Chapter One: The Canadian Bible College Controversy
The idea of creating the First Nations Party came to me in the summer of 1999, when I was 23. I was working for the City of Regina that summer maintaining the landscape of the Ring Road, which meant cleaning garbage and whacking weeds with a partner who had more seniority than me. It was a seasonal job- a summer job that would help me to support my wife and son until I went back to school in the fall. The previous semester at the University of Regina was a write-off; I failed to write any of my final exams and scored "No Paper" in all my classes, but my depression was somewhat warranted due to all of the unexpected changes in my life at that point. However, that was the point in my life that I saw a need for an aboriginal party and I looked into the possibility.
My partner was a native gentleman named Wes who provided me with entertaining stories and chitchat as we drove back and forth along the Ring Road picking up garbage and making sure the grass and trees were well groomed. I liked Wes and he seemed to like me. It was not long until he shared stories of the injustice he felt he experienced in life because he was aboriginal. Another employee told me how Wes broke down after a barbecue and sobbed "because he was an Indian." Wes once told me that a teacher in high school threw a book at him to get his attention from gazing out the window. He lectured her about her apparent failure to treat him like a human being, whose attention deserved to be acquired through verbally calling his name, not just throwing a book at him like he was "a dog or something."
I was impressed by Wes’ determination to be treated with dignity, and it pained me to see that his perception of himself and his people involved so much oppression. I suggested he and I start a First Nations Party so we could represent aboriginal people in the provincial legislature and show his former high school teacher just how bright and articulate he could be. He agreed and we would continue to debate politics as we drove through the Regina-Dewdney constituency where a by-election was underway. Of course the debate bounced back and forth between the governing NDP and the opposition Saskatchewan Party, and it rarely addressed aboriginal concerns.
I went to Saskatchewan Elections and asked them how to start a political party. They explained that one would need to collect over 2,500 signatures from a number of constituencies across the province to be recognized as an official provincial party. In fact, the New Green Alliance had just accomplished such a feat the year before. I received a copy of the Elections Act and some petition forms and went home and promptly filled them out for the First Nations Party of Saskatchewan and threw them in my closet where I'd forget them for almost a year.
I was pre-occupied with another matter which soon took on a political bent. My previous semester was ruined because I was recovering emotionally from being kicked out of the Canadian Bible College where I was six classes away from completing my bachelor's degree. I immediately transferred to the University of Regina to take philosophy but was struggling with depression and rarely completed assignments or even went to class. Eventually, I fell so far behind that there was no hope of passing any of my classes, which left me even more depressed.
I was expelled in January 1999 because my girlfriend had become pregnant and it was against the rules of the college to have sex before marriage. My fiancee and I were married a month later but that didn’t seem to matter to the college administration who learned of our pregnancy from an Alliance pastor whom my fiancee's parents had confided in. I was called into the dean's office and asked whether my girlfriend and I had had sex. When I confirmed that it was true, I was told that I could no longer continue as a student and would have to re-apply the following school year. I went home and told my mom through my tears that I had been kicked out. I even phoned the dean and apologized for swearing at him during our meeting. But there was nothing I could do.
Six months later, after discussing my situation with friends, I wondered whether the dean's questioning of my sex life constituted sexual harassment. I wrote the president of the bible college raising my concerns but received only confirmation that the dean's decision to expel me remained final. I decided I would approach the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission (SHRC) to see if my dismissal was sexual harassment. After filing my complaint, I notified some reporters I knew from the local media with the news of my complaint.
Within days the story was picked up by other media and was soon carried across Canada. "Student in Rights Fight" was the headline in the Regina Leader Post on Saturday, July 3rd. I met with local television reporters on my lunch hour from Ring Road maintenance and explained how offended I was that my sex life was being discussed by the administration of my former bible college. It became the lead story on CBC, CTV, and Global, and people debated it in the streets. A traffic policeman even tore up a parking ticket he had just written up for me because he recognized me from the news and told me, "I’m a Christian, and what they did to you was wrong!"
Reaction was mixed amongst my friends and family. A lot of people felt bad that I had been kicked out a semester away from graduating, but others felt that it was the college's right to enforce their rules, even though it concerned such a private matter. Canada Day weekend went by while we all waited to see what was decided by the SHRC. On Monday, July 5th, I received a letter from the Commission stating that my expulsion "does constitute sexual harassment" but the letter went on to defend the bible college in their decision. A reporter phoned the Commission and it was explained that a typo had occurred- my expulsion did not constitute sexual harassment.
I wrote a quick response to the Leader Post saying, "It is unfortunate that private religious schools in Saskatchewan are given so much license to intrude upon the privacy of their students and make inquiries in the most personal areas of their lives. It is obvious that the Canadian Bible College takes these privileges to the extreme..." It was published in the article "It’s Not Harassment" on Tuesday, July 6th. Although the ruling was not in my favour, I felt vindicated by the moral support many showed me and the fact that the college would think twice before they expelled anyone else. I truly believe some arrangement could have been made to allow me to finish the semester without reflecting poorly on the college. The fact that the college found out about our pregnancy before we had made it public bothers me to this day.
My relationship with the Christian community of the Canadian Bible College was strained for years to come because of the attention the whole incident received. Someone told me that the number of Regina students in following school years dropped significantly due to the bad impression a lot of people had of the bible college after that. Within a few years the bible college would be gone, moved to Calgary, and the number of students would be less than two dozen. A University professor I knew congratulated me when the college's plans to leave the province were made public. "You won!" he exclaimed, but I never saw it that way. Everybody lost because nobody involved acted honourably, myself included. It could have been different.
I am proud that I addressed an important issue relating to cultural relations, though. Not every community of people feels that an unplanned pregnancy is improper enough to warrant expulsion from college. My personal opinion is that fundamentalism like that is harmful to relations between Christian communities and aboriginal people. I know that I would have treated differently at the First Nations University of Canada, so maybe I should have enrolled in a non-religious college from the beginning. However, I believe that grace is provided in tough situations, and the grace to forgive those who make mistakes is the ultimate religious gift.
