So... we American Christians Only Go to Church Because We Don't Have a Tim Horton's?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Lest you think I’m making this up, this is a serious claim being made by the Toronto Star.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1143327032563&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid=968332188492&call_pagepath=News/News&pubid=968163964505
Apparently, a chain doughnut shop owned by an American conglomerate reflects the admirable sense of community and interdependence that make Canadians the greatest people in the world.

Meanwhile, Americans must settle for religion as a substitute for community.

I’m just curious- did any CANADIANS find this article as uterly idiotic as I did???

2

The claim isn’t being made by the Star. They’re quoting someone else.

[quote=The Toronto Star]
Pollster Michael Adams, whose book Fire and Ice explores the growing differences between Canadian and American values, thinks there might be some truth to that theory.

“Americans aspire to independence,” he says. “Their model is to drive out of town, Gary Cooper with Grace Kelly, and get on their ranch and she’s in the kitchen and having babies and he’s standing at the ranch gate with a gun, saying, `no trespassing.’”

Canadians, by contrast, are far less fearful. Yes, we’re mostly autonomous (from institutions and the state) but also interdependent (with each other as individuals).

That’s partly because, despite the vastness of Canada, our population is much more urban: Roughly 40 per cent of us live in the three biggest cities, compared with 15 per cent of Americans.

This, in turn, colours our respective views of “community.” Americans now increasingly use churches as their replacement for a sense of community lost to long working hours and lengthy commutes. Not us. “We don’t go to church as much on Sundays,” says Adams. “We go shopping and we go to Tim’s.”

[quote]

I personally don’t understand the obsession at all, but then I don’t drink any coffee, period. I suppose it’s kind of a sad, desperate flailing for a tangible Canadian icon to hang on to when American culture has already swept us far out to sea.

It’s useful as a kind of common currency for bribes, though, since you can sort of guarantee that anyone (especially in the military) will appreciate a Timmy’s coffe or Timbits. That’s the only way I can get some things done. :slight_smile:

3

Well, this Yank found your claim that the article was any more than half serious to be a bit absurd. I really hope that you are whoooshing us rather than being whoooshed by a newspaper puff piece. :wink:

4

Have I been whooshed? It’s happened before. Perhaps the Canadian wit is just far too subtle for me.

But what I see is a self-proclaimed expert on the differences between Canada & the U.S. saying (not implying) that Americans lack any sense of real community- and that, whilke Canadians bond over doughnuts at Tim Hortons, Americans seek a lost sense of togetherness by going to church.

Either Adams is REALLY putting us on, or he thinks he’s actually on to something. I suspect it’s the latter.

5

…

6

As an American woman, I seriously doubt that there is widespread desire among American women to live out on a ranch and have a lot of babies in the kitchen. Maybe 150 years ago, but I don’t think that’s what the writer was talking about.

7

I confess that I do go to church most Sunday’s. However, after church, I have spent many hours worshipping at the Temple of Krispy Kreme. :smiley: Take that Tim Horton’s!

8

Given that Tim Horton’s now has 700 locations in the United States and growing fast, apparently it’s a universal phenomenon.

Astorian, the article’s clearly tongue in cheek. Relax. The ongoing “why we’re different from Americans” bit is just a part of the Canadian psyche. It’s white noise.

9

I’ll take a donut shop over a church any day.

“mmmm, sacrilicious”

10

I found the article boring and the humor strained.

I’d rather be a Tim’s than church any day of the week.

Won’t be long before some church in Michigan starts handing out Timbits–the perfect melding of cultures…

:slight_smile:

11

Frankly, Tim’s has almost become the de facto meet 'n greet place for the kids. I’m there daily, and every evening, from dusk onward, the place is absolutely crawling with teens and their pimped rides; they hang out inside, around their cars, in the parking lot, etc. It’s almost like a teen’s own personal religion whose tokens of worship are coffee and iced capps.

Not that I’m giving the article any credence, but underneath its smirk is a winking nod at what has become ritual for a huge number of Canadians. Kind of a malt shop for the new millennium.

12

We used to go to church and THEN to Tim’s.
But only if we were good.

13

I guess it’s just foreign. The article explains itself and its point completely but it’s a foreign perspective.

I’ve had Tim Hortons in Michigan and it doesn’t taste the same and the sizing is all different. If you ask for a small you get a medium and if you ask for a medium you get a large and so on. It’s very confusing. On the other hand, I still think Michigan is a lot like Ontario and doesn’t feel like a foreign country. A lot of people there are self-deprecating about being American. Detroit is especially awesome. I notice whenever I talk to people from Detroit they are very conscious and focused on what makes them different and they have the same kind of outsider perspective. I don’t think it’s in the Tims though since the Tims isn’t the same.

14

Krispy Kreme kame to Kanada and Kanada kicked its ass :wink:

15

Ah hah! So that’s what Wendy’s was up to buying Tim Hortons. They’re trying to destroy the church…someone alert the right wing!!!

16

I think the OP missed the point of the article by a mile and especially the point about churches. The articles suggests that Americans have largely chosen church as the anchor for their sense of community while Canadians have chosen the coffee and doughnut chain.

There no implication that it’s a lack of Timmy’s that causes that but simply a different choice. There’s no claim that this choice makes “Canadians the greatest people in the world”, to quote the OP. It is simply an example of differences between the cultures.

It seems to me the OP is another example of the easily offended American Christian who, despite their claims to being enlightened and above pettiness, whine incessantly when others don’t grovel at their feet. Get over it and yourselves.

17

I figure, when our savior needs a break from all those boring hymns,
He’s just like all us sinners - He can’t wait to get to Tim’s! …

He was thinkin’ of cathedrals, he was lookin’ for a sign
When some musician told him - ‘MAN, TIM HORTON’S IS A SHRINE!’
(Not to be taken seriously. From “Jesus at Tim’s” by offbeat Canadian folk singer Nancy White. I tried to find lyrics online, but they ain’t dere.)

18

Thank you, Homebrew --I was trying to say that, but failed.

I read it through and kept thinking–how could anyone get offended by this? It’s a lame, silly article–pure fluff piece. :confused:

19

Easily offended? Not at all. Easily baffled? Sometimes.

My “outrage,” such as it is, is not aimed at the story’s author. My guess is, he was handed a human interest assignment by his editor: “Write a piece explaining the great social significance of Tim Horton’s.” He took a stab at it, quickly found out it was a silly subject, that even the people who frequented Tim’s didn’t have anything interesting to say about the place. So, the writer needed to pad the piece greatly, to fill up the column.

Where to turn, but to a self-important, left-wing sociologist? And this sociologist STATES that Americans have turned to church as a replacement for community.

Replacement? For crying out loud, until a generation ago, the church was at the CENTER of the community in the US, in Canada, and in most of the Western world! Now, in most other countries, church has faded in significance. So, Europeans and Canadians have sought replacements for church. They’ve found other pastimes, other ways to spend a Sunday morning.

In short, just the OPPOSITE of what Adams said. Americans haven’t desperately turned to church as a replacement for something they’ve lost, they’ve just held on to something that Canadians have largely elected to abandon.

20

I hate to break it to the writer, but I have encountered Tim Hortons deep in the heart of West Virginia. A friend of mine combines the best of both worlds – she goes to church, then to Tim Hortons! While they’ve yet to make it up to my neck of the woods, I’ll take them over Krispy Kreme.