Le lundi 29 novembre 2010 - Volume 100 Numéro12 Le seul journal francophone de l’Université McGill
Volume 100, Issue 23
November 29, 2010 mcgilldaily.com
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Foi Faith Une édition bilingue A bilingual issue
Table des matières Table of contents
5
Éditorial
News | Nouvelles
10 Students talk about the Middle East 11 La démocratie-chrétienne
Commentaire | Commentary
13 La foi à temps partiel 14 Faith and Marxism
Feature
20 The transformation of Brother André
Plus: Arch Café emails released 8
Arts & Culture
26 Souvenirs d’Auschwitz 27 A saint for Kahnawake?
Life | Société
30 La radio de Jésus? 31 Tolérance et foi en terre brûlée 33 Sports as faith
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The Daily returns on Jan 10, 2011
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
Éditorial
29.11.2010
La foi en héritage
Faith as change in Haiti
Montréal est connue pour être «la ville aux cent clochers». Cependant, depuis les dernières années, la métropole québécoise se voit graduellement dépouillée de ses églises, celles-ci étant démolies ou se réincarnant dans des complexes d’habitation. Vous direz que ce changement dans le paysage urbain est raisonnable, que ces lieux de culte sont de toute façon de moins en moins fréquentés, que la vocation d’être prêtre ou sœur n’est plus aussi répandue et que l’argent serait mieux investi ailleurs – dans l’éducation, notamment, bien sûr. Notre patrimoine religieux n’est-il aujourd’hui qu’un ramassis de vieux édifices délaissés, reniés, oubliés? N’y a-t-il pas sous cette architecture surannée et au-delà de ses lourdes portes, un monde qui nous appartient? Lequel, posez-vous? Le passé.
Yesterday, Haitians voted in their first elections since January’s earthquake, which killed over 200,000 people and decimated the country’s infrastructure. Though voting was held under the UN’s watch, the elections were far from fair. Most notably, former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his liberation theology-inspired party Fanmi Lavalas were excluded. As this joint issue of The Daily and Le Délit looks into the many roles that faith plays in the contemporary world, we should consider the crucial part that a particular kind of faith, liberation theology, has played in Aristide’s – and Haiti’s – recent political history.
Lorsqu’on la pose la question de ce qu’est la foi, on pense inévitablement au sacré, à la religion, à Dieu. Cependant, avant tout culte et toute divinité, la foi est croyance, «avoir foi en quelque chose», «avoir la foi». C’est d’abord un sentiment de confiance, d’assurance, d’adhésion. Les deux racines latines de «religion», religare (relier) et religere (relire), expriment bien l’intention première de ces récits mythiques et mystiques. La religion était sensée relier les êtres humains et relire la vie –personnelle et collective, créer un sens aux événements fortuits. La religion était une histoire qui se transmettait de génération en génération, transmission de péripéties et de valeurs. Seulement, l’être humain s’est vu instrumentalisé au service de textes lus au pied de la lettre, d’un sens élevé à une vérité absolue et proférée par une entité divine. La mort s’est substituée à la vie, et la liberté de l’homme est écrasée sous la force d’une idole inhumaine. Certains diront que la foi religieuse n’a été qu’une immense source de violence et que le monde se porterait mieux sans religion. Et les événements ne manquent pas de confirmer cette proposition. Toutefois, en temps de crise, la foi a également été indispensable pour la survie, intimement liée à des gestes de solidarité, de compassion et d’espoir. Ce mandat premier de la foi, d’union, se voit trop souvent écarté des décisions qui ont trait au patrimoine religieux. Comme si la réalité quotidienne ne se poursuivait pas dans ces espaces de culte, alors qu’autrefois ceux-ci pouvaient mieux éclairer le monde. Cette conception a créé une séparation entre la foi pour le futur et la foi en l’Homme. La religion est enchâssée dans l’histoire et répond à des doutes et des attentes. Voltaire lui-même a dit: «Si Dieu n’existait pas, il faudrait l’inventer.» La société moderne est beaucoup plus laïque qu’autrefois, sans aucun doute, mais avec la disparition de ces lieux de foi, un certain sentiment d’appartenance s’est aussi éteint. Ce n’est pas pour rien si on remarque plusieurs personnes se rassemblant pour sauver l’église Très-Saint-Nom-de-Jésus et ses orgues, célébrant la canonisation de Frère André, ou participant au documentaire web interactif Sacrée montagne produit à l’ONF. Ainsi, cette publication commune des journaux Le Délit et The McGill Daily sur le thème de la foi et ses différents rôles dans notre monde contemporain est, d’une certaine façon, symbole de deux solitudes moins marquées, d’une communion. x —Mai Anh Tran-Ho
Aristide had long opposed the wholesale privatization and deregulation of the Haitian economy. A former priest, Aristide put forward a political platform – including the establishment of social programs like health care and education for the greatly impoverished Haitian population – that draws its inspiration from liberation theology. After decades of repressive dictatorship, these policies represented serious democratic progress in Haiti, still the poorest country in the Western hemisphere. Liberation theology is a radical strand of Roman Catholicism that emerged in the sixties at the same time that large-scale decolonization movements were gaining strength. In contrast to the Vatican’s official stances, this movement focused on issues of social justice, directly advocating for better material conditions for oppressed communities, especially poor people in Latin America and across the Global South. Leaders inspired by liberation theology, many of them clergy members, formed some of the staunchest opposition to Western-backed military regimes in countries like El Salvador, Argentina, and Nicaragua. Since the 1980s, liberation theology has been under attack. An aggressive campaign led by the then prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Joseph Ratzinger – now Pope Benedict XVI – sought to ostracize it from the Catholic mainstream. At the same time, its objectives and stated opposition to free-market capitalism drew the ire of Western commercial interests and international bodies like the IMF and World Bank, whose programs have severely weakened its strength. Aristide’s Fanmi Lavalas party has suffered from this backlash. First elected in 1990 in the country’s first democratic elections, Aristide served two terms as the president of Haiti. His initial term was cut short by a 1991 coup, though he eventually received conditional support from the Clinton administration and was reinstated in 1994. However, during his second term, beginning in 2001, Aristide’s relationship with the U.S. and its allies had evidently deteriorated in the face of planned nationalization of key industries. In 2004, Aristide resigned the presidency under extreme pressure from the U.S., Canada, and France, among other countries, who lent their support to an armed insurrection against his administration. Aristide has repeatedly claimed that he was forced to resign after being detained at gunpoint by the U.S. military. Ever since his exile, Haiti has seen repeated demonstrations demanding his repatriation. As Aristide remains in forced exile in South Africa, unlikely to return to Haiti any time soon, yesterday’s election in Haiti was anything but democratic. These unjust elections and Haiti’s continued deep poverty demonstrate the need for an alternative ideology. Aristide and Lavalas, with their unabated popularity, could provide just that.
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
Nouvelles | News
29.11.2010
Homeless festival funding cut Heritage Canada decision may spell the end for event Sam Appel
News Writer
F
ourteen days before the État d’urgence, a four-day, five-night homelessness festival in downtown Montreal, the Department of Canadian Heritage decided to drop their share of the funding for this year’s event. The decision has left ATSA (Action terroriste socialement acceptable), the organizer of the event, with a $43,000 deficit, and effectively rules out the possibility of a festival next year. The État d’urgence – French for State of Emergency – which was inaugurated in 1998, ran from Thursday through Sunday in Place Émile-Gamelin last week. The event provided free food, clothing, and medical services for the homeless, and featured art exhibits addressing discourses on homelessness and social exclusion. When asked why Canadian Heritage, the ministry in charge of federal culture grants, cut funding for the festival this year, ATSA cofounder and event organizer Annie Roy responded, “I don’t think there is a reason for it, that’s the problem.” In an email to The Daily, Canadian Heritage’s press service representative Geneviève Myre noted that the ministry made no promises to ATSA this year with regard to funding, and thus had committed no error. “Funding was not withdrawn
for this festival, as no previous funding was announced for this year's event. As stated in our application guidelines, there is no guarantee of funding for applicants from one year to another,” wrote Myre. Despite the promoter’s financial woes, the atmosphere at the festival on Thursday was upbeat. Evidently homeless men lit up at the sight of old friends as they mingled under the massive “protest” photographs by Argentine artist Leonel Luna. Jean Yves, a 57 year-old Montrealer, homeless for 12 years, explained, “It’s good for food, warmth, clothes, for people to get together. People come for the atmosphere.” In the middle of talking he introduced an elderly man he had not seen, he said, since the man went to jail a few months before. “It’s good to see him back here.” One homeless man, who introduced himself as Ralph, said he planned on staying in the park for the whole four days, sleeping in the square with other festivalgoers. “I’m here for the festival just to have fun. I like to meet new personalities, that’s what I like to see,” he said. Most of the visitors at the festival on Thursday did not know that the event had lost its government funding two weeks before. JeanMatthieu, press coordinator for the ATSA, says the organization does not want to seem like it is complaining.
“We’re not mad at Canadian Heritage. We try to understand. But they’re putting us in a bad situation. … We want everyone to know [about the cuts], but also to enjoy the moment,” Barraud said. However, Roy expressed her displeasure with the way the government made its funding decisions known to ATSA. “They do not have consistency. They don’t realize they are asking small cultural organizations to be responsible with their budget,” she said. “[Canadian Heritage] is totally disconnected from the reality of the cultural milieu, how difficult it is to find money. They have the right to put their money elsewhere, but just do it correctly so we don’t crash.” Canadian Heritage did not say whether it would renew ATSA’s grant until two weeks before the festival, and before that, Roy insists, Canadian Heritage led ATSA to think it would gain substantial funding for this year’s festival. “The agent for Canadian Heritage told us to budget $65,000. The way they were encouraging us told us that we should expect money. We kept calling throughout the year up until two weeks ago and we were absolutely not expecting a zero.” Festivalgoers, homeless and otherwise, were disquieted when told that the festival might not be back next year. “If that’s really happening, any-
Victor Tangermann | The McGill Daily
État d’urgence may be packing up for good. one who is here is going to be upset,” said Ralph. Roy holds that not only was Canadian Heritage misleading in the run-up up to the grant decision, but that the basic structure of the fund-
ing operation is detrimental to the cultural institutions it supports. “They are not obliged to give us money but I think there is a certain ethic and procedure that needs to be followed,” said Roy.
femmes. L’odeur d’hypocrisie commençait sérieusement à me brûler les narines. Finalement, il est arrivé au point le plus important de son discours; la Palestine. Il a prétendu que le Hamas avait été démocratiquement élu et que la communauté internationale se devait de respecter le choix des Palestiniens. Il a totalement négligé le fait que ce «parti» a mené un violent putsch contre le Fatah en 2007. Il a aussi eu le culot de dire que le terrorisme était causé par l’État hébreu et l’Occident. L’islam radical, dans son imaginaire, n’y est pour rien. Pourtant, une petite lecture de la charte du Hamas lui aurait permis de découvrir que ce parti, bras palestinien des Frères Musulmans, est profondément ancré dans la haine des Juifs. Cet homme vit dans un déni total de la réalité. Pour lui, Ahmadinejad ne veut pas détruire Israël. Lorsque je lui ai demandé, sous les huées, d’expliquer pourquoi il assistait à des événements organisés par des organismes affiliés aux Frères
Musulmans, une organisation procharia (donc anti-gay et misogyne), il a simplement esquivé la question en prétendant qu’il n’y avait aucun membre des Frères Musulmans dans la salle. Vous doutez encore de la folie des gens présents? Les organisateurs ont réussi à récolter des milliers de dollars pour le Bateau Canadien pour Gaza. Ce bateau se veut être une deuxième flottille de la «paix». Cette flottille avait été organisée par l’IHH, un groupe turc associé au Hamas et parrainé par les Frères Musulmans. J’oubliais, Amir Khadir a fait une apparition. Imaginez si un député conservateur était présent à un événement où on faisait l’apologie de Mussolini. Il devrait démissionner. Je suis sorti de cet événement, en entendant encore le maître de cérémonie crier «Palestine libre!» plus amoureux de ma liberté et de la démocratie que jamais. Vous savez pourquoi? Parce que George Galloway a perdu son siège. x
Gallowayland Chronique| Nouvelles: Attention, chronique de droite Jean François Trudelle Le Délit
L
e 17 novembre, George Galloway venait nous entretenir à l’UQÀM de la liberté d’expression et de libération pour l’Afghanistan et la Palestine. Je ne pouvais pas manquer l’occasion. À peine assise, j’ai eu un avant-goût de ce qui m’attendait. L’homme à ma gauche disait à un ami qu’Agnès Gruda de La Presse était au service du «lobby juif». À ma droite se trouvait un couple de femmes. Quelle délicate ironie de voir ce couple venir faire la cour à des islamistes qui voudraient assurément les voir disparaître. L’événement a commencé avec une demi-heure de retard. Le maître de cérémonie, Stéphan Corriveau du Bateau Canadien pour Gaza, nous a servi un splendide discours. Il a vertement critiqué la droite qui défend les libertés individuelles en déclarant que la seule liberté qu’elle défendait est celle de
faire la guerre. Un peu de recherche lui aurait permis de connaître des instituts tels le Cato Institute, un organisme libertarien américain, qui fait notamment la promotion du retrait des troupes américaines d’Irak et d’Afghanistan. Parmi tous les orateurs, c’est une belle jeune femme qui m’a le plus étonné; Marie Auer-Labonté d’Alternatives, venue parler, keffieh au cou et en jupe, devant une foule de femmes dûment voilées. Qui sait si elle aura toujours le droit d’être si légèrement vêtue dans quarante ans? Une heure plus tard, George Galloway a pris la parole. Il a eu droit à une ovation. Puis, il a commencé à débiter ses niaiseries. Il a commencé par se présenter comme un champion de la liberté d’expression à cause de son «combat» pour entrer au Canada. Ce combat n’a en fait jamais eu lieu étant donné qu’il n’a jamais été interdit d’accès au Canada. Ne reculant devant rien, et ce après avoir dit qu’il était en faveur de la liberté d’expression, il a exprimé
son souhait que les lois contre la diffamation soient utilisées contre le ministre Kenney qui l’aurait prétendument refoulé aux frontières! Ce n’est pas tout. Il a ajouté qu’il était contre la liberté d’expression sans limite! Il a notamment témoigné son appui aux lois contre la diffamation des religions (lire l’islam). En tentant de se défendre des accusations d’antisémitisme, il a avoué son affection profonde pour les «titanesques génies» Marx et Trotsky (ce dernier disait que «toute opposition signifie mort par inanition»). Autrement dit, vous pouvez dire tout ce que vous voulez, dans la mesure où lui et sa bande d’autoritaristes sont d’accord. Il a poursuivi en parlant de l’Afghanistan. Selon lui, l’OTAN est la puissance colonisatrice. Il faut dire qu’il ne fallait pas s’attendre à mieux de quelqu’un qui disait que les Talibans ne sont pas ses ennemis! Par contre, il s’est empressé de dire qu’il était entièrement derrière les droits des gays et des
Nouvelles |News
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
Arch Café emails released The Daily has obtained a bundle of documents relating to the Architecture Café – including personal emails between administrators and student politicians, internal memorandum, and reports – after filing an Access to Information request. The document dump sheds light on the decision-making process surrounding the closure, detailing a coordinated media strategy on the part of the administration. Several key administrators and faculty declined to comment for this article, referring The Daily to Deputy Provost Morton Mendelson. They include Director of the School of Architecture Michael Jemtrud, Director of McGill Food and Dining Services Mathieu Laperle, Assistant Director of Legal Services Vilma Campbell, Dean of Engineering Christophe Pierre and Director of Media Relations Doug Sweet. Go to mcgilldaily. com to see the full documents. By Michael Lee-Murphy, Henry Gass, and Eric Andrew-Gee
B
y July 15, the decision to close the Architecture Café was final. More than a month passed between when the decision to close the cafe was made and when the administration officially told students it would not be reopened. There was also a more than two-month gap between when Architecture Students Association (ASA) president Kyle Burrows was told of the possible closure of the cafe, and when the official notice came. This delay left students confused about how to proceed – whether to resist the closure whole-heartedly and risk losing a student space, or to tentatively plan for a new, studentfriendly space where the cafe had been. Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning) Morton Mendelson wrote Mathieu Laperle, Director of McGill Food and Dining Services, just after noon July 15, in response to a question sent that morning as to whether a final decision had been made on closing the cafe. Mendelson wrote: “I agree that you should remove the [Architecture Café] as a destination in your [promotional] material.” As early as the beginning of June, however, Burrows was made aware that he should start thinking about new uses for the cafe space in a meeting with Michael Jemtrud, Director of the School of Architecture. In a June 15 email from Jemtrud to Mendelson, the director wrote, “The new ASA President [Burrows] is very reasonable and I have basically said the cafe is a done deal. I think I am getting them to the right place but they are concerned about being the bad guys of course and want to make sure it is replaced by something defensible.” In an interview with The Daily, Burrows said he was hesitant over the summer to begin publicly suggesting ideas for replacing the cafe, however, until he was sure the cafe was being shut down. “If the cafe was dead and gone we might start to think about [new plans for the space]. It was that constant struggle that we didn’t want to lose the space for students…but [the cafe] wasn’t a lost cause in our minds,” said Burrows. “For us to come forward with a proposal, before we had received any kind of official confirmation that the cafe would be closed – that would have a very negative effect on the way it was perceived,” he said. Despite Jemtrud’s indication to Mendelson that Burrows was resigned to the closure, the ASA president insists that he wanted to keep the cafe open from the beginning. “Our main objective was to keep that room a student space,” he said, adding that, “the ASA decided very early on that the cafe was the best representation of a student space we could have in the school. Nothing we could think of – especially not a study space – could ever match the quality and the charm of that space.” Katherine Messina, last year’s ASA president and senior manager of the cafe for the past two years, saw a more elaborate strategy in Burrows’ hedging between fighting the closure of the cafe and proposing what might replace it. Despite Burrows’s opposition to closing the cafe, Messina told The Daily that Burrows formally accepted
the administration’s desire to shut down the cafe in an attempt to gain their support throughout negotiations over joining the Engineering Undergraduate Society’s (EUS) Memorandum of Agreement (MoA). “The ASA was never on board with [the cafe’s] closing,” she said. “But because the ASA wanted to be accredited [as a student association] and we didn’t want anything to stop us from doing that, the idea was to make the ASA and the Arch Café appear to be two separate governing bodies, so that whatever was done to save the Arch Café did not reflect on the ASA and would not have made the University be like, ‘No, we’re not giving you your accreditation.’” Messina said she and other managers were tasked with opposing the administration’s decision, setting themselves apart from the ASA, which wanted to remain on the administration’s good side. Messina acknowledged that Architecture students were trying to “pull a fast one” on administrators with this strategy. Part of the ASA’s reason for wanting to be covered by EUS’s MoA – contracts that large student organizations like SSMU, faculty associations, and student newspapers have with the University – was to protect the Arch Café, Messina explained. EUS is allowed to run businesses under the terms of its MoA. “If we joined the EUS…the Arch Café could be a business of the EUS. So that was the idea,” she said. She also added that Jemtrud was aware of this two-pronged approach to saving the cafe, and that he played along in his correspondence with administrators. Both Messina and Burrows said it has been a long-standing goal of Jemtrud’s to join an official student organization with an MoA. “Because Michael [Jemtrud] has a lot invested in the ASA, and he really wants the ASA to ‘re-become’ a student organization, he had to paint Kyle in that light: that Kyle agreed with [closing the cafe], just so we wouldn’t get any backlash about it,” Messina said. In his interview, Burrows said Messina was off the mark, as he spent much of the summer trying to find out why the cafe was being closed, with a mind to keeping it open. “We weren’t hushed to be goody two-shoes with the administration,” Burrows said. Jemtrud was also concerned about who would be percieved as ultimately responsible for the closure. In an August 30 email, he wrote, “Either Food Services takes responsibility...or this thing is going to go sideways.” Mendelson replied later that day that he would be willing to be the “fall guy.” Students involved in the closing of the cafe are unanimous, however, in feeling that the administration largely ignored their concerns. Carly Rouault, slated to be this year’s top manager of the Arch Café prior to being shut down, said that Mendelson refused to negotiate with her and Burrows in a meeting during the first week of school. “Mendelson made it very clear that he was not sure why we were meeting and that there was no chance of any form of negotiation between us,” Rouault wrote in an email to The Daily. “He had made his decision and it did not concern us.”
