Friday, 12 November, 2010
Debate with Justin Trotter
The Munk Debates posted today a webcam debate between myself and Justin Trottier. Click here to watch the debate and, if you think I won, feel free to vote for me.
Thursday, 11 November, 2010
Makes me Want to Shop at Macy's
Copied from operphila.org.
On Saturday, October 30, 2010, the Opera Company of Philadelphia kicked off National Opera Week by partnering with Macy’s and John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to produce one of Knight Foundation’s “Random Acts of Culture” on a grand scale in Philadelphia.
With the Opera Company of Philadelphia Chorus as a core, over 600 singers from area choirs, accompanied by the famed Wanamaker Organ – the world’s largest pipe organ – surprised shoppers at the Center City Philadelphia Macy’s with a spontaneous rendition of the Hallelujah chorus from Handel’s Messiah. (Please see below for a full list of participating choruses!)
The performance builds on the success of the Opera Company’s April 2010 performance of a pop-up Brindisi chorus that featured 35 choristers from La traviata at the Reading Terminal Market, and which has received nearly 3 million hits worldwide on YouTube since its posting.
The Opera Company is committed to encouraging the personal practice of singing in fun and accessible ways, and is honored to be performing with the revered Wanamaker Organ. Macy’s is committed to preserving this treasured, historical instrument as one of the many community investments – such as their annual fireworks display, their famed Thanksgiving Day Parade, and the Macy’s Christmas Light Show and Dickens Village in Center City Philadelphia – which are made possible by their support.
This Hallelujah performance is generously funded as one of 1,000 “Random Acts of Culture” that Knight Foundation will make possible over the next three years. The “Random Acts of Culture” program is committed to bringing artists out of the performance halls and into the streets as a reminder of how the classical arts enrich lives.
This “Random Act of Culture” is scheduled to coincide with the launch of National Opera Week, spearheaded by Opera America and the National Endowment for the Arts as a way to celebrate the exciting opera activity in the United States each year by offering accessible, fun, free activities that encourage opera appreciation.
Our most sincere thanks to all of the individuals who joined us in song and in spirit on October 30th – follow us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr for information on future events!
On Saturday, October 30, 2010, the Opera Company of Philadelphia kicked off National Opera Week by partnering with Macy’s and John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to produce one of Knight Foundation’s “Random Acts of Culture” on a grand scale in Philadelphia.
With the Opera Company of Philadelphia Chorus as a core, over 600 singers from area choirs, accompanied by the famed Wanamaker Organ – the world’s largest pipe organ – surprised shoppers at the Center City Philadelphia Macy’s with a spontaneous rendition of the Hallelujah chorus from Handel’s Messiah. (Please see below for a full list of participating choruses!)
The performance builds on the success of the Opera Company’s April 2010 performance of a pop-up Brindisi chorus that featured 35 choristers from La traviata at the Reading Terminal Market, and which has received nearly 3 million hits worldwide on YouTube since its posting.
The Opera Company is committed to encouraging the personal practice of singing in fun and accessible ways, and is honored to be performing with the revered Wanamaker Organ. Macy’s is committed to preserving this treasured, historical instrument as one of the many community investments – such as their annual fireworks display, their famed Thanksgiving Day Parade, and the Macy’s Christmas Light Show and Dickens Village in Center City Philadelphia – which are made possible by their support.
This Hallelujah performance is generously funded as one of 1,000 “Random Acts of Culture” that Knight Foundation will make possible over the next three years. The “Random Acts of Culture” program is committed to bringing artists out of the performance halls and into the streets as a reminder of how the classical arts enrich lives.
This “Random Act of Culture” is scheduled to coincide with the launch of National Opera Week, spearheaded by Opera America and the National Endowment for the Arts as a way to celebrate the exciting opera activity in the United States each year by offering accessible, fun, free activities that encourage opera appreciation.
Our most sincere thanks to all of the individuals who joined us in song and in spirit on October 30th – follow us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr for information on future events!
Wednesday, 20 October, 2010
Calgary City Soul Project Released
Today Cardus is officially releasing the Phase I part of our Calgary City Soul project - an inventory of the physical worship spaces in the city core. The report can be found on the Cardus website.
