Church

  • Science can Strengthen Faith

    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

    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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  • Remembering Ted Byfield

    Ted Byfield was no quitter and until his passing over the holidays, he was a front-line culture warrior in the journalism, publishing, and Christian education spheres, Jonathon Van Maren writes.

    Edward “Ted” Bartlett Byfield passed away in his Edmonton home on December 23, 2021, at the age of 93. For more than a half-century, he was one of Canada’s most significant public Christians, and his life’s work included the founding of a religious order, t...

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  • Time to Challenge and Comply

    When it comes to Canada’s recently passed ban on “conversion therapy," Don Hutchinson argues that it’s bad legislation, not good faith religious counselling, that should be put on trial.

    The provisions of Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (conversion therapy), will be incorporated into the Criminal Code as law effective January 7, 2022. It may be poorly...

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  • True Progress Moves Us To God

    As Advent foreshadows the Christmas narrative, Peter Copeland and Father Deacon Andrew Bennett write that our end is not in restless secularism but the peace of union with the Father.

    Returning to where we began, to find out what ends we seek, what is the story we claim to be a part of?

    The secular progressive story is one that is inherently ill-defined. The end, the telos, are goalposts that are constantly changing. Its gaze is s...

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  • That All Faiths Feel At Home

    Father Tim McCauley argues instead of claiming Islamophobia is entrenched in Canada, we must ensure Muslims and all believers are made welcome.

    October was Islamic History Month in Canada. In a letter introducing the month, former of Diversity Minister Bardish Chagger wrote, “Today and everyday, I stand with Muslim communities, and indeed all Canadians, to denounce the hatred that fuels Islamophobi...

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  • The Hard Truth About Reconciliation

    Healing wounds inflicted on Indigenous people by Canada and its churches means facing what’s wholly true, not what’s politically appealing, Father Deacon Andrew Bennett writes.

    Let’s discuss truth and reconciliation in their fullness. How do we tell the truth, the fullness of the truth? How do we achieve true reconciliation? Both are two-way streets.

    Firstly, what is truth? Pilate’s question to Christ at his passion rings d...

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  • COVID Can’t Cancel Church in Ottawa Park

    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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  • Unmasking the Match Lighting Mob

    Don Hutchinson asks who has fuelled church burnings across Canada, and notes Indigenous leaders from coast to coast have been most stalwart in condemning the two dozen arson attacks.

    Mainstream media lit a fuse, and churches are burning. Nearly two dozen to date and a greater number have been vandalized with graffiti, paint-dipped handprints, and splatter.

    Some congregations have accepted acts of vandalism as a visual lesson on t...

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  • Canada’s Common Spiritual Hunger

    After last week’s online National Prayer Breakfast, Cardus Executive Vice President Ray Pennings reflected in his weekly Insights newsletter on how to pray in public – and pluralistic – spaces. Convivium reprints his text.

    Cardus Insights strives to “connect the dots” among faith, business, and public life. Ray’s weekly reading summaries can catch you up or provide you with more insight into the headlines you may have seen this week. And you can look forward to a...

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  • Grave Men Facing A Grave Faith

    Jonathon Van Maren reports on a series of leading serious intellectuals who recognize the need for Christianity’s resurrection but can’t quite bring the faith to life in themselves.

    Earlier this month, I spent some time on the phone with Niall Ferguson, the Scottish historian and Milbank Family Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, for a ...

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  • A Pandemic Journey to Pentecost

    Patti-Anne Kay and Fr. Peter Doherty, OMI, find Easter parallels in COVID suffering but recall it was at Pentecost that the fullness of the Resurrection was realized.

    Let us go about daily activities with a renewed sense of focus, purpose, and appreciation.

    The COVID-19 pandemic struck close to home. Finally, at Easter, my husband and I were overjoyed to see two of our grandchildren outdoors, everyone wearing mask...

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  • At Home in Houses of Worship

    Cardus Executive VP Ray Pennings breaks down for Convivium’s Peter Stockland new data on the eagerness of Canadians across faith traditions to gather again in their churches, mosques, synagogues, and temples.

    The COVID-19 pandemic has meant bitter medicine for Canada’s religious faithful but its aftermath could be the good news churches and other houses of worship have been waiting for.

    Poll resu...

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  • A COVID Cold Shoulder for Churches

    Peter Stockland reports on a group of B.C. Canadian Reformed Churches going to court to be allowed to come in out of the rain and worship together.

