National news

 — Dec. 31, 200531 déc. 2005

The Canadian Council of Churches celebrated and consecrated their new offices on 2 October 2005. Everyone was invited to attend as cherished colleagues as the CCC officially began its ministry of further and future ecumenical and inter-faith possibilities in its new location. The new address is: 47 Queen’s Park Crescent East, Third Floor, Toronto, Ontario M5S 2C3, Tel: 416-972-9494, 1-866-822-7645, Fax: 416-927-0405, Website: councilofchurches.ca.

The peace agency of the Canadian Council of Churches, Project Ploughshares, launched a campaign on 14 September 2005 against small arms and light weapons. “Public pressure is essential to encourage governments to act and to ensure a constructive outcome to the United Nations Small Arms Review Conference in July 2006,” said John Siebert, executive director of Project Ploughshares. The Toronto-based agency says that worldwide there are more than 600 million small arms and light weapons in circulation, responsible for more than half a million deaths a year, including 300,000 in armed conflict and 200,000 more from homicides and suicides. The 2006 UN conference is intended to review a UN programme of action on small arms launched after a world conference in 2001, but Project Ploughshares says the programme has received insufficient funding and political support. “We are calling on churches and all Canadians to join with us in advocating measures to restore the security and well-being of people in gun-affected regions,” said Siebert. Revd Karen Hamilton, general secretary of the Canadian Council of Churches, said, “We have a unique opportunity to raise awareness and speak out about the grave humanitarian suffering caused by small arms proliferation and misuse.” The campaign is urging Canadians to take action to ensure greater national and international governmental commitment to control small arms and deal with the underlying conditions that lead people to take up weapons. (Prairie Messenger)

Representatives of the Canadian Jewish Congress and of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) met at Ottawa on 16 November at a reception hosted by the CCCB in honour of the 40th anniversary of Nostra Aetate. Present at the reception were members of the CCCB’s permanent council, Jewish leaders, rabbis and Israeli Embassy staff, and bishops on the Commission for Christian Unity, Relations with the Jews and Interfaith Dialogue. Dr Victor Goldbloom, who chairs the national executive of the Canadian Jewish Congress said the desire for dialogue on both sides has kept Nostra Aetate, published in 1965, a “living document.” Goldbloom said it was important to look forward, to continue to deepen the friendship in an atmosphere of mutual respect. Archbishop André Gaumond, CCCB president, said the reception was one more sign of the mutual commitment to build peace and reconciliation as a sign of hope to humanity. (The Catholic Register)

Leaders from eight Christian denominations gathered in Ottawa’s Vincent Massey Park on 6 October to launch Water: Life Before Profit, a joint project of the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (D&P) and KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives. The campaign is designed to urge Canadians to fight efforts to privatize water supplies both at home and abroad. The chair of the Canadian bishops’ Social Affairs Commission, Archbishop Roger Ebacher, said clean water was a fundamental right, necessary for the common good. He warned that privatization of water supplies makes water too costly for many poor families and takes control of the resource out of public hands. (Catholic Times)

Posted: Dec. 31, 2005 • Permanent link: ecumenism.net/?p=184
Categories: CCE • In this article: Centre Canadien d’œcuménisme Transmis : 31 déc. 2005 • Lien permanente : ecumenism.net/?p=184
Catégorie : CCE • Dans cet article : Centre Canadien d’œcuménisme