Issues, ethics, memory
By Dennis Gruending Stephen Harper announced on April 4 that a re-elected Conservative government would scrap Canada's long gun registry. That hardly comes as a surprise. The Conservatives hate the registry. They tried in the last parliament to do away with it and have all of its records destroyed but they lost the vote narrowly in the House... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Stephen Harper used the first days of the 2011 election campaign to demonize the Liberals, NDP and Bloc Quebecois as plotting a coalition to replace him following an election in which he might win the most seats but form a minority government. It was both a scare and a smear tactic meant... Continue Reading →
The Conservative government has thrown us into the 2011 election campaign. This is perhaps a good time to take stock of who the Harperites have spent their time attacking in the past several years. (They have also lavished favour on their own, appointing them to be judges, to the Immigration Review Board, the CRTC or... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Note: This writing is drawn from a chapter that I contributed to a recently-published book called Bush Dweller: essays in memory of Father James Gray, OSB. Long after I had finished with my years at university, I made a list of the five teachers and professors who had been my best. Two... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending I have posted several pieces over the past year about the Harper government's decision to deny project money to the ecumenical social justice group KAIROS. I have also written about CIDA Minister Bev Oda's deceitful behaviour in the whole matter. For months this story was in the back pages of the newspapers... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Tony Martin was 11 years old when he emigrated from Ireland to Canada with his mother and six siblings in January 1960. His father had arrived nine months earlier to find work. Martin recalls arriving in Sault Ste. Marie Ontario in the dead of winter then making an additional eight-hour train trip... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Sociologist Reginald Bibby is probably Canada's closest observer of religious trends. He has been polling on religious practices and attitudes since 1975 and has placed the numbers into context in several books beginning with Fragmented Gods in 1987. Bibby has just released another book called Beyond the Gods and Back, and he... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending On January 8th a young man Jared Lee Loughner opened fire with a Glock 19 handgun during a political event held in the parking lot of a Tucson, Arizona mall. He killed six people and wounded 14, including Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. He shot her in the head. She is being treated... Continue Reading →
By Dennis Gruending Early on the morning of January 1 Coptic Christians were leaving Saints Church in the ancient Egyptian city of Alexandria after celebrating midnight mass. A suicide bomber waiting outside set off explosives that killed 21 people and injured almost 100 others. The attack also led to concern in Canada as Eastern Rite... Continue Reading →
In 2010, the Conservative government of Stephen Harper effectively destroyed the Montreal-based International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development. The organization had been created by Brian Mulroney, an earlier Conservative prime minister. But Harper's appointments to the organization's board accused it , falsely, of providing grants to terrorist organizations working against Israel.
Pulpit and Politics 