Issues, ethics, memory
By Dennis Gruending Stephen Harper and the Conservatives won election in Canada with a minority government just over two years ago. The vote of evangelical Christians and Catholics who attend church weekly was a deciding factor in that election. The question now is whether that was a blip or an emerging reality in Canadian political... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Reverend Charles McVety says that he has many friends among the Harper Conservatives who govern in Ottawa. This week he will testify before the Senate banking committee in support of legislation that he says occurred partly as a result of his lobbying. It would deny tax credits to films that the government... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending I spent several hours on a recent Saturday morning with 20 people at the Galilee Centre, set amid the woods along the Ottawa River at Arnprior, Ontario. We talked about the links between religious faith and public life. Much of the discussion was about how, unfortunately, the call to public involvement remains... Continue Reading →
Dennis Gruending recalls a 2008 visit to the National Gandhi Museum in New Delhi. The museum was dated but the message profound
By Dennis Gruending I first posted to my Pulpit and Politics blog in November 2007 and am pleased that some of you have begun to make comments. A few of those were posted in the Comments section of the blog itself; others have arrived as messages sent to my email address dennis.gruending@sympatico.ca); and there have... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending The federal New Democratic Party has created a Faith and Justice Commission as a forum for progressive people who come to politics from a faith based perspective [www.ndp-faith-justice-foi-npd.ca/]. Its chair is Joe Comartin, one of several Catholic MPs who were denied communion by the church because of their support for same sex marriage legislation.... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Ted Schmidt is a former teacher in the Toronto Catholic school system and a staunch critic of a church hierarchy that he says is "patriarchal, misogynist and out of touch." Schmidt also served as editor of the defunct Catholic New Times and has now written a book called Journeys to the Heart... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending The Economist magazine in a recent edition published a special 18-page section called In God's name: A special report on religion and public life. Editor John Micklethwait said in an accompanying interview, "In the 20th century people, particularly among the elites, tended to think that religion was disappearing. That obviously hasn't happened."... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending The Canadian Council of Churches (CCC) has released A Health Care Covenant, a short book that describes the involvement by churches in our country's various debates about health care. The Ecumenical Health Care Network of the CCC says that it produced the book to "contribute an ethical voice to the ongoing dialogue... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending When Donald Rumsfeld left the Bush Cabinet, he quickly found a new job at Hoover Institution, one of dozens of powerful and wealthy right-wing think tanks (such as the Heritage Foundation, the Hudson Institute and American Enterprise Institute) that wield tremendous influence in US politics. Canada’s best-known counterpart is the Fraser Institute,... Continue Reading →
Pulpit and Politics 