Category: faith and culture

Deconstructing Deconstruction: Jersak’s Chronicle of Spiritual Detox

May 17, 2023

He is one of the key Canadian voices when it comes to the notion of faith deconstruction, and he’s just published his 18th (or so) book entitled Out of the Embers: The Great Deconstruction this past fall. Angela Bick and I interviewed him for our own forthcoming book on deconstructing Canadians with New Leaf Press. He gave us a friendly, personal, and at times poignant conversation about his de/reconstruction with Jesus, “history’s all-time, hinge-point proponent and practitioner of de/reconstruction.” … More Deconstructing Deconstruction: Jersak’s Chronicle of Spiritual Detox

Fred Reinders (1930-2023): A Life of Structural and Moral Integrity

February 9, 2023

Born in 1930 Friesland, Fred Reinders was a dreamer, a visionary, and a leader, and he expressed that gift first of all through engineering design and construction. The Dutch have a proverb, roughly translated, that says “You can never cross the ocean until you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.” Well, Fred left the shores of his native Netherlands in 1953 to see what opportunities lie in Canada and it seems his life was a series of calculated risks from there on. … More Fred Reinders (1930-2023): A Life of Structural and Moral Integrity

Have a Righteous Christmas, Joseph Style: A Meditation on a Saint in a Season of Sexual Misconduct

December 12, 2022

Was St. Joseph’s character more about being righteous or being just? The original Greek word opens up possibilities in meaning that have been a matter of a translation debate which has implications for sexual ethics today. … More Have a Righteous Christmas, Joseph Style: A Meditation on a Saint in a Season of Sexual Misconduct

Sexual Abuse Sends out Wide Ripples of Hurt: Bruxy Cavey’s Meeting House Wreckage

November 2, 2022

when leaders go off the rails, it is not only the celebrities and their victims who crash and burn in the brush. They take with them a whole trainload of unsuspecting people who trusted them, and many who bet their lives on the leader’s integrity and vision. How does this happen in a place driven to be a balm in a bruised world? … More Sexual Abuse Sends out Wide Ripples of Hurt: Bruxy Cavey’s Meeting House Wreckage

Brain Drain in African Higher Education: Motivations and Methods for Bolstering African Educational Opportunities

October 3, 2022

Brain drain is typically understood as the growing trend of educated, emerging leaders from developing countries emigrating to foreign nations that offer better vocational opportunities, higher pay, and more desirable living conditions. This essay argues that a flourishing African continent requires students to invest in their homeland, and that methods need to keep motivations in mind. … More Brain Drain in African Higher Education: Motivations and Methods for Bolstering African Educational Opportunities

On Learnedness: A September Meditation in Light of the Queen’s Reign

September 22, 2022

Publications, appointments, awards and prizes, scholarships, bursaries and residencies may be the proofs of proficiencies in our worldly academic domains, but the gifts of good judgement, thoughtful restraint, humble presence, the seeking of truth, compromise, self-sacrifice, perseverance and mutual respect in the clamouring – at times, now contentious – hallways of the academy are still the most tangible ways we can share God.  … More On Learnedness: A September Meditation in Light of the Queen’s Reign

Grace Happens: Reconciliation in a Post-Colonial Age as the New Paradigm for Christian Mission

September 8, 2022

Reconciliation is not new to the faith, but as a paradigm for mission, it is being put in a position of greater urgency in Christian practise. Christian mission has been focused on growth, expansion, translation, transformation, and renewal. But now reconciliation must take centre stage. Reconciliation is when conflicting parties come to make amends, ideally turning to friendly relations, and right now the Church is one of the offending parties. … More Grace Happens: Reconciliation in a Post-Colonial Age as the New Paradigm for Christian Mission