churches of their artwork, Church music of its instruments, closed theatres, and basically looked at almost any attempt at artistic expression as an offense against the God Who had given the ability of artistic expression to man.
By “aesthetic permissivism” I mean the idea that artists should not be subject to any rules external to those of their art, an idea closely related to the idea that art should not be subject to any criticism other than aesthetic. In practice these ideas quickly translate into the artist not being subject to any rules whatsoever and his art not being subject to any criticism. These are popular ideas today, not least among artists for whom they have an obvious self-serving appeal, because of a) the widespread notion that beauty, the standard upon which all aesthetic rules and judgements are based, is purely subjective and b) the less widespread, except among left-wing activists who think they are artists, notion that beauty is a false standard that needs to be deconstructed and so art must be made to deliberately eschew the standard of beauty by embracing its opposite. Much of the corpus of the late Sir Roger Scruton was devoted to demonstrating how erroneous these ideas are. Most Christians are uncomfortable with aesthetic permissiveness in its bald form as described in this paragraph although there is an idea popular in certain Christian circles that resembles an inverted version of it. This is the idea that while artists and their art should be subject to rules and criticism of a moral nature, albeit not to the extent demanded by Puritanism, aesthetic judgements are purely subjective and should not be influenced by theology or ethics. A version of this that arises with regards to Church worship is the notion, often supported by a misinterpretation of St. Paul, that the matter of how we worship is adiaphora. Fr. Paul A. F. Castellano’s As It is In Heaven: A Biblical, Historical, and Theological Introduction to the Traditional Church and Her Worship (Tucson: Wheatmark, 2021) is an excellent rebuttal of this notion.
Puritanism is no more an acceptable position for orthodox Christians than aesthetic permissivism. The premise that all artistic depictions break the commandment against idols can be answered in the same way as can the premise that killing in self-defense or defense of others, in war, and as the execution of a sentence for death passed for the commission of a capital crime are forbidden by “thou shalt not kill”, i.e., with “turn the page.” Exodus 21:14-17 and 29 prescribe the death penalty for various offences in the chapter after “thou shalt not kill” or more literally “thou shalt not do murder” in Exodus 20:13. Only a few chapters later in Exodus 25 comes the instructions on building the ark of the covenant, with the mercy seat, with two golden cherubim (images of heavenly – in the sense of the heaven where God dwells – beings) (vv. 18-20). The candlestick was to have representations of almonds on it (Ex. 25:33-34). The ephod of the high priest was to have depictions of pomegranates on it (Ex. 28:33-34). The Puritan interpretation of Exodus 20:4 as forbidding all artistic depictions cannot hold up within the context of its own book. It cannot hold up in the context of the next verse which provides the criteria which distinguishes an idol from something that is merely a work of art. As for depictions of God, the ruling of the Second Council of Nicaea (787 AD) against iconoclasm maintained, Scripturally, that the Incarnation had changed things, He Who as the eternal Son of God is the perfect Image of the invisible God His Father (Col. 1:15, Heb. 1:3) became Man and in doing so revealed God that He might be seen in Him (Jn. 1:18, 14:9), and so since in the Incarnate Son God and Man are forever united in Hypostatic Union, God can be depicted because Man can be depicted. The Second Council of Nicaea was a general council of the Church prior to the East-West Schism, received by the whole Church and both sides of the later Schism, as the seventh truly ecumenical council. Protestantism’s reasons for rejecting it as such are insufficient in my opinion. The attitude that manifested itself in the iconoclasm against which Nicaea II pronounced judgement and then later again in Puritanism goes back prior to the coming of Christ to the aftermath of the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucids. Zealous lay leaders of Israel, recognizing from the prophets that the Assyrian and Babylonian Captivities had come upon Israel because of idolatry, determined that Israel would not only not practice idolatry again but would not be allowed to get close, and “hedged” the second commandment, and all the other commandments of the Mosaic Law, with extra commandments making the burden of the Law that much heavier. These became the sect of Second Temple Judaism known as the Pharisees with whom Christ interacted in His ministry. The spirit of Pharisaism is evident in the way the English Puritans responded to the efforts of Archbishop Laud and the other Carolinian Divines to maintain the “beauty of holiness” (Ps. 29:2, 96:9) in the English Church within the limits of the rubrics of the Protestant Elizabethan Prayer Book with accusations of papist conspiracies, armed revolt against Church and King, regicide, and a tyrannical regime that stripped the Churches of everything of aesthetic value.
