Do Not Fear, I Will Uphold You with My Victorious Right Hand (Isaiah 41:10)
Larry Worthen
This article originally appeared in the September 2025 issue of FOCUS Magazine.
As part of our 2021 strategic plan the Board of Directors asked me to make cultural impact one of our four key result areas. This area has historically included our work to oppose the legalization and expansion of MAiD and to maintain conscience protection. This has included numerous letter-writing campaigns, meetings with provincial and federal politicians, media interviews, and a social media campaign called “No Options, No Choice”, which raised concerns about the plight of patients for whom MAiD is easier to access than the alternatives.
We will be meeting with the Board of Directors on November 7th and 8th in Toronto to discuss our key result areas for the 2026-2030 Strategic Plan.
What follows are my thoughts on the current political climate in Canada in 2025 and the corresponding implications for our advocacy efforts. Our experience over the last twelve years has been extensive and we have tried many strategies with varying degrees of success. Throughout it all, the Lord has been with us – supporting us, inspiring us, and consoling us when things did not go our way. As well, we could not have accomplished this without our members and their support.
One of the most revealing interactions I had during all our government relations work was with a backbench MPP from Ontario. It was at the end of the first term of the Progressive Conservative government under Premier Doug Ford (2018-2022). We had commissioned a public opinion research study by Angus Reid that found that 85% of respondents felt that Ontario should have legislation to protect conscience rights. We had been lobbying the Ontario PC MPPs since their time in Opposition around 2016. When they took control of government, we lobbied many of the cabinet ministers. I want to thank all of the Ontario doctors who were involved in those many meetings. Your presence made a difference. Thanks to Cardinal Thomas Collins of Toronto, I was able to meet with the Health Minister of the day, the Hon. Christine Elliott. It was Minister Elliott’s support that led to our extensive discussions with the College and with the Ministry of Health to find a solution to the problem of “effective referral” in the CPSO policies. Cardinal Collins met with the Ontario Premier in a subsequent meeting to discuss the conscience issue amongst other items.
I was shocked that the Angus Reid study did not get more traction with the MPPs and cabinet ministers. They all seemed noncommittal, even in the face of the reality that this proposal had strong public support. I was surprised. Finally, I asked a particularly outspoken backbench MPP if he could explain this to me. And he did. But I must say that I was not prepared for the answer.
To the best of my recollection, this is what he said: “Larry, the Premier agrees with you, the Minister of Health agrees with you, and, in fact, the whole caucus agrees with you. Actually, we believe that the majority of people in Ontario agree with you. But we cannot pass the legislation that you want us to pass.” I asked him why. He said candidly, “Because if we did, MAiD advocates would say that Doug Ford is anti-MAiD and the press would print this and we would lose a share in the popular vote because of it.”
Now, I can be a bit of an idealist. I was shocked. But after I thought about it, it made me realize that my country is no longer one that is based on democratic ideals and principles. Representing the wishes of the people is no longer the most important consideration – fear of the special interest groups is now the key motivating factor. Doing the right thing and making the system better now takes a back seat to the “prime directive” of appeasing vocal special interests and getting elected.
Up until last week, I thought that these things only happened to us. I was surprised that our thoughts were echoed in a book by journalist Andrew Coyne called The Crisis of Canadian Democracy. Coyne is very much an establishment journalist – you may have seen him on the CBC television “At Issue” panel or read his columns in the Globe and Mail. He is certainly not a populist nor a conspiracy theorist. That is why his conclusions surprised me. Here is a quote from his book:
One of the things Canadians think they know about Canada is that it is a democracy: among the greatest democracies on earth, in fact […] It is the ambition of this book to deprive Canadians of this comfort. Far from a democratic example to the world, our parliamentary system is in a state of advanced disrepair — so advanced it is debatable whether it should still be called a democracy.
His book has eight chapters and each one deals with a separate factor that is contributing to the decline of Canadian democratic 
institutions. One that is relevant to this article is the power of unelected officials in the Prime Minister’s office or in the Premiers’ offices. A consolidation of power at the executive level has undermined the role of elected representatives and even cabinet ministers, according to Coyne. This creates an environment in which elected politicians are afraid to speak up to represent the interests of their constituents if this is contrary to the advice given to the Premier or Prime Minister by their staff. He also has a chapter about activist judges, who are blatantly encroaching on parliamentary authority by making policy determinations which should be the exclusive role of the federal parliament or individual provinces. This is what happened in the 2015 Carter case which legalized euthanasia in Canada. It is not just Andrew Coyne who is sounding the alarm. His book follows another published in 2019 by Professor Donald J. Savoie called Democracy in Canada: The Disintegration of Our Institutions.
