Prizes for Poets

Peter Stockland with Doug Sikkema

November 27, 2018

The Mitchell literary prize is ramping up to receive poems eligible for a $20,000 first prize. Doug Sikkema, managing editor of Comment magazine, talks to Peter Stockland about partnering with Image Journal to host the prize, and why faith-based poetry must become central to Canadian letters.

PS: When you say faith, that's not just a euphemism for exclusively Christian, is it? The winner of the last Mitchell Prize for Poetry was a young Muslim woman, correct? Peter Stockland: So, the Mitchell Prize, which drew so many great entries in 2017 as part of Faith in Canada 150, is open for subm...

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Getting Religious Freedom Right

Ray Pennings

November 26, 2018

Cardus Executive Vice-President Ray Pennings says polling data done for the think tank by the Angus Reid Institute suggests many Canadians suffer amnesia about the centrality of religious freedom in the Charter of Rights.

Only 31 per cent of the group hostile to public faith says religious freedom makes Canada better The same Angus Reid Institute survey used a series of measures to classify Canadians among three categories – those welcoming of faith in public life, those who are unsure, and those hostile to it ...

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Data to Put Your Faith In

Peter Stockland

November 23, 2018

Cardus executive vice-president Ray Pennings has spent a lot of time speaking about the data around the role of faith in public life. But, says Pennings, data doesn't exist for itself. Today, Peter Stockland reports on Pennings' recent presentation in Montreal as a shining example of how data lets institutions and society adjust to new realities.

In the church basement in Montreal’s Cote-Des-Neiges neighbourhood, he was equally at home delivering the message to gathered Christians that Canadians of faith must start effectively telling secular society not just what religion means to the religious, but how vitally it contributes to a vibrant, ...

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Giving Thanks, Living Faith

Raymond J. de Souza

November 22, 2018

Father Raymond de Souza sees in the kerfuffle around U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren’s claim to Native heritage an example of truth being an act of faith for which we should be thankful.

It is likely true that when Harvard Law School was casting about to boost its diversity figures, Warren was happy to reference her Native American ancestry, which she likely genuinely believed He would give a million dollars to her chosen charity if Warren would take a DNA test and prove that she wa...

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Embracing My Inheritance

Susan Fulmore

November 21, 2018

Susan Fulmore was brought up in the evangelical tradition. She explores her inheritance, of rooms unused, of spaces she had not sat. The full house has been calling her. 

Knowing that millions of Christians from all branches of the faith are preparing along with me for the coming of Advent or Easter reminds me of my place in the holy catholic church While remaining in my local evangelical church I am choosing to read from the vast library of wisdom left by those who ...

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From Nightmare to Nobel for Nadia Murad

Susan Korah

November 21, 2018

Convivium contributor Susan Korah traces the ascent of the young Yazidi woman whose escape from horrifying sex slavery at the hands of ISIS has brought her a date in December where she’ll be given the Nobel Prize in the presence of the King of Sweden.

Abbas and Murad were among several thousand survivors flown into Germany through a program established in 2014 for Yazidi victims of ISIS atrocities I have never met Nadia Murad, but I came close to hearing of her experience first-hand when I met and interviewed one of her fellow Yazidi survivors, F...

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Facing What Facebook Feeds Us

Peter Stockland

November 20, 2018

With Ottawa set to bailout Canadian newspapers, and even the advertising industry alarmed by the media havoc Facebook has caused, Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland argues we should all look in the mirror for the culprits.

The New York Times reports – with a straight face – that a senior executive at one of the world’s largest advertising firms is lashing the leadership of Facebook for the social media giant’s money grubbing and moral bankruptcy Then we will come face to face with just how deeply Facebook has disrupte...

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Eyes Wide For a Child of God

Brittany Beacham

November 19, 2018

Brittany Beacham stored up heavenly treasures awaiting the arrival of a child. Now, she can’t take her eyes of the gift of God’s work.

A tiny little babe laid across my chest, hollering with all the strength her little lungs could muster and we broke and we cried and we clung - to her, to each other, to the grace of our all-sovereign God In a chest for three years ...

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The Cross in the Sky

November 19, 2018

Jutting up into the sky, a cross, salvation, forgiveness.

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The Church on the Hill

November 19, 2018

The road of life leads through many pastures, some of purple flowers, others of green meadows.

For in each journey there is hope to reach the church and to reside there awhile. ...

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The Promise

November 19, 2018

The cross raised high above the roof tops, proclaiming the faith of those within.

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Flagging False Comparisons

Peter Stockland

November 16, 2018

This past weekend, John Carpay made an unfortunate connection between the rainbow flag and Nazi and Communist symbols. This week, Peter Stockland explores the meaning of dialogue, and what we stand to lose when we don’t stop to listen.

How does “soft” totalitarianism function in daily life? Havel, a playwright first of all, illustrates it with the example of a shopkeeper who puts a “workers of the world unite” sign in his store window What do you want to do with that victory? Celebrate it by forcing the opposition remnant to stumb...

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Bringing the Great War Home

Raymond J. de Souza

November 16, 2018

A 1917 speech at Queen’s university disparaging Pope Benedict XV as a puppet of the Kaiser angered Catholic students so much it led to creation of the Newman House on campus, writes Father Raymond de Souza.

A few months later, on October 26 1917, the “Newman Club at Queen’s” was established, named in honour of the great 19th-century Catholic convert and man of the university, Cardinal John Henry Newman This did not sit well with the Catholic students, who thought that a) Benedict XV was not the Kaiser’...

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Late To Find Love

Peter Stockland with Peter Jon Mitchell

November 14, 2018

Senior researcher Peter Jon Mitchell talks with Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland about a Cardus Family study released yesterday showing a steep decline in young Canadians tying the knot or even living together.

Peter Stockland: It’s sort of two-fold, isn't it? For the people in that age group themselves, it’s a critical time to understand what it means to be in a stable relationship or develop a stable relationship Certainly, there are other factors that might be contributing to a delay in partnership or n...

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Unreachable

November 13, 2018

The world can portray itself in many ways. Sometimes through the veil of different lenses.

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