Surely the righteous will never be shaken; they will be remembered forever. – Psalm 112:6

Today's Scripture Reading (August 27, 2022): Psalms 111 & 112

I attended Sir John A. MacDonald Junior High School. (We referred to the school as SJAM.) Maybe it was a different age, long before what has come to be known as "Cancel Culture." It was an age when we were more forgiving of our cultural heroes. The significance of MacDonald for Canadians was that he was the first Prime Minister of Canada, fulfilling the cultural relevance to Canadians that George Washington fulfills for the United States. But also, like George Washington, his image has become a little more tarnished in recent years. George Washington and other founding fathers have been re-examined because of their ownership of enslaved people. Washington declared his support for abolition but continued to enslave people throughout his life. It was an act that we are not sure deserves our forgiveness.

For Sir John A. MacDonald, his relationship with indigenous populations has brought extra scrutiny to his legacy. One crime that has been specifically under attack is his support for Louis Riel's execution. Riel had been the political leader of the Metis people, and he had led a revolt against the Government of Canada because of the government's failure to live up to their treaty obligations early in 1885. He was found guilty at trial, but the jury had recommended mercy. No mercy was given. Riel was executed on November 16, 1885, and some blamed the Prime Minister for the execution.

I get it. People like Sir John A MacDonald and even George Washington didn't get everything right. Actually, there was much that they got wrong. But I don't believe in trying to cleanse history. We can learn from the good, the bad, and the ugly of those who have gone before us. In Canada, a movement has demanded that statues of MacDonald be removed, websites deleted, and even schools named after the Prime Minister be stripped of the MacDonald name and renamed after a more acceptable historical people. But I resist the move. As the first Prime Minister, MacDonald did many things right, and we have many reasons why we should remember him. We don't have to cleanse our history of the negative. We should be able to honor our predecessors as well as evaluate all the ways that they went wrong. There is no contradiction in this concept, but rather a recognition that all of us are actually a combination of the good and the bad.

The Psalmist says that the righteous will never be shaken, and they will be remembered forever. The promise is that those who follow the demands of God will find that they never have anything for which culture will want to cancel them. It is true, but few of us have reached that exalted state. In the Bible, I can only think of two; Jesus and Joseph, Jacob's son, both lived God-anchored lives. All others had times when they failed God. They are remembered as a mixture of good and bad. What a tragedy it would be if someday someone decided that they should be canceled and their stories erased so that we can no longer learn from the good and bad present in their lives.

Today's Scripture Reading: Psalms 113 & 114