Attached is the media release that went out this morning.
Calgary’s Centre City Plan: Disincentive to Diversity?
CALGARY, October 20, 2010—The City of Calgary's Centre City Plan may create an unintended disincentive to diversity, to the distribution of vital social services, and to continuing widely accepted social virtues, according to a preliminary study released today by Cardus.
"The Centre City Plan is an impressive document," said Ray Pennings, Cardus Senior Fellow and Director of Research. "But it has unintentionally failed to provide growth opportunities for one element—institutions of faith—that have been at the heart of cities since the beginning of civilization. It failed, in fact, to even mention them."
Cardus' audit, conducted over the summer, analyzed the physical infrastructure that supports the work of faith communities in the area defined by the Centre City Plan. The audit shows there are 25 spaces devoted to worship—mostly Christian churches and one Buddhist Temple—active within the boundaries defined by the Centre City Plan. That plan is designed to provide room and services for 40,000 additional residents in the civic core in the years ahead. There are no synagogues, mosques, Latter Day Saints, Sikh or Hindu temples currently within the civic core.
The study also shows that those 25 existing institutions, in addition to nurturing people's spiritual needs, provide a comprehensive array of social services that contribute to the culture, physical fitness, language learning, and job search and skills enhancement for new and old Calgarians. These congregations also support immigrant transition, food and clothing banks, addiction recovery groups, work with HIV patients, the homeless and single mothers, as well as temporary housing and social assistance for those in need. These spaces are also used for music concerts, performing arts, marriage counselling and childcare for those who live, work in or visit the downtown core.
"While worship itself has always spoken to people's most deeply held beliefs and helped us define what it means to be a human being, it is clear that even for those who do not share those beliefs, these institutions act as incubators for commonly accepted social virtues," said Pennings. "Capping the diversity and strength of institutions that sustain our spirit within our city's core, while limiting their opportunities for growth to the fringes of our society, at the very least requires a thoughtful conversation regarding the nature of the city Calgarians are building."
With the preliminary audit complete, Pennings said Cardus hopes to launch a more comprehensive study of the impact of institutions of faith on Calgary's culture. Cardus is a think tank and ideas lab for social innovation that builds intellectual capacity, social networks and policy alternatives to sustain a wide range of cultural entrepreneurs involved in the study and renewal of North American social architecture. Its team members are scattered across Canada and the US with permanent staff on site in Hamilton and Calgary.
-30-
Media Contact:
Ray Pennings (403)479-4590
rpennings@cardus.ca
A direct download copy of Calgary City Soul Phase 1: Inventory of Physical Worship Space in Calgary’s City Centre is available at http://www.cardus.ca/files/calgaryworshipspaces/
Attached is the media release that went out this morning.
Calgary’s Centre City Plan: Disincentive to Diversity?
CALGARY, October 20, 2010—The City of Calgary's Centre City Plan may create an unintended disincentive to diversity, to the distribution of vital social services, and to continuing widely accepted social virtues, according to a preliminary study released today by Cardus.
"The Centre City Plan is an impressive document," said Ray Pennings, Cardus Senior Fellow and Director of Research. "But it has unintentionally failed to provide growth opportunities for one element—institutions of faith—that have been at the heart of cities since the beginning of civilization. It failed, in fact, to even mention them."
Cardus' audit, conducted over the summer, analyzed the physical infrastructure that supports the work of faith communities in the area defined by the Centre City Plan. The audit shows there are 25 spaces devoted to worship—mostly Christian churches and one Buddhist Temple—active within the boundaries defined by the Centre City Plan. That plan is designed to provide room and services for 40,000 additional residents in the civic core in the years ahead. There are no synagogues, mosques, Latter Day Saints, Sikh or Hindu temples currently within the civic core.
The study also shows that those 25 existing institutions, in addition to nurturing people's spiritual needs, provide a comprehensive array of social services that contribute to the culture, physical fitness, language learning, and job search and skills enhancement for new and old Calgarians. These congregations also support immigrant transition, food and clothing banks, addiction recovery groups, work with HIV patients, the homeless and single mothers, as well as temporary housing and social assistance for those in need. These spaces are also used for music concerts, performing arts, marriage counselling and childcare for those who live, work in or visit the downtown core.
