COVID-19

Science can Strengthen Faith

Kyelle Byne

February 7, 2022

Kyelle Byne attended a talk by renowned Christian author Philip Yancey in which he borrowed centuries-old lessons from John Donne to frame the challenge and opportunity for Christian scientists in our pandemic context. Suffering can uncover contours of our faith and motivate a Christian witness of care and understanding.

Philip Yancey has spent most of his writing career circling around the themes of pain and suffering with over 25 award-winning books, including titles like Where Is God When It Hurts, Disappointment with God, and The Question That Neve...

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Covid and the Tears of Christ

Tim McCauley

February 2, 2022

We must not let fear of this pandemic stop us from trusting God and praying through our doubt and frustrations, writes Father Tim McCauley.

Christ wept over ancient Jerusalem for the people’s lack of faith, failing to recognize God in their midst in the Person of Christ. I wonder if Christ also weeps over our culture during this pandemic. Perhaps we too fail to recognize the presence of God amo...

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Why So Vindictive, Mr. Mandate Man?

John Jalsevac

January 14, 2022

The increasingly heated rhetoric towards the unvaxxed is designed to assuage the feelings and retain the confidence of the vaccinated. At least, so argues John Jalsevac, a FAST Fellow and PhD student at the University of Toronto, who is concerned the current trajectory will not end well.

"The unvaxxed, I really feel like pissing them off," said French President Emanuel Macron a few days ago. "And so we’re goi...

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Chicken Little and Teens

Paul Bennett

January 10, 2022

Author and educator Paul Bennett reviews recent books and articles by Dr. Erica Komisar that have stirred a viral hornet’s nest. Komisar, a New York psychoanalyst, highlights the importance of parent-child attachment and argues that believing in God is so important to parenting, that those who don’t should “lie about it.”

Everyone remembers the children’s fable about a chicken called “Chicken Little” or “Henny Penny” who believes that the sky is falling when an acorn falls on its head. While the phrase “the sky is fal...

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The Need for A Stable Influence

Don Hutchinson

December 17, 2021

Christians who cherry-pick Scripture for particular purposes, like the politicians who abuse Parliament by rushing through legislation, need to consider what they’re celebrating, Don Hutchinson writes.

Newscasters were almost giddy introducing coverage of Canada’s social-distancing, mask-wearing, elbow-touch-greeting prime minister gliding across the House of Commons’ floor to hug and handshake with members of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition. Canadians cou...

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What To Do After the Deluge

Daniel Dorman

December 14, 2021

Daniel Dorman argues each of us has an obligation, as soon as it’s safe, to assert individual freedoms lost to the pandemic.

“What? Lose our freedom and not get security in return? Why, it was only for security we surrendered our freedom at all.”

– C.S. Lewis, A Dream

“T...

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Shouting Myself Hoarse for Life

Peter Menzies

November 26, 2021

Peter Menzies is in the house to watch Canada beat Mexico and suddenly a dream comes true to trump eighteen nightmarish months that included – oy! – taking up camping.

It’s been almost two years now since I had a social life of any kind to speak of. You remember social life, don’t you?

Having friends over for dinner, going to a crowded restaurant on Friday after work and feeling the buzz of interaction, picking you...

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Monsters, Mobs and Me

Don Hutchinson

November 24, 2021

Don Hutchinson writes that whether we have unwittingly become card-carrying members of monsters at work or mobs inc. is best revealed by a look in the bathroom mirror.

When I encounter Frankenstein, the word that most readily comes to mind is ‘monster.’

I chuckled at the meme, “Albert Einstein was a genius. But his brother Frank was a monster.” The word association instantly conveys a humorous image, even ...

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Follow the Political Science

Travis D. Smith

November 22, 2021

In the second of two parts, Travis Smith argues that our responses to the pandemic reveal a Canada progressively squeezing out its commitment to liberty.

Part One: The COVID Golden Calf

“The passion to be reckoned upon is fear.”

– Thomas Hobbes, Leviat...

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The COVID Golden Calf

Travis D. Smith

November 19, 2021

In this first of a two-part essay, Travis Smith teases out the new ersatz religiosity of our political, clinical and social pandemic responses.

Part Two: Follow The Political Science

The ongoing campaign against COVID-19 has several religious attributes and analo...

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The Contagion of Tribal Contempt

Ruth Dick

November 8, 2021

Ottawa writer Ruth Dick argues it’s time to restore political health by purging our viral responses of the urge to condemn and dominate.

Basta! Enough!

With that exhortation out of my system, let me add a suggestion that’ll go over like a lead balloon: Within the sphere of public discourse, leave those who are actively vaccination resistant alone:
Avoid sharp-p...

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The Stampede to Crush Privacy

Sandra B. Julian

November 3, 2021

Sandra B. Julian warns a basic human right is being trampled in the COVID-fed panic to digitize and QR code where we can go and what we can do based on whether we’ve had the jab.