29.11.2010
JUNE JUNE 15: 8:23 a.m. From: Morton Mendelson To: Michael Jemtrud
Any word on the Architecture students? The summer is fast evaporating, and we are hoping to clear up the issue regarding the Architecture Cafe before the start of the adademic year. JUNE 15: 9:16 a.m. From: Michael Jemtrud To: Morton Mendelson
...The new ASA president is very reasonable and I have basically said that the Cafe is a done deal. I think I am getting them to the right place but they are concerned about being the bad guys of course and want to make sure it is replaced by something defensible.
JULY JULY 15: 12:24 p.m. Mendelson directs MFDS director Mathieu Laperle to remove the Architecture Café from promotional materials.
AUGUST AUGUST 11: 8:25 a.m. From: Michael Jemtrud To: Mathieu Laperle; Morton Mendelson; Christophe Pierre; Subhasis Ghoshal
How do we move on this? I think it is important we give them something ASAP so they are concretely invested in moving forward before school starts. They will defend the decision more heartily and have something positive to tell their constituents during the referendum. ... What is the official process to put this thing to rest? I believe we are finished with the major stick handling at this point. Thanks to Everyone.
AUGUST 18: 5:37 p.m. From: Morton Mendelson To: Mathieu Laperle; Michael Jemtrud; Subhasis Ghoshal
...When you meet the student, please make it clear that you’re meeting her as a courtesy to provide her with information about the changes that will occur. Be careful not to create the impression that you are entering into a “negotiation” about the space or that you are speaking to her as a general representative of students in Architecture.
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Nouvelles | News
This timeline details the administration’s major decisions regarding the closure of the Architecture Café. Where indicated, text has been directly lifted from emails between administrators obtained by The Daily through an Access to Information request. For full documents, see mcgilldaily.com.
SEPTEMBER SEPTEMBER 12: 12:54 p.m. From: Doug Sweet To: Morton Mendelson
...I see this as representing the range of response options, some of which are obviously unacceptable at this stage, but which might have to be considered down the road. • hunker down pretty much in silence and know that, eventually, perhaps after an awful lot of bad feeling, this, too will pass • hang in with the opeds/interviews to try to make the points the administration needs to make, even though this will largely become a dialogue of the deaf • capitulate • try to seek a compromise that will allow this sacred icon to remain in some other form/place
SEPTEMBER 21: 9:18 p.m. EUS president Daniel Keresteci submits EUS proposal to take over control of the cafe to Mendelson, Christophe Pierre, and Michael Jemtrud
SEPTEMBER 21: 9:31 p.m. From: Morton Mendelson To: Mathieu Laperle; Doug Sweet
...My inclination: The University has moved away from having student-run food services outside the [University Centre] and [Thomson House], and we do not intend to revisit that decision. I would sorely like to add: The obvious place for a food service run by undergraduates is in the [University Centre]. And then riff on SSMU selling out to corporate food.
OCTOBER OCTOBER 8: 4:18 p.m. Mendelson replies to Keresteci, writing that the plans to repurpose the cafe space is going forward.
W
ithin the broader narrative of the Architecture Café’s closure, both SSMU and the Engineering Undergraduate Society (EUS) entered the game late. SSMU entered the dialogue as part of a late-summer attempt to open an Arch Café-like space in the University Centre, and the EUS was drawn in as a potential solution to the cafe’s perceived financial problems. By mid-September, both organizations were lobbying to re-open the cafe under student management in its original space. The earliest records of SSMU and EUS entering the conversation are found in a June 15 email from Director of the School of Architecture Michael Jemtrud to Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning) Morton Mendelson. Jemtrud wrote that ASA president Kyle Burrows “has spoken with the SSMU and EUS presidents. It looks like the SSMU is the most likely route,” referring to re-opening the cafe in Shatner. “The EUS seem to merely be interested in our female students and graphic design capabilities,” he added. “I am not aware of any such meeting,” wrote SSMU president Zach Newburgh in an email to The Daily. “I had met with Kyle Burrows in June to ask about the status of the Architecture Café after having heard a rumour that the University was shutting it down. Kyle assured me that there was no such action being taken by the University, and that it was nothing more than a mere rumour.” According to the correspondences obtained by The Daily, Newburgh was not involved in any Arch Café dialogue for the rest of summer, until August 27, when Director of McGill Food and Dining Services (MFDS) Mathieu Laperle proposed opening a similar cafe in Shatner. Laperle wrote Newburgh: “I have a suggestion for you: there is no space on campus available for [Arch Café], but we can help you to prepare (MFDS with SSMU) a business case during the school year to open a kind of ‘Architecture Café’ inside [Shatner].” According to Newburgh, “This was the first time that an employee of the University suggested” such an alternative. “Unfortunately, there is simply not enough space in our building to add another food operation,” wrote Newburgh. Four days later, according to Newburgh, Mendelson proposed the same alternative. In the November 8 issue of The Daily, Newburgh said the remark was “taken jokingly.” “Beyond a casual email correspondence, and an off-hand comment made by the Deputy Provost in person, there was no real proposal to move the Café into [Shatner],” said Newburgh. “Considering that the ASA was in the process of becoming a departmental association of the EUS, it made the most sense to ensure that the former could continue running the Architecture Café under the latter’s legal supervision.” The incorporation of ASA into EUS had been in the works for years, and it was this burgeoning formal connection between the two organizations that fueled the EUS’s legislative attempts to save the Architecture Café. Keresteci said that the administration had supported the merger for a long time. “When I came into my presidency I knew that that kind of move was supported by the administration,” he said. With the move coming closer to fruition through the fall, finally approved by the Architecture student referendum November 9, the EUS drafted a proposal for a student-run Arch Café under EUS oversight. Keresteci submitted the proposal to Mendelson September 21, and on October 8 Mendelson replied, rejecting the proposal. Engineering Senator Andrew Doyle had attempted to set up a meeting with Keresteci and the Dean of
Engineering, Christophe Pierre in a September 17 email to Pierre. The Dean was unavailable, and Doyle ended up meeting with Engineering Faculty Senators David Covo and Arun Misa two days before the September 22 Senate meeting. “We really just wanted to know anything: why it was happening, why nobody knew anything about it until it was too late, why there was no forum for us to bring this up in,” said Doyle. “We’re talking about something that should be the jurisdiction of somebody else, just nobody knew who that was. It should have been Christophe Pierre.” Doyle, who edited the proposal, described it as “pretty rough,” explaining that it had been generated in three days in order to submit it before the Senate meeting. When asked if it would have been preferable to submit a more refined proposal at a later meeting, Doyle answered, “To be honest, I don’t think it matters, I don’t think there’s a way to reverse this.” Keresteci said that the neither the failure of the proposal, nor the time Mendelson took to reply, surprised him. “I never really felt like the proposal was ever going to be taken seriously,” said Keresteci. “The reason we did the proposal was to show that we wanted to be constructive. … If there was a possibility – which we didn’t even know there was – if there was a chance that they wanted to look at a student-run option, then we wanted to have something ready for them.” Doyle concurred, stating that the proposal had been designed as a response to the administration’s arguments that the cafe wasn’t financially sustainable, illustrating that EUS could assume the financial responsibility for the cafe. After the September 22 Senate meeting, Doyle said he confronted Mendelson about the proposal. “Mendelson and I had this back and forth, and he basically just said, ‘Listen, we have this MoA with student groups, with everyone, saying – and there’s a clause – ‘You can not compete with McGill Food Services.’ And he didn’t explicitly say that that was the reason that it was closed, but that was the message that I got,” said Doyle. Email correspondence obtained by The Daily reveal that the administration had clarified their position to the EUS proposal less than 24 hours after receiving it. Keresteci said that he did not know Mendelson had decided to reject the proposal the day after it was submitted, but said he wasn’t surprised given that accepting it “would be against what the administration’s plan is right now,” which is to move away from student-run food services on campus. “That’s why it didn’t really surprise me when he came back two weeks later saying no, and that’s why it doesn’t really surprise me that he made the decision the next day, because it was clear that the administration never really wanted to revisit the issue of a student-run Arch Café.” For a brief moment, however, it appears that Mendelson considered taking the proposal seriously. At 8:00 a.m. on September 22, Mendelson wrote to Laperle, “If we even consider the EUS suggestion, we can’t remove the Arch Cafe equipment, so please don’t remove it until we’ve decided whether we might go there.” Less than four hours later, Mendelson had decided to reject EUS’s proposal. In an 11:27 a.m. email to Laperle and Pierre, among others, the Deputy Provost wrote, “After considering the EUS proposal and its implications further, I believe it is in the University’s best interest to hold the line on our position that student associations cannot offer food services on campus outside the University Centre and Thompson House. Thanks to all who have provided feedback on this.”
