Pulpit and Politics

Pulpit and Politics reviewed on Amazon.ca

You can read reviews of my new book Pulpit and Politics at Amazon.ca:

Hill Times and Dennis Gruending on Pulpit and Politics

The Ottawa-based Hill Times carried an interview with me in its October 17 edition regarding my new book, Pulpit and Politics: Competing Religious Ideologies in Canadian Public Life. It was released earlier in October by Kingsley Publishing of Calgary. It is available in Ottawa at Brittons magazine stores: 846 …

NDP leadership hopeful Paul Dewar, "faith is political"

Paul Dewar, the Member of Parliament for Ottawa Centre, has entered the race to become leader of the New Democratic Party. Dewar was raised in a political home in Ottawa and his parents were staunch Roman Catholics. Two years ago, I invited him to talk to a class that I was teaching about faith and public life and he was candid with those attending. I posted the following piece on my blog in early 2009. Now, with his intention to run for party leader, Dewar’s remarks about the relationship between religious faith and public life take on an even greater relevance. I am reposting that piece here.

Oscar Arias decries militarism in Carleton University speech

By Dennis Gruending

Óscar Arias, former president of Costa Rica and recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1987, was recently awarded an honourary degree by Carleton University in Ottawa. Arias used his 30-minute acceptance speech to deliver an impassioned message about the urgency of shifting out-of-control military spending into investments for peace and human development. He made his appeal on behalf of the world’s children, many of whom have “lives defined by landmarks such as tanks and missiles, mass graves and refugee shelters.” While most children in wealthy countries do not experience the realities of war first hand, they, too, are affected, Arias said. “For even the children of wealthy nations are learning lessons of violence from their parents and grandparents. Even they are being taught, by their governments and newspapers and schools, that violent conflict is an inevitable part of their nations’ existence.”

Jack Layton’s legacy to the NDP

Jack Layton received a fond public farewell from Canadians genuinely saddened by his untimely death. Now, the focus has, inevitably, begun to shift as members of his party contemplate next steps and the NDP’s opponents ponder with trepidation what the flood …

Conservative pundits diminish Breivik’s Norwegian victims

By Dennis Gruending

On July 22, Norwegian extremist Anders Breivik set off a car bomb in downtown Oslo that killed eight people. Then, dressed as a policeman, he traveled to a nearby small island and used a semi-automatic rifle to massacre 77 members of the Labour Party’s youth wing who were attending a summer camp. Now the dead (many of them just teenagers) have been buried. Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg has been unequivocal in saying that Breivik’s unspeakable actions will not change Norway’s commitment to democracy and tolerance. However, many media commentators, columnists and pundits on this side of the Atlantic have conspicuously lacked Stoltenberg’s vision or grace. On his syndicated talk radio program, the notorious Glenn Beck compared the young Norwegian victims to Nazis. As New York Times columnist Timothy Egan described it, Beck said the summer camp attended by the Labour Party youth “sounds a little like, you know, the Hitler Youth.”