As a bonus feature, we’re linking Sandra Julian’s article to a Long Way Podcast discussion on vaccine passport policy.

...

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The Tyranny of Pragmatism

Robert Joustra

October 29, 2021

Ominous State expansion under cover of the COVID crisis isn’t a sign of future despots at work but the consequence of a culture in which outcome trumps process, Robert Joustra argues.

The overreach of government is a common refrain among conservatives this pandemic, and not without cause. As those such as Father Raymond de Souza, Ed Bosveld, and others have argued, the State has not merely expanded to the occasion of the crisis, nor only...

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Nightmare Lives of Lebanon’s Children

Susan Korah

October 25, 2021

Susan Korah reports on the grim toll the country’s collapse inflicts on its young while Canadian kids return to post-pandemic trick or treating.

“For every act of violence against children that creates headlines and cries of outrage, there are many more that go unreported.”

Henrietta H. Fore, UNICEF Executive Director

As we approach the first post-pandemic Halloween, ...

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Defending Artur Pawlowski’s Dissent

Don Hutchinson

October 18, 2021

Don Hutchinson says the recent court order compelling a Calgary street preacher to reference science in his sermons about COVID is offensive and has to be appealed.

Politically determined public health guidelines during the covid-19 pandemic have come with a cost.

Governments have defined essential and non-essential services, ostensibly to ensure Canadians have access to food. Not all can afford essential servi...

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Have We Become Not-Canada?

Travis D. Smith

October 8, 2021

Travis Smith warns time is running out to free our home and native land from its pandemic-induced contagion of distrust, resentment, and contempt for our neighbours.

“But now old friends are acting strange / They shake their heads, they say I’ve changed”

– Joni Mitchell, “Both Sides Now”

We have been learning a lot about each other, ha...

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The Path Back to Trust

Peter Stockland

September 27, 2021

The good results notoriously sceptical French are getting by taking a leap of faith in the fight against COVID shows the necessity of trust within democratic life, Peter Stockland writes.

A photo in Monday’s public prints brought the good news of people dancing in La Grande Motte, France as evidence la République appears on its way out of its COVID crisis.

Alas, the photo was taken last July, which seems a lifetime in pandemic days, o...

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A Liberal Dose of Compulsory Confusion

James Bryson

September 17, 2021

In the dizzying dash for vaccine mandates, James Bryson asks, what happened to the liberal/Liberal claims of “my body, my choice” that justified abortion and MAiD?

By throwing their weight behind vaccine mandates, Justin Trudeau and the Liberal Party of Canada have picked a strange hill to die on in the run to Canada’s snap election next week.

The Liberal support of vaccine mandates represent a 180 degree turn ...

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Separating Sheep From Scapegoats

Peter Stockland

September 14, 2021

Peter Stockland reports on writer Charles Eisenstein’s work to identify a force even more dangerous than contagious public stupidity.

American writer Lance Morrow recently identified our current moment as the golden age of stupidity.

No evidence exists that the author of America: A Rediscovery and Second Drafts of History was peeping across the border watching the...

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Taking a Jab at Religious Freedom

Don Hutchinson

September 10, 2021

Despite contrary claims, sincerely held faith is a Charter-protected justification for declining to take the COVID shot, Don Hutchinson reports.

John Longhurst’s provocatively titled column Religious leaders should make it clear faith ...

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Pushing Back Against Vaccine Bullying

Tara Vreugdenhil

September 8, 2021

In the second of two parts, Tara Vreugdenhil writes that regardless of pure intentions, many methods used in the pandemic response are classic harassment tactics.

This is part two of a two-part series from Tara Vreugdenhil. Click here to read part one: "A COVID Shot in the Dark"

The point is made frequently that hospita...

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A COVID Shot in the Dark

Tara Vreugdenhil

September 7, 2021

In this first of two parts, Tara Vreugdenhil argues the pandemic response has unleashed a contagion of fuzzy language, shifting definitions, and logic that doesn’t follow.

This is part one of a two-part series from Tara Vreugdenhil. ...

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COVID Lessons for the Education System

David Hunt

September 1, 2021

The flexibility and responsiveness of Ontario’s independent schools during the pandemic prove the advantage of humanized education in small, family-centric schools, David Hunt writes.

As Ontario’s public schools struggle to accommodate students in a new school year amid what could be a fourth wave of COVID-19, what can the Ontario government learn from the last 17 months?

For starters, the government needs to accept that huge, ind...

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COVID Can’t Cancel Church in Ottawa Park

Matthew Boardman

August 17, 2021

Despite fines for congregating contrary to COVID rules, an open air church in an inner-city park flourishes by serving society’s marginalized, writes Matthew Boardman.

Recent media reports of a petition by residents in Ottawa’s inner-city Dundonald Park neighbourhood demanding more community supports for indigent users of...

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