If you yearn for economic justice and human flourishing in the southern hemisphere, you may be plagued by the nagging suspicion that there is little that you can do to promote this. Sure, you can give to charity or even go on a short term volunteering mission, but still there’s a sense that these efforts are at best band-aid ‘solutions,’ or at worst, volun-‘tour’-ism for rich Westerners to salve their consciences.
Dr Aidan Donaldson confronts some of those doubts in his new book, Encountering God in the Margins: Reflections of a Justice Volunteer (Veritas, 2010). Donaldson is Assistant Head of Religious Education and Chaplain at St Mary’s Christian Brothers’ Grammar School in Belfast. He writes out of his experience of the Christian Brothers’ Developing World Immersion Programme and its work on Project Zambia.
Continue reading ‘Aidan Donaldson Book Review: Encountering God in the Margins’
The Irish School of Ecumenics, Trinity College Dublin, is marking the midpoint of its three-year research project this week with a conference, ‘From World Mission to Interreligious Witness: Visioning Ecumenics in the 21st Century.’
The conference is recognising the centenary of the 1910 Edinburgh Missionary Conference, which is considered the birth of the modern ecumenical movement. Prof. Linda Hogan, Head of the Irish School of Ecumenics, opened the conference on Wednesday by acknowledging that ecumenical heritage. But she noted that the concept of ‘mission’ articulated at Edinburgh has become problematic in our pluralising, globalising world.
Continue reading ‘Questioning World Mission: Trinity College Conference on Ecumenics in the 21st Century’
With the Saville Report, the City of Derry and Northern Ireland now have a document that has, in the main, satisfied the families of the victims who were shot dead by the British Army in 1972. The families and other citizens of the Bogside have for years said that they knew the truth. But the Bloody Sunday Inquiry was about receiving public acknowledgement from the British state about what happened on that day.
By now the facts of the Saville Report are well known: the Army fired the first shot, all of the victims were innocent in that they posed no threat to the soldiers, and some soldiers lied about what happened on the day. By acknowledging all of this and more, the Saville Report can be seen as a significant step in promoting healing for the families of the victims and for others who stood in solidarity with them.
Continue reading ‘Bloody Sunday and the Saville Report: David Cameron and How to Say Sorry’
If you have ever contributed to charities working in developing countries, you’ve probably wondered just how far your money is going. First, there’s the worry that your money may be going to admin costs rather than the people ‘on the ground.’ Apart from that, you may have been plagued by the nagging suspicion that throwing money at poverty isn’t really going to change anything.
That’s why I’m heartened by Christian Aid’s latest campaign, which draws attention to the way that company tax policies hurt poor countries. Christian Aid is in favour of,
Continue reading ‘Christian Aid Tax Campaign: Reform, not Charity …’
Non violence works. That’s the evidence from a study carried out by Maria J. Stephan and Erica Chenoweth, which argues that ‘major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 per cent of the time, compared with 26 per cent for violent resistance campaigns.’
For those who are committed to nonviolent methods as a matter of principle, this research lends some practical credence to their beliefs. You can read the entire research paper, which focuses on civil resistance campaigns, here. For those committed to or exploring Christian nonviolence, Fr Emmanuel Charles McCarthy is leading a weekend conference in Dublin on Gospel Nonviolence, 4-6 June 2010, and giving a public lecture on 8 June.
Continue reading ‘Exploring Non Violence: Events in Dublin with Fr Emmanuel Charles McCarthy’
In the West, where ‘institutionalised’ forms of Christianity seem more tired, creaky and discredited by the day, some people involved with ‘emergence Christianity’ or the ‘emerging church’ are advocating a ‘religionless’ approach to Christianity.
The term ‘religionless Christianity’ is associated with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German pastor implicated in the plot to assassinate Hitler during the Second World War. Bonhoeffer’s ideas around religionless Christianity are somewhat fragmented, due no doubt to the conditions under which he wrote – in prison and awaiting execution in a context of extreme socio-political upheaval.
Continue reading ‘Are there any Christians in Religionless Christianity?’
What’s faith got to do with human rights? That’s one of the questions explored in a new publication, edited by Dr David Tombs of Trinity College Dublin at Belfast (the Irish School of Ecumenics), Rights and Righteousness: Perspectives on Religious Pluralism and Human Rights.
The publication was featured this morning on BBC Radio Ulster’s Sunday Sequence (see chapter 7 of the online recording, ‘Righteousness vs. Human Rights?’) The segment includes input from Tombs, Prof. Monica McWilliams of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, and Dr Norman Richardson, Lecturer in Religious Studies at Stranmillis College in Belfast.
Continue reading ‘What’s Faith Got to do with Human Rights? Publication of Rights and Righteousness’
The sun was shining, and the streets were full of colour. Not always what you would associate with strolling about Belfast city centre, but that was my experience yesterday.
There was a parade of the trade unions, marking May Day, with a brass band and a peaceful, colourful ensemble of participants. Music was emanating from City Hall, where runners were pouring in to collect their numbers for tomorrow’s Belfast City Marathon. And in various locations, street performers on hand for the Festival of Fools were entertaining passers-by with everything from sword-swallowing to comedy acrobatics.
Continue reading ‘Be Playful! Activism from the Kitchen Table on 5 May’
Today we continue with the third of Fr Michael Bennett’s guest posts on the Irish Catholic Church, A Look from Afar. Here, Fr Michael argues that establishing an agenda for justice, peace and integrity of creation (JPIC) is absolutely essential in today’s Ireland.
Fr Michael urges us to take another look at some of the ideas developed in Social Justice Ireland’s An Agenda for a New Ireland. He contrasts the lack of debate about how we might construct a ‘common good’ for social, political and religious life in Ireland, with our obsessive focus on the private sexual lives of celebrities and politicians.
Continue reading ‘Crisis in the Irish Catholic Church: A Justice, Peace & Integrity of Creation Agenda by Fr Michael Bennett’
Back in March, 
Recent Comments