posted on May 31, 2010 in Columns, Patricia Schneider

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Like many Christians, I’v had difficulty trying to comprehend the Trinity. The enormity of God fills me with awe.

posted on May 31, 2010 in Columns, The Messy Table

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Recently, my daughter has been toasting God. And I don’t like it.

posted on May 26, 2010 in Columns, The Messy Table

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Check out the burning bush gig stick! Complete General Assembly reports. I love it. And I want one…

posted on May 24, 2010 in Columns, Patricia Schneider

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I watched as the tiny spider at its end, without fear, spun itself down until it rested on a nearby chair. It was really faith in action.

posted on May 24, 2010 in Columns, The Messy Table

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Today, it’s still a great story, and one that easily makes its way into every Bible-stories-for-kids-at-bedtime storybook.

posted on May 17, 2010 in Columns, The Messy Table

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Reading these stories, you know that to be somewhere cosy and bright and with family is to be connected to a greater goodness. And sometimes that’s hard because the house is small and being a little sister and a big sister at the same time isn’t easy.

posted on May 17, 2010 in Columns, Patricia Schneider

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The mind is a curious thing and I was learning fascinating things about it. But the practical aspects of the job were a far greater learning experience.

posted on May 15, 2010 in In Song

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I first met California singer-songwriters, Jean and Jim Strathdee, at the Naramata Centre, near Penticton, B.C., when I was writing for the church curriculum The Whole People of God.

posted on May 15, 2010 in Columns, Wondering Wanderer

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In a coincidence that I think was unconnected with the loss of a beloved sister-in-law during the last Christmas season, I have read two books about death and resurrection in recent weeks.

posted on May 10, 2010 in Columns, Patricia Schneider

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We waited together…
Waiting for time to stop.

posted on May 10, 2010 in Columns, The Messy Table

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Memory loss is everywhere these days. Culturally, we seem fascinated with it. It’s like a Rubik’s cube that we keep picking up, not really expecting to solve it but playing with it nonetheless because it’s so intriguing.

posted on May 3, 2010 in Columns, Patricia Schneider

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I grinned as my eyes slid over the old photo of us, grubby but smiling, sitting around the campfire at the end of the climb. We’d been so young and full of enthusiasm. I’d learned something special that day; something that has stood by me through the years.

posted on May 3, 2010 in Columns, The Messy Table

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I want to consider parenting as a spiritual practice. Not because parenting is purer or more sacred or less worldly than other activities, but because it is so consistently messy.

posted on May 1, 2010 in Columns, Wondering Wanderer

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We are a religion of the word and, boy, do we hear a lot of words.

posted on May 1, 2010 in In Song

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There’s an album, now 20 years old, that keeps popping into my conversations. It came up most recently in a planning meeting for the Emmaus Project.

posted on May 1, 2010 in News

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Kilgour Vies for Nobel Prize

LOLing About on the Interwebs, by Bradley Childs

Canada in 2031: Greater Diversity, Fewer Christians

More Honours for Kettle

Head of Planned Giving Plans to be Moderator, by Connie Purvis

The Faces of Fair Trade, by Connie Purvis

Church Councils Forge Ahead, by Amy MacLachlan

Muslim Woman Expelled Over Veil, Files Complaint

Quebec Human Rights Commission Weighs in on Muslim Veils

B.C. Churches and Temples Offer $25,000 for New Chaplain

Come One, Come All, by Amy MacLachlan

Letter from India: “We Eat Rats”, by Guy Smagghe

Presbyterians Lend a Hand in Vancouver

P.E.I. Church Tackles Oil Spills

The Book of Praise Now in Braille

The Story Behind… the Book

posted on May 1, 2010 in Letters

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Re Populist Thuggery, March

Wasn’t the title of your editorial somewhat hyperbolic for a (presumably objective) discussion on whether or not society could more effectiviely match punishment and any given crime?

