The Spirit of Sir John A.

Beautiful lofty things:  O'Leary's noble head;
My father upon the Abbey stage, before him a raging crowd:
'This Land of Saints,' and then as the applause died out,
'Of plaster Saints'; his beautiful mischievous head thrown back. - W.B. Yeats

One of my brilliant Chinese students made an important point in class today. The model essay in the text was arguing that celebrities have a duty to be role models; to ensure that their conduct is beyond reproach. Otherwise young people might imitate their behavior. A common argument in the West.

My student pointed out that doing so is actually more harmful—giving young people the false idea that there are no hard moral choices, that good people never do anything wrong. That is not the real world. Model that to children, and you are teaching them either utter cynicism, or despair.

Now apply this wisdom to the hysteria about toppling statues; the public justification for it is founded on this very childish delusion, which we indeed promote: nonsense like George Washington and the cherry tree. Although I think for most the real motive is more sinister, and dare not speak its name: simple envy.

I am tempted to blame the delusion in the USA on Calvinism: the Calvinists believe you are either saved or damned, and once you are saved, you never sin. Yet the same nonsense is everywhere in Catholicism as well, although perhaps only in English-speaking Catholicism, under the influence of the Calvinist majority. I think it was Saint John XXIII who remarked “Irish Catholicism is a terrible thing.” I have always gagged on the common prayer-card portrayals of Catholic saints: bathed in light from heaven, their features soft and placid, their eyes turned upward, their hands folded. Saint Kateri Tekakwitha was nearly blinded by smallpox; yet her face is always portrayed as smooth and spotless. In a profound way, the common devotional portrayals are the very opposite of what real sainthood is. Real sainthood is earned in the muck and the blood and the terrors of battle. These plaster saints make me want to vomit. Some actual saints have made the same observation: Theresa of Avila, Dorothy Day.

As I have said before, more than once, the good person is not the one who does not sin, but the one who admits to sin. Teaching children saints are sinless subverts what ought to be their essential moral education.

One of the more admirable things about Canada is that we used to understand this. Americans might tell their tall tales about George Washington or Abe Lincoln never telling a lie; we were perfectly sanguine that Sir John A. Macdonald, our own founder, told many. Despite our admiration for what he accomplished, we commonly heard he was a political operator, embroiled in a scandal or two, and a chronic drunk. Canadians have always been realistic about heroes.

 

Now there is talk of suppressing his memory—even in his home town of Kingston Ontario. This ibased on the false premise my Chinese student understands clearly. It will no doubt make us look idiotic to much of the world, and idiotic to our grandchildren.

And in Kingston? Tourism is vital to Kingston’s economy, a day trip away from Toronto, Montreal, or Ottawa, and junction of the Rideau Canal and the Thousand Islands, two officially world-class tourism destinations. Being the home of Sir John A., and Canada’s first capital, is a big part of its brand. To suppress mention of Macdonald would be a travesty against the public good.