Nouvelles |News
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Vers une sphère publique laïque, vraiment? L’Université McGill et la Fondation pour la foi Tony Blair en partenariat pour l’étude du rôle de la religion dans un monde globalisé. Xavier Plamondon Le Délit
e 12 novembre dernier, étudiants, professeurs ainsi que plusieurs personnalités publiques se sont rassemblés dans la grande salle de l’ancien Hôtel Windsor afin d’entendre une allocution de l’ancien Premier ministre britannique Tony Blair, soulignant de ce fait le partenariat entre sa Fondation pour la foi et la Faculté d’études religieuses de l’Université McGill. L’objectif de cette coopération consiste à établir un contexte intellectuel et académique quant à l’étude de «l’impact de la foi sur la politique, les affaires, la société et le développement d’une collectivité de plus en plus globalisée». Au total, sept universités à travers le monde font partie de ce mouvement, dont l’Université Yale aux États-Unis et l’Université Durham au Royaume-Uni. L’événement a pris la forme d’une discussion de trois-quarts d’heure entre le politicien à la retraite et l’animateur de la CBC Evan Solomon. «Le XXIe siècle ne sera pas marqué par des questions fondamentales de la droite contre la gauche, du capitalisme contre le socialisme», a expliqué Tony Blair. Selon lui, l’enjeu majeur sera de savoir «si la religion devient une force pour le progrès, ou bien si elle ne devient qu’une source de conflits et de sectarisme». Il a ajouté que l’étude de la religion est essentielle dans la sphère publique puisque «les politiciens ne peuvent pas se fier à une opinion publique chancelante, mais plutôt à un travail académique solide et indépendant» que seules les universités peuvent fournir. De plus, selon lui, l’a priori selon lequel une société devient de moins en moins religieuse à mesure qu’elle gagne
Victor Tangermann | The McGill Daily
Tony Blair a charmé l’audience grâce à son flegme britannique et son charisme de politicien. en prospérité est faux: «En fait, la religion gagne en popularité tant au sein des sociétés développées que dans celles en développement. La religion est donc là, mais la question est maintenant de savoir quel rôle elle devrait jouer». La foi serait donc devenue un sujet incontournable en gouvernance publique: «Si vous voulez être un leader aujourd’hui, vous ne pouvez pas être religieusement illettré. Vous serez peut-être en désaccord avec la religion, vous ne l’aimerez peut-être pas, mais vous devez impérativement connaître ce sujet», a-t-il affirmé. Si Tony Blair a parlé du rôle de
la foi au niveau politique, il a aussi abordé le sujet de la religion dans la prise de décisions importantes. «La foi a une influence importante dans la façon de penser. On ne peut pas aller dans un coin, prier et demander à Dieu quel devrait être le salaire minimum! La foi donne cependant du courage, mais ne nous dit pas si ce que nous faisons est bien ou mauvais». L’événement a grandement plu à Arvind Sharma, professeur à la Faculté d’études religieuses de McGill. «Le message de Tony Blair, exprimant qu’il faut entendre ce que la religion a à dire, est impor-
tant dans le sens qu’il ne faut pas laisser la religion dicter ce que nous faisons. L’ouverture est désirable, et non la domination de la religion». Le professeur Sharma pense aussi que la religion tient un rôle de plus en plus important au niveau politique, mais que la question n’est pas de choisir entre la laïcité ou le pluralisme religieux. «En fin de compte, c’est la société qui le déterminera», tranche-til. «Cependant, dans une société moderne, nous devrions viser la laïcité, et à la fois considérer la diversité religieuse dans nos décisions politiques». Selon lui, nous
devrions «privilégier un système laïc-pluriel plutôt que religieuxpluriel. On tolèrerait ainsi le pluralisme religieux, mais ce dernier serait circonscrit de par des considérations laïques. La laïcité complète est dangereuse, puisqu’elle deviendrait une nouvelle religion. Elle serait forcée sur le peuple, ce serait une idéologie officielle». Lorsqu’on lui demande si retirer le crucifix de l’Assemblée Nationale serait un geste dangereux, le professeur répond que «la majorité des Québécois sont chrétiens. Le crucifix n’est pas une offense, mais si des minorités se sentaient discriminées à cause de cela, ce serait autre chose. Jusqu’à présent, personne ne s’est plaint. Je ne vois donc pas le but d’enlever le crucifix.» Arvind Sharma est d’avis que Montréal est une place de choix pour l’étude de ce sujet parfois délicat: «Montréal est riche en communautés. C’est en effet la deuxième ville la plus diverse en Amérique du Nord après la ville de New York. L’étude de ce sujet à McGill permet une anticipation d’un modèle global». Tony Blair avait d’ailleurs affirmé, au sujet des accommodements raisonnables au Québec, que c’était «un concept construit pour trouver des solutions à des problèmes importants. C’est toutefois intéressant de voir que le monde entier vous regarde résoudre ces questions, car eux-mêmes sont à la recherche d’une façon de remédier à leur situation». Il apparaît donc logique que Montréal soit un laboratoire de choix pour observer ces phénomènes. Pourquoi la Fondation pour la foi a choisi McGill? Tony Blair n’a pu s’empêcher: «Parce que c’est une institution fantastique pour l’apprentissage». Décidemment, son flegme de politicien n’avait pas pris congé. x
New McGill group seeks to change campus Israeli-Palestinian discussion Founder hopes Omeq will have a “moderating effect” Alexander Dawson News Writer
new McGill group calling itself Omeq is aiming to change the dynamics of the Israel-Palestine discourse on campus. The group takes its name from the Hebrew and Arabic letters OMQ, the root letters of the words “depth” and “profundity” in both languages. According to Omeq VP External Michah Stettin, debates on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict are consistently hampered by an adversarial atmosphere. He described the formation of Omeq in early 2010 as “a response to too much inflammatory rhetoric on campus, as opposed to substantive discussion and dialogue. We felt that there was a need to have
a group on campus that was hospitable to numerous viewpoints.” Stettin cited last winter’s SSMU General Assembly as a particular source of strife, when the McGill chapter of Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR) brought forward a motion calling for the creation of a financial ethics review committee. The motion made numerous references to the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza. Another reason for the new group, according to Stettin, is the frustration expressed by Omeq’s mostly Jewish members that positions taken by Hillel McGill, a major Jewish student group, did not reflect their own perspective. “I don’t think that there is such a thing as the Jewish political opinion. Thus if an organization takes a political opinion, there will be Jews
that disagree. Hillel in the past has taken stances on issues on campus, and there were people on campus who were left outside of those positions,” he said. Stettin did, however, maintain that “Hillel is a great place for Jewish students and serves very important functions.” Corey Omer, president of Hillel Montreal, said that he sees Omeq “as a positive thing, to have other groups. Any way Jewish students can represent themselves is good. Hillel strives to represent everybody; however, it is hard for one organization to say everything to everyone.” The effort to create what Omeq’s executives call “increased dialogue” on campus has not, however, been met with universal acclaim. Sam Bick, a McGill student and SPHR member who stressed that he did not speak for the group as a whole, said that dialogue may
hurt more than it helps. “People don’t come to the table on the same footing. … When there are different degrees of power, when there’s military violence happening, dialogue becomes a much different thing,” he said, adding that dialogue may end up diverting attention “from dealing with real issues.” Through a series of talks on subjects such as anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and the role of activism in Israel and Palestine, Stettin hopes that Omeq can act as a moderating force in conversations that have been tense on campus in recent years. A talk scheduled for last Wednesday, “Debunking Myths about Islam,” would have been the fourth this year for Omeq, but was postponed in favour of a general meeting due to a scheduling miscommunication. Rex Brynen, a McGill Political
Science professor, sees a respectful environment as something that will come naturally to Omeq because of its structure. “If you set up contexts–whether it’s speakers on campus or internal dialogue sessions–in which the understood rules of the game are that you can say what you want but you have to be respectful with it, [dialogue] doesn’t become terribly hard,” he said. Brynen feels that organizations like Omeq have an important role to play in decreasing the polarization of campus discourse. “People get upset at occupation of the settlements, people get upset by terrorism, and and it sort of drives them apart and leads them to a situation where they can’t recognize common interests, so I think [OMEQ] kind of re-centres the discussion in useful ways,” he said.
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Depuis la fin du dernier mandat de l’Union nationale, de 1966 à 1970, le Québec n’a plus connu le conservatisme, le traditionalisme et le catholicisme au pouvoir dans les sièges du gouvernement. Par contre, un parti politique peu connu garde la chandelle de la chrétienneté allumée. Francis L.-Racine Le Délit
a fin du règne de l’Union nationale au Québec et la Révolution tranquille ont vidé les Églises et ont fait en sorte que l’Église et l’État ne soient plus joints comme ils l’étaient du temps de Maurice Duplessis. La société Québécoise est bien différente aujourd’hui et la chrétienneté n’a plus une place prépondérante. En fait, la séparation entre l’État et l’Église est bien floue, car aucune loi ne l’établit formellement, mais en pratique l’Église n’a plus aucune influence sur le politique. Les catholiques sont beaucoup moins nombreux aujourd’hui, mais encore nombre de Québécois s’affichent comme catholiques. L’héritage chrétien du Québec peut résider dans une certaine mesure au sein d’un parti politique peu connu mais avec un programme imposant pour «le projet» du Québec. Le parti démocratie-chrétienne du Québec ne prétend pas être dans la lignée de l’Union nationale et loin de là. Il ne s’agit pas d’un retour de la prépondérance de l’Église ni d’un retour aux valeurs du terroir. Selon le chef du parti, Gilles Noel, «le projet du parti démocratie-chrétienne
du Québec s’appuie sur les valeurs chrétiennes pour aller de l’avant». Il ne faut pas s’y méprendre affirme M. Noel, le parti démocratie-chrétienne ne cherche pas à faire revenir l’Église au poste prestigieux qu’elle occupait sous Maurice Duplessis dans les années 50. «L’Église n’est pas une menace pour la société québécoise. L’Église a perdu depuis les quarante dernières années de son influence sociale et politique, car seulement 10% des québécois se disent pratiquants.» Lorsque Le Délit a demandé à M. Noel si la foi (chrétienne) était politique ce dernier s’est empressé de répondre: «Non, la foi de croire en Jésus Christ est totalement indépendante de la politique, mais le fait de créer un parti politique ayant la terminologie chrétienne en son sein suggère que le parti propose au Québec un projet de société orienté sur les valeurs chrétiennes d’amour, de générosité et d’entraide.» En fait, selon le chef du parti, la foi n’est pas reliées aux actions entreprises par le parti politique. Les démocrates-chrétiens pensent qu’occulter l’héritage francophone et catholique du Québec, c’est oublier l’essentiel de l’histoire québécoise mais surtout son patrimoine. Ils proposent que
Elizabeth-Ann Michel-Boulanger
l’enseignement social de l’Église soit remis à l’avant scène, car cet enseignement, selon le parti démocratie chrétienne, apporte une solution judicieuse aux problèmes tant individuels que collectifs. La monnaie locale est l’un de leurs chevaux de bataille. Le chef du parti démocratie-chrétienne du Québec a rappelé que les ménages québécois étaient endettés à environ 119% et que pour remédier à la situation la mise en place d’une monnaie locale pour le Québec serait souhaitable, malgré le fait que la mise en circulation de la monnaie est la compétence de la Banque du Canada et du gouvernement fédéral. Il pense toute-
fois qu’on peut prendre exemple sur Canadian Tire: «ils ont émis leur monnaie pour que les gens dépensent leur monnaie chez eux.» Dans cette optique, «le gouvernement du Québec pourrait mettre en place une monnaie locale pour le Québec où un dollar québécois serait égal à 10 timbres permanents de 0,57$ en 2010, c›est-à-dire 5,70$ CAN donnent 1$ QC, et de cette manière en substituant la monnaie québécoise en canadienne, la disponibilité du dollar canadien augmente. Nous pouvons rembourser la dette en 10 ans et prêter aux familles québécoises avec des taux plus avantageux.» C›est en concurrence avec les Banques q’un
gouvernement démocrate-chrétien mettrait en place la monnaie locale du Québec qui serait accepté dans les détaillants participants. Au niveau de la famille, ceuxci voudraient abolir le travail le dimanche et pour toutes les fêtes catholiques et d’autres mesures sociales favorisant la famille et le retour au travail. Ils sont d’ailleurs contre l’avortement. Ils ne reconnaissent pas un statut particulier à l’homosexualité, ni aux unions homosexuelles, car selon une position affichée sur leur site internet «Dieu aime tous ses enfants également et Dieu a une préférence pour les plus blessés et les plus “poqués”». Finalement, au niveau de l’immigration, M. Noel urge de renégocier l’entente Collinscouture des années 70 faisant en sorte que 65% de l’immigration du Québec soit francophone; mais M. Noel va plus loin, il demande que 65% des immigrants soient francophones et chrétiens. «Ce n’est pas tout la langue, la religion est très importante.» Selon lui, l’immigration doit être régie selon un principe de réciprocité. En somme, selon le chef du parti démocratie-chrétienne, le parti souffre d’un désintérêt par les médias ce qui explique l’impopularité depuis 2003. x
CEGEP students locked out days before going on strike Week of activism sees protest on McGill campus Erin Hudson
The McGill Daily
B
eginning on Saturday November 20, students at CEGEP du Vieux Montreal (CVM) were locked out of their college for five days. The lockout came as students prepared a week of mobilization against the Liberal government’s planned tuition hikes. The week of student action included strikes, sit-ins, and an outdoor bed-in. “The goal of closing the CEGEP…is really to prevent the mobilization of students,” argued Laurent Cornelissen, a spokesperson for the AEGCVM, the CEGEP’s student association. According to Estelle Desgerlis, another AEGCVM spokesperson, students received an email on Saturday morning saying that the CEGEP would be closed until Thursday. In the email, the administration cited the difficulty of securing the school in the face of the week’s coming activism, as the reason for the closure. The CVM administration could not be
Victor Tangermann | The McGill Daily
Locked out, striking CEGEP students slept outside their college. reached for comment. “It took three weeks for us to organize the strike and the cultural conference with workshops outside…to really inform people what is happening,” said Fallon Roullier, a student who played a large role in organizing the action. Last week’s schedule included two strike days on November 23 and 24 along with participation in protests on René Levesque and a
protest on McGill campus. AEGCVM has traditionally held bed-ins the night before student strikes to prepare students for the action and to facilitate more students attending the strikes. This year, in the face of the lockout, students slept outside in a tarpenclosed barricade. “In the past we had a lot of experience with bed-ins, we had an experience where things went badly in 2007…[At that time the
bed-in was] illegal because the administration did not permit them except that some activists decided to sleep there anyway,” Roullier explained. Rouiller said that in 2008 the CVM administration oversaw a successful bed-in. The role of the administration included supervision of students and help in accessing bathrooms and water. This year, in the week before the lockout, there were no negotiations between students and the administration. “The CEGEP administration refused all forms of negotiations with us in regards to this strike. All we wanted to do with the administration was to talk, make an agreement, make compromises, discuss. But the administration refused that right,” said CVM student Corrine Lagoie. “It is due to [the unwillingness of the administration to negotiate] that we organized a pacifist sit-in [for Monday afternoon] then in reaction to this pacifism they closed the school for five days,” Lagoie added. Students eventually staged
a sit-in scheduled for Monday, November 22 – the day before the two days of student strikes were set to begin – in order to demand that the administration negotiate with students. “I think that…[the administration] saw on Facebook the group had 250 people who said they would participate in the sitin … They feared the would lose ground so they decided simply to close the doors [of the CEGEP],” said Desgerlis. How the lockout and subsequent student protests will affect long-term relations between the CVM administration and students remains to be seen. But students are bitter about what a student association press release called “a pure display of paternalistic behaviors.” “[The strike] is the only democratic medium that we can use to be heard apart from voting,” CVM student Jeanne Pilot pointed out. “We cannot wait until 2012 when the [increased tuition fees] have arrived. … I think that [a strike] is the way to send a clear message if you are not heard.”
