Words Worth Noting - February 12, 2025
“Atlas Shrugged makes no sense to me: the good people I know [rich or poor] are not stingy with their skills and expertise or whatever contributions they can make – whether prayer, money, or time – toward the common good. I know this as a fact. It is the characters in Atlas Shrugged who opt out (sometimes with much hand wringing) who are by definition the second rate. From knowing so many good people, I knew Atlas Shrugged was bunk. But I was wrong – in an oblique way this book was prophetic, but it was not Atlas who had shrugged; the world sitting on Atlas’s shoulders decided to jump off. Two years ago in Canada, every institution in Canadian society rejected the help of their many dedicated volunteers, and outlawed public participation in clubs, amateur sports, education, and religious observance. Any gatherings of five or more were prohibited, even in our homes. Christmas and Easter were cancelled. Sunday Mass was cancelled. Religious services were outlawed; whereas liquor stores, pot shops, big box stores, and professional sports were all kept open. The lines of demarcation were obvious, if it freely benefited families, helped the elderly, or made life better for people it was cancelled. Youth curling? Gone. House league hockey? Gone. Public arenas? Locked. Public pools? Public parks? Public walking trails? Shut down, access blocked with padlocks and chains, patrolled by the police. People, including children, who dared ride a bike, skate on a patch of ice, slide down a hill on cardboard or skateboard in an empty parking lot were fined, sometimes pushed violently to the ground, and often arrested. Funerals, weddings, baptisms, first communions – these were outlawed. All of our social, religious, and media institutions collaborated. A few Christian congregations resisted and their pastors were arrested, sometime just for reading the Bible outdoors. The City of Toronto (among others) opened up snitch lines so people could report anyone who celebrated Christmas or Easter. Those who questioned even the more extreme capitulations to dictatorship were pilloried in the press for being anti-science. However, there were still children to raise, people who needed encouraging, teen-agers who needed to learn and play, swim, and play music. Spontaneously, without any central organization, house league hockey was re-started by invitation only, on frozen ponds and rinks behind barns and hedges away from the searching eyes of both officialdom and vindictive neighbors. At our home we raised the height of the fence so people could not see into our yard from the road, which allowed us to host Euchre tournaments, and Christmas feasts, live music events, with visitors parking behind a large woodpile away from view. Everywhere, priests said Mass in private homes with time-and-place communicated by word of mouth to those who could be trusted to keep quiet.”
David Beresford in Gilbert! The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #4 (March/April 2024)