Ottawa Archbishop wants to deny communion to some Catholic politicians

10 worst countries for women to live (and die) in

Ian Brodie, Stephen Harper’s chief of staff
Peter Worthington asks some questions
David Aiken CTV Politics Blog

Philosophy professor on John Corvino on three problems with ex-gay (reparative therapy) ‘ministries.

Fort Worth Broadway Baptist Church which has been embroiled in controversy for some time (use BDBO side bar search engine if you want to know more) will vote after the Sunday morning service today on whether or not to keep Dr. Brett Younger on as senior minister.

Country Keepers has found a cool web based tool that scans your software and provides the solutions.

IMonk on resisting the religious-industrial evangelism of the US.

Broadway Baptist Church will vote today on whether or not to oust minister Dr. Brett Younger.  I’ve blogged about the battles this church were in. Use the search field on the side bar if you want to get caught up.

An Anglican Church in New Westminister BC which has tainted unsafe water,  raised money and sent it to assist water dry areas in Africa. As a commenter said, the parish in Whonnock BC “knows the difference between an inconvenience and a lack.”

Canadian Christianity recently did a seven part series on evangelicals in Canada.
What I find interesting is how  inside chatter or inhouse writing tends to portray evangelicals as the Canadian Church, while acknowledging how diverse this branch of the Church Universal is.  In the final part of the series participants acknowledge that there is no ‘Canadian Church’.
In fairness, traditional Protestant  denominations, Orthodox and Catholics in Canada have effective ways to bring their concerns to the public table. Work is done together when need arises. Damian Macpherson, the director of ecumenical and interfaith affairs for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto added his voice to this series.

Part VI: Those pesky moral, social issues looks at how Canadian evangelicals are doing in publicly addressing poverty, homelessness, the environment, health and sexuality. I give credit to the men who participated because they did not hesitate to point fingers back at themselves.

Dr. Brian Stiller was the first Director of The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada* and what he has to say jumped off the screen:

Stiller said that a key challenge for Canadian Christians is “is to decide if the role of faith in culture matters. If it does matter, how can we help the people of God understand what it means to be the voice and presence of God in the marketplace? . . . In defining faith as being that which happens in church and within the individual, we’ve allowed secularity to become the dominant cultural model . . . There appears to be a lingering fear of engaging the culture . . . Mingling with the cultural gatekeepers of the community provides enormous opportunity for congregations.”

He noted that the church narrowly lost battles on abortion and same-sex marriage and that “it was important that we register our concerns.” However, he suggested that is important for Christians to think carefully about those struggles: “What did we gain by our battle, and how did we represent Christ in the battle? What’s the long-term benefit? At the time, what I heard was angry and unchristlike chatter, and frankly, I was embarrassed by much of it . . . Did we discredit Christ by the style and attitude which were the carrier of our words? I don’t think we were served well, and neither was the gospel.”

(Cameron)Roxburgh (Southside Community Church BC**) admitted: “The church has been marginalized . . . We need to focus on changing our approach without compromising and cheapening the gospel. It has been said before that people are not opposed to Jesus, just the church.”

Delineation of groups
*The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada is a national policy organization with 40 affiliate denominations and 5 observer denominations. There are 89 ministry (parachurch) affiliates, 34 educational institution affiliates. This organization maintains an lobbying office in Ottawa (Centre for Faith and Public Life), and is transparent with  membership details, policies and finances.  They publish  Faith Today magazine, and run the website Christianity.ca . The EFC is a member of the World Evangelical Alliance.

**Evangelical Free Church of Canada is the Canadian branch of a 28 country federation with 150 congregations in Canada.  Trinity Western University in BC is the church’s seminary.

Canadian Christianity started out as a local religious news magazine in BC and is now run by Christian Info Society, a network of individuals involved in evangelical media in Canada.

The Evangelical Association (not mentioned above) was founded by Elmer McVety. Current leader, son Charles McVety grabbed national headlines again this week.
The EA is Canada’s evangelical far right. Originally started as an fundamentalist ministerial association, members have branched out into authoritarian public policy under the claim of evangelism and autonomy. There is open co-operation with US fringe religious right groups. 
This is the group we all love to react to, willing, willful caricatures of what people see as what’s wrong with blending authoritarian religion and politics.  The EA claims a membership of 350 church and parachurch groups and does not publish membership details or finances. The EA has offices in Winnipeg and Toronto.

Interviews with participants in The State of the Canadian Church