Mr. Speaker, I share the emotions of many of my colleagues in the House today. I did not realize when I first ran for the nomination to become a member of parliament that it would involve debating matters of such magnitude.
This morning while walking over here from my hotel there were a thousand thoughts in my mind. I had spent most of the night listening to the debate, between sleeps. It is obvious that we have a huge dilemma on our hands.
It seems to me we can boil this down to one fundamental question. How much killing do we engage in in order to stop killing? It is a sobering thought.
From the reports that we have, and we believe they are reliable, there is no doubt in our minds that tremendous atrocities are taking place in the former Yugoslavia. There are great difficulties among the people.
It reminds me of some of my family history. We take our freedoms so much for granted. When I was walking here I did not feel threatened. Several cab drivers wanted to give me a ride but they were rather generous in their invitations and did not threaten me in any way. There are people not only in Kosovo but in many parts of the world today who do not have the kind of freedom we enjoy in Canada.
It takes me back to my family history. Approximately 75 years ago my family faced the same situation as people are now facing in Kosovo. It is generally known with a name like Epp that I come from immigrant stock. Members of my family were very firm Christian believers. Perhaps they took the Christian teaching beyond what many do, but they also believed that it was wrong to kill another person for whatever reason.
My grandparents on both sides, both my mom's and my dad's families, even though they did not know each other at the time had very parallel circumstances. My mom's dad had three of his brothers shot. What was the crime? They were not supporting the revolution in Russia after the first world war. Because they were not in support of the revolution they were considered enemies of the revolution and therefore were fair game. These marauding soldiers as they were called went into the Mennonite villages and shot all the men and all the boys who were old enough to fight. Both of my grandfathers said that it was time to get out. They took their families and fled by night and hid by day until they got out of the country. It is an amazing story.
I still remember my grandmother talking about it. I think this is taking the Christian faith to the ultimate. I remember as a youngster hearing my parents and grandparents talk about their experiences. I grew up in one of those farm family homes before there was central heating. It is amazing but we had a house which had a hole in the ceiling on the main floor in order to provide some heat to the second floor. When we were kids we would hear the adults speaking. The hole in the floor was in the hallway upstairs. We left our door open so that some of the heat would come into our bedroom. We heard them talking about this.
I specifically remember my grandmother. She was probably the strongest one in this, although grandfather echoed it. Even though members of our family had been ruthlessly killed, she said that we cannot continue to hold that against them, that we must practise forgiveness.
It is regrettable that the Lord's Prayer has been taken out of our morning prayers in this House. We used to pray: Lord forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. My grandparents, ever grateful that they were able to come to Canada, insisted that their children exercise no animosity and seek no revenge.
Over all these years, these people, my family and other families like mine, have been very open to their former country, Russia. They have worked in order to bring some peace and harmony to that country.
One thing occurred to me this morning when I was thinking about this. When I think of what happened to members of my family who refused to shoot their enemies but who came here and left some of the family behind, left that country behind, I cannot help but think that perhaps there is a divine purpose for all of this. We know that the prosperity, and I am not speaking only of financial prosperity but the total prosperity, the freedom of our family was far in excess of that which they could have fought and killed for.
If we look at that part of the world today, people there have very little in comparison. They have very little in terms of personal freedoms, very little in terms of economic strength and very little in terms of amenities which we take for granted.
As Canadians and in the solid Christian tradition on which this country was founded, we ought to be emphasizing what we can do there to alleviate the suffering. We do not have any idea of what kind of terror those people have gone through.
Our son worked for a while in Bosnia. He has been in many different parts of the world. One of the things that struck him when he was over there was how much the countryside was the same as Alberta's, how the homes looked so similar, but close up the difference was that they were full of bullet holes. He told us of some of the atrocities. It is difficult to speak about them. Some things are so horrible one cannot even verbalize them.
He spoke of the atrocities against women. One of the things my son did over there was to provide refuge for people who were victims of these marauding what they call soldiers but that is a misnomer. They are marauding criminals who go around raping, pillaging, killing and burning. That is what is happening in Kosovo.
I would like to see big time in big spades Canada reaching out to those people in love and compassion and providing a refuge for them in this time of trouble.
I cannot imagine some of the things they are going through. My son told us about some of the things. I will resist the temptation to talk about them here because as I said, they are so horrible I cannot even bring myself to say the words.
Canada is known around the world for its peacekeeping and humanitarian efforts. I have some problems with the fact that we are engaging in dropping bombs. Is there a worse terror? Which is more terrorizing, the fear of the marauding tribe coming into someone's home at night with guns and bayonets or the stray bomb that blows someone instantly into oblivion?
These are difficult questions. We have spoken of having a vote. What a difficult vote that would be, yet that is what should be done.
In conclusion, I simply say my thoughts, my prayers, my compassion are for the people over there who are suffering.