Since the late 1960s, there has been a tremendous concentration of power in the office of Prime Minister and to a lesser extent in those of our provincial Premiers. The Prime Minister appoints the Senate, the Supreme Court, Cabinet Ministers, Deputy Ministers and controls all activity in Parliament. The Prime Minister decides who gets to run as their party’s candidates in federal elections. Over the past six months, we have seen numerous examples of the Prime Minister committing billions of dollars to projects without a Parliamentary vote.
In addition, most Canadians are not aware of the extent of government subsidies for the news media in Canada. There is a whole series of initiatives which underwrites journalistic activities. One prominent example is the Canadian Journalism Labour Tax Credit, that provides a tax credit of 25% of the salary of any accredited journalist in Canada directly to their employer. Over and above that amount, the federal government contributed $1.4 billion in funding to the CBC in 2024.
It is not the intention of this article to discuss the topic of media bias. Suffice it to say that the public funding of almost all media in Canada cannot help but add to the power of the Prime Minister, especially when the opposition party has promised publicly to end subsidies if they are elected. At the very least, it creates a real conflict of interest for subsidized journalists to report fairly given that one electoral result could cost them their jobs.
The Ontario back bench MPP had candidly portrayed himself and his party as being prisoners of special interest groups collaborating with the media. According to him, he and his government were powerless. So, I asked him for his advice on how to deal with the problem of the lack of conscience protection. He responded, “You have to change the narrative.” I was startled. “I have to change the narrative?” I thought, “I am just an Executive Director of a small Christian charity! How can I change the narrative?” The comment may have just been an attempt to shift responsibility for the problem. But the more I thought about it, I realized that there may be something in what he was saying.
I don’t think I could change the narrative single handedly, but I think that Christians could change the Canadian narrative if we put our complete trust in Christ, overcame our fear, and spoke out for the dignity of human life. We have allowed our country to legislatively turn its back on Christ and adopt radical secularism, but I don’t think all Canadians have consciously shifted our core beliefs. I think that the Canadian response on these issues is born of fear – fear of being singled out for contrarian views, fear of conflict with special interest groups, or fear of being cancelled. The politicians are so frightened of the media and special interests that they can no longer pass legislation that they believe in. Ironically, they need conscience protection too! It is understandable then that our institutions should be crumbling because “Unless the LORD builds the house, the builders labor in vain.” (Psalm 127:1) We need to repent of our inaction and cowardice and start to use our influence to place God at the centre of healthcare in situations in which we can still make a difference.
We also need to be realistic about the successes we will experience. They will of necessity be small. But I believe sincerely that Jesus does not actively will that Canada’s institutions should disintegrate. He may be allowing that to happen so that our country will turn to him, but I believe that he will richly reward our modest efforts to turn our country around. His power is everywhere; we just need to tap into it.
We have had some small successes already this year:
A group of fifty BC doctors wrote their registrar through CMDA Canada, asking questions and expressing concerns about a draft policy on conscience rights proposed by the College. The Registrar responded quickly with an offer of a meeting. This resulted in changes to the draft policy and a good explanation of the sections of the draft that were concerning. The fact that they have conscience protections in BC is due to a policy of the provincial health department which is due to CMDA Canada lobbying in 2015.
A group of twenty doctors wrote the provincial health ministers in Saskatchewan, leading to a Zoom call with them about proposed legislation in that province protecting conscience rights and vulnerable patients from being subjected to offers of MAiD.
One of our physicians in Alberta was invited to participate in a provincial government consultation on how MAiD could be revised to create better protections for patients
290 people have been trained as trainers in our church-based program “Dying with Christ, Living with Hope.” 1,563 people have received training as participants.
I have delivered a presentation called “What is Wrong with MAiD?” 14 times to 667 people across Canada. We are currently producing seven 7 minute You Tube videos on this topic to try to spread the news through social media.
In October, I will deliver four 30-minute presentations to the Canadian Federation of Pastoral Councils on MAiD. These will be used as educational materials for Catholic priests all over Canada. The materials can easily be revised for a Protestant or Evangelical audience.
In summary, while Canadian democratic institutions seem to be crumbling, there is still the opportunity to change the narrative in Canada. While many Canadians are wringing their hands about the status of our country, Christians need to have the hope that “all things work for the good for those who love God,” (Romans 8:28) even with problems of this magnitude. In all the work we have done, I have seen the presence of the Lord in the most unlikely circumstances. We have the hope that comes from knowing the Lord, which we can share with others in this time of uncertainty. Perhaps as faith in human ideas and institutions fades, there will be a renewed interest in seeing what Christ has to offer. We can only hope.