Nouvelles | News
La démocratie-chrétienne au service du Québec
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Loi C-94: les voix mésentendues Les femmes et les communautés musulmanes ont un rôle central à jouer dans le débat public sur la pratique des accommodements dans les espaces publics. Emma Ailinn Hautecoeur Le Délit
omme en a témoigné le colloque sur la «Démocratie dévoilée» tenu à l’Université Concordia, du 18 au 22 novembre, la présence féminine au sein de la recherche académique sur les accommodements, la laïcité et les modèles d’intégration de société est majoritaire. Pourquoi ne faisons-nous pas affaire à la même formule dans le discours politique? Le débat public au Québec est aux yeux d’une académicienne française «extrêmement poli; vu de France c’est vraiment dépaysant!» Cela ne signifie pourtant pas qu’il en est plus juste. Comme le fait remarquer Corrine Torrenkens, membre du Groupe d’études sur l’Ethnicité, le Racisme, les Migrations et l’Exclusion à l’Université Libre de Bruxelles, la loi C-94 –comme d’autres lois sur les signes religieux dans les espaces publics– dans sa logique, bien que non explicitement, vise le port de la burqa et du niqab dans les espaces publics, notamment les écoles, et, par extension, a pour objet sous-jacent la femme
musulmane. La femme musulmane représente donc l’«autre», muet et uniforme. Dans l’histoire du Québec, la laïcité a subi deux transformations; une «dissociation entre laïcité et langue», qui a permis au Québec de s’épanouir culturellement, et une «jonction entre le débat pour la laïcité et celui pour la souveraineté», note Yvan Lamonde auteur de «L’Heure de la vérité. La laïcité québécoise à l’épreuve de l’Histoire». C’est bien cette dernière lutte commune qui fait de l’exemple québécois, non un exemple unique mais bien un exemple aux extrêmes qui permettait aux journalistes en mars dernier de parler de crise d’identité du Québec, quand le débat sur les accommodements raisonnables a repris, à la proposition du projet de loi. Daniel Weinstock, un des initiateurs du manifeste pour un Québec pluraliste, note qu’une des oppositions à la position pluraliste qui le touche le plus est la position féministe. Les principes d’accommodements religieux risquent «d’accorder plus de pouvoir à certaines autorités religieuses qui sont par tradition plutôt patriarcales». Cette position est bien celle articulée par
la Fédération des Femmes du Québec dans son mémoire sur la loi C-94: «Être pour la laïcité ne veut pas dire nécessairement être pour le droit des femmes. Le féminisme cible notamment le patriarcat». Le problème est la peur du «pouvoir coercitif de l’État», note M. Weinstock, qui est vraisemblablement exacerbée par une pratique d’accommodements au cas par cas. La Fédération des Femmes du Québec (FFQ) est donc en faveur d’une «règle générale» comme la loi C-94, encourant quelques changements, bien que critique de ses prémisses. La FFQ recommande donc «que le gouvernement prépare un livre vert sur la laïcité et tienne une commission parlementaire à cet égard». Bien sûr, la laïcité reste problématique au Québec, car, comme en France, «que serait la laïcité sans le catholicisme français (ou québécois)?», se demande Narcira Guénif Souilamas, auteur de «La République mise à nue par son immigration» et «Des Beurettes». Puisque notre majorité laïque se forme en opposition à l’autre, le religieux, elle ne peut être composée de néant. Qu’on le mette sous couvert de tradition ou de culture,
il n’empêche que les vestiges de l’époque pré-révolution tranquille n’ont pas tous été anéantis pour faire place à une neutralité pure de l’État. Le Québec ne peut donc pas être pris comme exemple idéal d’égalité, d’autonomie et de réalisation individuelle des femmes. C’est bien ce qui préoccupe la FFQ. La fédération s’émeut aussi du fait que du débat public «résulte une vision des femmes musulmanes réduites à des victimes sans libre arbitre». Justement, Mme Torrenkens notait que lors du débat à propos des signes religieux dans l’espace public en Belgique –débat maintenant clos– les organisations musulmanes n’avaient pas pris part au débat en masse. Elle expliquait qu’en entretien avec certains chefs musulmans du pays, ils ont témoigné avoir en quelque sorte «d’autres chats à fouetter», des préoccupations plus importantes. Ce n’est pas le cas chez nous: le Conseil Canadien des Femmes Musulmanes (CCMW) présentait aujourd’hui un mémoire sur la loi C-94 dans le cadre des audiences publiques. Le CCMW est opposé à une loi qui ancrerait une limite des pratiques d’accommodements
raisonnables dans le système légal canadien. Il réitère les craintes souvent formulées que «les femmes qui portent le niqab deviennent isolées et marginalisées» et pensent que «le rôle de ces femmes comme mère serait grandement compromis et toute la famille serait indûment affectée». On ne peut qu’observer que les inquiétudes des féministes québécoises et des femmes musulmanes se reflètent, même si leurs positions quant à la loi sont opposées. Qu’en est-il des autres groupes musulmans? Les autres associations contactées n’ont pas donné de réponse quant à leur position sur le projet de loi. Les deux jeunes françaises, auteures de la vidéo «Niqabitch», grandement visionné sur YouTube, ont utilisé l’humour pour «dédramatiser la situation» autour de la loi visant à interdire la dissimulation du visage dans l’espace public. Indépendamment de tout discours religieux ou laïc en fait, ces deux protagonistes en niqab version mini-jupe ont simplement passé le message qu’il était temps qu’on arrête de faire abstraction de la voix des femmes musulmanes. x
Elliot Carver et la machine à cote d’écoute Chronique|Nouvelles: Le franc-parleur Francis L.-Racine Le Délit
H
ier, à l’Assemblée nationale, le Premier ministre a fait un discours inspirant pour les principes qui sont chers aux Québécois et qui sont intimement liés à l’État de droit. De cette manière, Jean Charest, le ministre de la sécurité publique Robert Dutil, le député de Chomedey Guy Ouellette, et la député de Trois-Rivières Danielle St-Amand, ont tous les quatre, notamment, fait un plaidoyer pour les commissions d’enquête policières, exposant le renforcement de la législation sur le financement des partis politiques, l’attribution des contrats publics, l’éthique municipale, l’escouade anti-collusion du ministère du transport et plus. Ce sont des actions concrètes et vraies. Ces personnalités ont ainsi pris part au débat pour contrer la motion de censure présentée par la cheffe de l’opposition officielle, la très gauche caviar, Pauline Marois. Par contre, même si Madame Marois dans sa déconnection la plus totale de la société
québécoise déchire sa chemise tous les mardis, mercredis et jeudis à l’Assemblée nationale pour une commission d’enquête publique… elle n’a jamais été seule. À qui peut bien favoriser une commission d’enquête publique au Québec? Le PQ, sûrement électoralement, mais on verra ça aujourd’hui dans Kamouraska Témiscouata. Les plus grands bénéficiaires d’une commission d’enquête publique sont cependant, sans l’ombre d’un doute, les médias. Les médias sont les plus grands fervents des crises qui secouent le Québec. On peut juste se rappeler du triste épisode des accommodements raisonnables pendant lequel les médias véhiculaient l’idée selon laquelle les Québécois se faisaient assimiler au reste de l’Amérique du Nord, créant ainsi une crise identitaire et un tollé! Et qu’a trouvé la Commission Bouchard-Taylor? Elle a mis l’intolérance des Québécois au grand jour et au grand appétit des médias, surtout que 75% des dossiers présentés par les médias étaient disproportionnés, faux ou erronés. Les journalistes sont victimes de la pression de leur patron pour
attirer les cotes d’écoute ou plus de tirages. Ainsi, les journalistes ne font pas leur travail d’autocritique en écrivant des articles sensationnalistes. Désormais, le Québec n’est pas victime d’une crise de corruption endémique, mais bien de la désinformation intrinsèque à la société. La crise que vivent les médias est sans précédent et elle s’acharne sur le pouvoir en place, ce qui rappelle qu’au Québec nous avons un large bassin de médias tant écrits que télévisuels pour une très petite population, où les médias se battent pour les cotes d’écoute, à savoir qui aura la nouvelle la plus croustillante de la soirée. Les médias sont les premiers bénéficiaires d’une commission d’enquête. Une commission d’enquête publique est une machine à faire imprimer des journaux et à remplir un bulletin d’information de 18h et de 22h! Une machine à profits ! Les médias se sont déchaînés tel Katrina sur la NouvelleOrléans, lors des commissions Gomery et Bastarache. Qui est Elliot Carver? Cet homme est le magnat de la presse que devait affronter James Bond dans le film Tomorrow Never
Dies. Il avait créé une histoire de toutes pièces pour déclencher une guerre afin d’avoir des droits de presse en Chine et dans le monde grâce à ses journaux. Il décidait ainsi de ce que les gens pensaient, regardaient, écoutaient et discutaient. Cela ne semble pas très éloigné de l’objectif de nos médias d’essayer de faire flancher le gouvernement du Québec pour une commission d’enquête bidon afin qu’ils remplissent les journaux et leurs bulletins télévisés. La population pense dorénavant qu’une commission d’enquête peut tout résoudre, mais une commission d’enquête publique ne fait peur à personne, car elle ne met personne en prison grâce à l’immunité dont les témoins appelés bénéficient. La police fait peur aux criminels, car elle trouve des preuves. Personne ne bénéficie d’immunité lors d’enquêtes policières. La police découvre et démantèle des réseaux criminalisés et mafieux. Bref, la police met des gens en prison. PAS LES COMMISSIONS. Par contre, il faut savoir que les commissions remplissent les journaux, lancent des carrières d’avocats et de journalistes, et pro-
tègent les criminels par l’immunité que la commission leur offre. Les médias sont prêts à monter des histoires burlesques et sans fond avec l’aide des péquistes au Salon bleu qui bénéficient de leur immunité parlementaire pour lancer des allégations sans fondement afin de semer le doute dans la tête des Québécois. Les médias jouent à Elliot Carver pour leurs propres intérêts: le profit. Les médias se sont dissociés de leur fonction: tenir le gouvernement responsable de ses actes de manière factuelle et véridique. Ainsi, la mise en place d’un titre de journaliste professionnel indépendant et d’une réforme du Conseil de presse pour donner des dents à cet organisme est nécessaire pour protéger la population du Québec contre les excès des médias. Éviter les Elliot Carver au Québec est une obligation à laquelle le Gouvernement doit se soumettre pour que les Québécois aient le droit à une information juste et factuelle sans se faire endoctriner par les magnats médiatiques pour maximiser leurs profits et faire décroître le bien-être des Québécois. La machine à cote d’écoute doit cesser! x
Commentaire | Commentary
I believe in connections The character of community Adrian Kaats
adrian.kaats@mcgilldaily.com
any moons ago, a budding understanding of science led me to turf the ideas of an omnipotent and omniscient deity. I would likely have had a different, and perhaps more pleasant life, had I turfed science, but there’s an elegance, an immediacy, and a rationale to the sciences that have always suited my temperament, and so here I am, godless. Age, however, erodes everything, and that has included my belief in my own faithlessness. I’ve had a number of opportunities to discover just how full of faith I am. Particularly, I’ve found it necessary to try to describe that feeling of connectedness and purpose that, from time to time, arises apparently from nowhere, perhaps that place some call “soul.” A life of scientific study has led me to believe that although I can’t write you a system of equations to describe it, this feeling of connectedness is an emergent property of the interactions of various actors and forces in the highly complex, dynamical system we belong to, and which science seeks to describe. Simultaneously, my activities in industry, academia, and politics have all led me to understand that one cannot have blind faith in science, regardless of what it purports,
since it’s produced by people. Not only are people subject to a number of corrosive influences which taint our products, “to err is human,” and those errors appear everywhere. So a sensible view of the future is nebulous at best. Who knows whether we’ll maintain the course that promises answers and unifying theories, or if we’ll even survive long enough to realize them. After all, the universe is pretty complicated. In fact, science itself has revealed the fundamental uncertainty underlying observation, and if our observations are inherently uncertain, perhaps that’s reflected in our conclusions. There is no finality in conclusions derived from this continuing discourse – there is no “end” to learning. Similarly, there is no end to history or end to evolution. In fact, it’s unlikely there’s even a final destination. And that brings me to a very important idea about humanity, where we came from, where we are, and where we are going. The human race, like any other, is evolving. We have been and are subject to the various forces of speciation inherent to that process. Our minds and bodies are simply not exempt. One implication is that to deny the differences between peoples is plain wrong. That idea alone has far-reaching, and sometimes uncomfortable, consequences. Another implication is that if we set and achieve goals, we should only expect those achievements to be met by still more goals. That’s the nature of the game. We never “reach the end” of anything, really, and that translates to our position
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
La foi à temps partiel Elizabeth-Ann Michel-Boulanger Le Délit in history. We haven’t reached a final destination, nor should we expect to, and there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. What bothers me about many who claim to be “non-believers,” often those simultaneously claiming to “believe in evolution” (a bit of an irony itself) have a habit of exempting humanity. This can make it easy to maintain a number of politically avant-garde, but fundamentally rigid, beliefs about various forms of “equality.” This Cartesian-style logic is not only tragic, but very dangerous. It denies the very real and important plurality of “human kinds,” both in space and in time. By its corollary it also denies the need for the constant and widespread dialogue necessary to satisfy the evolving needs, desires, and goals of those kinds: it kills community. In fact, this type of thinking, which on the surface appears to safeguard a number of “human rights,” is actually the bedrock upon which those rights have historically been removed. This brings me to another matter of my faith. In place of a rigid political ethos, I believe that somehow good deeds and tolerance beget the same. The hope is that sustained effort and input, even without promise of returns in our lifetime, eventually elicit response in kind. Equally, I believe the opposite is true: put in ill will, greed, egoism, and intolerance (in their many forms), and expect the same in return. I believe we are indeed all “connected,” past, present, and future, even if the math of it is presently beyond our grasp. o
a foi n’est pas très en vogue dernièrement. Le Québec est enseveli sous les controverses religieuses depuis quelques années: accommodements raisonnables, scandales de pédophilie au sein de l’Église catholique, abandon de nos églises, etc. Il était donc probablement temps de passer en révision ce que représente la foi pour nous. Je suis catholique pratiquante, mais je me définis comme pratiquante à temps partiel. C’est-àdire que je ne respecte pas tous les commandements de Dieu, je n’ai pas une Bible sur ma table de chevet et je ne vais pas à l’église toutes les semaines comme une bonne catholique devrait le faire. J’ai néanmoins reçu une éducation religieuse et tous mes sacrements. Je me surprends même à connaître toutes les prières lorsque je vais à l’église. De plus, j’ai déjà fait du bénévolat au presbytère pour venir en aide aux plus démunis. C’est en changeant de milieu que j’ai réalisé que j’avais probablement un plus grand bagage religieux que la plupart des autres jeunes de mon âge. Je ne peux parler de ma foi en l’Église catholique, ou du temps que j’ai passé chez les Sœurs-de-laCharité à Québec. Habituellement, quand je raconte mes liens avec cette communauté religieuse, les gens sont extrêmement surpris. Je dois avouer que je n’ai pas l’image d’une «pure sainte». Les sœurs ne sont plus beaucoup à habiter au couvent, peut-
être cinq. Elles me faisaient souvent l’éloge d’une période qui leur semble désormais lointaine, où les jeunes filles prononçaient leurs vœux par dizaines. Certaines ont fait partie de ces jeunes filles qui ont eu la vocation prématurément, d’autres se sont engagées plus tard, après avoir eu une carrière. D’ailleurs, il ne faut pas croire qu’elles restent au couvent à prier, au contraire, elles ont la girouette les sœurs! Quand je leur parlais de ma génération, elles riaient: «Vous avez le droit d’être jeunes, nous aussi on l’a été!» Effectivement, elles ont dû l’être, mais pas à la même époque, pas avec les mêmes enjeux. Pourtant, elles ne semblaient jamais choquées. Elles lisaient «religieusement» leur journal tous les matins, très loin de l’image typique des sœurs coupées de la réalité. Ayant eu deux tantes au sein des Soeurs-de-la-Charité, je sais concrètement tout le bien que ces femmes font à la communauté. Elles sont à des années-lumière des scandales de pédophilie qui éclaboussent l’Église catholique présentement, mais elles sont tout de même gênées du comportement de certaines personnes qui est très loin de ce qu’elles prônent. Bref, ce n’est pas demain la veille que je vais m’enrôler dans une communauté religieuse, mais je crois que ma pratique de la religion s’adapte très bien à mon style de vie et à l’époque à laquelle je vis. La foi est quelque chose d’extrêmement personnel qui peut se discuter, mais n’est hélas pas toujours sujet à débat. Encore faut-il avoir l’ouverture d’esprit nécessaire pour le faire. x
Supplique d’une promeneuse solitaire «Flâner est un art. C’est la gastronomie de l’œil.» Honoré de Balzac Luba Markovskaia Le Délit
D
imanche après-midi. Soleil sur le Mont-Royal. Une journée d’été perçant la grisaille automnale et faisant resplendir les couleurs d’octobre. Une mer de monde –familles, couples, joggeurs, promeneurs de chiens, tous profitent de cette éphémère journée estivale. Nous traversons un portique néo-gothique et… plus personne. Le cimetière NotreDame-des-Neiges, pourtant l’un des plus beaux parcs forestiers de
l’Amérique du Nord, est désert en cette journée de loisir extérieur. Le soleil y brille pourtant tout autant, les sentiers sont des plus agréables, la nature est omniprésente, bref tout pour satisfaire le marcheur du dimanche. Alors que la moitié de la population montréalaise s’entasse sur les flancs «profanes» du MontRoyal, nous avons le cimetière pour nous seuls. J’en venais à espérer de croiser quelque promeneur, pour me rassurer que certains sachent tout de même apprécier cet espace. Personne. Est-ce par respect pour les morts? Augustin disait que le rituel
du deuil était pour les vivants et non pour les morts, pour ceux qui restent, plutôt que pour ceux qui partent. Somme toute, c’est un rite purement terrestre. Pourquoi les vivants répugnent-ils ces espaces qui sont pourtant pour eux? En effet, on passe pour un morbide, un lugubre ou un excentrique lorsqu’on avoue aimer la calme beauté des cimetières. Les Amis du Mont-Royal stipulent bien, pourtant, que le cimetière est là pour accueillir promeneurs et amoureux de la nature. Le site web du cimetière propose une description détaillée de la flore qu’on y
delitfrancais.com
retrouve, vante ses 145 espèces d’oiseaux et sa multitude d’arbres centenaires, ce qui montre bien que l’espace n’est pas réservé à ceux qui pleurent leurs morts… Un petit tour à la campagne, pour s’assurer du même phénomène. Il n’y a pas que les montréalais ou les urbains qui boudent le cimetière, ils sont autant déserts en région. Ils bordent tristement les routes, délaissés, alors qu’il manque cruellement de haltes routières sans Tim Hortons ni pompes à essence dans nos périphéries, de lieux calmes où on peut se ressourcer ou même pique-niquer avant de reprendre
la route. Ils sont même très souvent verrouillés (ce qui veut dire que votre dévouée photographe a sauté maintes barrières pour voler quelques clichés) de peur qu’on ne les profane. Impossible, donc, de s’y recueillir quelques instants, de profiter de l’ombre généreuse des arbres qui y sont souvent magnifiques. On garde toutefois les parcs ouverts… J’en appelle à votre sens de l’esthétique. Lors de ma prochaine promenade, je souhaite rencontrer plusieurs de ces errants rêveurs. Venez nombreux! Les morts sont si accueillants… x
mcgilldaily.com
Commentaire | Commentary
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
A preacher, a Muslim, and an atheist walk into a bar... Marxism and faith
Marxists believe in the inevitability of socialism. While the former zealously prepares the masses for the eventual second coming by shepherding them to the house of
God every week, Marxists prepare our working-class brothers and sisters by organizing them into unions and parties. They have mass prayers; we have general
assemblies. In a lot of instances, mass prayers quickly turn into general assemblies as the people get tired of kneeling and praying. It is heaven on earth that we seek; this is our faith. While Marxism as a philosophy provides us with a method to understand the world we’re living in, one needs a leap of faith to go from merely understanding to attempting to change the world. It’s easy to criticize capitalism and all its illnesses, but it’s another thing to take up the cause when the odds are against you. Marxism is often likened to a religion – with Capital as its holy bible – and I think to a certain extent we stand guilty as charged. Capitalism has created a world full of want, material and spiritual. It crushes people. It leads people to a blind alley. Religion, then, becomes a source of solace in this world of want. Religion is a symptom of a society riddled with misery. But Marxists do not clasp our hands together praying for a saviour from on high to save us. We don’t wait for that pie-in-the-sky. We clench our fists and rally our class brothers and sisters to be their own agents of change, with a faith so firm that millions of times over we have been lined up against the wall for our beliefs. Yet we’ll keep on believing until we’ve found that promised land and wrestle it – forcefully if need be – from the few who own it now. In that sense, there’s no contradiction in a preacher, a believer and a non-believer all embracing Marxism. o
This passionate response comes when every solution offered comes in one flavour, where the roll-backs of austerity are alwaysalready paired with a roll-out of the market: privatization, corporatization, structural adjustment. When we begin with the assumption that what is good for speculative capital is good for everyone, compromise always goes in one direction. And so the Democrats sound confused, because they won’t call bullshit. There are plenty of people, in the United States and around the world on the left, who have their analysis ready, who are on the streets, who are actively building an alternative while they fight the imposition and continuation of these systems. But their anger, in a way, cannot even exist, cannot become intelligible within this ide-
ology of post-politics. The thing that mobilizes the ordinary everyday, that causes the facts and figures to harmonize is passion – it’s faith. It’s what makes you reach out and love someone else, what makes you sacrifice for something, maybe it’s the only thing getting you out of bed in the morning. So far in this piece, I’ve been setting up a binary – the boring technocrats versus the passionate activists. But what I really want to do is shift away from this realm of the boring, and join the fight to delineate something we can have faith in. My uncle back in the States is pissed at the system – he wants to throw the whole gang in the ocean, et cetera, et cetera. This passion is appropriate to the enormity of the problem – crisis after crisis, with each solution simply moving the crisis around geo-
graphically, and growing into the next crisis. The political movement that he feels is expressing this rage is the Tea Party. Behind the technocracy is a faith in markets; behind the Tea Party is a passionate anger, and a faith – this is where the politics lie. So, rather than ignoring that realm, regarding it like some “gateway drug” into irrational madness, we need to join in, making interventions at that level – having that discussion. Faith is a powerful force, but as long as we cede this ground, there’s going to be that “enthusiasm gap” – which in real terms means a choice between this postpolitics which gradually makes the inequality and suffering in our system permanent, or fascism, or both. We’re going to need some faith. o
Red star over Asia Ted Sprague ted.sprague@mcgilldaily.com
“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.” —Karl Marx eter is the minister of a small evangelical church, the majority of whose congregation comes from workingclass slums. Nadia, a labour organizer, is a devout Muslim. I myself am a committed atheist. What do the three of us have in common? Other than having assumed names here, what we share is a faith in Marxism. How do we reconcile our religious faith – or lack thereof – with a materialist doctrine that rejects the existence of a divine being? Whether one believes in God or not doesn’t change the fact that there is injustice in this world. Whether there is a heaven above or a hell below doesn’t change the fact that the majority of people are living a hellish life, and thus religiously seek heaven hereafter. I don’t believe in prayers, but as you read this line, millions of people are on their knees praying to keep their jobs, homes, or just to know when they’ll eat next. These material facts bind us together: an evangelical minister, a Muslim woman, and an unflinching atheist.
