 TORONTO - Ontario’s bishops have offered Catholics a different way to engage politics with their latest redrafting of “Taking Stock: An Examination of Conscience.”
It’s the third incarnation of the Ontario Conference of Catholic Bishops’ guide for Catholic voters, this time in advance of the Oct. 10 provincial election. The bishops released “Choosing a Government” before the 1998 election and “Taking Stock” in 2002.
The revised version of “Taking Stock” for the next provincial election won’t come rolling off the presses. The costs of printing, warehousing and mailing paper copies of the pastoral letter have proved too high. Instead, the document will be available as a PDF download on the relaunched version of the bishops web site in late August. The web site is at www.occb.on.ca.
As in previous versions, the bishops’ guide to democracy in Ontario envisions parish-based groups coming together for a workshop or even a series of discussions about the issues raised in the document.
If the workshops actually happen in the more than 1,300 parishes across Ontario, it could transform people’s engagement with politics, said University of Ontario media studies professor Tim Blackmore.
“There’s a cultural importance to having people sitting and talking, which is a real antidote to having people in front of the television set where they’re isolated,” Blackmore said.
The more people see politics solely through the media, as a spectator sport, the less likely they are to see it as relevant in their lives. It’s not that television and newspapers are bad, it’s just that without conversation among friends and neighbours about the serious business of politics people tend to become passive, individual consumers with only the limited power of a single vote. Citizens are more powerful as active participants in democracy, said the professor.
The OCCB was unable to provide The Catholic Register with the names of any parishes which organized workshops or seminars on “Taking Stock” in 2002.
“Taking Stock” casts a wide net, identifying 12 areas of concern for voters. With references to the 1997 Catechism of the Catholic Church, papal encyclicals and the Gospels, the bishops point to ways faith can help a voter decide how to cast a ballot.
The document makes no reference to the four political parties running full slates of candidates, nor does it mention the referendum on changing the voting system to mixed member proportional representation.
The 12 policy areas covered in “Taking Stock” are listed in alphabetical order. They are: the criminal justice system; the economy; education; employment; the environment; life ethic; the family; health care; housing; labour relations; the poor; and taxation.
The problem Blackmore sees in the bishops’ highly idealistic approach to political decision making is that, in an effort to avoid taking partisan positions, “Taking Stock” stays general and fails to name specific goals or proposals.
“If you don’t have plans for implementation to a certain point which are quite specific then people don’t really know how to react,” he said.
On the other hand, the bishops’ vision of discussion groups hashing out important issues together could make the election something more than a competition among advertising agencies for audience approval.
“I’m always in favour of small groups of people sitting down and talking at length about the direction they feel their lives are going, and their feelings about cultural shifts,” said Blackmore. “It is absolutely crucial that if we’re going to teach our kids — or do anything — we’re going to have to understand and choose, I hope, rather than have chosen for us what kind of culture we’re going to have. It really starts around the kitchen table, and then it goes to a group of kitchen tables — and that’s great. We’ve missed that. We haven’t had it for decades. That’s very much worthwhile.”
For the complete statement in pdf format, go to Taking Stock: An Examination Of Conscience .
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