"While worship itself has always spoken to people's most deeply held beliefs and helped us define what it means to be a human being, it is clear that even for those who do not share those beliefs, these institutions act as incubators for commonly accepted social virtues," said Pennings. "Capping the diversity and strength of institutions that sustain our spirit within our city's core, while limiting their opportunities for growth to the fringes of our society, at the very least requires a thoughtful conversation regarding the nature of the city Calgarians are building."
With the preliminary audit complete, Pennings said Cardus hopes to launch a more comprehensive study of the impact of institutions of faith on Calgary's culture. Cardus is a think tank and ideas lab for social innovation that builds intellectual capacity, social networks and policy alternatives to sustain a wide range of cultural entrepreneurs involved in the study and renewal of North American social architecture. Its team members are scattered across Canada and the US with permanent staff on site in Hamilton and Calgary.
-30-
Media Contact:
Ray Pennings (403)479-4590
rpennings@cardus.ca
A direct download copy of Calgary City Soul Phase 1: Inventory of Physical Worship Space in Calgary’s City Centre is available at http://www.cardus.ca/files/calgaryworshipspaces/
From Today's Calgary Herald
Great cities need leadership, resources and spirit For The Calgary Herald October 20, 2010 2:15 By most measures, the city, which has just elected a freshly minted mayor and council is doing well. The Calgary Foundation's 2009 Vital Signs report showed a city becoming a better, safer place to live and the City of Calgary's Centre City Plan is a roadmap for a vibrant core. It has room for the growth of commerce, condos, shopping, arts and entertainment, pubs, restaurants. It satisfies the senses and without question is a fine document -- a dynamic template for a city with great aspirations.
Yet a critical element -- one found in all of the world's great cities -- has been overlooked. The Centre City Plan leaves no room for the growth of faith institutions to serve the 40,000 additional residents expected to fill its core.
What are the consequences of this in terms of brick-and-mortar space as well as program delivery? If city living is intended to meet the wide range of its residents' needs, isn't spiritual nourishment among those? If the plan makes no reference to the need for growth of the faith institutions, what will flourishing in the future be like? Can a great city exist without nurturing its most deeply held beliefs?
Cardus, a think-tank that studies social architecture and which has undertaken similar work in Toronto and Hamilton, has now completed the first of a multi-phase undertaking designed to answer these questions. We have conducted an audit of the physical infrastructure that supports the work of faith communities in the Calgary city centre. The existence of structures like churches, mosques, and temples speak to the fact that worship has been part of what it means to be human since the beginning of time. Faith communities, just like arts and business communities, have impacts on citizens whether or not they participate in them.
This is what we have discovered and some of the questions we hope to address in the next phases of our work.
There are 25 spaces devoted to worship within the boundaries of Calgary's Centre City. They range from historic Christian churches, to a Buddhist Monastery, to spaces provided for Muslim Friday prayers. There are no synagogues, mosques, LDS, Hindu or Sikh temples.
The spaces that do exist are in some cases used by multiple religious communities. They are networked with each other, with governments, non-profits, and businesses to provide a vast range of social services. The religious communities in the downtown core are responsible for the creation of significant levels of social capital in volunteer hours, charitable activity and infrastructure serving the needs of the underclass.
Additionally, churches offer a wide range of services which aren't specifically religious, nor necessarily aimed at the poor, but contribute to the arts, physical fitness, language learning, job search and skills enhancement.
The precise impacts of limiting the participation of faith institutions in these areas will be the subject of future work but it is clear that without the Mustard Seed, Salvation Army, Inn From the Cold, Calgary Urban Project Society (CUPS), Neighbourlink, FaithLink, AA, NA, and other groups using religious spaces in downtown Calgary, the city core would be a very different place. One does not have to be a believer to recognize that institutions of faith have -- if nothing else -- sociological value as incubators of social virtues.