Alex McKenzie | The McGill Daily
As a Marxist, I am a man of faith. What separates me from other people of faith is that while they believe in the inevitability of the coming of the messiah, we
Have faith Listen to the people’s rage All we want, baby, is everything Sam Neylon
sam.neylon@mcgilldaily.com
n the United States, they called it the “enthusiasm gap.” It’s when voters who might have gone for the Democrats didn’t – because they thought they were boring. All those polls show that almost everyone was explicitly worried about the economy. The way the Democrats approached this problem was to “get the car out of the ditch.” In other words, the economy was fine, it just needed some tweaking – it was a temporary problem, not something systemic. What they want is to continue with a kind of solution-based politics, a “post-politics” where the “smartest” solution wins the day.
This sort of technocracy thrived when the credit markets were flying high: “What? Inequality is increasing? Let’s give everyone loans!” In this way, administrations like Clinton’s Democrats, Blair’s New Labour, and Paul Martin, when he was Finance Minister here, were able to achieve – temporarily – the liberal goals of “helping marginalized people” without engaging in any kind of systemic critique. But now the loans are due, and someone has to pay. Where did the rage go? After 2008, most people would agree the “system” was flawed, and yet, we were given more “solutions” that were born from, and extensions of, this system – only this time without the smiley face. The angry among us would call bullshit. But this inchoate anger at the system is a powerful recognition.
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Why the burden of proof is on believers Harmon Moon Hyde Park
Olivia Messer | The McGill Daily
Art, science, faith
The politics undergirding our beliefs The gadfly Shaina Agbayani
shaina.agbayani@mcgilldaily.com
“Skepticism is the beginning of Faith.” —Oscar Wilde aith – in an Occident made starry-eyed by secularism – is often unpopular. Yet it has quite simply evolved.
Secularism: the Politicization of Art When feigned by apathetic Rage Against the Machine (politically-polemical nineties band) concertgoers screaming, “Eff you, I won’t do what you tell me,” the politics of rage can be seen as a practice of misguided wretches, brainwashed into fanatically commercialized performances. “Without action, rage becomes just another commodity or marketing tool,” laments Mark Levin in an Al-Jazeera article titled, “No More Rage Against the Machine.” In response to the dearth of rage surrounding Wikileaks’ revelation of the myriad atrocities denied or concealed in Iraq by the American government, he criticizes how fury is channelled in concert-screaming rather than protest. The disparity between Rage’s enormous fan community and the petty fraction of them who exhibit the band’s commitment to political resistance against the woes of neoliberalism epitomizes, for Levin, politicized art’s artificiality. The notion of politicized art – or any artistic creation that is not simply a religious product – is relatively new. Walter Benjamin, in his essay “The Work of Art in the
Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” speaks to the necessary politicization of art when bereft of traditional and ritualistic value. After secularization in the 18th century, paintings and music once commissioned primarily as veneration for religious figures or as accompaniment to religious ceremonies were diverted for secular purposes. The novel secularity of art revised its value as an end in itself rather than as means to the divine. This paved the route towards key loci of modern artistic activity – galleries, concerts, et cetera. While Rage concerts may not foment political spirit in the traditional sense, they politicize the faith in music itself, required to replace the faith gone astray in the process of secularization.
Science=Faith Atheism’s Jesus, Mohammad, and Abraham – Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris – preach scientific scriptures, seeking to disenchant the brainwashed from theological curses. Yet while watching Harris’s TED presentation – “Science Can Answer Moral Questions” – I was persuaded that he was engaging in mystic wizardry, casting a spell on his white, middle-aged, middle-to-upper-class audience. “Does the Taliban have a point of view on physics worth considering?” No, he responds to himself. Almost on cue, as if meticulously orchestrated, they chuckle at hackneyed, obtuse jokes. Laughter ensues from his theatrically-voiced response. Chuckles likewise follow his profession that he is the Ted Bundy (seventies serial killer) of string theory. I frequently marvelled, Huh? Wtf is Sammy sayin’? Eventually, I was laughing incessantly at an
often-illogical ramble (liked by 4,197 YouTubers) accompanied by visual presentations juxtaposing DNA strands with statues of the Virgin Mary; terrifying images of the Pope, sallow and darkeyed, with even more terrifying pictures of gravely-gazed Rabbis; and women in burqas, with scantily-clad blonde bombshells. While analyzing the infidels’ hyper-receptivity to Harris’s scientific sermon – their eruption into applause after remarkably uninsightful remarks – Bob Dylan whispered to me...
Moralizing conclusion The Duchess moralizes Alice in Wonderland, “Tut, tut, child! Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.” What is it? Dylan chants, “The answer is blowin’ in the wind,” depending on what you listen to, or, more precisely, what you choose to hear, scream apolitically at Rage concerts, or laugh gratuitously at at TED talks. Our ethnocentrism allows us to criticize all performances of faith as the actions of brainwashed androids. Yet the idea of brainwashing is curious to me. The moralizing din that religion, amongst other institutions, brainwashes, is banal. Everything “brainwashes” – capitalism, nationalism, art, ad infinitum. Humans require faith in somethings, the mere belief in which never inherently indicates vice. Faith is what forges institutions into existence, and what is humanly – not epistemologically – contrived for “good” or “bad.” As Wilde so astutely notes, skepticism and the subsequent disavowal of certain value systems is quite simply the beginning of faith in other systems from which to derive a sense of community and morality. o
t some point in your life, you will find yourself confronting the idea of god. Does he exist? What is his role? Does he actually want you to do what you think he does? This is, of course, normal; to question one’s core beliefs is an integral part of the development and growth of a human being, and not to do so is to deny oneself the opportunity to mature. Here, then, is a presentation of the view from the other side: a brief explanation of the principles behind rationalist, atheistic thought. In a debate, you usually have two sides – the proposition and the opposition. One person proposes something and the other person opposes. If the proposer wants their argument to hold water, they have to back up their statements. Let’s say I turn to you and announce that you are standing in the way of an invisible pink unicorn that would like to get by. It would be perfectly reasonable in this situation for you to ask me how I know there’s a unicorn there. Until I provide a satisfactory answer, you’re in no way obligated, to accept the existence of my invisible pink unicorn as a fact, and if I were to start demanding, “Why don’t you think there’s an invisible pink unicorn here?!” it would also be perfectly reasonable for you to simply walk away. Since I am the one proposing, the burden of proof is on me to show that there is an invisible pink unicorn in the room. There’s a bit more to this, though. Continuing with the unicorn, let’s say that I announce: “I know the invisible pink unicorn is there because she told me so.” “I didn’t hear anything,” you reply. “Maybe she could repeat that?” “You didn’t hear her because she was whispering,” I reply in turn. “She doesn’t want to talk
But wait!
to anyone else, though, so you’re going to have to take my word for it. There’s your proof.” Unfortunately for me, evidence needs to be verifiable in some way in order to be reasonably accepted. Since there is no way to confirm whether the unicorn actually spoke or not, having me tell you that the unicorn spoke is not acceptable proof of the unicorn’s existence. “Okay then,” I assert, “She’s standing right there. You can see her hoofprints in the carpet.” “Those look like they could be marks from the vacuum cleaner,” you counter. “Can we take her outside and see if she makes the same marks in the dirt?” “Getting her hooves dirty?!” I cry incredulously. “What’s wrong with you? Don’t you have all the evidence you need?” Further, the evidence needs to be able to be presented independently of the circumstances. If you claim that your TV can turn itself on, but only when there’s a remote control in the room, you have not presented compelling evidence. Move the TV to a new room, or move the remote, and the phenomenon is no longer replicable. The TV doesn’t turn itself on, and the unicorn probably doesn’t exist either. This is the same issue with god. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and it’s hard to find a claim more extraordinary than that there exists an omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent being that cannot be perceived but which has a profound effect on everything that happens in the world. Until the proposition has working proof for its claims, the opposition is under no duty to disprove it, and the invisible pink unicorn will never make her way across the room. Harmon Moon, U1 History, is a member of the McGill Freethought Association. Write him at harmon.moon@mail. mcgill.ca.
There’s more:
• Michael Morgenthau on the BDS campaign • Anastasia Pokholok on net value • Jade Calver on the merging of language and culture departments • Frazer Anderson and Simon Hudson on the upcoming “double-dip recession” • Hilary Angus on Canadian nationalism • Whitney Mallett on cancer activism
Check out mcgilldaily.com/sections/commentary for these great articles!
Commentaire | Commentary
Beyond a reasonable doubt
Commentaire | Commentary
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Clash of civilizations
Learning about the diversity of belief in a globalized world Mays Chami Hyde Park
was raised with a very Catholic upbringing in a more or less homogeneous community in the Middle East. I believed throughout the whole of my childhood that a religious person was a good person and a good person was a religious person. My first contact with an atheist person was at the age of 12, when my day camp counsellor told me in private that she did not worship God. My first reaction was shock, which slowly transformed itself into an internal conflict. How could this young woman whom I liked and even looked up to be a non-believer? For a time I went through a phase of denial about it, and then eventually came to terms with my inner struggle to comprehend this seemingly blatant contradiction by attributing her atheism with the fact that she was French: a foreigner from the land of bohemians where the rules of morality that I had been taught simply did not apply. The drastic and sudden change in my life happened when I moved to Canada and started to encounter colleagues, classmates, and teachers who completely reworked my perspective on religion. Firstly, the girl sitting next to me in English class at CEGEP turned to me one day and casually asked me if I believed in God. Again, I was flabbergasted, except this time I tried not to show it. I pretended to ponder the question for a few seconds before responding in the affirmative. A few weeks later I was intro-
Alex McKenzie | The McGill Daily
duced to a Jewish girl who I clicked with immediately. She was the very first Jewish person I had ever had personal contact with, and happily I felt the hesitant and ill-defined prejudice that had been instilled in me
dissolve. For the next few months, I started coming to terms with the idea that believing in God was a choice. Pretty soon I came to the realization that atheists were perfectly capable of being good people
too. Eventually, I decided that I liked the moral criteria of atheists better than those of traditional (monotheistic) religious groups. My outlook toward religion turned into one of cynicism bordering on self-
congratulatory haughtiness. Recently, however, I have met people who are religious and believing, yet who behave in ways that I thought were contradictory with what is typically associated with devout faith. I have also encountered people who behaved in what I assumed were religiously-adherent ways, yet did not believe in God. I have also, on a couple of occasions, found myself having a debate with somebody coming from a certain religious background, where I was the one siding with the standpoint that their religion holds, instead of the other way around. These exchanges, along with my personal readings and reflections, have allowed me to come to a very passive view of religion, where I do not feel the need to categorize myself as either religious or non-religious: I choose simply to be good. The two concepts – being good and being religious – are not interdependent. I also find myself identifying with almost any religious school, which has made me think that if I can identify with bits and pieces of different religions and philosophies, then certainly I was not the only person to do so, and therefore an infinite number of religious combinations and permutations exist. It is extremely reductionist to group people into predetermined sets of philosophies and beliefs. A more accurate way of assaying a person is by understanding their philosophies, not by knowing the name of the religious group to which they belong. Mays Chami is a U3 Chemical Engineering student. You can reach her at mayschami@gmail.com.
The man waiting Some misconceptions about Christianity Joshua Chu Hyde Park
t is not only about rules, nor only about obeying the Ten Commandments. It is not only about heaven or hell, nor is it only about reading the Bible. It is not only about going to church, nor is it only about tossing a dollar in the collection plate. It is something much greater than that. Something rich. Something life-giving. Christians know what people think of us. Popular depictions of us as Bible-thumping, judgmental, hypocritical, sexist fundamentalists are all over the place. We are well aware of all this and it would be more than fair to say that we deserve some of that criticism. We
are sorry and we hope that you can forgive us for our insensitivity and bigotry. Though we sometimes fail to effectively communicate the message of Christianity, it is not only about rules, duty, or obligation. To be honest, I myself, as the son of a pastor, thought that was what Christianity was all about. I blindly obeyed the rules without really understanding what it was all about. However, once I came to McGill and left my parents and my church, I realized that I needed to find out what I, for 18 years of my life, had committed myself to. Christianity is about a relationship. All of us as Christians have met a man named Jesus. We were not forced to meet him. We met him when we were ready, in our own personal ways. He was wait-
ing for us ever so patiently. We came to Jesus in our poverty. All of us are poor in some way. We may not be financially poor, but all of us experience some sort of need or suffering. Some of us need food, a roof over our head, and a warm bed. Some of us need freedom from the slavery of school, perfectionism, and self-hatred while others need rest, peace in our bodies, and solitude in our hearts. However, all of us need someone who sees us as who we are (not as our appearances or our GPAs) and accepts us in the way that we need to be accepted. We, as Christians, have acknowledged our needs, our poverty, and in our desperation, sought this man named Jesus, who told us that he wants to offer us something more than just a
solution to our poverty. He wants to offer water to our thirsty soul, satisfaction to our hungry hearts, peace to our chaotic minds. Jesus has invited us into a relationship with him. He told and showed us that we are precious to him. We are valued. Even though we suffer from our poverty, he offers to be the shoulder we cry on, our best friend, our sustainer. Through this relationship, we find true satisfaction, freedom, and a deep love within. How do we know this? He came to this world to live with the outsiders – street people, the awkward, and those rejected by society. He then sacrificed himself on a cross to show us how much he truly valued us. Jesus has asked us to let go of our poverty, to let go of the things with which we often replace an intimate,
loving, life-giving relationship and to acknowledge that what Jesus is offering is so much better. However, like all relationships, there must be commitment, a willing desire and decision to allow Jesus to become our top-priority. What is your poverty? What are your needs? What do you suffer from and wish every day that you would be freed from? Jesus is offering you freedom. Do you want it? Meet Jesus on your own terms. It does not have to be at a church. It does not have to be with a priest. Speak to Jesus. He listened to me, and he’s waiting to listen to you. He’s been waiting for you. Joshua Chu is a U3 Theology student and president of the McGill Christian Fellowship. You can reach him at joshua.c.chu@gmail.com.
