2011‑2022, and is preserved here for archival purposes.
In the lull after Christmas and New Year’s, Josh Nadeau finds the pursuit of peace ever-elusive but never more imperative.
We’ve come through Advent, got past Christmas season, and launched into January overweight with get-togethers, eggnog, nostalgia, spiritual practices and cultural traditions that would probably seem downright weird if they weren’t already so familiar. Stock...
Now is the ideal time for non-religious Canadians to lighten up around discussions of faith, says Cardus Executive Vice-President Ray Pennings, citing polling data showing religious Canadians are happy to debate their beliefs in good humour.
Christmas often brings out the best in Canadians. We dig into our pockets for charity a little more. We volunteer more. And we make more time for friends and family than at other times of the year.
But the holiday sometimes brings out our weirder sid...
At a prayer breakfast today in Markham, Ontario, Convivium’s Father Raymond de Souza serves a reminder that Canadian Christians should be as proud to share the Christian Gospel as they are to be Canadians. The reason, de Souza says, isn’t triumphalism but the pure joy of speaking God’s Word.
I am eager to preach the Gospel to you who are in Rome.
So St. Paul writes to the Romans, and I might suggest that those words are suitable for any preacher at any time, including this preacher this morning in Markham. I thank you for the in...
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.
On this American Thanksgiving, as our neighbours reflect upon the blessings of their bountiful land, and their debt to those who went before them, it is a fitting occasion to ask what we know about our own ancestors. What we know is an act of faith, and tea...
Whatever happened to saying “I just don’t know”? Today Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland shares concerns, in light of the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation debacle, about troubling changes to public dialogue and the growth of political tribalism. Words are used to impress others with a willingness to think as they think—rather than to express thought.
For the second time in two weeks, a veteran journalist friend has voiced to me deep disquiet about the observable damage being done by current media habits of mind.
It is not mere beaking off in the bar after the Daily Fishwrap has hit the streets, o...
Singer-songwriter and recording artist, Andrew Peterson explores his radical decision to delete Instagram off his phone in an age of almost constant social connectivity. You might ask if an artist whose very livelihood is tied to marketing can afford to remove himself from this social media platform? The real question, says Petersen, is can he afford not to?
This piece was re-posted with permission from The Rabbit Room.
I deleted Instagram from my phone earlier this summer. A few months before that I did th...
Reflecting on a paper he wrote almost 10 years ago ago as a Senior Fellow for Cardus, veteran Canadian journalist Peter Menzies concludes that trust is adrift on a sea of lies but, hey, it’s still better to light a candle than curse the dark.
A hint of new life was spotted this year within the list of nominees for this year’s National Newspaper Awards (NNA).
Toronto’s The Athletic, an online subscription-based service, received its first nomination, for Sunaya Sapurji in the Sports catego...
Recently, the Gerber baby food company chose a child with Down syndrome as its “spokesbaby.” But as Keith Dow of Christian Horizons asks, while the winner’s extra chromosome paints an adorable picture for disability advocacy, will the small step begin a journey of lasting social change?
A couple of years ago, I participated in a forum bringing together churches, accessibility advocates, and service providers in the Ottawa area to explore what “widening the welcome” could look like in our faith communities. Several adults with developmental...
Ottawa lawyer Albertos Polizogopoulos is saying “no” to the Law Society of Ontario’s demand for a written statement of principles obliging lawyers in the province to promote equality, diversity and inclusion. Here’s why.
Every year, lawyers in Ontario are required to fill-out an annual report and submit it to the Law Society of Ontario (LSUC), the legal regulator in Ontario. The report addresses trust accounts, client identification and the scope of one’s practice. ...
The federal budget released this week purports to give women a hand up when in reality it gives men the brush off, contends Cardus Family Program Director Andrea Mrozek.
Back in the day, it was a success when women changed the workforce such that working part-time was more acceptable. We also used to look down upon, for example, the legal profession where becoming partner involves a cot in the office with a pillow of legal ...
Finance Minister Bill Morneau handed down a 2018 budget today that spends billions in new money Canada doesn’t have, and raises the national debt to almost $700 billion. But no worries, writes Convivium’s Peter Stockland. It’s also got a gendered analysis. And it puts people first.
The key number for understanding the federal Liberal government’s 2018 budget is 319. That’s the page number where total projected spending for the coming fiscal year is first mentioned.
It’s an eye-popping $338.5 billion, up from $311.3 billion in t...
Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould has been criticized for intervening in the manslaughter trial of a Saskatchewan farmer. Convivium’s Peter Stockland argues the real damage will come if judicial reforms she’s promising have already been rejected by the Supreme Court of Canada.
Aggressive denunciations of Canada’s legal system following the Gerald Stanley acquittal remain deeply troubling even as they are emotionally understandable.
