A couple of days ago I asked who Gilles Duceppe might referring to
when he accused the Tories of giving money to a group of bible translators . Well, the good Dr. Dawg did some sniffing around and came up with the following:
Wycliffe Bible Translators slurped up a hefty $495,600 of your money and mine.And
CC has found the paperwork:
And, put succinctly, Wycliffe Bible Translators are missionaries--I mean,
they refer to themselves as missionaries in one or two places on their website. They're translating bibles to bring more people into the church. Here's Barbara Trudell, one of their translators, discussing how, in the African context, beginning a child's education in their mother tongue produces more readers of
The Gospel (bolding is mine):
Learners who begin in their mother language have better cognitive development and are likely able to handle demanding subject matter. Trudell says their whole approach to education is with an eye cast toward the Gospel.
Once the translations are completed and available, churches can move forward in discipleship, while keeping the community's identity intact, much more quickly. "If the education system can produce readers of the Scripture," says Trudell, "that's a real boost for us in Bible translation because we have an automatic, ready-made audience."
Their financial statements are also pretty impressive. These guys are hardly hurting for cash.
Update: R.G. Harvie chimes in.
'22 out of 173 grants made went to faith-based organizations'
ReplyDeleteWOW! 1.27% of the funded organizations were faith based, that's real scary stuff BCL.
Is there a breakdown where the other 98.73% went to?
So your happy with the gov. funding missionary work?
ReplyDeleteWilson masturbates to visions of little African boys reading Genesis.
ReplyDeleteAs I pointed out @ the Woodshed, Wycliffe has some controversy. According to Wikipedia "It is true, however, that [Wycliffe] has influential ties to capitalist enterprise, politicians, and military figures in the United States and in the developing countries in which it works. [Wycliffe] is not an "empire" per se, but foreign missions such as [Wycliffe] are part of the larger political process in which powerful nations export political, economic, social, and ideological patterns to the relatively weaker and poorer regions of the world. Today, people in many developing countries are debating whether some aspects of this process should be limited or controlled."
ReplyDeleteOur tax dollars exporting ideological patterns for political purposes, with ties to military? Oy vey, do they export the rapture too?
I have no problem with Church organizations being sponsored with my tax dollars to help Aboriginals in Canada, or set up youth centers in low income neighbourhoods,
ReplyDeletedo you?
And shockingly, millions of people read the bible.
I'm not one of them, but I sure think that sponsoring the translation of ANY book read by millions is ok.
Canada spends literally billions on French/English translations, and I don't read a word of French,
should I be outraged?
Get some perspective BCL.
There are 100's of millions spent here (see link of grants for 2009) that I 'may' have objection too, but then I'm not trying to engage in a culture war.
http://www.tpsgc-pwgsc.gc.ca/recgen/pdf/44.pdf
It's 12.72% not 1.27%.
ReplyDelete"'22 out of 173 grants made went to faith-based organizations'
ReplyDeleteWOW! 1.27% of the funded organizations were faith based"
Think again Wilson. That's 12.7% not what you quoted.
I certainly don't want my taxpayer money going to any religious group.
F*ck. There will be a letter going to my MP today asking for an explanation.
ReplyDeleteSo.. it appears my voting choices are Michael Ignatieff, looking to have his version of a "village" raising my child.. or I get to support Stephan Harper subtly seeking to use my tax dollars for Christian missionary work.
Nice.
Thanks for the heads up.. as much as it pains me to see it.
WOW! 1.27% of the funded organizations were faith based, that's real scary stuff BCL.
ReplyDeleteWOW! Learn math. 22/173=12.7% not 1.27%
By this Stats Can report,
ReplyDelete77% of Canadians identify themselves as Christian (Evangelical Christians: 40% Canadian Protestants and 15% of Canadian Catholics)
Total population 29,639,035
Catholic 12,936,905
Protestant 8,654,850
Christian Orthodox 479,620 Christian -elsewhere 780,450
...
No religious affiliation 4,900,090
http://www40.statcan.gc.ca/l01/cst01/demo30a-eng.htm
Yah, my mistake.
ReplyDeleteYour 'culture war' in a nutshell:
13% of the grants went to organizations that 77% of Canadians identify with.....
But go ahead and insult 3/4 of the Candian population,
it's working for yah so far, eh.
Folling my last comment:
ReplyDeletehttp://searchingforliberty.blogspot.com/2010/05/conservatives-we-arent-front-for.html
If I oppose a Liberal Government imposing their morality upon me and my children.. I had better be opposed to a Conservative government seeking to do the same thing.