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
How, not why By Edna Chan
Œuvre d’art | Art essay
Essai photo | Photo essay
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Le DĂŠlit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Holy mountain, holy streets Finding faith in Montreal
Lorraine Chuen for The McGill Daily
Courtesy of Thuru Murugan Temple
Victor Tangermann | The McGill Daily
Notre-Dame Basilica 110 Notre-Dame O. In 1824, Irish-American architect James O’Donnell moved to Montreal from New York to design and build the Basilica, and remains the only person buried in the church crypt after converting to Catholicism on his deathbed. Its reputation as the main draw for tourists to Old Montreal is welldeserved: Justin Trudeau delivered the eulogy for his father and former prime minister Pierre Trudeau there; it was the funeral site for Canadiens star hockey player Maurice Richard.
porated a mission for the growing Polish population in Mile End. Instantly recognizable by its byzantine dome and minaret-style tower, the church’s regular bazaars offer a chance to sample Polish cuisine and find used clothes on the cheap.
of Jewish life in Montreal since a wave of immigration at the turn of the last century. Also known as the Congregation Temple Solomon, the synagogue is recognized by the Quebec government as the oldest one still at its original location in Montreal.
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The Mosquée Al-Omah Al-Islamiah (above right) 1245 St. Dominique The mosque first rented a space on St. Laurent in 1982. It is open to visitors everyday and hosts a children’s Sunday school for religious education and Arabic. A mural gracing the outer wall can be seen from Ste. Catherine.
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Enpuku-Ji Zen Centre 4620 St. Dominique Visitors, students, and resident monks meditate together in morning and evening sessions under the guidance of the abbess Myokyo, who helped found the centre in 1995. The centre hosts the annual Montreal Zen Poetry Festival.
St. Joseph’s Oratory 3800 Chemin Queen Mary The implied backdrop for Quebec filmmaker Denys Arcand’s Jesus of Montreal, the Oratory is the largest church in Canada and boasts the third largest dome of its kind in the world, after the Basilica of our Lady of Peace of Yamoussoukro in Côte d’Ivoire and St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.
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Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue 4894 St. Kevin Although they have only occupied their current Cote-desNeiges location since 1947, the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue’s congregation dates back to 1760 and is the oldest Jewish institution in Canada.
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Centre Soufi Naqshbandi de Montréal 138 Fairmount O. A distinct order of Sufi Islam, the Naqshbandi claim descent from Abu Bakr, the Prophet Muhammad’s father-in-law and the First Caliph (Muslim ruler). The Naqshbandi are currently led by Sheikh Nazim Al-Haqqani, who established the Montreal centre in 1989. The Sheikh is in his nineties and still receives visitors to his home in Cyprus.
Union United Church 3007 Delisle On September 1, 1907, 26 black railway porters and members of their families worshipped together for the first time as the Union Congregational Church. The stone church they moved into nearly a decade later dates to 1899. Now deteriorating because of water damage, the church is ineligible for restoration funding because it scores a low rating from Quebec’s religiousheritage council. The congregation has told the Gazette, however, that they are confident they will find a way to save their church, which has been a spiritual and social and mainstay for Montreal’s black community for over a century. Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu are among the notable leaders who have preached to the congregation at Union.
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Church of St. Michael and St. Anthony 5580 St. Urbain Inspired by the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, this huge church was built to serve an Irish Catholic parish but has since incor-
Bagg Street Shul (above left) 3919 Clark In 1922, the Shul opened at this location just a stones throw from the Main, or St. Laurent, which has always been an artery
The Bahá’í Shrine 1548 des Pins O. In 1912, Montreal was the only Canadian city visited by ‘Abdu’lBahá, eldest son of the founder of the Bahá’í faith, during his North American tour. He stayed three days in the house of May Maxwell, a central figure in the early Montreal Bahá’í community whose husband William Sutherland Maxwell was one of Canada’s most prominent architects. Their home became the only Bahá’í shrine outside Western Asia in 1953. Gaden Chang Chub Chöling Tibetan Buddhist Temple 1870 de l’Église, Longueuil (not on map) The founder of the temple, the Venerable Geshe Khenrab Gajam Rinpoche, was among the many who followed the 14th Dalai Lama to India after the Chinese invasion of Tibet. In 1972, Canadian Immigration officials accepted approximately 400 Tibetan refugees and specifically invited Geshe Khenrab to care for the Tibetan community in Longueuil. His first small apartment there became a hub for Dharma teachings in Quebec, with Leonard Cohen’s house in the Plateau on St. Dominique a popular place for initiations and retreats. Thiru Murugan Temple (above centre) 1611 St. Regis, Dollard-des-Ormeaux (not on map) Members of the Tamil-speaking Hindu community were meeting on a weekly basis when they formed the Saiva Mission of Quebec in 1985 to build a temple for the Lord Murugan. By 1992, the Mission had raised the funds to purchase two acres of land in Dollard-des-Ormeaux. Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami blessed the land and the temple was built there three years later. —Compiled by Rana Encol and Sheehan Moore
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Feature
Foi | Faith
Victor Tangermann | The McGill Daily
Miracles on the mountain Catholicism in Quebec is nowhere near as prevalent as it used to be, but the recent canonization of Brother André demonstrates the persistence of faith in this province, writes Ian Beattie t 4 a.m. on October 15, one of the many underground chambers of St. Joseph’s Oratory – known as the “crypt church,” and in fact the first part of the complex to be completed – was packed out the door by a crowd of well over a thousand people. The occasion was the canonization of Saint André Bessette, a turn of the century Quebec monk and mystic, who is credited with the miraculous healings of thousands of people. From around 1900 until his death in 1937, André was one of the most famous people in Quebec. His personal legend and his fanatical devotion to Saint Joseph, the stepfather of Jesus, inspired the wealthier Catholics of Montreal to finance the massive Oratory’s construction. And his following seems only to have grown since then. More than two million pilgrims a year visit the Oratory, many in hopes of curing their medical problems. Part of the massive flight of stairs leading to the basilica is roped off for pilgrims who ascend them on their knees, saying a prayer at each step. André is entombed in a chamber deep beneath the church, his heart on display in a nearby glass case filled with formaldehyde. Adjacent to the tomb is a chapel devoted to Saint Joseph, with stations for each of his different areas of patronage: the worker, the family, those beset by demons, and so on. In between the stations, enormous racks reach up to the ceiling, covered by hundreds and hundreds of crutches. They have been left there by pilgrims who came to the Oratory, and left with no more need for them. The most poignant are the
crutches that are just three or four feet tall – the flung-away fetters of an injured or disabled child. Since the actual ceremony for André was being held in Rome, a screen had been set up at the front of crypt church to livebroadcast the ceremony, but it kept collapsing. Each time it was re-erected, thunderous applause broke out, and some were even moved to tears. A young American nun sat on the lap of her elder sister, craning her neck for a better view; at the back of the room, a Radio-Canada camera crew pressed equipment in people’s faces, aggressively demanding comment. I spoke to one man who had came from Ottawa to pay homage to André. “The fact that it’s Brother André’s canonization, I think it’s very important that I be here,” he said. “Quebec City was founded 400 years ago or something, and we have [only] one saint now. The church was mostly in Europe, before, and now it’s expanding.” Globally, maybe so, but not in North America. “Quebec has gone very far from being religious. Maybe [the canonization] will bring some back, I don’t know. The church needs to be realigned.” Another man had travelled all the way from Connecticut. Coincidentially, he was also named André Bessette. “Over the past four or five years, I have been more deliberate, and mindful of my faith, and our heritage,” Bessette told me. He is now an Episcopalian, but comes from a traditional French-Canadian Catholic family (he even said he was a distant relation of his namesake). “What Brother André did, and continues to do through so many people, it’s amazing,” he said. “I was
really honoured to be here.”
The path to sainthood The process leading up to this honour is remarkably bureaucratic. First, a person must be beatified, for which one confirmed miracle in their name is required. They are then referred to as “The Blessed so-and-so,” as Brother André had been since 1982. After a second confirmed miracle, the person becomes a saint, but this can take many years. Brother André was actually one of the youngest of his class – two of this year’s new saints died in the 17th century. In an interview with The Daily, Richard Bernier, a doctorate student at McGill specializing in the intersection of faith and culture, explained the technicalities of a “miracle.” “A miracle is understood to be something that manifests the presence of God in the world,” Bernier said. Everyday, personal miracles are part of the Catholic faith, but in the context of canonization, he said, they need to be a little bolder. “In practice it’s always of a medical nature…something that happens in the case of a sick person that’s medically inexplicable.” Whether or not it is inexplicable is determined by a Vaticanappointed team of doctors. If they investigate the case and come up empty-handed, and the medical case is explicitly tied to Catholic devotion – say, if the afflicted had been praying for help to Brother André – a miracle has officially taken place. Contrary to common conception, the Church doesn’t “make” anyone a saint; the word merely refers to someone who
is in heaven. Those recognized as saints here on earth are those known to be in heaven, thanks to the evidence provided by miracles. Saints have no healing power of their own, but, being in heaven, can appeal to God on behalf of people here on Earth. Most people in the crypt church that night believed André already was a saint, and had just been waiting for the Vatican to acknowledge it. “It’s like when you discover a band,” Bernier told me. Himself a practicing Catholic with a hero of his own – John Henry Newman – on the path to canonization, Bernier continued “If everyone understands how great that music is, maybe it doesn’t change your appreciation of it, but there’s a sense of confirmation, and also you’re sharing something wonderful with other people.”
Staying modest about miracles The bureaucracy of the canonization system, and individuals’ own veneration of saintly people, can lead to some strange contradictions. It took a century for Brother André to be credited with two confirmed miracles, yet people have been experiencing miracles on the southwest slope of Mount Royal every day for all that time. The tiny chapel where André received the faithful before the crypt church was constructed has been preserved in the shadow of the Oratory. Its walls are covered with donated plaques, thanking Saint Joseph for curing everything from rheumatism to cancer. When I asked Bernier about the discrepancy between the popular understanding of Brother André and the Vatican’s recognition
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Source: bloggingcanadians.ca
of only two of his miracles, he emphasized the need for skepticism within the faith. “That’s kind of the hierarchy’s job, they’re like the airbrakes on a truck,” Bernier told me. “They’re meant to slow things down, and that’s frustrating if you’re trying to go faster, or it’s frustrating if you don’t want to encounter that resistance.” Across the globe, average Catholics venerate people and places that the church refuses to recognize. Bernier cited the shrine at Lourdes, France, a widely-revered site that in the past met with severe resistance from church authorities. Here in Quebec, though, there may be other reasons for the church to play down André’s mass healing powers. André was a big part of pre-Quiet Revolution Catholicism, when the Church was the most powerful cultural institution in the province, bar none. At that time, people weren’t terribly subtle about their faith in André’s miracles. In one of my favourite documents from the period, a comic book entitled The Wonder Man of Montreal, a bulked-up André doles out healing at every flip of the page. When a man comes to him with a paralyzed right arm, André reminds him to go to confession, then says, “PICK UP YOUR HAT…WITH YOUR RIGHT HAND.” And he does. Later in the book, he even brings a woman back from the dead, Lazarus-style. (She wakes up hungry, prompting him to say, “GET ME AN ORANGE. I WANT HER TO EAT IT.”) But times have changed. We now live in an era of high-tech hospitals and Catholic child and sex abuse scandals. If the church went around touting “the miracle-man of Montreal,” it might garner some pretty sharp criticism. Consequently, André has
gone through something of a public-image revision, from which he has emerged as a faithful naïf, prone less to raising the dead than saying pithy things like “It is with the smallest brushes that the artist paints the most exquisitely beautiful pictures!” A Globe and Mail article about the canonization spoke sternly about the “creepy” side of André’s legacy, meaning, essentially, miracles, which always have been, and always will be a central part of the Catholic faith. Church officials were quoted in the article emphasizing that the modern-day Oratory only encourages “healthy spirituality.” “The context in which we live today is different,” one priest told the Gazette, “there are a lot more social services and medical services, but there are still a lot of people who need a friend, who need a brother to whom they can talk. Brother André reminds us that we can be this brother, this friend, for people around us.” For many of the faithful, this tamer church may provide an avenue to reconcile their belief with their modern sensibilities. Besette explained his idea of miracles to me in a manner that perfectly synthesized traditionalism and modern skepticism. Though he “believes” in miracles, less institutionalized, more interpretative miracles appealed to Bessette. “I believe in miracles, I can’t say I see them every day, but I’ve seen them. I’ve got three kids, and they’re all pretty good kids, that’s miraculous.”
Crutches in the basement Yet things have not changed as much as it could seem to an outsider. Church offi-
cials may insist to the sneering anglophone press that they endorse “healthy” kinds of devotion, but the crutches in the basement more than speak for themselves. Little testaments of private faith are scattered throughout the Oratory, suggesting that in the minds of the faithful, André is still the same miraculous, humble man. There are more crutches in the original chapel, and notes slipped under the glass of André’s preserved living quarters beg for his help with all kinds of medical problems. The Oratory has become a true sanctuary for ill and disabled Catholics. On one of my visits, a young woman who was over-dressed for the weather reached the top of the steps, leaned against a railing, and coughed heavily into a white handkerchief. If critics of the church wish to deride its endorsement of miracles, then they must contend with the other elements of André’s healing legacy. One of these is the Congregation for the Sick and the Suffering, a weekly prayer service for disabled and ill people, held every Wednesday without fail. Bernier stressed the need to place healing miracles in perspective. “As much as I, or anyone else might say, you know, miracles are a thing of a past – and I’m not saying that is the case – at the same time there are ordinary folks who went to the Oratory one day and experienced something that allowed them to leave their crutches behind. And for them, that might have been life-changing.” Do we really want to relegate miracles to the past? Miracles are one part of faith that can never be dominated by institutional hierarchy or dogma. Even if they can be co-
opted, the actual experience of a miracle remains entirely and intimately personal. Likewise, saints must become folk-heroes before they can merit that institutional stamp of approval. The question of whether or not miracles do, in fact, occur, has almost nothing to do with the fact that people experience them. Try to imagine that the maker of the universe has singled you out and cured your bad leg, and you can begin to understand why the Oratory remains such an attraction. It is this sense of wonder that drew people to the Oratory the night of October 15, including monks, priests, lay-people, and even casually agnostic, Presbyterian-raised student journalists like myself. On the night of the ceremony, I met a man named Pierre standing on the terrace, smoking a cigarette. His eyes were red with tears. He looked to be in his mid to late thirties and he had long, brown scraggly hair. Despite the awkwardness of the language barrier, he seemed eager to talk to me, and I told him I could record him in French. I asked him why he was there. “Oh,” he said, at a loss, “Brother André is my friend. I don’t know how to explain it…He is someone who has helped me a lot...I wanted to be here to thank him.” I asked what “helped” meant. “I have foot problems,” he explained. I nodded. As Bernier said, “You’ll meet lots of faithful who are encouraged by the fact that there was a man who walked our streets, who knew Côte-des-Neiges, and took the streetcar – all these ordinary parts of urban life. They derive encouragement from the thought that he also seems to have done extraordinary things.”