Calgary's historic churches played a significant role in the establishment of the city, its character and its culture. St. Patrick Roman Catholic Church was built in 1883 in East Calgary, was later moved and renamed Our Lady of Peace before finally becoming St. Mary's Cathedral. Knox United Church (originally Knox Presbyterian) was built in 1883, Cathedral Church of the Redeemer by the Anglicans in 1884, and Trinity Lutheran Church in 1889. Over the years, other venues were added to reflect diversity and include worship spaces for francophones, Hungarians, Ethiopians and Eritreans, Vietnamese, Hispanic, Chinese and other Asian communities.
Beyond the spiritual, the Cardus work shows these congregations provide a vast range of services to the wider community, including language instruction, food and clothing banks, addiction recovery groups, work with the homeless, the unemployed, single mothers, HIV patients, temporary housing and social assistance. These spaces are also used for music concerts, performing arts, marriage counselling and child care for those who live, work in or visit the downtown core.
As the makeup of Calgary's downtown residential population changes, so too will the need for worship spaces to reflect those changes. Adding 40,000 residents means there will be a need for space well beyond present capacity. The extent to which the current Centre City plan creates a disincentive to diversity within the core will be a matter for further study. It's also a conversation that needs to engage us all.
Ray Pennings is Senior Fellow and Director of Research for Cardus.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/Great+cities+need+leadership+resources+spirit/3698326/story.html#ixzz12tjLbSNh
Yet a critical element -- one found in all of the world's great cities -- has been overlooked. The Centre City Plan leaves no room for the growth of faith institutions to serve the 40,000 additional residents expected to fill its core.
What are the consequences of this in terms of brick-and-mortar space as well as program delivery? If city living is intended to meet the wide range of its residents' needs, isn't spiritual nourishment among those? If the plan makes no reference to the need for growth of the faith institutions, what will flourishing in the future be like? Can a great city exist without nurturing its most deeply held beliefs?
Cardus, a think-tank that studies social architecture and which has undertaken similar work in Toronto and Hamilton, has now completed the first of a multi-phase undertaking designed to answer these questions. We have conducted an audit of the physical infrastructure that supports the work of faith communities in the Calgary city centre. The existence of structures like churches, mosques, and temples speak to the fact that worship has been part of what it means to be human since the beginning of time. Faith communities, just like arts and business communities, have impacts on citizens whether or not they participate in them.
This is what we have discovered and some of the questions we hope to address in the next phases of our work.
There are 25 spaces devoted to worship within the boundaries of Calgary's Centre City. They range from historic Christian churches, to a Buddhist Monastery, to spaces provided for Muslim Friday prayers. There are no synagogues, mosques, LDS, Hindu or Sikh temples.
The spaces that do exist are in some cases used by multiple religious communities. They are networked with each other, with governments, non-profits, and businesses to provide a vast range of social services. The religious communities in the downtown core are responsible for the creation of significant levels of social capital in volunteer hours, charitable activity and infrastructure serving the needs of the underclass.
Additionally, churches offer a wide range of services which aren't specifically religious, nor necessarily aimed at the poor, but contribute to the arts, physical fitness, language learning, job search and skills enhancement.
The precise impacts of limiting the participation of faith institutions in these areas will be the subject of future work but it is clear that without the Mustard Seed, Salvation Army, Inn From the Cold, Calgary Urban Project Society (CUPS), Neighbourlink, FaithLink, AA, NA, and other groups using religious spaces in downtown Calgary, the city core would be a very different place. One does not have to be a believer to recognize that institutions of faith have -- if nothing else -- sociological value as incubators of social virtues.
Calgary's historic churches played a significant role in the establishment of the city, its character and its culture. St. Patrick Roman Catholic Church was built in 1883 in East Calgary, was later moved and renamed Our Lady of Peace before finally becoming St. Mary's Cathedral. Knox United Church (originally Knox Presbyterian) was built in 1883, Cathedral Church of the Redeemer by the Anglicans in 1884, and Trinity Lutheran Church in 1889. Over the years, other venues were added to reflect diversity and include worship spaces for francophones, Hungarians, Ethiopians and Eritreans, Vietnamese, Hispanic, Chinese and other Asian communities.