I too am a practicing Presbyterian, but my view of Christian forgiveness tells me that criminals (ergo sinners) need to supplicate for God’s forgiveness rather than that of the increasingly atheistic society in which they/we live. Perhaps if I were a better quality of Christian I might be able to forgive and forget, making it convenient and comfortable for the perpetrator by separating his criminal act from its victim, for example in the case of a child, raped and beaten to death by a miscreant, a person I fear you might view as being totally forgivable. But I can’t think that way, because I regard the innocent victim’s interests as being paramount in such events. Nor do I have any inclination to apologize for this view, which I believe to be based on reasonable, humane logic.

Surely you agree that there are unspeakable crimes that are so horrendous as to be unforgivable in the eyes of the sane majority? The literal view of universal forgiveness that you espouse in you editorial, if practiced wholeheartedly, might negate culpability in all criminals, making Canada an object of ridicule throughout the world and making it a promising haven for international criminals. Thugs might be flocking here by the thousand.

Frankly, your attempt to provide statistics so as to bolster the case for lesser sentences and less incarceration appears to be a very large, very red and very redundant herring. The statistical incidence of any form of crime has nothing whatsoever to do with the severity of it as an antisocial act against innocent members of society. In case it might not have occurred to you yet, on rare occasions psychopathic monsters are born into this world — humans with no sense of the true value of God’s greatest gift, viz. human life, and some of those will go on to rape, abuse, torture and kill innocent people. Whether or not those perpetrators are sane or insane, they pose the same threat to society, and society needs to be protected from them. I’m willing to go out on a limb and suggest that the law-abiding, peace-loving majority in this country would much prefer to see such psychopathic murderers humanely incarcerated for the rest of their natural lives rather than being given a Christian blessing, a prayer-book and then sent on their way.

In the same way that the statistical occurrence of a particular crime is unrelated to it’s significance, recidivism figures are also irrelevant in any discussion on crime and punishment. Crimes are considered, and criminals are tried and sentenced on an individual basis, and references to such statistics have no place in the trial or sentencing of a transgressor.

I’m afraid that you are singing from an entirely wrong hymnal here; it’s been my observation that most Canadians, including my numerous Presbyterian friends, want sentences for heinous crimes increased not decreased. If Canada has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, we should be glad of it, as it means that the courts, for all their numerous faults, are protecting us from our social enemies in a relatively effective way. Religion, its practice and the personal beliefs that go with it are critically important in their way, but jurisprudence represents an entirely different sphere of life altogether.

posted on May 1, 2010 in People & Places

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St. Paul’s, Simcoe, Ont., recently held their annual Family Christmas Breakfast and were joined by special guests Calvin Brown, Executive Director of the Renewal Fellowship within the PCC, left, and his wife Phyllis. They were guests of St. Paul’s minister, Rev. Ian Shaw, far right and his wife Linda. Mr. Brown also writes very interesting and informative columns for the Presbyterian Record.

posted on May 1, 2010 in Features

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Intentionally and Freely:
“Each of you must give as you have made up your
own mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion …”
— 2 Corinthians 9:7

Proportionally:
“For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has — not according to
what one does not have.” — 2 Corinthians 8:12

Off The Top:
“On the first day of every week, each of you is to
put aside and save whatever extra you earn …”
— 1 Corinthians 16:2

Gratefully:
“For who am I, and what is my people, that we should be able to make this freewill offering? For all things come from you, and of your own have we given you.”
— 1 Chronicles 29:14

Cheerfully:
“God loves a cheerful giver.” — 2 Corinthians 9:7

posted on May 1, 2010 in News

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Presbyterian PoliticiaN and human rights advocate David Kilgour has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his investigations of alleged organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China.

His research partner, human rights lawyer David Matas, has also been independently nominated. They previously won the 2009 Human Rights Award from the International Society for Human Rights.

The duo coauthored Bloody Harvest: The Killing of Falun Gong Practitioners for their Organs. The book details interviews and research which suggests imprisoned practitioners have become the victims of a lucrative market for organ transplants.

Falun Gong is a system of beliefs and practices founded in China in 1992 by Li Hongzhi. The country’s Community Party banned the movement in 1999.

Kilgour was a serial MP for southeastern Edmonton between 1979 and 2006, and served as secretary of state for Latin America and Africa, and for Asia-Pacific.

The Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded Dec. 10 in Oslo, Norway. — C.Purvis