Œuvre d’art | Art essay
Every day the same Naomi Endicott
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Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
Arts & Culture
29.11.2010
par Raphaël Thézé
Matière grise et pensées libres
Foi | Faith
A church united? The Daily speaks with NDP MP Bill Siksay about Canada’s religious landscape ill Siksay is the first openly gay non-incumbent to be elected to the Canadian parliament. Originally from Oshawa, Ontario, Siksay studied to be ordained as a minister in the United Church of Canada, during which time he came out as gay. His partner, Brian Burke, is the minister of Trinity United Church in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia. Siksay currently serves as the critic for Ethics, Access to Information and Privacy, and LGBT issues in the NDP’s shadow cabinet. The McGill Daily: You came out as gay during your ordination process of becoming a minister with the United Church of Canada. Did the fact that you came out play a significant role in your never being ordained? Bill Siksay: It’s an interesting question. I was one of the
first people to come out in the process toward ordination when the United Church was debating that issue back in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The church had already begun a study of human sexuality in general, but a number of us came out in 1980 and said that we wanted to be considered for ordination and that we were gay and lesbian. I think it made the process more difficult, there’s no doubt about that. The church at that moment hadn’t re-examined its policy on ordaining gay and lesbian people, and was in the process of doing that. But it’s hard for me to say that I wasn’t ordained because of the policy. There’s no doubt that the policy was a barrier at the time, and that some of the church people I had to deal with weren’t prepared to move forward with my candidacy, but I think if I had persevered, ordination would have been pos-
sible eventually. MD: The United Church has traditionally been seen as politically left-leaning, supporting issues such as universal health care when it was an ideologically divisive issue in Canada. Do you think that the United Church still has a strong voice on the political stage, or has it diminished in the last decade or so? BS: Certainly the United Church isn’t as prominent as it once was in terms of the number of Canadians who have direct affiliation with it, but I still think the church can and does exert influence. The church seeks to let politicians know its concerns on matters such as refugee policy and economic policy, and I think the United Church played a positive role in the debate on gay and lesbian marriage as well. MD: Why doesn’t the church command the same type of alle-
giance as it once did? BS: The religious landscape of the country has changed. Not as many people claim affiliation to the United Church, the size of other denominations and religious groups has increased, and many people no longer claim affiliation to any religion. While this changing landscape has changed the numbers within the United Church, the church still sees a clear role for itself in influencing social policy in Canada, and I think it stills exerts this influence. MD: Is the United Church more prone to losing members of its congregation than other denominations? BS: No, I don’t subscribe to the notion that the conservative denominations are growing at the expense of other denominations. The proportion of Christians in Canada is just different than it was decades ago, as is those of
other religious groups and the proportion of those who claim no affiliation. MD: Does religion in Canada make the political landscape more difficult to traverse for gay politicians? BS: I don’t think the objection to gay and lesbian people’s full participation in society is entirely religiously motivated; people who hold that opinion come to it from a number of different directions, not just religious concerns. Many folks who you might consider to be from a more conservative religious tradition don’t discriminate on that basis when it comes to judging the abilities or the suitability of an elected official. —Compiled by Lyndon Entwhistle Read the full interview online at mcgilldaily.com/culture
Arts & Culture
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
L’irrésistible attrait du matériel Chronique|Arts & Culture: Tant qu’il y aura des livres Rosalie Dion-Picard Le Délit
’est tellement 2007, je le sais avant même de commencer. Non seulement le sujet est-il dépassé, mais mes prophéties le concernant s’avèreront à la fois vaines et ridicules. Dans trente ans, quelque individu mal intentionné trouvera, par le biais de Google 3000, cette chronique pompeuse remplie de prédictions erronées qu’il révélera à la face du monde. Pourtant, au risque de gâcher ma future réputation (dont l’existence
reste à prouver), je me lance telle une héroïne sans peur dans le monde de la controverse: écran ou papier? Pour ce qui est du livre je suis dans le camp, comme cela se devine aisément, des arriérés pour qui le livre physique s’apparente à un ami. Qu’on se comprenne bien: les tablettes ne méritent pas la mort, non plus qu’elles ne sont que des bébelles chères (quoique …). Je vous ferai grâce des arguments bibliophiles sur la communion spirituelle exceptionnelle entre le lecteur et l’incarnation papier du livre. La question du devenir des libraires, infographistes, manutentionnaires, éditeurs et que sais-je encore a
été largement débattue par des polémistes autrement plus savants que moi. Je puis néanmoins affirmer, sans crainte de me tromper, que l’imprimé a une valeur intrinsèque. Matériel et concret, on peut le traîner partout, sans piles, sans bébelle chère. Oui, plusieurs déserteront les librairies, car les œuvres les plus demandées seront numérisées et prêtes à être téléchargées depuis le confort d’une chaise de bureau ergonomique. Pourtant, certains continueront de flâner entre les rayons, de profiter des conseils des libraires et de feuilleter les œuvres. Comme devant leur pro-
pre bibliothèque, ils choisiront parmi les étalages leur prochaine lecture. Moi qui suis, disons-le, peu structurée, j’ai besoin de posséder des objets physiques pour ne pas oublier leur existence. Et, non, ce n’est pas comme les CD remplacés par les lecteurs mp3. D’abord la musique, ça ne se voit pas. Du disque à la cassette au CD au Ipod, il faut un support pour écouter la musique, et ce support change. Des mots sur du papier, il y a longtemps que ça roule comme système. Peut-être, entre autres, parce qu’il est à la fois pratique, peu dispendieux et agréable à utiliser. Des choses que j’ai du mal à associer d’emblée aux
Kindles et Ipad. J’ai aussi lu un jour quelque chose sur les écrans, qui fatiguent plus les yeux que la lecture sur papier. En plus, tous ces machins proposent des distractions. Le syndrome du «si je n’ai pas commencé mes travaux, c’est de la faute de Facebook» risque de s’aggraver si toute lecture peut être interrompue d’un simple clic vers Tetris. En toute honnêteté, c’est ce qui m’arriverait. Même le guide de la maîtresse de maison que j’ai vu en librairie l’autre jour le dit: les livres possèdent un grand potentiel décoratif, même si vous ne les ouvrez jamais. x
God on ice Université de Montréal professor Olivier Bauer explains Habs culture as religion livier Bauer is an associate professor of Theology and Religious Sciences at the Université de Montréal. He is currently teaching a course called La Réligion du Canadien de Montréal (The Religion of the Montreal Canadiens). Next spring, he will be releasing his second book on the subject, entitled Une Théologie du Canadien de Montréal. He spoke with The Daily about the relationship between religion and hockey. The McGill Daily: How do you define religion? Olivier Bauer: Religion is a relation between human beings and an absolute sacred one: god, divine principle, or something like that. It is a transcendent relation between someone or something where he or she is sacred... you can name it what you want; maybe it’s God, or the absolute, the divine architect, and so on. MD: How is sport a religion? OB: In general, things don’t happen every time as they should. You can be the best player and one time you can score
a goal and the day after it could be impossible for you to score… so it seems that there is something more than human in sport in general. It’s not just the skill of the players or the quality of the [equipment]; there is something we don’t know involved in sport. There is a supernatural power that is involved in sport that can help you; it can play with you or against you. It’s a religion because you have to please this supernatural being to make it play with you, not against you. MD: What factors lead to the creation of a sport-religion? OB: With the Habs religion, what is very particular is that it is a religion of Montreal and of Quebec. It’s the same as in every other sport; to make the gods play with the Habs. But it’s in a very Catholic way and in a very Quebecker way. For the Habs, the way you pray is the Catholic way because the culture of Quebec is very Catholic. For example, during the playoffs, there are people who go to the Oratoire St. Joseph and they [kneel] because it is the Catholic way to ask for something from God. It takes a Catholic face because we are in Montreal.
But probably if you are Jewish or Protestant or atheist you can have another kind of a relation [to the sport]. MD: Religion offers its followers a moral code, does hockey do this as well? OB: That is very interesting, because in hockey you have a moral code. It’s the man you should be – it’s a very specific kind of virility. You have to be a man and you have to be very strong and you have to be ready sacrifice yourself and you need to fight and you need to be hurt. It’s this kind of morality. It’s very interesting because of the motto of the Habs: ‘Nos bras meurtris vous tendent le flambeau (our bruised arms are holding the torch). I think there is a kind of moral dimension here. It’s not very unusual in Quebec; you know there is this mentality “Nous sommes nés pour un petit pain (we are born for a small loaf of bread).” You have to suffer if you want to win, if you are a Quebecker you have to suffer because everyone is against you. It’s the same on the ice. MD: What drew you to this topic?
OB: When I arrived in Montreal in 2006, I thought it would be very interesting to work on this topic: the link between the most important cultural phenomenon in Montreal – the Habs – and the religious dimension… my interest was to discover some religious aspect of cultural life and to explain it [through theology]. MD: What has the reaction been to your course? OB: It was amazing. I remember it was in 2007 and I gave an interview for the newspaper of the Université de Montreal. The day after I got two, three phone calls for interviews… and over the past two years I’ve given, I think, 150 interviews. I was very interested to discover how important it was for people in Montreal. Everyone was saying that the Habs are our religion but nobody had really explained what that means. MD: By studying sport as a religion, what do you hope to achieve? OB: Some celebrity, of course, and to be interviewed by The McGill Daily. The first thing is I want to understand. For my part I wanted to understand what that means: the Habs in Montreal.
I got a lot of testimonies from people [saying] “I’m part of this religion”, and so I’m a little bit afraid because I think it’s not a very good religion. It’s a very tribal religion. There is a lot of violence and hate, for example between Flyers and Habs. You have to hate Philadelphia and also to hate the people from Philadelphia…I think a religion should promote love and not hate. That’s why it’s not such a good religion. It’s a very selective religion. If you don’t have money you can’t be part of it. You need money to go to the Bell Center, you need money to buy some jerseys. It is also a selective religion on the ice: you have to be the best player. And the last thing is it’s not a very solid religion. The team could be sold and in ten years there won’t be any Habs in Montreal like in Quebec, the Nordiques. So what is there left? That is three critiques I can address to the Habsreligion. That’s why I think it could be better to put your faith and your hope in another religion and maybe in another god. —Compiled by Misha Schwartz
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Karen Armstrong’s book takes faith back to basics Anqi Zhang
The McGill Daily ontrary to what her book’s title might suggest, Karen Armstrong does not provide an argument for the necessity of religion or the existence of God. Instead, in The Case for God, she traces a complex history of religion through time to explore its role and the means by which it was practiced. Amstrong begins with the earliest worship of Mother Earth and the Animal Master, moving to the origins of scriptures and later, organized and unified religions. She discusses how the idea of religious skepticism arose in the face of tragedies such as the Holocaust, spawning present-day debates about God’s
existence. There is extensive discussion of several religions, and not only the major monotheistic ones; Armstrong also discusses Paganism, Hellenism, and Buddhism, among others. But for all its historical breadth, this book is tied together by one central message, making it easy to follow what would otherwise be a mere historical account of various religious approaches interspersed with esoteric vocabulary. Armstrong bases her discussion in the human tendency toward religion that led to the development of myths and mythical beings as early as the Stone Age. But she says that our current understanding of religion has deviated from these roots: we are no longer “willing to make the effort” that true religious experience necessitates. We no longer look at scripture as text to be
interpreted and reinterpreted, tailoring it to provide guidance in our everyday lives. Instead, we look to religion and religious texts as an easy means of acquiring empirical knowledge. The desire to dissect religious texts in search of concrete answers is a modern phenomenon. So too, therefore, is the rejection of those concrete answers by today’s more militant atheists. Armstrong berates not only those who take religion too literally, but also those atheists who reject all that religion represents based solely on this factual approach to religion. She stresses that if religious texts were viewed today as they are meant to be viewed – as parables, and not as factual account – there would be no divisive conflict regarding God’s existence. In today’s society, where speaking about religion in pub-
lic is almost taboo for fear of offending or causing argument, this concept offers a fresh angle on the God debate. Armstrong does a good job of presenting it, as she defines key words like “belief,” “atheism,” and “faith”. She notes that the definitions of these words have evolved over time, and her attempt to question our current perception of these meanings provides a fresh view of the approach to religion as a concept. Armstrong tells us that religion, in its purest form, is not about belief as we define it today – a blind faith in a tradition that we take to be reality – but about the experience. Religion is not meant to be realistic, or to be believed, Armstrong argues. Rather, it is meant for people to experience things that “are not explainable or logical.” Believers must actively involve themselves
in their faith, she says. The Case for God has a misleading title. Fortunately, this is its only negative feature. Throughout the book, Armstrong criticizes humanity’s progressive divergence from the pure concept of religion. She does not attempt, as the title might suggest, to prove or disprove the existence of God, but rather, to prove that there is no real need to know whether God exists. Though Armstrong does not really present a case for God in the expected manner, she does present a compelling case for a return to faith as it was classically defined. Framing religion as a matter of dogma and reason does not do it justice, Armstrong maintains; she proposes a return to the ancient approach to religion – emphasizing trust and connectedness rather than the pursuit of empirical correctness.
Holy fuck: the Pope and condoms Davide Mastracci The McGill Daily
here has been a storm of controversy within the Catholic world in recent days. The stir was incited by Pope Benedict XVI’s comments in a book of interviews conducted by German journalist Peter Seewald. In one of the interviews, Benedict claims that “there may be a basis in the case of some individuals, as perhaps when a male prostitute uses a condom, where this can be a first step in the direction of a moralization, a first assumption of responsibility.” In the world of the logically minded, this statement would merely resemble the toss of a pebble into a body of water: no major discernible movement. Yet this painfully obvious statement has had the effect of a tsunami on the lunacy of the Holy See. People dissenting to Benedict’s claim seem to prefer his previous statement made only a few months ago in May, when he stated that condoms were not “a real or moral
solution” to the AIDS epidemic, adding that this “can really lie only in a humanization of sexuality.” It’s comforting to know that it only took six months for the leader of the Catholic Church to realize that if you pick up dog shit with a plastic bag, you probably won’t get your hands dirty. This realization is not the critical factor, however, as it is merely a small drop of insight (if you can even call this elementary conclusion that) in the vast Catholic desert of perpetual ignorance. What holds a far greater level of prominence is the terror which accompanies the thought that a group to which millions of people pleadge allegiance can turn this painstakingly obvious matter into the subject of debate. Those in the upper echelons of the Church realize condoms can help to prevent against pregnancy and STIs, yet they insist on sending soldiers into battle without their helmets on. Thankfully, among the legions of Catholics, many – even some bishops – have objected to this war crime. For some, it is due to theoretical reasoning, while others take a more realistic approach to
the matter. For many, shooting daggers out of their dicks every time they use the washroom is far more daunting than the possible smiting of an unknown spirit in the sky. The Church would claim that these rogue soldiers are mere deserters from the Catholic legions, and if they simply followed the rules passed on by their officers, there would not be an issue. In this sense, the Church is correct. If humans did not have sex until they were married, and only for the purpose of having children, condoms would not be a necessity. In an unjust war, however, deserters have a moral justification in disobeying their officers and leaving the forces of injustice behind. And when your officer is standing over you and your partner, attempting to enforce his despicable views into the bedroom, deserting his illegitimate cause is a morally justified option, although retaliation would certainly be preferred. Davide Mastracci is a U0 Arts student. You can reach him at davide. mastracci@mail.mcgill.ca Emilio Comay del Junco | The McGill Daily
Good luck on exams, McGill. À janvier!
