BETRAYAL IS SO PAINFUL

I'm sure that nobody likes to have their trust betrayed. But that's just what happened last month to tens of thousands of Alberta's citizens. On a bleak afternoon in December, Wildrose leader Danielle smith and eight other members of the Legislature of Alberta crossed over to the Progressive Conservative Party which they once fought.

About seven years ago, disaffected members of the Progressive Conservative party decided to unite with the Alliance party to form the Wildrose Alliance Party. The PCs had been in power for thirty-seven years. As with all politicians who have ruled for so long, the members felt entitled to lavish salaries and extravagant perks. The Wildrose members felt this waste had gone on for too long. In the 2008 provincial election, they managed to gain two seats in Alberta's  Legislature.

During the next four years, Wildrose rapidly gained the support of grassroots volunteers. Constituency Associations formed to the point where there were candidates running in all eighty-seven ridings.

Much of the support for the party was garnered by Danielle Smith. Her articulate explanation of policy and her determination to balance the budget without burdening taxpayers appealed to many Albertans, particularly in rural areas. Pollsters felt so confident that they predicted Wildrose would win the upcoming election in April of 2012. During the final days of campaigning, the PCs dug up dirt on two candidates and made it look like the whole party was homophobic and extremist. That stampeded voters to vote in the PCs again.

Danielle Smith decided to moderate the social stance of the party by affirming homosexuals. She even walked in Edmonton's pride parade that June. The party membership were told that this was just a way to gain acceptability among the majority of Albertans and that it had nothing to do with the goal of ridding Alberta of fiscally irresponsible government policies.

The party faithful, including me, worked hard to promote Wildrose. People knocked on doors, held events, and campaigned for their riding candidates. By 2014, Wildrose had matured into a powerful opposition party.

Then the unthinkable happened. On December the seventeenth, Danielle Smith announced at a press conference that she and eight other legislature members were "rejoining" the PC party. She said that most of the fiscal policies which Wildrose proposed were being enacted by the government and that we, meaning Wildrose, won.

The defection gutted the party and hurt its credibility. People who had supported it, including myself, felt as if we'd been kicked in the butt by these nine defectors. Whatever happens in the coming years, the trust of Albertans will be difficult to win back.

Spiritual betrayals are just as painfully devastating to the faithful, as I described in How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity. Check this amazing story of God's providential guidance at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Powell's Books.

THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF WORK, EH?

The saying, "easier said than done" is true of practically every endeavour. Work is no exception to that aphorism. High school and post-secondary students are frequently presented with rosy images of employment in glamorous careers by recruiters from various industries, all touting their company's virtues.

In December of 1975, a CNIB representative extolled the benefits of Caterplan, an employment scheme designed to place blind individuals in cafeterias and kiosks, to a group of us teenage patrons visiting the headquarters in Toronto. Being in need of a job, I applied to Caterplan for work the next month.

In my How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity memoir, I described my dismay when the promise of a rewarding career didn't immediately materialize. Here's an excerpt from my manuscript that describes what happened.

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The phone rang one morning in late January. A CNIB counsellor named Bob gave me the good news that I would be employed as a dish washer in the cafeteria at the Alberta Legislature. That afternoon, I had my long hair cut short and beard shaved off.

My joy turned to shock on the morning that I reported for work. Except for two coffee breaks and a short lunch, I continually loaded the large dish washing machine's conveyer belt with dirty dishes and dried them when they tumbled out the other end. Additionally, I scrubbed pots and checked the racks by the kitchen for more dirty dishes. The pressure never let up.

By the end of the day, I called Bob at the CNIB from the nearest pay phone. "I can't do this job. It goes too fast," I complained.

"Don't worry, Bruce, it takes time to get into the swing of things. You'll get better at it as the days pass."

"I hope you're right. I didn't realize dish washing would be this hard."

"Just keep working at it. We don't have any spare stands for you to work at now so you'll have to stay where you are."

I did my best to keep up with the demands of the job. Even so, a constant backlog of dirty dishes and angry co-workers badgered me.

"If you think this is busy, wait until the Legislature is in session," one woman admonished. "This will seem like a picnic."

The manager dismissed me at the end of the month. Though I beamed with pride as I held my first pay cheque, and knew that I had earned every penny of it, I lost much of my starry-eyed optimism for the wonderful world of work.

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How I Was Razed is the testimony of how God revealed his true character to me after charismatic house church elders misled me for more than fifteen years. You're welcome to contact me directly for more information about this upcoming paperback.