Beyond the spiritual, the Cardus work shows these congregations provide a vast range of services to the wider community, including language instruction, food and clothing banks, addiction recovery groups, work with the homeless, the unemployed, single mothers, HIV patients, temporary housing and social assistance. These spaces are also used for music concerts, performing arts, marriage counselling and child care for those who live, work in or visit the downtown core.
As the makeup of Calgary's downtown residential population changes, so too will the need for worship spaces to reflect those changes. Adding 40,000 residents means there will be a need for space well beyond present capacity. The extent to which the current Centre City plan creates a disincentive to diversity within the core will be a matter for further study. It's also a conversation that needs to engage us all.
Ray Pennings is Senior Fellow and Director of Research for Cardus.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/Great+cities+need+leadership+resources+spirit/3698326/story.html#ixzz12tjLbSNh
Saturday, 16 October, 2010
Cardus Center for Cultural Renewal
We held a Calgary launch this week and the Herald today has a fine piece outlining what we do.
New centre building roads between culture and faith
By Mario Toneguzzi, Calgary HeraldOctober 16, 2010 7:51 AM CALGARY - The Centre for Cultural Renewal has existed for two decades with a mission to explain faith to culture and culture to faith. But this year, it joined with think-tank Cardus to become the Cardus Centre for Cultural Renewal.
"Essentially, what (the centre) does is look at issues of faith broadly defined. It's not a denominational organization. It's certainly not an evangelizing organization," said centre director Peter Stockland.
"But it tries to look at the way people's faiths and beliefs impact their ability to function as full and effective citizens."
Stockland was in Calgary on Thursday for the Calgary launch of the centre with Cardus. The centre has a publication called LexView. It also holds an annual Parliament Hill lecture in Ottawa.
"We share so many commonalities with (Cardus) and we take such a similar approach in terms of the need to look at issues of faith in the public square," said Stockland.
Peter Menzies, a senior fellow with Cardus, said Cardus studies "social architecture."
"We're not left. We're not right. We're actually not all that interested in those sorts of definitions," he said.
"We basically work to study and support public intellectuals who are interested in the study of society's key institutions."
Menzies said the organization is "unapologetic" about the fact its intellectual capacities are founded in 2,000 years of Christian thinking. "We don't evangelize in that sense ... We provide a venue for people with an intellectual foundation in Christian thought to participate in public square discussions."
Its website describes Cardus as a think-tank -- an ideas lab for social innovation.
"We build intellectual capacity, social networks and policy alternatives to sustain a wide range of cultural entrepreneurs for the renewal of North American social architecture."
Team members are throughout Canada and the United States, with a home base in Hamilton, Ont.
"The Cardus was a kind of marketplace or public square that took the form of a public street," says the organization's website. "It was the north-south road that connected people in Roman cities to their major public spaces.
"We face a growing gap. Our institutions and cities are connected by high speed networks that move people, products and information with increasing speed. This acceleration has important cultural implications. Cardus conducts research that explores how these changes will redefine our moral and political horizons."
mtoneguzzi@calgaryherald.com
For those in the Ottawa area or who have reason to be in Ottawa this week, the Ottawa launch of the CCCR and the Hill lecuture will take place this coming Wednesday,October 20th. It is sounding like we are expecting a very good attendance but more are always welcome.
New centre building roads between culture and faith
By Mario Toneguzzi, Calgary HeraldOctober 16, 2010 7:51 AM CALGARY - The Centre for Cultural Renewal has existed for two decades with a mission to explain faith to culture and culture to faith. But this year, it joined with think-tank Cardus to become the Cardus Centre for Cultural Renewal.
"Essentially, what (the centre) does is look at issues of faith broadly defined. It's not a denominational organization. It's certainly not an evangelizing organization," said centre director Peter Stockland.
"But it tries to look at the way people's faiths and beliefs impact their ability to function as full and effective citizens."
Stockland was in Calgary on Thursday for the Calgary launch of the centre with Cardus. The centre has a publication called LexView. It also holds an annual Parliament Hill lecture in Ottawa.
"We share so many commonalities with (Cardus) and we take such a similar approach in terms of the need to look at issues of faith in the public square," said Stockland.
