Who’s offended by the Ten Commandments?
Apparently the bigwigs at the helm of our showcase public park in Tuxedo didn’t want to find out.
And if you weren’t aware that the Assiniboine Park Conservancy Board of Directors kicked the can on their problem over to Winnipeg City Hall, neither was Marty Gold – until an outraged listener tripped over the paper trail.
In a development almost completely ignored by the local media, the stalemate landed with an ‘advisory committee’ which conducted yet another dubious public consultation process. They’re still pondering what to recommend. In the next year councilors may have to vote on whether to
A) re-install a monument donated to the City in 1965 depicting the Biblical two tablets – removed during park pavilion renovations – or
B) keep it out of public view lest some angry woke cranks protest against yet another historic site that represents our society’s most common values.
The 10 Commandments (or Aseret Hadibrot, “The Ten Statements,” in Hebrew) were communicated by G‑d to the people of Israel at Mount Sinai, 50 days after the Exodus from Egypt. The event is known as the Giving of the Torah. G‑d then carved the Ten Commandments onto two tablets of stone, which he gave to Moses.
Hear how, as part of an international campaign to help guide troubled youth, the Fraternal Order of Eagles presented the monument to the City, and it resided in AssinIboIne Park until construction of the “Leaf Diversity Gardens” in 2017.
Then the APC Board, who lease and operate the ‘Crown Jewel’ of Winnipeg, started to squirm.
“While the religious monument is part of Winnipeg’s history, APC’s goal as a not for profit organization entrusted to steward Assiniboine Park and its assets is to nurture a sense of community within our Park that makes all feel welcome, accepted and comfortable to be themselves.”
Are those actual people with any genuine legitimacy who need to be catered to? You’ll hear about the back-and-forth as Park officials tried to unload the City asset, and the complaint APC officials filed with the advisory group about the display potentially creating a “negative impact” making the Park “less welcoming for some members of the community” if it was restored.
As Marty describes, according to the gift-givers they were first told to take it back by a group of “community leaders” who fear the anti-religion “diversity” mob more than they fear insulting the vast majority of their actual donors and users (aka traditionalists and believers in God.)
Listen to information from a City Councilor who wasn’t so sure the advisory committee should have been handed the file, and about the pushback by over 1100 signatories to a petition whose organizer said “Someone needs to hold the Conservancy accountable.”
As a Hebrew school graduate, Marty airs a few strong views in Episode 35- is this an attack on not only the Christian donors of the monument but on Winnipeg’s Jews and Muslims too? Do city councilors risk an embarassing outcome either way?
Hear about the “Committee of Community Members” the issue was delegated to, and the “Welcoming Winnipeg” feedback process which had a 2 week window for comment.
If a resident didn’t comb the City website daily they would have had no idea of the controversy or that their opinion was (supposedly) wanted.
Now they will.
And there will be a follow-up in the next 2 weeks as more information has been received from inside City Hall, and an additional, barely-read newspaper brief about the petition drive was unearthed.
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Wondering how the media missed covering this story last year? This is obviously an important issue and you’d think would have come up in the civic election…
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