250 Years Later: Canada, America, and the Gift of Difference

In the last year, Canada’s two major political leaders have told different histories of Canada’s origin. Just as the 1619 Project aimed to redefine America’s founding story, our leaders have sought to redefine Canada’s—either as a continuation of European Progress (Prime Minister Mark Carney has called Canada “the most European of the non-European countries”) or as the continuation of a more ancient “rule of law” and libertarian values (Pierre Poilievre often references the influence of Magna Carta on Britain and subsequently Canada, drafted in 1215).

Both leaders seem to be reaching for stories which avoid reference to America, due to an increasing anti-American sentiment. For Carney, Canada must reduce our economic dependence on the United States because of Trump’s rhetoric and actions. For Poilievre, Canada has a historical tie to liberty and the “Canadian dream” without any relationship to the ideals of the Republican Party. It’s a question of foundations.

They both seem to believe that who we have been implies something of who we should be. And there is some truth in this. In a similar way, being made in the image and likeness of God implies something of who we should be. Given the 250th anniversary of America’s founding, how should we think about our identity as Canadians? And how should we view our countries’ origins as Christians?

My Name Is Andrew and I Am Not American

Today is July 2nd rather than the 4th, but it is significant as the day which saw the first full draft of the Declaration of Independence. Some important edits were made in those two days, including the removal of a statement against slavery. And the document wasn’t actually signed until August. But when it was signed, no one north of the 49th parallel signed it. Canada’s identity was formed, in part, by our rejection of the American Revolution.

It wasn’t just a lack of signatures. In 1776, loyalists repeatedly fought and rebuffed rebel troops from the south. In that summer, George Washington received updates on his retreating troops from Quebec City and Montreal. Amid the war, Canada received many immigrants from the colonies, somewhere between 40,000 and 50,000. They moved to Canada for the very fact that they didn’t want to rebel. Our loyalty, non-aggressive posture, and politeness are all downstream from the characteristics of those who joined and remained in the north in those early years.

In elementary school, I memorized the famous speech: “My Name is Joe and I Am Canadian”. Canadian readers will readily recall the details but for those reading from south of the border, I’ll explain. In March 2000, around the time when the Toronto Maple Leafs were jockeying for playoff position, a beer commercial for Molson Canadian portrayed an ordinary man named Joe giving a “rant” on-stage in a theatre.

Some of Joe’s lines were whimsical, noting our cultural differences with American language: “a toque is a hat, a chesterfield is a couch, and it’s pronounced Zed, not Zee, Zed.” Other lines had more of an edge: “I believe in peace-keeping, not policing. Diversity, not assimilation.” In these lines, Joe is obviously taking a shot at Americans. Though he then lightens the mood: “and the beaver is a truly proud and noble animal.”

Canadians are distinct from Americans. It’s core to what it means to be Canadian. And I believe these distinctions are not only good for Canada but good for America. We offer a perspective that Americans lack. Likewise, lest Canadians take on a posture of smug self-importance (an unfortunate habit), we should learn from Americans. I’ve seen many American friends surprised at our posture toward the government during the pandemic, or enraged at Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) policies, or worried about aggressive hate speech regulation. They have insight we lack. Our two cultures are different and that is good.

Technology and Ideology

As I’ve read more about the history of our two countries, I have come to the following conclusion: America was founded on ideology while Canada was founded on technology. In 1776, America rallied around certain ideas such as the evil of taxation without representation. They read and promoted books like Thomas Paine’s Common Sense, emphasizing the government exists to serve the people, not the other way around. America was founded on ideas, many of them good and just. Many of them were less than ideal, such as the proliferation of slavery and the false doctrine of Manifest Destiny. A mix of good and bad. But ideas were at the core. Canada, however, was different.

In the wake of the second industrial revolution, those who resided in British Columbia were not yet sure if they would join the rest of Canada. They used American stamps. Their businessmen exchanged goods with San Francisco far more than Toronto. The USA had purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867. When B.C. representatives visited Ottawa in 1871 to consider joining Canada, they had to travel through the States to get there.

In the end, they did decide to join. Not on the basis of ideals but on the promise of a technology: a railroad to connect sea to sea. Likewise, Canada would look very different if it weren’t for the Hudson Bay Company and the fur trade. The expansion of Canada tended to follow slow and pragmatic principles (with occasional force of power) rather than revolution and a Manifest Destiny doctrine of divinely-ordained conquest.^[1]

Canada’s technological origin does not negate our intellectual output; it shapes it. As Arthur Kroker has reflected, “Canada’s principal contribution to North American thought consists of a highly original, comprehensive, and eloquent discourse on technology.”^[2] The writings of many Canadians—Marshall McLuhan, George Grant, and Harold Innis—have influenced many technology critics who came after them on both sides of the border. Our two countries have much in common. And yet, our unique origins cast shadows our eyes can best parse with the help of each other.

