Letters to the editor
Bob Ogle was Never Bewildered
Dan Ogle, Rosetown, SK
Volume 33 Issue 7, 8 & 9 | Posted: September 30, 2019
The Editor:
Thank you for the ICN. The article on my cousin Father Bob Ogle describes his decisions to leave politics at the Vatican’s behest as “bewildering”. I suppose it still bewilders politicians, but it did not bewilder him or those who knew him well. True, he didn’t like being told what to do by the Vatican, and the decision to leave politics was difficult, but it wasn’t bewildering.
The Editor:
Thank you for the ICN. The article on my cousin Father Bob Ogle describes his decisions to leave politics at the Vatican’s behest as “bewildering”. I suppose it still bewilders politicians, but it did not bewilder him or those who knew him well. True, he didn’t like being told what to do by the Vatican, and the decision to leave politics was difficult, but it wasn’t bewildering.
What I witnessed, as one of those closest to him throughout his entire life, may help clarify how his political thinking and his religious thinking influenced each other. As a priest, he was fervently determined to do God’s work. Importantly, this included the work of creation. Creation continues in all aspects of life, and Father Bob wanted it done God’s way. As a politician, he promoted systems to spread the world’s wealth more fairly. But creating systems to spread it and creating wealth itself are two different things, and it took him a few years to fully appreciate the distinctions.
When he first entered politics, it was all about spreading wealth fairly. His illustrious work with Development and Peace, to help individual farmers in Latin America to maintain their small family farms for example, illustrates this. But anyone who grew up, poverty stricken, with a horse and plow on a Saskatchewan farm during the ‘30s and ‘40s, and who, by the ‘80s, represented highly mechanized and highly successful Saskatchewan farmers in parliament, could not help but notice that the socialistic methods of Development and Peace, although well intentioned, would ultimately entrap poor people in poverty.
Gradually, during his third year in parliament, he started to talk about his lack of understanding of macro economics. So he studied economics intently and came to a growing appreciation for creating wealth. Wealth doesn’t just exist somewhere, it needs to be created. As the need to have wealth created became more and more important to him, he recognized that this was going beyond standard NDP thinking. Besides, creating is a continuation of God’s work. He remained a strong advocate for a fairer sharing of wealth, and therefore a strong NDP member, but he saw that NDP thinking had not gone far enough, it had not recognized the full consequences of the fact that wealth needs to be created.
Although he would not create wealth himself, he encouraged others to do it, and he continued doing God’s other work for many years. He was not bewildered.
Dan Ogle, Rosetown, SK