At the practical level, Stanley’s point-blank shooting of young Colten Boushie in a Saskatch...
In the second of two parts, Convivum contributor Deborah Rankin talks with front line warriors against human sex trafficking. Despite tough laws passed by Canada in recent years, the battle in the street is far from over.
Joy Smith runs a registered charity in Winnipeg that supports and provides funds to front-line organizations across Canada to rescue and rehabilitate victims of human trafficking.
The former Conservative MP for Kildonan-St. Paul has dedicated much of...
During the last years of the Harper era, parliamentarians of all stripes worked in non-partisanship to combat human trafficking. Yet as Montreal writer Deborah Rankin learns from experts, and writes in this two-part Convivium series, all that political energy produced depressingly few benefits for young women trapped in the sex trade.
“Nobody should have to be obliged to sell their body in order to meet their needs and aspire to a better future. My rights do not limit me to only survive, but to live with dignity." - Chantal, survivor of sex-trafficking and board member The Way Out
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Convivium returns to the testimonies of Convivium’s editor-in-chief and two regular contributors whose statements were highlighted in this week's Commons Heritage Committee report on a motion to combat religious discrimination.
When the Commons Heritage Committee handed down its report this week on a motion to combat religious discrimination, including Islamophobia, Convivium’s editor-in-chief and two regular contributors were among the witnesses whose testimony was highl...
In an eloquent speech to the Commons this week, Alberta MP Michelle Rempel issued a “call to action” for everyone on Parliament Hill – including the media – to stop treating collisions of sex and power as chances for partisan advantage, and start seeing them as serious social disorder. Because of its clarity in framing the issue, Convivium offers Rempel’s speech in full.
What happens when power collides with sex? The government's response to this question and to more sexual harassment and assault allegations against politically powerful people coming to light was to schedule Bill ...
Convivium’s Father Raymond de Souza says Patrick Brown’s departure as Ontario Conservative leader is cause for huzzahs from all who care about political integrity in our common life.
Patrick Brown is gone. Soon he will be forgotten. But before he is, a few observations are in order.
Just over a year ago, apropos of Brown’s fiasco of attempting to block Sam Oosterhoff from winning the Progressive Conservative nomination in Niagara...
Citing the Supreme Court’s historic Morgentaler decision, Andrea Mrozek and Faye Sonier show why Prime Minister Trudeau gets so-called abortion rights so wrong.
In listening to our political leaders, you’d be hard pressed to know there is no right to abortion in Canada. Take the Prime Minister’s recent comments regarding the Canada Summer Jobs program, which now requires prospective employers, from soup kitchens to...
In an interview this week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke about his insistence on proper conduct between the sexes on Parliament Hill and, by extension, among Canadians generally. Peter Stockland examines what it means for a son to grapple with what his father catalyzed.
Purely as observation, it feels like good fortune to watch this full circle moment when the son must grapple with what the father wrought.
In an interview this week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke eloquently and emphatically about his insistence...
Convivium’s editor in chief asks why more care wasn’t put into investigating a young girl’s tale about her sliced hijab – for her sake and for Canada’s
“I don’t know why he did that, but it’s just not Canada,” said Saima Samad, mother of Khawlah Noman, the 11-year-old girl who reported that a man with scissors had cut her hijab, twice, on her way to school.
It’s just not Canada. The Toronto Sun...
A government push to stop Quebec businesses from politely using a French-English greeting for customers is more than just another example of the province's language wars. Convivium Publisher Peter Stockland argues the move interferes with Quebec's social architecture.
Quebec’s anglophones, francophones, and allophones should, as one, be on their smart phones demanding to know what in the name of Saint René Lévesque just happened in the National Assembly.
“We are not a small people,” the late premier famously said ...
Today, we release the final piece in our series of Policy Options articles that have emerged as a response to our Spirited Citizenship: Care, Conflict, and Virtue round table in Ottawa last month, convened in partnership with the Angus Reid Institute to mark Canada’s Sesquicentennial.
(Mr. Milton Friesen, Program Director of Cardus Social Cities program, Mr. Joe Gunn, Executive Director for Citizens for Public Justice (...
As a Trinity Western University grad and member of the LGBTQ community, contributor Matthew Wigmore urges caution about seeing tomorrow Supreme Court hearing strictly as a legal fight over religious freedom.
Can religious freedom claims be taken seriously if the claimant is responsible for discrimination? In light of Trinity Western University’s ongoing battle for a law school, the question should effect c...
Tomorrow’s Supreme Court of Canada’s hearing on Trinity Western University should engage all Canadians confronted by the State’s chipping away at fundamental Charter rights, warns alumnus Evan Menzies.
Off Metcalfe Street and MacLaren in Ottawa, sits the century old J.R. Booth mansion which now houses the Laurentian Leadership Centre. It runs and operates an internship program for Trinity Western, the private Christ...