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Editorial

Cancelling Christ at the Royal Ontario Museum


December 23, 2002

In this Christmas season of 2002, the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) has tossed out the time-honoured notion of marking calendar years on its exhibits with AD and BC to the "more modern and palatable" system of BCE and CE.

More modern and palatable to whom?

The words, newly-minted for the ROM, but already in scholarly use yet often unfamiliar to the unwashed mass known as John and Jessica Q. Public, refer to the time after the birth of Jesus as the "common era", rather than with the religiously accepted "ano Domini", Latin for, "year of the Lord." Instead of "before Christ", the new style renders those times as "before the Common Era".

Tinkering by politically correct scholars can vaunt miles away from plain common sense.

The scholar behind this particular move is the museum’s "director of collections management," Dan Rahimi.

Describing the meaning behind his change, he said, "is just to be more inclusive," let’s say, in how we even describe the years.

"A lot of people accept the reality of Jesus as a historical figure but don’t accept him as Christ, and to use the words `before Christ’ is really quite ethnocentric of European Christians. And to use ‘the year of our Lord’ is also quite insensitive to huge populations in Toronto who have other lords."

What about the huge population in Toronto, who revere Jesus as their Lord, Mr. Rahimi?

Sadly, if not ironically, the very first ROM exhibit to display the new words is the famed James ossuary, a stone box believed to have once contained the bones of James, brother of the now displaced Jesus, and the namesake of the dating system the museum has decided to abandon.

It would be easy to now conclude that the recently found ossuary has more to deplore than a mere crack.

The ossuary, on museum public display until the end of last month, dates to between 50 and 70 CE. A footnote explains that the two systems are identical, and the common-era style has been adopted because it is "current".

The ROM, it seems, no longer has to pay homage to history.

In recent years, paleo-zoologist Hans-Dieter Sues was the ROM’s biggest drawback against the adoption of the " common era" system of marking time--currently a common trend in historical and archaeological circles. Unfortunately, museum exercises in the rewriting of history, followed on Dr. Sue’s departure to take up a new job as the associate director for science and collections at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh.

Sues could be among the first to know that his colleagues didn’t wait too long after the dust of his departure settled.

As far as the ROM is concerned, tradition seemed to go out the door with the paleo-zoologist.

As the mighty National Post has editorialized…"To abandon the Christian dating system just in time to classify this relic (the ossuary)--at the start of the Christmas season, no less--calls into question just how "sensitive" the ROM really is"…"But when a reputable institution such as the ROM adopts this revisionist methodology, it not only does itself--and its city--a disservice."

The new management, which has taken over at the ROM, may have spent too much time unpacking crates among cobwebs and dust motes in setting up dinosaur displays.

Meanwhile, Happy Holidays rather than Merry Christmas from the Royal Ontario Museum and welcome to the Toronto home it made the politically correct centre of the world!


Canada Free Press founding editor Most recent by Judi McLeod is an award-winning journalist with 30 years experience in the print media. Her work has appeared on Newsmax.com, Drudge Report, Foxnews.com, Glenn Beck. Judi can be reached at: judi@canadafreepress.com


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