Freedom and Belonging

Carl Trueman has often remarked that the history of modernity is the desire to reconcile two ideals: freedom and belonging. As an oversimplification, America prioritized the first while Canada prioritized the latter. Both are good and biblical. Finding the right balance is difficult.

There are times when I hear the loudness of Americans and their ability to speak up on any issue and I lament the lack of such voices in Canada. I remember when one American megachurch pastor came to Canada and declared, “there has never been a great Canadian preacher. You need to fix that.” As much as I might contend that D.A. Carson does meet that criteria (Carson was born and raised in Quebec), I admit that Canadians are far more uncomfortable with big churches and big personality preachers than Americans are. Canadians like to belong. We don’t want to go to a show. We want to join a community.

This again takes us back to the foundations of America. To declare oneself as independent from the necessities of others is to speak a lie. Of course that is not what America did in 1776. They declared independence together. But there is something in the American spirit that says, “I don’t need you. I’ll do it myself,” which strikes people like me as not simply wrongheaded, but possibly unChristian. God declared it is not good for man to be alone. Independence, in and of itself, is not a virtue. As American writer Kelly Kapic has said, we were made to belong to God and to one another.^[3] We were made to be dependent. We were made to belong.

And likewise, we were made to be free. It is only in the Christian community, in the body of Christ and in the justification of the saints, that we can both belong and be free. Freedom in Christ is the ability to live for Christ rather than a freedom to live without any obligations.

As I think of the humility of George Washington, Thomas Paine’s zeal for democracy, and the mixed moral legacy of the foundations of America, I am thankful. And yet I am also thankful to belong to Canada. My prayer is for freedom in both of our countries; “for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Tim. 2:2).

The Good Old Days? Don’t Forget Our Origin Story

It can be easy to take for granted how great our countries are. One aspect that struck me after hearing a lecture about Toronto by historian (and TGC Canada columnist) Michael Haykin, and the retelling of 1776 by David McCullough, is just how rampant sin was at our origins: prostitution, drunkenness, gambling, slavery, theft, lying, profanity, and more. We shouldn’t over glorify the past. The only true perfect origin story is found in the first few pages of Scripture.

That being said, it is when we forget our true origins—of morality, freedom, and belonging—that we can go astray. When Jefferson made final edits to the Declaration of Independence he decided to reduce the phrase, “we hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable,” to the more concise, “self-evident.” As Andrew Wilson rightly notes,^[4] many values portrayed in the Declaration of Independence (equality, life, and liberty) are not common to all cultures, they are not self-evident, and they find their best articulation in the Christian faith.

This danger faces all people, but especially those of us in the West: we can recognize gifts as good without recognizing the Giver. We swim in the benefits of a Christianized culture but we don’t even know we’re wet. Just like Jefferson, we take for granted what God has given to us in his common grace and asked of us in his special revelation. Let it not be so with us.

May all people be treated as the image of God, both the unborn and the aged, the First Nations and the immigrants, the free and the slave, the Jew and the Gentile, the Canadian and the American. Let us reckon with our pasts honestly, seeing the good and ill together, and pursue our happiness in our holy God. Let those who bear the sword do it justly. Let those who bear the keys to the church do it humbly. And may Christ be honoured in our countries for another 250 years, in the love of neighbour and the proclamation of the gospel, or may Christ return.

My name is Andrew and I am a Canadian Christian who is thankful for America.

^[1] For more detail on these aspects of Canadian history, see Stephen R. Bown, Dominion: The Railway and the Rise of Canada (Toronto: Doubleday Canada, 2020); and Bown, The Company: The Rise and Fall of the Hudson’s Bay Empire (Toronto: Anchor Canada, 2021).

^[2] Arthur Kroker, Technology and the Canadian Mind: Innis/McLuhan/Grant (Montréal: New World Perspectives, 1984), 8.

^[3] See Kelly M. Kapic, Christian Life, New Studies in Dogmatics, ed. Michael Allen and Scott R. Swain (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Academic, 2025).

^[4] Andrew Wilson, Remaking the World: How 1776 Created the Post-Christian West (Crossway, 2023).

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