    As Christians around the world raise “hosannas” to their Saviour this Palm Sunday, the congregation of Aldergrove Canadian Reformed Church might also be putting up umbrellas.

    Members of the church located near the western end of B.C.’s Fraser Valley ...

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  • Irish Eyes on Meghan and Harry

    This might be the best Saint Patrick’s Day to skip the clownish caricatures and ponder the British monarchy from Ireland’s historical perspective, Peter Stockland argues.

    With her ever-present perspicacity, Wall Street Journal writer Peggy Noonan pinpoints the flurry of furies engulfing the House of Windsor as both family tragedy and institutional catastrophe, two matters of particular program concern here at Cardus...

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  • When A Pope Comes Home

    The welcome for Pope Francis on his visit to Iraq was a memorable first step. Now hope must become reality, Susan Korah reports.

    A calculated risk in the face of pandemic fears and potential security threats, the visit of Pope Francis to Iraq brought incalculable benefits, say members of the country’s indigenous Christian community. 

    Traumatized by years of violence and hate w...

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  • When Covid Constraints Come to Church

    Don Hutchinson considers the complementary roles of Church and State vis-à-vis the pandemic and public health.

    Governments have reacted, some say overreacted, to a declared pandemic by moving beyond giving advice for the good of our health to legislating behavioural constraints. Those restrictions have come to church, generating contradictory responses.

    Wash ...

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  • Pandemic Pancake Tuesday

    On this day before Lent, Don Hutchinson counsels Convivium readers to prepare for the 40 days before Easter as a mix of self-denial and doing unto others as we would have them do for us.

    It’s Pancake Tuesday! My first memory of Pancake Tuesday is from my elementary school years. My working single mom had arranged on school days for a neighbour to feed me breakfast – cereal I carried each morning in a baggie – and lunch. On that particular T...

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  • Hope Born Anew

    In the darkness that can envelop even the Christian Church, Peter Stockland writes, the season Christmas reminds us that Christ’s hope, faith, and truth illuminate the world.

    On the eve of Advent, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Montreal released a devastating report on its own horror-show ineptitude regarding a sexually abusive priest named Brian Boucher.

    Even in a year free of the disaster of COVID-19 church closures,...

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  • When Believers Become Invisible

    COVID-19 has revealed an uncomfortable reality, Jonathon Van Maren points out: closure of churches isn’t State persecution but widespread ignorance of what goes on inside them.

    For the past several months, Christians have been bombarded by headlines warning us that places of worship are being unfairly targeted by government COVID-19 restrictions and lockdowns. Most insinuate persecution without making the accusation outright, ...

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  • Religious Persecution’s Red Letter Day

    Canadian churches turned red recently hoping to open Canada’s eyes to violence against believers, Susan Korah reports.

    The red-lit facades of Mary Queen of the World Cathedral in Montreal, St. Michael’s Cathedral in Toronto, and the Embassy of Hungary in Ottawa stood silhouetted against the dark November sky, in silent tribute to the 260 million Christians around the world ...

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  • Canada’s Hidden Economy

    Economic impact is one of religion’s less-talked-about features but Stephen Lazarus writes that there may be at least $67 billion of Canadian GDP worth discussing.

    TORONTO – Newcomers to this country often find Canadians have a curious stance toward religion. We seldom say much negative about religion in public, but then we never take it too seriously either. A new study, ...

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  • Blueprints for God’s Hotels

    Raymonde Gauthier, co-curator of a current exhibit at Montreal’s Hôtel Dieu museum, explores with Peter Stockland how the 19th century partnership of Bishop Ignace Bourget and architect Victor Bourgeau shaped the city’s spiritual landscape.

    About 40 years ago, Raymonde Gauthier found a PhD topic by glancing out the window of her small apartment at the corner of Montreal’s St. Laurent Boulevard and Sherbrooke Street.

    Through the heat of Quebec’s post-1960s anti-clerical nationalist eupho...

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  • The Cardinal’s Diplomatic Dressing Down

    Quebec’s mistreatment of faith groups during the COVID lockdown drew a Cardinal’s ire in words high on diplomacy and inspiring, says Canada’s former ambassador to the Vatican. Peter Stockland reports.

    Near the end of June, I pulled into our parish parking lot full of gumption at the resumption of Masses after four months of COVID-forced church closures. 

    A small circle of my fellow faithful had already gathered around Father Piotr Miodek as he sto...

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