Image below, third from bottom, is the front-page banner ad placed by sikhchic.com in The Guelph Mercury at Christmas, December 2009.
Current Events
Guelphites & Guelph's Faith Community Rally Around Gurdwara
by JOANNE SHUTTLEWORTH & SCOTT TRACEY
CHURCH LEADERS RALLY AROUND SIKHS
by JOANNE SHUTTLEWORTH
GUELPH, Ontario, Canada - The faith community is rallying around the Guelph Sikh Society as it faces backlash to its proposal to build a new and expanded Sikh gurdwara in Guelph's south end.
Eleven United Church ministers have written a letter supporting the Sikh community and chastising those whose opposition to the gurdwara is racially motivated.
"I'm sure there are many reasonable voices in the south end and perhaps reasonable reasons not to put a temple there," said Rev. John Lawson, the former pastor at Dublin Street United Church, who is forming a new congregation in the south end. "I find the racist reaction appalling though. This is why religious leaders need to stand up and say this is unacceptable."
Rev. Wendy Brown is a minister at Harcourt United Church. She's been in the city for about five months and lives in the south end.
"I'm really disturbed by this and what it says about our community," she said. "We received one of those mass mailings and my whole family was distressed by it. It wasn't hate mail, but it felt that way."
Lawson and Brown were meeting with other United Church ministers Tuesday and the topic came up. The group wrote the letter and delivered it to the Guelph Mercury, the region's leading newspaper.
"Members of the Sikh community have found themselves in the uncomfortable situation of having to defend their religious practice and their religious beliefs. We who are part of the Christian tradition wish to let them know that we stand with them - in our shared love of God, our desire for peace between all peoples and in sharing together as good neighbours in our city of Guelph," the letter reads.
"The onus should not be on the Sikhs to educate us about their religion," Brown said. "There needs to be openness of heart or nothing will be learned."
Rev. John Buttars, minister at Harcourt Church until he retired in 2006, remembered the outpouring of support for Guelph Muslims after vandals sprayed graffiti on the Muslim mosque in the weeks after 9/11.
Though far from the tragedy in New York City, Muslims in Guelph felt threatened. The faith community came together and organized a number of interfaith services, so community members could observe a service and hopefully build understanding.
"That did a number of things," Buttars said. "The Guelph Peace Community came out of that and it met for three or four years. I think there's now better communication between faiths and faith leaders. We were particularly alert to the Muslim community, but by and large it fostered respect for all religions."
Lawson said that while there are differences between Sikhism and Christianity, what they have in common is love of God and love for one's neighbours.
"That's the bottom line for Christians. We need to stand up and support our neighbours," he said.
[jshuttleworth@guelphmercury.com]
BACKROUND
OPPONENTS OF GURDWARA DISTORTING TRUTH
by SCOTT TRACEY
I continue to be astounded and troubled by the degree and nature of opposition to a Sikh gurdwara proposed for the south end in Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
A website entitled 'stop-the-temple' has begun, through which its creators are soliciting funds to mount an organized opposition to the proposal from the Guelph Sikh Society.
Nearly 2,500 flyers have been mailed to homes in the area, and the group behind the website hopes to collect 1,000 names on a petition.
Some have warned supporting the temple proposal would be "a career-limiting decision" for councillors who do so.
Tough words indeed. So what is this issue all about?
The Sikh Society has sought to have the parcel of land on Clair Road rezoned to allow the construction of a gurdwara.
Many residents are opposed to the proposal, citing a range of concerns including incompatibility with the neighbourhood, increased traffic, lack of adequate parking and noise resulting from the gurdwara.
These are legitimate concerns which city staff will have to address. But it's curious they've been raised so passionately since the Sikhs' proposal came forward.
Consider the subject property was not long ago rezoned to allow the construction of a long-term care facility, which would have been much larger than the proposed place of worship, include a similar amount of parking and clearly have staff, residents and visitors coming and going around the clock.
The level of opposition to that proposal? Not a cheep.
No petition. No mass mail-outs. No stop-the-long-term-care-facility website.
