Ottawa's Rob Samulack attended the COP 26 UN Climate conference held in Glasgow in late 2021 as an official observer with the Christian Climate Observers Program. The experience changed him.
Climate change, hope and discipline
Koch brothers finance Canada’s right
Newspapers have recently carried lengthy obituaries on the death of David Koch, the US billionaire. Through Koch Industries, David and his equally wealthy brother Charles controlled the second largest private corporation in the US, with ownership in chemicals, pipelines and fossil fuel extraction. The company was also, until recently, a major investor in Alberta’s oil... Continue Reading →
Questions for the United We Roll convoy
The United We Roll convoy of trucks on its way from Alberta to Ottawa makes for good television coverage, but the deep sense of grievance and anger on display does beg questions. Here are some of them. What about global warming? Those in the convoy demand that Ottawa simply clear the way for the construction... Continue Reading →
Tony Clarke and zero carbon emissions
Activist Tony Clarke was respected by foes and revered by activists for speaking truth to power in Canada and abroad. He died on December 4, 2024. I am reposting a blog piece that I wrote in 2018, upon the release of Clarke's last book, Getting to Zero: Canada Confronts Global Warming.
Trevor Herriot, Towards a Prairie Atonement
In April, I was invited by the Canadian Council of Churches to interview the well-known writer, naturalist and activist Trevor Herriot. Members of the CCC's Commission on Justice and Peace were meeting in Ottawa and asked Trevor to address them during an all-day meeting. They believe, correctly, that Trevor has much to say about living sustainably and with justice in our... Continue Reading →
Canada’s first ministers and climate change, no room for cynicism
Prime Minister Trudeau called the first ministers together in Vancouver recently to begin mapping out a plan for Canada to meet commitments made at December’s Paris Climate Conference. The Paris meeting was a last ditch attempt to prevent the most dramatic impacts of global warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels whose emissions remain trapped in... Continue Reading →
UN climate conference in Paris, no magic fix but signs of hope
The UN Climate Conference in Paris (COP21) will not produce a magic fix to curb the emission of greenhouse gases caused by burning fossil fuels. Given the number of countries and competing interests involved, that is not a surprise. The world’s political leaders have been negotiating since the Earth Summit in Rio de Janiero in... Continue Reading →
Naomi Klein on climate change
Naomi Klein has done it again with her new book, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs the Climate. She challenges the existing ignorance and denial on climate change and administers her own form of shock doctrine on that all-consuming issue. I do find, however, that her complete reliance on the power of social movements to bring... Continue Reading →
Light for Lima
Faith groups continue to call for an international agreement that addresses climate change. On Dec. 7, groups in nine Canadian cities held vigils that coincided with the latest round of UN climate change talks in Lima, Peru. The Ottawa vigil took place in a downtown Lutheran church, where participates heard from representatives of Catholic, Anglican,... Continue Reading →
Global cry of the people
Recently, I attended a Saint Paul University symposium dealing with environmental and human rights abuses committed by Canadian mining companies — with the knowledge and complicity of the federal government. The Ottawa symposium was called the Global Cry of the People: Mining Extraction and Justice, and the presenters included a range of church-based and other... Continue Reading →
Pulpit and Politics 