By Lloyd Mackey

SOMETIMES, the import of the moment leads to a failure to observe the traditions of the season.

Last week, I neglected to wish OttawaWatch readers a Happy Easter, with its attendant celebrating of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In that fault, I am on common ground with NDP Leader Jack Layton, but not with either Prime Minister Stephen Harper or Opposition Leader Michael Ignatieff.

I don't know what happened to Layton, to have caused him to forget. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that Bill Blaikie has departed the federal scene and moved into the Manitoba legislature. Blaikie is a United Church minister and was a veteran MP. In addition, he was former NDP deputy leader and Layton's sometime spiritual advisor.

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Unlike Layton, both Harper and Ignatieff made it a point to issue public Easter greetings, aiming them toward Canadians who are likely to take the occasion seriously.

Before parsing the similarities and differences between the greetings, I want to provide a little background.

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A few days before Easter, Listen Up, a Christian television documentary show hosted by Lorna Dueck, issued a statement that the prime minister's office had offered an Easter greeting video for possible airing on the show. The LU e-mail announcing the statement included an advanced copy of the video.

Not long after, people connected with Listen Up extended feelers to a number of Christians close to the Ottawa scene, designed to determine if Ignatieff, the Liberal leader might want to provide a similar video.

Whatever the result of those feelers, no video was apparently forthcoming from the Liberal leader's office. But a media release with greetings was issued on Maundy Thursday, April 9.

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Both the greetings made the point that this holiest of Christian holidays commemorates the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The two messages, however, picked up on differing sub-themes.

Harper spoke of the Christian belief that "God works out his purposes in history" and that the Easter message gives hope and encourages Christians to take care of their neighbours.

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Further, he spoke of the religious liberty that is ideally present in Christian-influenced communities -- a spirit that he said encourages people of diverse views "to live together in harmony."

For his part, Ignatieff suggested that "falling during Canada's spring season, this celebration also reminds us of the powerful potential for renewal."

He continued: "It is my hope that all Canadians, regardless of their faith, can share in the sense of new beginnings provided by this holiday and enjoy these early days of spring."

So both leaders implied the need for good relationship among people of diverse views. Harper's perspective was to encourage Christians to build those relationships; Ignatieff's, for people of other viewpoints to enjoy the concept of "new beginnings."

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One other tidbit might tie in to these greetings.

Listening to CBC Radio One, also shortly before Easter, I caught an interview with a Muslim leader who has been working with Ottawa people responsible for the development of the community's cemeteries.

This leader, whose name I did not catch, pointed out the need, in Ottawa, for developing burial and cemetery services that specifically serve the growing Muslim community.

He noted that there are now 80,000 Muslims in the national capital region. That represents close to 10 per cent of the population -- about eight per cent higher than the national average.

That figure gave some pause, to this listener at least. Likely, in most large Canadian cities, the resident percentage of Muslim population likely well outstrips the national average. In that sense, the good-natured image communicated by a television show like Little Mosque on the Prairie, is not exactly the norm. (True, there are exceptions -- like the large numbers of Somalians working in the sugar industry in south-eastern Alberta.)

The point worth drawing, however, from these leaders' statements, relates to one of the perceived strengths of the Christian community -- its sense of respect for free expression of diverse views.

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Lloyd Mackey is a member of the Canadian Parliamentary Press Gallery in Ottawa and author of Stephen Harper: The Case for Collaborative Governance (ECW Press, 2006), More Faithful Than We Think: Stories and Insights on Canadian Leaders Doing Politics Christianly (BayRidge Books, 2005) and Like Father, Like Son: Ernest Manning and Preston Manning (ECW Press, 1997). Lloyd can be reached at lmackey@canadianchristianity.com.

April 16/2009