No twisting of the facts to prevent all those seniors from moving into the neighbourhood.
Those behind the stop-the-temple movement have developed quite a knack for fear-mongering.
The design of the 18,000-square-foot building will allow for a maximum capacity of about 400 worshippers, city officials have repeated often. This is in keeping with the Sikh Society's stated intention, which is to have a temple large enough to allow some future growth for their 300-member community.
But opponents allege the temple will have a potential occupancy of 2,000, which makes it easy to claim the 169 parking spots proposed for the site will not be sufficient and the true number of vehicles arriving for services will be at least twice that.
The latest point of attack seems to focus on the potential impact of a temple on the local sewage system.
"The sewers installed were calculated to handle the sewage generated by the existing sites approved," reads a message on the stop-the-temple.info website. "The occupancy of this building will be equal to 400 homes."
Besides being terribly misleading - unless it means 400 one-person homes occupied for only a few hours each week - the statement also makes me wonder where these arguments were when this was supposed to be a long-term care facility.
Certainly hundreds of seniors living there full-time would have been a much greater strain on infrastructure than occasional attendees at a temple. Exaggeration aside, I suppose we should be glad opposition is at least focusing on actual planning principles, and not on the racist garbage so prevalent early in this exercise.
But it feels like the race angle has just been intentionally downplayed since it became clear it was undermining the opposition.
The website's original logo, which depicted a domed temple with a line through it, was recently removed. While I thought a domed temple with a line through it was an entirely appropriate logo for a website aimed at stopping the construction of a domed temple, a posting on the site indicated it was removed to alleviate claims of racism.
But consider another posting on that same website promoting the public information meeting earlier this week.
"Please refrain from any racial comments," the posting read. "The politicians behind this will use that as an excuse to move forward with their agenda."
If the opposition was never about race, why the need to ask people to refrain from making racial comments?
The other curious note about that posting is the claim moving the temple forward is part of the agenda of city councillors. This assertion is repeated often on the website, at one point even calling Mayor Karen Farbridge "the driving force" behind the proposal. Rubbish.
The rezoning application came from the Sikh Society, through its lawyers, and is being studied by city staff as would any other such application. The only real involvement from politicians at this point has been receiving the application. The opponents deserve to have their concerns heard. But trying to support these arguments with false claims only clouds the issue.
[Scott Tracey is a Mercury staff writer. His Jury of One column appears Fridays. He can be reached at stracey@guelphmercury.com]
[Courtesy: The Guelph Mercury]
February 25, 2010
Conversation about this article
1: T. Sher Singh (Guelph, Ontario, Canada), February 25, 2010, 11:16 AM.
I wish to set the record straight. I have lived in Guelph for the last 20 years and never, not even for a minute, have I regretted having moved here. It's been a pure pleasure living in this city - it is a warm, enlightened, welcoming and loving community. The unfortunate racism we have witnessed in the last few months, since the proposal for a new Sikh gurdwara went to city council, is in no way reflective of by far the majority of Guelphites or Ontarians. It is clear that this community too has its fair share of nuts and they're certainly entitled to their exercise of free speech - after all, it is central to Sikhism to respect this right. But the loving support and outpouring of decency and fairness from local citizens is reflected in the stories posted by Scott Tracey, Joanne Shuttleworth and others, the editorials of The Guelph Mercury, the Letters to the Editor, and the generous support of Guelph's church leaders and general citizenry. I wish to express the Sikh community's deepest and sincerest gratitude to each and all of them. It's make us all so proud not only to be Canadians, but also to be part of this extraordinary community. A big 'THANK YOU'!
2: Greg Schirk (Guelph, Ontario, Canada), March 01, 2010, 8:40 AM.
It is typical for bigots to deny their prejudice. They have enough intelligence not to openly proclaim hatred in 2010 Canada, but not enough to try to understand their fellow human beings. I hope you sweep them aside. I wish you all the best in creating your place of worship in your preferred location. This will be a valuable addition to Guelph.
3: Dawn (Estepona, Spain), December 19, 2010, 1:33 AM.
Really good post!