On June 11, 2008, Prime Minister Stephen Harper made a formal apology for the Canadian government’s part in the residential schools tragedy. This month, the anniversary of that historic statement will be marked in Ottawa, when the National Forgiven Summit opens.

Since January – beginning at Coquitlam’s Westwood Community Church – a team  affiliated with Gathering Nations International has travelled across Canada – exhorting First Nations people to extend public forgiveness in response to the apology. Contact: i4give.ca

To summit up

About 80 religious leaders from around the world will gather in Winnipeg June 21 –  23. The World Religions Summit will ‘shadow’ the summit of the government leaders of the G8/G20 nations, who will meet shortly afterward in Ontario.

The religious leaders will urge the government leaders to cut global poverty in half by 2015.

This will be the first time Canada has hosted the World Religions Summit, which grew out of an interdenominational Christian meeting around the 2005 G8 summit in the United Kingdom. The Summit now also includes Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, Aboriginal, Hindu, Sikh, Baha’i and Shintoist faith leaders.

Speakers at the event will include Canadian senator Romeo Dallaire, whose warning about the impending Rwandan genocide was ignored; Jim Wallis of the American Christian social justice magazine Sojourners; and Shaban Mubaje, grand mufti of Uganda.

A poor report

Citizens for Public Justice has released a research paper entitled ‘Bearing the Brunt: How the 2008-2009 Recession Created Poverty for Canadian Families.’ The paper states that the poverty rate in Canada rose to 11.7 percent of the population in 2009; the child poverty rate likely rose to at least 12 percent in 2009; a quarter of workers making $10 an hour or less lost their jobs; and social assistance caseloads rose across the country, and have continued to rise in 2010.

Further, the recession increased the proportion of precarious work – as part-time jobs replaced full-time jobs, and temporary jobs replaced permanent positions. Food prices rose by 4.9 percent, and average rent by 2.3 percent; the number of food bank users rose 18 percent in 2009; average debt per household grew 5.7 percent; and bankruptcies increased 36.4 percent.

SoulChat got your tongue?

The Billy Graham Evangelistic Association of Canada (BGEAC) has won Anvil Awards for two television ads that encourage people to go to its SoulChat.ca website.

The humorous commercials feature know-it-all people who find themselves at a loss for words when colleagues or friends seek spiritual advice.

SoulChat uses blogs, videos and articles to encourage Canadians to discuss faith issues, and “discover the Good News of Jesus Christ.” The ads, two of three created by the Zero Gravity ad agency for the BGEAC, received the awards in early May at the annual Calgary Ad Rodeo Industry Gala.

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Home-grown porn

Evangelical Fellowship of Canada vice president Don Hutchinson has told CanWest News Media that Christians are appalled the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has approved a Canadian pornography channel. The channel, called Vanessa, will begin airing in French October 28 and in English in 2011.

American-based X-rated cable and satellite channels are available in Canada, but the new license requires Vanessa to have 20 percent Canadian programming – effectively encouraging the development of a Canadian pornography industry.

Hutchinson cited studies showing pornography is linked to organized crime, prostitution and human trafficking.

He added that he hoped the new channel won’t get enough subscribers, and “will die a natural death.”

Write on

The Word Guild, an association for writers and editors who are Christian, has received a record 245 entries for the 2010 Canadian Christian Writing Awards. Sixty-one of the entries have been shortlisted to win prizes in 32 categories.

The shortlist includes 19 writers from B.C., seven from Alberta, five from Saskatchewan, five from Manitoba, 38 from Ontario, one from New Brunswick and two from Nova Scotia.

Winners will be announced at a gala June 16 at World Vision Canada headquarters in Mississauga, Ontario.

Also given out at the gala will be the first-ever $5,000 Grace Irwin Award, for the best book published in 2009 by a Canadian Christian author; the Leslie K. Tarr Award for career achievement as a writer; and The Word Guild Partnership Award for exceptional support and encouragement for Canadian Christian writers.

March blocks traffic

Member of Parliament Joy Smith and First Nations Grand Chief Ron Evans led a march of hundreds of people in Winnipeg May 8, to raise awareness about human trafficking. The walk was supported by political leaders, police and numerous organizations, including the Catholic Women’s League, The Salvation Army, Inner City Women’s Ministries International, the Hindu Society of Manitoba and the Jewish Federation of Manitoba.

Have underwear, will travel

Brent King and Robb Price drove an RV across Canada May 14 – 28 to deliver 30,000 pairs of men’s underwear to homeless shelters in Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Regina, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax.

King, an entrepreneur from Calgary, came up with the idea, called GotGinch, in 2008 when he asked a local homeless shelter: “What do you need?” In 2009, he delivered 25,000 pairs of underwear. Price, another entrepreneur, has developed an online social giving network called DeliverGood.org.

– Jim Coggins

June 2010