Skip to content

Posts from the ‘Politics’ Category

Feb 3

11 Comments

Atheism on the Bus

A while back someone from our church asked me what I thought about the prospect of the atheist bus ads, brainchild of British writer Ariane Sherine and enthusiastically supported by that most zealous of atheist proselytizers Prof. Richard Dawkins, making their way into Canada (apparently Toronto and Calgary are in the works, while Halifax has deemed the ads too controversial for public consumption).  On the left, is the slogan currently appearing on buses in the UK, Madrid, Washington D.C., and which you may see on a bus in Canada in the not-too-distant future. Read more

May 23

Religion and Violence: An Interesting Conversation

Some friends are visiting from Alberta and we spent part of yesterday over at a market in North Vancouver. After a bit of shopping our friends’ kids were getting a little restless so we camped out in the play area for a while and let them run off some steam with the other kids. As we were sitting around watching the kids play, we struck up a conversation with a gentleman who was there taking care of his granddaughter. After a bit of pleasant small-talk, the conversation turned, as it inevitably does, to where everyone’s from and what they do. Read more

Mar 4

2 Comments

Wishful Thinking

“Hope” and “change” are words that are being slung around quite regularly lately. From Obama, Clinton and McCain south of the border to Ed Stelmach in my home province of Alberta to the eminently hopeful Oprah Winfrey, everybody’s selling something revolutionary—something which will offer us a brighter future, one in which things will, finally, change for the better. Hope might not be very realistic, and it may be historically unjustified, but it certainly does sell, as politicians (and Christopher Hitchens) know as well as anyone. Read more

Nov 29

20 Comments

Which Story?

One of the things we’ve talked about in the course I’m teaching out at Columbia Bible College this semester is the importance of understanding how all world-views—whether they consider themselves to be “religious” or not—offer their own set of explanations to questions about the nature of the world, the nature of human beings and the problems that plague us, and the potential remedies that are available. The nature of the story one accepts about the world will determine both the kinds of questions one will be inclined to ask and the nature of answers that will be deemed acceptable in response to those questions. Read more

Sep 15

6 Comments

The Political and the Divine

A couple of weeks ago I posted about an article by Columbia professor Mark Lilla which addressed, among other things, the persistence of religion in a post-Enlightenment age and what might account for it. For those who are interested, his book—The Stillborn God: Religion, Politics, and the Modern West—is now available, as noted in this morning’s review in the New York Times. In an age where religion is frequently portrayed as the enemy of all that is good and true, any effort to provide clarity on the subject of the historical interaction between religion and politics seems (to me) to be a welcome one indeed. Read more

Sep 3

13 Comments

The Challenge of Secularism

Yesterday’s New York Times had an interesting follow-up of sorts (Times Select link here) to Mark Lilla’s more extensive analysis of the relationship between religion and politics from a few weeks ago. Stanley Fish reiterates the deep divide that exists between secular liberalism and those who subscribe to some more “ultimate” explanation of what is (or will be) really true about the world. Read more

Aug 23

7 Comments

I Wish This was a Joke…

One of the interesting features of blogging at WordPress is being able to see which sites are linking to your own posts. There aren’t usually very many of these, mind you, but the odd one pops up. Some of these are intriguing, but many are just plain strange and I have no idea where they come from or how they connect to me. Read more

Aug 21

2 Comments

The Persistence of Religion

Columbia professor Mark Lilla wrote a very interesting article in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine which deals with the relationship between religious belief and politics (adapted from his forthcoming book, The Stillborn God: Religion, Politics, and the Modern West). It’s an interesting article—one well worth taking the time to read and think about. Among the many interesting issues raised by this article, I was drawn to one in particular—the persistence of religious belief, and what might account for it. Read more

Aug 18

2 Comments

The Politics of Doing Good

Two articles from Vancouver newspapers today left me scratching my head and feeling a little frustrated. The first is the more high-profile story of a Vancouver church’s dispute with local authorities regarding what services it can and cannot legally offer as a place of worship, and the second a less publicized issue relating to the Vancouver civic workers strike. Read more

Apr 7

2 Comments

A Different Kind of Easter Message

Easter is the season for celebrating Jesus and what his death and resurrection accomplished for the world. It seems to be one of those times of the year when everyone who has some nominal identification with the Christian tradition finds their way back to a church service. Apparently, even some members of the Toronto Maple Leafs have taken an interest in churchgoing and prayer during this, the most important period of the Christian calendar, in the hopes, I presume, that God is as concerned that the New York Islanders lose tomorrow as they are. Read more

Mar 30

4 Comments

Rewind?

Well here’s a story that’s bound to generate a bit of controversy especially given our current political climate. I saw this on a newsstand as I was waiting for Naomi and the kids at the airport last week, and I had to do a double-take to make sure I saw the headline correctly. I’m not sure it’s exactly the kind of thing some in America are looking for when they seek to “get the bible back in the classroom,” but it’s a somewhat surprising argument to find in a major news magazine nonetheless. The following quote offers a summary explanation of sorts as to why such a “step back” might be a good thing: Read more

Mar 3

15 Comments

Something about Forests and Trees…

Well, this really is a head-scratcher for me. This morning I came across this truly baffling article in the New York Times. Leaders of several conservative Christian groups have apparently drafted a letter with the expressed purpose of attempting to dissuade the Washington policy director of the American Association of Evangelicals, Rev. Richard Cizik, to stop speaking on the problem of global warming. Read more

Jan 19

11 Comments

Nations and Narratives

An article discussing the Liberal Party of Canada’s national leadership convention caught my attention in this month’s edition of The Walrus. In it, Don Gillmor addresses, among other things, the vexed issue of what exactly constitutes Canada’s national identity, and the role nationalism plays in personal senses of belonging and identity. Consider the following quote (Ignatieff = Liberal leadership runner-up and author Michael Ignatieff): Read more

Newer Entries »