Amid Chauvin trial and more police killings, calls for ‘peaceful’ protests sound obnoxious. But as Martin Luther King Jr. preached, we must reject peace that prioritizes calm over justice — and work toward building a positive peace instead. Maria J. Stephan explores the options.
Read MoreAs rampant urbanization increasingly severs humanity from the living world, naturalist Michael McCarthy explores the ways in which the “anthropause,” ushered in by the coronavirus, has—on an unprecedented scale—made nature visible again.
Read MoreSlavery existed across British colonies, but often white Canadians, both in and outside the church, talk about enslavement by fixating on the Underground Railroad. Alydia Smith through her own experience in church culture, addresses this misconcpetion.
Read MoreLorraine Johnson is an environmentalist, passionate gardener and activist. In 2002, she released her seminal work, The Gardener’s Manifesto. This call to action has inspired a generation of gardeners to embrace their work with an ecological and social purpose - and to plant native plants on their properties.
Read MoreAuthors and hosts of Spirituality and Practice, Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, write his wonderful response to the question, What is Spirituality? They offer numerous paths of approach to the topic with their gentle, encouraging vision on the subject.
Read MoreAmerica - the world - is changing. Millennials are less religiously affiliated than ever before. Churches are just one of many institutional casualties of the internet age in which young people are both more globally connected and more locally isolated than ever before. Against this bleak backdrop, a hopeful landscape is emerging. Millennials are flocking to a host of new organizations that deepen community in ways that are powerful, surprising, and perhaps even religious.
Read MoreAdele Halliday, writing in Broadview Magazine, expresses her dismay at the events taking place in the summer of 2020. “I write as a Black Canadian. The events of the past few weeks have been deeply traumatizing. I have been cycling through three main emotions – intense anger, immense exhaustion and deep pain. These emotions are not new to me – they are part of what it means to live in a Black body with the reality of racial injustice.
Read MoreFrom Sojourners, comes this steady advice to white people about how to be good allies to BIPOC people., written by Courtney Ariel. Based in the Christian tradition and a person of colour, Ariel responds to white friends asking, ‘how can we become better allies?" Her advice is clear, steady, and accessible. Read what she writes. Do what she does. White people need to be part of the solution.
Read MoreAs America marks 400 years since people of African descent were first brought to our shores in chains, some politicians, academic institutions, communities of faith, and individuals are beginning to wrestle with the atoning possibility of reparations. The institution of the church is uniquely positioned to shape this movement of reckoning.
Read MorePeggy McIntosh, founder of the National SEED Project on Inclusive Curriculum, which seeks Educational Equity & Diversity in the USA, writing way back in 1989 observed: “I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets which I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was ‘meant’ to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions. . . ”
Read More#BlackLivesMatter was founded in 2013 in response to the acquittal of Trayvon Martin’s murderer. Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, Inc. is a global organization in the US, UK, and Canada, whose mission is to eradicate white supremacy and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities by the state and vigilantes. (BLM Website Statement)
Read MoreThere is a major conversation happening globally between those affected by racism and those with the privilege not to be affected. The latter have an opportunity and a responsibility to learn about it.
If you’re white, this work might feel uncomfortable. It’s supposed to. Canada is not immune to racism.
Read MoreWhat is an ally? An ally is any person that actively promotes and aspires to advance the culture of inclusion through intentional, positive and conscious efforts that benefit people as a whole. Sheree Atcheson, author of "Demanding More : Why Diversity & Inclusion Aren't Happening & what you can do about it", writes about why being an ally is so important to anti-racism.
Read MoreWarner Sallman's 1940 oil painting "The Head of Christ" is believed to be the most reproduced religious work of art. It's been copied a billion times, if you include lamps, clocks and calendars. It came to define Christianity for generations of Christians in the United States and beyond.
When Emily McFarlan Millergrew up and began to study the Bible on her own, she started to wonder about that painting and the message it sent.
Read MoreMany Canadians view slavery as something that happened in the United States of America from the arrival of the first slave ships in 1619 until the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, but fail to understand that the buying, selling, and enslavement of Black and Indigenous people went on for about 200 years in our own country (beginning with the arrival of Olivier le Jeune in 1628 to New France and ending with the Slavery Abolition Act, August 1, 1834).
Read MoreResmaa Menakem is a healer, therapist, trainer, and speaker, and the author of the New York Times bestseller My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Healing Our Hearts and Bodies. Here are four blogs he has written for Psychology today concerning Somatic Abolitionism, how it affects our bodies and the way we think.
Read MoreResmaa Menakem describes Somatic Abolitionism as a living, embodied anti-racist practice and cultural building —a way of being in the world. It is a return to the age-old wisdom of human bodies respecting, honoring, and resonating with other human bodies. It is not a exclusively a goal, an attitude, a belief, an idea, a strategy, a movement, a plan, a system, a political position, or a step forward.
Somatic Abolitionism is not a human invention. It is the resourcing of energies that are always present in your body, in the collective body, and in the world. Somatic Abolitionism is an emergent process.
Read MoreFor people living in the Arctic, climate change is hacking away at their foundation. It drives storm surges, washes out roads and clogs rivers with sediments. It produces sinkholes and triggers landslides capable of altering the topography and tilting houses. The climate crisis is even seen by some as a form of environmental racism — a problem created down south and suffered up north. Susan Nerberg, from Broadview.org headed up north to witness these dramatic changes.
Read MoreFour members of Shelburne’s Anti-Black Racism, Anti-Racism and Discrimination Task Force discuss their mission and the vision they have for Shelburne.
“The death of George Floyd hit everyone in the heart. White people do not walk out of their house with the fear they will be treated differently and killed because of something they can’t control. But Black people do,” says Soha Soliman.
Read More
