The Leader 

The province and health officials have announced the new ER department at Surrey Memorial Hospital will bear the name of Guru Nanak Dev Ji, the founder of Sikhism.

Is this a misdiagnosis of the public’s penchant for multiculturalism?

Perhaps.

After all, Guru Nanak is a religious figure. The first of the 10 Sikh gurus, he is also revered by Hindus and Muslims.

Considering the new emergency department is a taxpayer-funded public facility – (albeit bolstered by private donations, including millions from members of the South Asian community) – is the naming an inappropriate blending of church and state? What message does it send to followers of other religions, or indeed, the non-religious?

When Ontario’s new Brampton Civic Hospital opened last month, it named its emergency department after Guru Nanak, a move that caused community backlash.

Health officials there dismissed the flak as “sheer ignorance,” and defended the choice as a way of recognizing the scope of the South Asian community – which makes up 40 per cent of the region the hospital serves.

(Similarly, South Asians in Surrey, according to the 2001 census, make up one quarter of the population – a number that will most certainly increase when 2006 figures are tallied).

While aligning an ER with an eastern holy figure is a first for B.C., the concept of marrying a higher power with health care is certainly not without precedent.

Take Providence Health Care, for example. The non-profit Catholic organization operates the very religious-sounding St. Paul’s, St. Vincent’s, Mount Saint Joseph and Holy Family hospitals.

Its mission, according to the Providence Health Care website, is “inspired by the healing ministry of Jesus Christ.”

This likely matters not a whit to the poor soul rushed in suffering from cardiac arrest, stroke, or traumatic injury.

In fact, one could argue that when sick, a measure of spiritual reverence is inherently appropriate.

Besides, if not Guru Nanak, then what? Coca-Cola Care Centre or Wal-Mart Health Care?

We already have a hospice for terminally ill children named after a hockey team (Canuck Place) and a wing at VGH pays tribute to a billionaire car dealership tycoon (Jim Pattison Pavilion).

We tacitly accept corporate infringements on our free time at venues such as the Bell Performing Arts Centre, the Ford Centre for Performing Arts, GM Place, Telus World of Science, etc. It’s a trade-off, we rationalize. Put up with a little blatant branding in return for the construction and/or maintenance of much-needed public buildings.

Often, names are used to honour substantial contributors, as in the case of Surrey’s Czorny Alzheimer Centre, made possible by the outstanding donation of $10 million and 8.4 acres of land from Marilyn and Chick Stewart. (Michael Czorny, Marilyn’s late father, suffered from debilitating dementia).

Naming the entrance way to Surrey’s new ER after a much-loved Sikh guru incorporates the culture of a large part of the community; honours its substantial contributions; and is no more out of place than other existing designations.

In fact, it was Guru Nanak who taught “devotion of thought and excellence of conduct as the first of duties.”

Given the controlled chaos that occurs each day in B.C.’s busiest ER and the medical saints who preside over it, the name is remarkably well-suited.