While the Roman Church’s handling of the Paolo Veronese “incident” demonstrates that a mean can be found between these two extremes it does not necessarily illustrate what the proper mean should look like. Let us return to the incident that prompted this discussion. A better Christian response to the blasphemous mockery of the Last Supper than to rely solely on the liberal principle that one religion should not be singled out and targeted for the kind of mockery to which other religions would not be subjected is to stand on the Christian moral and theological principle that the true and living God will not be mocked. To this moral and theological condemnation, however, must be added aesthetic condemnation. The performance was bad not just on moral and theological grounds but aesthetic as well. It was a display of ugliness not beauty. Performances of this nature, even when they are not desecrating events from sacred history, generally are. The spirit of mockery in which they are conducted, even when not directed explicitly against God, is directed against standards that are wrongfully considered to be oppressive, which in the arts means especially beauty. Mockery of beauty is ultimately mockery of God, of course, because beauty like the other transcendentals (properties of being), goodness and truth, finds its ultimate expression in Him in Whom Being and Essence are one and Whose very name translates as “He Who Is.”
St. Peter commanded us to “be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you” (1 Pet. 3:15) and to give such a response as discussed in the previous paragraph to “artistic” assaults on the faith, Christians should familiarize themselves with basic theological aesthetics. Although more has probably been written in the last hundred years on this subject than in all the rest of Christian history put together it is much more of a niche subject than its counterpart philosophical aesthetics, the field of the aforementioned Sir Roger Scruton. Hans Urs von Balthasar’s seven volume The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics (published in German from 1961 to 1967, English translation published by Ignatius Press in San Francisco from 1983 to 1990)is a good place to start. For anyone wanting to learn more about how in God Being and Essence are the same thing read St. Thomas Aquinas, or if you are looking for a shorter treatment E. L. Mascall’s He Who Is: A Study in Traditional Theism, originally published in 1943, just republished last year by Angelico Press in Brooklyn. Don’t mistake St. Thomas and Mascall as starting with being as possessed by created things and equating it with God. This would be both idolatry and pantheism. It is God’s Being, of which created being is merely analogous, that is one with His Essence, as no created being and essence are one. For a warning against the idolatry of equating God with anything in creation, including our idea of Him, see the first chapter of Vladimir Lossky’s The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (Crestwood: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2002) but with the caveat that Eastern theology often takes its apophaticism to the extreme of denying the possibility of natural theology, a denial that is difficult to reconcile with the first chapter of Romans. One final recommendation is Benjamin Guyer’s The Beauty of Holiness: The Caroline Divines and Their Writings (London: Canterbury Press, 2012), from the Canterbury Studies in Spiritual Theology Series.
§ Druthers crew expected to arrive after being delayed by fires along their route
2. Monday, August 5 (holiday Monday)
o TWO EXCITING EVENTS WITH THE DRUTHERS CREW
§ At 2 and 6 p.m.
3. Call for DRUTHERS donations
Geesh, we’re in a pickle again… 200,000 papers have been printed for August and we are still $8k short from being able to pay the bill and only 12 hours left in the fundraiser. Can you help? Fundraising page > donorbox.org/druthers Or send e-transfers to > admin@druthers.net
I know a few hundred of you have already donated this month and I thank you immensely. But this email goes out to 22,000+ people and if just 80 more people will pitch in $100 each, we can pay the printer.
Or if any heavy hitters are reading this, it would only take 8 of you contributing $1000 each to reach our target by the end of today. Are you a heavy hitter?
Donating to help print and distribute Druthers is the best way to make a difference with your money in this country.
Canada is rapidly waking up and this Druthers project has played a pivotal role in that happening. We can’t ease up now… let’s keep it going!
Anything you can do to help this fundraiser along is greatly appreciated.