ReplyDeleteI don't care how many people are, like me, Christian.
Otherwise.. wait for the day that Muslims outnumber Christians and then be prepared to hear about people in glass houses throwing stones.
RG Harvie,
ReplyDeleteLiberal morality has been forced upon Canadians.
As this poll finds, contrary to what the Liberal left (and their media) have been telling us, Canadian values lean Conservative.
Allan Gregg of Harris-Decima and Dr. Andre Turcotte of Carleton University’s School of Journalism and Communication, who conducted phone interviews with 1,000 Canadian adults between February 1-10.
The poll found :
-89% strongly agreed that “nothing is more important than family,”
-67% strongly agreed that “marriage, by definition, is between a man and a woman.”
-60% strongly agreed that “abortion is morally wrong.”
Catholic 12,936,905
ReplyDeleteProtestant 8,654,850
Christian Orthodox 479,620 Christian -elsewhere 780,450
I doubt if you poll these people that they would all agree that government money should be given to Wycliffe translations.
But nice of you to lump Catholics and Protestants together... they have different Bibles.
Liberal morality has been forced upon Canadians.
ReplyDeleteAs this poll finds, contrary to what the Liberal left (and their media) have been telling us, Canadian values lean Conservative.
Granted, if people were forced to marry people of the same sex or have abortion it would be wrong. Absolutely wrong. I don't think we're heading there as a country.
Still, if you worry about the above -- a value being forced upon you -- shouldn't you worry about the reverse -- conservative values being placed on the apparently minority in the above poll? (Can't find a direct link for Manning or Decima on the questions and breakdown -- much appreciated if someone could use their google-fu to find it.)
Some thoughts on the questions.
-89% strongly agreed that “nothing is more important than family,”
Most groups would agree with that -- after all, Conservatives do not have close to 89% support in the polls, so I assume Liberals, NDPers, Green, Bloc, and Rhino suporters are in there. How is this a Conservative value?
-67% strongly agreed that “marriage, by definition, is between a man and a woman.”
And yet 61% support same sex marriage. How many of the above -- people who believe marriage is between a man and a woman -- would repeal same sex marriage?
-60% strongly agreed that “abortion is morally wrong.”
What were the numbers to having abortion made illegal? Not everything people believe to be morally wrong are criminal offenses. (For example, it's morally wrong to encourage a poor person to pile up debt, but it's not illegal to send them a credit card in the mail.)
Ha! That Gregg poll has been beaten to death on countless sites. It was a joke. Perhaps you should check what the definition of strongly degree here, or find out for yourself what affect a 7-point scale has on responses. Christ you're stupid.
ReplyDeleteBut nice of you to lump Catholics and Protestants together... they have different Bibles.
ReplyDeleteAnd the eastern Orthodox Churches have yet another Bible.
Not surprising for someone who cannot tell a Shia from a Sunni Muslim.
Fewer than 38% of Canadian voters voted for the Conservatives. All of the other parties are more liberal than the Conservatives. More than 60% voted against the CPC.
ReplyDelete************
Way off topic, MJ, but I don't seem to have your email address. Here's one that might be up your alley:
http://philosophyofscienceportal.blogspot.com/2010/05/mutant-bugs.html
"Canada spends literally billions on French/English translations, and I don't read a word of French,
ReplyDeleteshould I be outraged?" Wilson asks.
Should he be outraged? Of course not; it's because of translation that he never receives government documents, forms and correspondence that are available only in French.
That said, I wonder as to the source of Wilson's figure. "Canada spends literally billions on French/English translations", he writes. Not true.
"I have no problem with Church organizations being sponsored with my tax dollars to help Aboriginals in Canada, or set up youth centers in low income neighbourhoods,
ReplyDeletedo you?"
THe correct answer is 'I'd rather see my tax dollars go to building adequate schools for the 'Aboriginals in Canada'...
As many of us here already know, our current gov't isn't.
"60% strongly agreed that abortion is morally wrong."
ReplyDeleteAnd I am one of them, but I also believe it is even more morally wrong to impose my beliefs on everyone else on a matter of such profound a nature as the control of their own bodies, which is why politically I am as pro-choice as the most ardent members of that movement. I realize this may be hard for you to grasp Wilson but people are capable of holding views that reflect one thing in their personal lives but the opposite when it comes to public policy affecting all citizens.
