How to Grow Good Wool

Suzanne Tietjen

March 5, 2019

The quality of a sheep's fleece is determined by the quality of the shepherd's care, writes once-shepherd Suzanne Tietjen. The shepherd's presence may seem a hardship to the sheep when they resist coats, vaccinations, and fences. However, what the sheep can't see is that the only thing they need to do is abide.

I, their shepherd, couldn’t grow wool myself, but I harvested good wool because I loved the sheep and took care of them The fault in the fleece often lies with the sheep, but the quality of a flock’s wool depends on whose they are Most sheep grow white or off-white wool, but ours, bred from the occa...

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In Veritate Vincit

Andrew P.W. Bennett

March 4, 2019

Today's stunning resignation of Treasury Board President Jane Philpott over the SNC Lavalin scandal – the second cabinet resignation from the same portfolio in less than  two months – proves truth will out even in politics. And as Rev. Dr. Andrew Bennett argues, it also proves there can only be one truth no matter how many political tales are being told.  

To be sure it is a very different case from Russian-occupied Ukraine, but the fundamental issue is the same: what is truth? For two weeks the Prime Minister, the Clerk of the Privy Council, and other senior officials have maintained publicly, often with the most obscurantist language, that nothing u...

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Canada’s Mr. Saturday Night

Raymond J. de Souza

March 1, 2019

Who’d have thought, Editor in Chief Father Raymond de Souza asks, that Justin Trudeau would be Canada’s version of Tricky Dick Nixon?

JWR would have been quite sure that, had she resigned without being able to explain why – cabinet confidentiality and solicitor-client privilege – she would simply have been replaced with a more compliant attorney general who would have done the prime minister’s bidding Every attorney general knows ...

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Hidden

March 1, 2019

You could miss it if you don't look at exactly the right gap in the trees, from the path.

The work of our hands, like the trees, points up without us realizing ...

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Round Two

March 1, 2019

There's time to reflect, as breath grows louder alongside the pitch of the floor.

...

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Again and Again

March 1, 2019

The monotony of repetition. How many times must I ask?

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Hope in Wilson-Raybould's Boldness

Peter Stockland

February 28, 2019

The quality of Jody Wilson-Raybould's presence before the justice committee was completely hers. But the system had room for it to happen. The media functioned as it should, as the democratic watchdog. In this, there is hope, writes Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland.

I’m in no way shy to acknowledge much of it was attributable to Wilson-Raybould’s remarkable personal presence as an Indigenous woman, levelly speaking to her peers as an MP, and implacably challenging the highest levels of political power in this country I cannot remember feeling more proud to be C...

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Opening The Gate for Baha’i

Geoffrey Cameron

February 27, 2019

Geoffrey Cameron reviews the film The Gate: The Dawn of the Bahá’í Faith, the first cinematic attempt to portray the life, history, and teachings of The Báb. There are challenges in interpreting the lives and teachings of Prophets and Messengers of God, he writes.

The Bahá’í Faith traces its origins to the tumultuous and transformative ministry of The Báb, although Bahá’u’lláh established the spiritual and social teachings that form the core of the religion today The Gate: The Dawn of the Bahá’í Faith, directed by Bob Hercules, is the first cinematic attempt ...

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Stories Like Secrets

Josh Nadeau

February 26, 2019

Convivium regular contributor Josh Nadeau asks a quartet of Canadian literature-makers about the legacy of Nobel Prize winner Alice Munro, whose first collection of stories was published 50 years ago.

I taught "The Progress of Love" for the first time last fall, and I'm not sure it was a particularly helpful experience for the students, since I just kept wanting to say, "Do you understand how ridiculously hard it is to write a story that does all these things?" – as if we were trying to quietly a...

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Refugees By Any Name

Susan Korah

February 25, 2019

Canadian Elizabeth Woods is leading a Jesuit Refugee Service urban support program in Jordan, writes Convivium contributor Susan Korah. In the spirit of accompanying displaced people on their journey, this service offers personalized services and visits with follow-ups to refugee families. 

The problem, Woods told Convivium, is that the United Nations High Commission for Refugees in Jordan is no longer issuing official refugee status to all refugees The Canadian leader of a Jesuit support program for refugees and displaced people in Jordan wants Ottawa to stop demanding the designation...

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A Conundrum of Flowers

Peter Stockland

February 22, 2019

After encountering glimpses of what Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland calls invisible mending on the Montreal Metro, he sees how it illuminates not just the outward world, but the tiniest stitching of our hearts with every detail of what we know is love.

In the middle of a freezing February, in a week of flaming government scandal, in a tunnel of the Montreal Metro, I encountered a homeless man facing a conundrum of flowers It’s called Weave: The Social Fabric Project, which Brooks started in 2018 as a contribution to the social isolation he encount...

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Moved by Music

Brian Doerksen with Hannah Marazzi

February 22, 2019

Musician Brian Doerksen sits down with Convivium to discuss how music shaped him, how the needs of his family shaped his music, and how, in the end, collaboration is life.

Her mother was the first violinist in the orchestra for my event, so she started hearing the songs as they were learning them and she thought, "This is the kind of music that my daughter needs to hear It was like she had music in her and it took an injection of some of these fresh songs that she had...

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Passing on Comfort

February 21, 2019

Karin Gerber-Bartel is a former refugee who now make comforters for Mennonite Central Committee to support other displaced people.

Years later, Karin now lives in Switzerland, and she helps give back by making the comforters for MCC They traveled to Switzerland to meet with Karin Gerber-Bartel who has made comforters for MCC for several years I told Karin that in my work in Lebanon in Syria I learned that sometimes the blankets...

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Corruption's True Cost

Peter Stockland

February 20, 2019

The SNC-Lavalin scandal is about much more than bad actors on the political stage. It’s a showcase for corruption’s intrusion into the very way we think, argues Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland.

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Reverence and the Rule of Law

Rabbi Moishele Fogel

February 15, 2019

As Canada’s Parliament is convulsed by a cabinet-splitting controversy that goes to the heart of our legal system, Ottawa Rabbi Moishele Fogel has released a research paper on the vital role of ancient Jewish law, Halacha, in sustaining identity and relationships. The full report can be read on the Cardus Religious Freedom Institute web site.

The goal of my paper is to provide insight into the relationships between Halacha, the Jewish people, and the various forms of state and State legal systems they have crossed paths with throughout the millennia For thousands of years, the Jewish community has used Halacha as a mechanism for defining...

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