Books

What Happened to Religion in Canada?

How our neighbor to the north lost its faith.

Into the 1960s, Canada was a markedly more religious country than the United States, with a higher percentage of church attendance and a stronger place for Christianity in public life. In that decade, however, things began to change, and in a hurry.

For Canada’s Sake:Public Religion,Centennial Celebrations,and the Re-makingof Canadain the 1960sby Gary R. MiedemaMcGill-Queen’s308 pp.; $70.00

Gary Miedema’s carefully researched book explores and explains those rapid changes. By studying the place of religion in celebrations of Canada’s 100th birthday (July 1, 1967) and at the World Exposition in Montreal that same year, Miedema shows how elite and many ordinary Canadians had come to look differently at their nation.

No longer did particular identities such as Catholic and Protestant, or French and English, matter most. Rather, the new unifying ideal was a hope that by embracing pluralism and diversity, national unity would flourish.

This effort both reflected and stimulated a large-scale reordering of public life, including the recent legislation that has legalized gay marriage throughout the nation.

Miedema’s tone is low-key, but he nonetheless offers much to ponder—especially on how the national effort to combat religious discrimination led to extensive discrimination against sharply focused religious groups (often evangelicals) and on how an ideology of pluralism has succeeded only partially in creating a strong sense of Canadian identity.

Copyright © 2006 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Related Elsewhere:

For Canada’s Sake is available from Amazon.com and other book retailers.

More information is available from McGill-Queen’s University Press.

Christianity Today covered recent church growth in Canada.

News and information about evangelicals in Canada is available from the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada.

Our full coverage page has past CT articles about Canada.

Also in this issue

The CT archives are a rich treasure of biblical wisdom and insight from our past. Some things we would say differently today, and some stances we've changed. But overall, we're amazed at how relevant so much of this content is. We trust that you'll find it a helpful resource.

Cover Story

Young, Restless, Reformed

'Divine Conspirator' Dallas Willard Dies at 77

It's All About God

Inside C.S. Lewis's Toolbox

Embrace Your Inner Pentecostal

China's New Legal Eagles

Spiritual Classics

Class Warfare

Despair Not

The Call of Samuel

Logic Left Behind

The Whole Word for the Whole World

Jeffrey Dahmer's Story of Faith

For Shame?

Christ's Story

Postcard from Africa

Editorial

God's Will in the Public Square

The Truth Is Somewhere

Wrongful Love

Theology for an Age of Terror

News

Quotation Marks

The New Missions Generation

News

Go Figure

News

<em>Christianity Today</em> News Briefs

News

Passages

Excerpt

A Call to an Ancient Evangelical Future

Together in the Jesus Story

Nicholas Kristof on Evangelicals, China, and Human Rights

'Volcanic' Response

We're Not Spectators

Bygone Protests

Two Degrees of Separation

News

Scrubbing CleanFlicks

Thinking Straight

Echoes and Voices from Beyond

How to Create Cynics

Sermons of Frederick Buechner

Estranged Bedfellows

The Problem with Prophets

Sit Down, Sit Down for Jesus?

Pluralist Impotence

Dr. Willard's Diagnosis

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