I have known many women that had abortions and none of them took it lightly, they all felt profoundly about their decision, and would if their circumstances had been different preferred to keep their child, so I find this argument I see from the pro-birthers like yourself about how this is something you need to make for others because they don't take it seriously enough incredibly offensive, paternalistic, and frankly more than a little authoritarian.
Each woman has to be able to decide for themselves since they are the ones whose bodies are put through the strains of carrying a child to term and more often than not are the parent that ends up having to take care of the child when both parties aren't willing to be responsible parents.
One of the main reasons I am so in favour of comprehensive sex education from early childhood is so that people make responsible choices, I am fine with casual sex, but I am not with casual reproduction. The more people know before they become sexually active and have easy access to contraceptives the less abortion is needed. It will always be needed because some women can never safely give birth and to date we have no 100% effective contraceptive method that all can safely use and I suspect we may never.
I make this comment to underscore just how fallacious the thinking you use Wilson in claiming that the majority of Canadians are socially conservative let alone politically so. Then from what I've seen of your comments throughout the internet this comes as no surprise, you are one of the more dogmatic partisans out there and that facts are not your first priority.
It is no surprise that you are fine with money for Bible translations yet mask it as not being different than any other english book to be used to teach the language. Somehow I think that is more of your claptrap because I suspect if say the Communist manifesto was the document being used to teach English and paid with tax dollars you would find that an unacceptable use of taxpayer dollars. Indoctrination is indoctrination be it religious or political and should not be subsidized by government to boost its support which is what you are advocating here.
"77% of Canadians identify themselves as Christian"
ReplyDeleteIncluding the author of "The Armageddon Factor". So why don't you stop pretending that you and Harper speak for them all.
So Wilson in order to be a good family person one has to have religion? If I told you religion is the main reason for war and suspion of other groups, would you cut my head off? If I said religion causes people to be blindly judgemental, would you shoot me? And if I said, there is not any such thing as heaven, would you nail be to a cross?
ReplyDeleteI believe wilson is committing a common fallacy of faulty generalizations and extrapolation of statistical data. Nevermind the landmine of pitfalls associated with the actual questions posed in polling, falsely conflating and establishing false equivalencies between political and philosophical positions relating to a topic abound here, which scotian highlighted quite well.
ReplyDeleteThere is also the cute meaningless assertion that "liberal morality" has been imposed on Canada, a seeming chimera that appears in the deepest fearful recesses of the minds of the self-avowed victimized 'silent majority.'
After all, if you recall awhile back, the Conservative blogosphere lit up in knee jerk rage about the 'damning' video of Palestine House with those same people asking "Do you want you tax dollars to go to a place like this with these kind of people who do such things?" (a baiting technique, sort of watered down version of 'Have you stopped beating your wife')
Without delving into it more, I shall summarize in one phrase that is repeatedly uttered in response to this recycled line of specious reasoning: It's Okay If You Are Conservative.
"Canada spends literally billions on French/English translations, and I don't read a word of French."
ReplyDeleteBut you sure do speak teh Jesus, don'cha?
French is an official language of Canada, and Anglicanism the national religion. To go with your example we should fund only Anglican organizations, eh?
But we keep our government secular, and with good reason. The English specifically extended religious freedom and language rights to the conquered French of Quebec (who would have considered lumping Catholics and Protestants together as that badly-flawed poll does to be purest heresy).
Harper just desperately needs street cred with his base. Hence his rolling back abortion to 1953 and blowing half-a-mil to mistranslate further a thoroughly-already-mistranslated book of Aramaic nomad fables.
"Good night, and may your god go with you."
~Dave Allen
Wycliffe has been receiving generous government funding for many years including:
ReplyDelete1996: $240,000
1997: $200,000
1998: $330,000
In fact they received federal funding as far back as 1991, and perhaps much earlier than that (1970's?).
Duceppe might find traction with this, but the Liberals won't.
Gotta agree with wilson,big whoppee 12.7% of the total hardly scary.
ReplyDeleteAnd beside the bible is not so scary,indeed if even 10 percent of all Christians actually lived their lives according to the teachings of Jesus the world would be a better place.
We all know Harper et al preach about religious values,but when it comes to actually practicing their supposed faith they are negligent,indeed they seem to miss the entire point of the bible. In particular the teaching of Jesus.
So in short don't let Conservative double-speak confuse you,rather hold them to their faith.What better way to show then for being the mean-spirited ,anything-but- Christian, hypocrites that they are.