Peter Menzies, a senior fellow with Cardus, said Cardus studies "social architecture."
"We're not left. We're not right. We're actually not all that interested in those sorts of definitions," he said.
"We basically work to study and support public intellectuals who are interested in the study of society's key institutions."
Menzies said the organization is "unapologetic" about the fact its intellectual capacities are founded in 2,000 years of Christian thinking. "We don't evangelize in that sense ... We provide a venue for people with an intellectual foundation in Christian thought to participate in public square discussions."
Its website describes Cardus as a think-tank -- an ideas lab for social innovation.
"We build intellectual capacity, social networks and policy alternatives to sustain a wide range of cultural entrepreneurs for the renewal of North American social architecture."
Team members are throughout Canada and the United States, with a home base in Hamilton, Ont.
"The Cardus was a kind of marketplace or public square that took the form of a public street," says the organization's website. "It was the north-south road that connected people in Roman cities to their major public spaces.
"We face a growing gap. Our institutions and cities are connected by high speed networks that move people, products and information with increasing speed. This acceleration has important cultural implications. Cardus conducts research that explores how these changes will redefine our moral and political horizons."
mtoneguzzi@calgaryherald.com
For those in the Ottawa area or who have reason to be in Ottawa this week, the Ottawa launch of the CCCR and the Hill lecuture will take place this coming Wednesday,October 20th. It is sounding like we are expecting a very good attendance but more are always welcome.
Wednesday, 13 October, 2010
Articles worth referencing....
Last week Friday, the Globe and Mail ran my piece "The Wildrose Shot heard round Alberta - and Ottawa."
Saturday in the Calgary Herald ran a story which referenced some research Cardus will be releasing next week about the contribution of faith and faith-based agencies to Calgary's city core.
A colleague brought to my attention an article by Margaret Sommerville already a few months old which helpfully highlights the role of religion in the public square, and how it is a mistake to think that secularism is neutral. Worth a read.
Saturday in the Calgary Herald ran a story which referenced some research Cardus will be releasing next week about the contribution of faith and faith-based agencies to Calgary's city core.
A colleague brought to my attention an article by Margaret Sommerville already a few months old which helpfully highlights the role of religion in the public square, and how it is a mistake to think that secularism is neutral. Worth a read.
Changing Focus
The politicians have various phrases (prorogue, recalibrate, going on a listening tour, etc.) they use when they need to change the agenda, and it appears that my commitment to this page needs a similar agenda change. When I started blogging, I resolved that a 3-4 entry per week was required to make this meaningful for writer and reader. Despite best efforts, it simply is proving impossible to keep up this pace. There are good reasons - the pace at Cardus is simply much faster with larger projects, more project proposals, and speaking opportunities coming our way, all demanding more of my time and creative energy. Throw in my commitment to getting my Masters degree completed sooner rather than later, volunteer and family responsiblities, and the reality that I am learning to enjoy myself (took Thanksgiving weekend off and read both Inside Harperland and Taking the High Road- last year I would've blogged a review of both; now I simply enjoyed them, put them down and went for a snooze.)
So rather than beat myself up over this, I am simply resigning myself to the reality. Hence, for the foreseeable future, the focus of this page will change a bit. I will link events / articles that I have written / articles of interest perhaps with one or two sentence explanations but no attempt to provide further commentary. This will allow (a) this page to provide a useful archive for myself in finding documents of interest and (b) provide a potential resource for others who may be interested in some of the same things I am to find articles of interest. Perhaps in the future again I will find time or occasion to provide more regular commentary on current events again, but for the time being, this page will end up with more of an aggregator feel.
So rather than beat myself up over this, I am simply resigning myself to the reality. Hence, for the foreseeable future, the focus of this page will change a bit. I will link events / articles that I have written / articles of interest perhaps with one or two sentence explanations but no attempt to provide further commentary. This will allow (a) this page to provide a useful archive for myself in finding documents of interest and (b) provide a potential resource for others who may be interested in some of the same things I am to find articles of interest. Perhaps in the future again I will find time or occasion to provide more regular commentary on current events again, but for the time being, this page will end up with more of an aggregator feel.
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