Arts & Culture
The case for religion
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Une carte de souhaits au coeur de l’enfer Le Cœur d’Auschwitz de Carl Leblanc retrace l’histoire inouïe d’une amitié tissée dans l’horreur des camps de concentration. Émilie Bombardier Le Délit
u Centre commémoratif de l’Holocauste à Montréal, un objet en particulier attire l’attention des visiteurs: une carte de souhaits en forme de cœur, couverte d’un tissu mauve brodé d’un «F» au fil rouge. Une journée de travail entière aurait été consacrée à la confection de ces quelques pages qui se déplient pour former quatre cœurs juxtaposés sur lesquels quinze jeunes filles âgées de moins de vingt-cinq ans ont signé des vœux d’anniversaire. Le 12 décembre 1944, ce minuscule cœur de papier fut offert en guise de cadeau d’anniversaire à Fania Feiner par ses collègues de travail, alors que toutes étaient contraintes aux travaux forcés à l’usine d’armement «l’Union», située au cœur même du camp de concentration d’Auschwitz. Leurs mots calligraphiés incitent la fêtée à garder courage, à croire en une liberté
prochaine, à se souvenir d’elles et à reconnaître «que leur plus grande victoire sera la survie». L’objet intrigue le visiteur. Comment ses signataires ont-elles pu voler papier, crayons, ciseaux et tube de colle dans cet endroit
où la mort les guettait constamment? Comment ont-elles confectionné ce cadeau à l’insu de tous? Comment Fania a-t-elle pu le ramener de l’enfer, le garder sous son bras durant son séjour à Auschwitz et tout au long de l’interminable marche de la mort qu’ont fait subir les SS à bon nombre de déportés à l’approche de l’armée rouge, en 1945? Ce «cœur d’Auschwitz», symbole extraordinaire d’une foi
inébranlable en la vie, est le sujet du documentaire de Carl Leblanc. Ce réalisateur québécois a commencé par rencontrer Fania Feiner, aujourd’hui octogénaire. Toujours bouleversée par l’acte si généreux qui aurait pu coûter la vie à ses amies, elle déplore les avoir perdues de vue, et avoir oublié leurs visages et leurs noms. Fasciné par cette histoire et assurément investit d’un devoir de mémoire, le documentariste s’est chargé de retrouver les «filles du cœur», entreprise audacieuse qui l’a mené aux quatre coins du globe. Il s’est ainsi promené d’un centre d’archives à l’autre, cherchant à déchiffrer les signatures de chacune. Le périple de Leblanc n’a pas été des plus faciles. Entre celles qui ne souhaitaient plus raconter même une seconde de leur séjour en enfer et celles qu’il n’a jamais retrouvées, sa recherche a pu sembler à plusieurs reprises aboutir à une fin infructueuse. Une survivante qui avait supervisé l’usine d’Auschwitz lui a même affirmé que ce cœur n’était qu’un coup de publicité; elle était convaincue qu’il n’avait pas pu être fabriqué dans un camp
de concentration, puis préservé. Pourtant, à l’aide de quelques femmes, Leblanc parvient finalement à retrouver quelques signataires, dont Lena, auteure du plus beau message de la carte, ainsi que Hanka qui avait eu l’idée de la confectionner. Les enfants d’une autre, décédée quelques années plutôt, verront en ce cœur le dévoilement de ce que leur mère avait toujours voulu leur cacher. Au fil de l’enquête –car c’est véritablement ce que cette recherche devient– tout porte à croire qu’un tel cadeau est le résultat d’un acte de courage immense, le témoignage d’un espoir l’emportant sur la peur. Documentaire réalisé en toute simplicité et avec peu de
Gracieuseté de Filmoption International
Arts & Culture
Foi | Faith
moyens, Le Cœur d’Auschwitz, dévoile l’histoire formidable d’un petit objet porteur d’une mémoire transmise aux enfants et petits-enfants des signataires, ainsi qu’aux visiteurs du musée auquel il a été confié. Si Theodor Adorno déclarait que faire de la poésie après Auschwitz était tout simplement impossible, le fait de retrouver celle qui s’est faite pendant l’horreur tient presque du miracle… x
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Arts & Culture
Mohawk miracles
Mike Mszanski for The McGill Daily
The debated sainthood of Kateri Tekakwitha Christina Colizza
The McGill Daily he mythic story of the “Lily of Mohawks” Kateri Tekakwitha’s miraculous healing powers and devotion to the Catholic Church has created much debate surrounding her possible canonization. An internationally cherished figure, her lasting legacy yearly draws pilgrims to the St. Francis Xavier Church on the Mohawk reserve in Kahnawake, Quebec. Once a safe haven for indigenous people wishing to practice Catholicism free from persecution, reluctance now exists amongst Kahnawake’s own residents as to whether she truly deserves sainthood. Her miracles, albeit inspiring in story, are viewed with ambivalence by much of Kahnawake’s population. A wave of smallpox killed Tekakwitha’s parents and brother when she was four, leaving her face completely scarred. Adopted by her uncle, Tekakwitha was introduced to Jesuit missionaries and her passionate spirituality lead to her eventual baptism in 1676. Her fellow Mohawks ostracized her for her devoutness, causing Tekakwitha to flee from upstate New York to Kahnawake in 1677. In the last three years of her life, Tekakwitha devoted herself completely to God, accepting Jesus as her only husband. Stories often glorify her self-flagellation, sleeping on beds of thorns, or praying
barefoot in the snow to emulate Jesus’s suffering. The most significant of these folk tales is the disappearance of her scars in the moment of her death. After her final words, “Jesus, I love you!” (or “Jesus! Mary!” as other sources say), Tekakwitha’s smallpocked face cleared, leaving a rosy complexion. Her body is said to have exuded the “odour of sanctity” that emanates from the body of saints. Tekakwitha was only 24 years old. A resident of Kahnawake since birth, Michael Loft, of the Indigenous Access department at McGill, offered a more scholarly opinion of Tekakwitha. In speaking about her chastity, Loft explained, that “In her own way, she was an early feminist. She was a headstrong woman who was going to do what she wanted.” Despite a Catholic upbringing, Loft remained primarily indifferent to Tekakwitha. Influenced by the community’s elders, Loft “heard from the traditional people, who gave me mixed messages as a young man about her status. I was lead to believe she was almost not a real factor amongst us. I didn’t grow up like, ‘Woah, she’s almost a saint.’ She was not a cultural hero of any sort for me. Only as a I grew older did I realize that she was practicing some pretty important things.” Loft’s view parallels that of many Mohawk people in Kahnawake – an appreciation for Tekakwitha rather than a worship of her. Interestingly enough, after enduring multiple eye surgeries, Loft prayed to Tekakwitha. He jokes, “I
don’t know if it was [Tekakwitha] or the miracle of modern medicine, but those things drive you to prayer. I was so happy after and I thank her for that.” However, like many Mohawks I spoke to, Loft remains essentially indifferent to Tekakwitha’s legacy: “She is more important to the rest of the world than to us…but if anything gets you that deep in life, can’t be anything wrong with it.” A local legend or a gift from God? Kahnawake’s librarian Cathy Rice explained that such clear distinctions don’t exist. For Rice, to understand the debate from an outsider’s perspective is difficult. She asked, “Do you know the way you recognize your family, your brothers, your aunts? That is how I look at everyone here [on the reservation]. Everyone is much more aware of each other’s sensitivities and acts accordingly. It’s not a conflict; it’s just how it is. We acknowledge the differences in opinion.” In Rice’s case, she doesn’t believe Tekakwitha should be a saint. For her, religion is “too compartmentalized and controlling…and trying to elevate her to sainthood is against [Mohawk] philosophy and culture.” She emphasized the Harvest Festival and the Mohawk way of “incorporating spirituality into all daily activities and giving thanks.” However, she too views Tekakwitha as a strong woman. For Rice, “[Tekakwitha] did what she had to do. There will always be battles we have to contend with, even today. Encroachments on our land, for example are still happening today. She did what
was best in the moment.” A mile from the library in Kahnawake, the steeple of St. Francis Xavier dominates the skyline from downtown. A stone block bears Tekakwitha’s name and dates of birth and death in the front yard with the St. Lawrence River behind. Despite passing pickup trucks, the space feels sacred. A museum in the left wing of the church features old chalices and rosaries amongst moccasins along with a small room dedicated to Tekakwitha. Paintings depict her with braided hair and hands clasped in prayer. It is also completely empty – a true reflection of the prominence of Catholics in Kahnawake. Ron Boyer, a former colleague of Cathy Rice and the deacon who leads services at St. Francis Xavier, described his efforts in promoting Tekakwitha’s canonization. He blamed the Vatican for her stalled sainthood, not God. Canonization is not, in fact, the process of “making” someone a saint, but simply the recognition that they always have been one. He explained the Vatican’s suspicion as to why Tekakwitha only experienced an act of God (the disappearance of her scars) after death. However, he reassured me the Vatican was just “taking their time” after Brother André’s canonization this past October. Boyer already views her as a saint – so why the rush, one may wonder? He responded quite simply, “It would fill the seats!” Dependent on the charity of church-goers, Boyer’s plea for Tekakwitha’s canonization was at least in part financially motivated.
Upon asking him about the many non-believers in the community, he explained, “Oh…they’re disenchanted.” Disenchanted, discouraged, plain old “hurt,” Boyer truly believed all of Kahnwake felt Tekakwitha was a saint in their hearts. In his view, they simply weren’t “healed.” Leaving Tekakwitha’s chapel, I encountered a woman buying prayer cards. A pilgrim from Indiana, she explained that “My daughter has learning disabilities and I am praying to Tekakwitha for her, or for my own strength.” She believed her prayers were “just asking a favour. A big big favour.” Before I had left, she had bought up the store’s entire supply of cards. For the Catholics on the reserve, Tekakwitha’s canonization may seem like an opportunity to legitimize their faith before their peers. Catholicism remains a contentious issue on the reserve, with its echoes of colonialism: out of a population of 8,000, only 150 residents regularly attend St. Francis Xavier. Surely, Tekakwitha’s canonization would be an economic benefit for the church as well as Kahnawake tourism. However, her saintly status may only further suppress Mohawk tradition. Tekakwitha remains a controversial figure, but many of the proponents of her canonization are Mohawk themselves, and across the Americas, Catholic indigenous people have adopted Tekakwitha as a symbol of their faith. Tekakwitha’s legacy doesn’t require the approval of the Vatican to be legitimized.
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Religion 2.0 Worship is taking to the web in an attempt to keep up with today’s lifestyles Anqi Zhang
The McGill Daily t is possible to be baptised online. It is also possible to receive Holy Communion, join prayer circles, and receive religious guidance, all over the web. This could be a reflection of our generation’s ever-increasing need for convenient solutions to living fulfilling and busy lives. But with the recent increase of religious organizations setting up base on the internet, the impacts of this trend both on society and these religions should be considered. These sites are all-encompassing, offering the entire religious experience, accessible in just a few clicks. Online communities exist for faiths from Christianity to Judaism to Islam. These sites are not only filled with religious texts and news, but also stress interactive participation through prayer forums, discussion boards, games, and personality quizzes. Help and advice is also offered through this online medium; for example, many Islamic websites offer online fatwas (religious decrees), allowing the website
to develop their own identity and influence their users. Alphachurch.com provides, among many others, a marriage service, giving the email of a reverend who can be contacted for wedding ceremonies. This same online church gives online baptisms and offers online confession. Other websites allow virtual pilgrimages; hindunet.org, for example, allows you to visit 3,000 temples. While all this appears quite convenient at first glance, one wonders what this will entail for the religious institutions that use online methods of reaching patrons. The possibility for open discussion online may cause these religious communities to develop their own unique identities; whether this leads to changes in established religions, or even the perception of religion itself, remains to be seen. Another concern is what this means for the patrons of physical places of worship. Many of these websites are meant to play a supplementary role to regular real-life participation. But in our ever-globalizing world, where real-life participation may not be possible or plausible for all, it is inevitable that
for some, the internet will become a more viable or preferable substitution for traditional religious practices. By eliminating the restraints of space and time, the arrival of online spiritual communities makes religious participation more accessible. For example, in the age of online religions, moving to a different location or picking up an extra shift at work no longer entails the loss of all spiritual connectedness. There are, however, inherent downsides that can arise from these benefits. While these sites may allow new immigrants an element of home to hold on to as they move far away from all they have known, it can be just as easily argued that a lack of resources drives people to set up new religious institutions and places of worship in their new communities. What remains to be seen is whether the new level of ease produced by these online communities will impede this spread of religious diversity. In addition, while these online communities can make worship possible at any time, at any place, perhaps religion should not be given the task of squeezing into a schedule. The availability of 24/7 prayer time and advice takes
Carly Shenfield | The McGill Daily
Arts & Culture
Foi | Faith
away the intimacy and communalism of worship held at a shared time and place, reducing the “organized” aspect of organized religion to something barely existent. This recent increase in online worship could thus also negatively impact both the quantity and quality of meaningful time spent in places of worship. For all their convenience and strategic value, one must wonder whether the merging of religion and internet was an inevitability, considering the lifestyle a large portion of the world lives today. It’s certainly not a new trend in religion
to use media as an outreach tool. From the early 12th century when morality plays were the main mode of popular religious expression, to the more recent development of televangelism in the 1980s, we’ve seen religions like Christianity use whatever media is currently most dominant to promote its message. But how will this particular shift change the image, or reality, of religion for future generations? While it may be too soon to predict the concrete impact of the internet on religion, it is not too early to know that such an impact will certainly arise.
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Religious groups are trying to bridge the divide between bingeing and belief Laura Pellicer
The McGill Daily s a leader for my paleontologythemed Frosh, my shirt was adorned with the title “DinoWhora Laura.” At first I didn’t object to this name suggestive of bestiality; it was at least better than my cohorts’ attire. I realize in retrospect, however, that the hyper-sexualization of Frosh not only makes newbies blush, but also serves to marginalize those whose beliefs go against boasting about sexual exploits – real or fictional – on beer-stained T-shirts. Frosh marks a lot of important firsts for McGill students. Some of the people who make up your Frosh group will undoubtedly become your first friends at McGill. I personally was comfortable enough suspending some of the conservative Christian values that I was raised with in order to delve into three days of lower-field drinking with wanton abandon. But the drinking culture and sexual rhetoric ubiquitous at Frosh has the effect of alienating a good number of religious students. Even the following
age-old McGill chant popular during Frosh carries an alienating message for many religious students: McGill once, McGill twice Holy Fucking Jesus Christ Wham Bam God Damn Son of a bitch shit. Three cheers for McGill – Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Three cheers for fucking – McGill! McGill! McGill! A number of religious student groups on campus offer alternative activities during Frosh to encourage inclusivity of a range of beliefs. Many of these groups attempt to shift the focus of Frosh from being primarily on heavy drinking and sexuality. The Newman Centre, Campus for Christ, Impact Church, and McGill Christian Fellowship host Fish Frosh, which is specifically geared toward Christian students. The McGill Muslim Students’ Association and Chabad Jewish Student Centre of McGill both organize a number of Frosh activities which are popular with religious students. Rabbi Shmuly Weiss of McGill’s Chabad Students’ Centre on Peel attended the last few Froshes serving up kosher BBQ fare for students. Although he explained
that lots of Jewish students participate in Frosh, he pointed out that he doesn’t know of any deeply religious Jewish students – those who adhere strictly to the laws of the Torah – who have. Regardless of which Frosh McGill newbies choose to attend, the effect is similar: those first crucial friendships are still being established between like-minded students with similar religious or non-religious orientations. How can students then meet people with different backgrounds and religious views? Mahab Firuz is a McGill student who has worked in the Chaplaincy department for five years. She suggested that an activities or games day that was open to all students and didn’t revolve around drinking or religion would be a beneficial contribution to Frosh. Perhaps McGill needs to take a page out of Concordia’s orientation itinerary. Our neighbouring university doesn’t organize a Frosh where registration and fees are mandatory. Instead they host a number of free events on campus where all new students can participate. The free concert that Concordia hosts at the beginning of the year is a great example of a successful event
Alex McKenzie | The McGill Daily
that attracts thousands of students. The result is that a more inclusive cross-section of the student population can participate in the same event. I don’t want to discourage newbies from participating in SSMU or faculty Froshes. For those who are planning on indulging in the drinking culture prevalent in Montreal’s university population, then this intense
week may serve as a boot camp where you hastily discover the many ups and downs to booze. The sexual shock value of SSMU and faculty Froshes is also a large part of their appeal. But events which attract both religious and non-religious students would serve to broaden the mindset of first-year students and overall have benefits for the coexistence of students on campus.
a nature-based faith deriving from Eastern mysticism and folk shamanic practices. The Montreal Pagan Resource Centre, the first of its kind in Canada, is a volunteerbased drop-in centre that was launched in August of 2000 by Scarlett Cougar. A Concordia graduate who identifies herself as a Wiccan, Cougar explained that Contemporary Paganism is a very young belief that has been steadily on the rise – in 2005, statistics showed a 400 per cent increase in the number of people who identified as Pagans, with 849 believers living in Montreal alone. “Paganism resonated very well with both [the feminist and ecological movements of the 1900’s] because it was very nature based, honoured a Goddess, and regarded women as equal religiously,” she said. Although her beliefs have been met with ignorance and disdain in the past, Cougar said that outlooks seem to be changing. “Twenty years ago people thought that Satanism and Paganism [were] the same thing. If you were a Pagan, you
worshipped the devil.” Today, she sees a much greater interest being taken by educators and the media regarding the history and understanding of her beliefs. Although McGill University does not directly teach any courses on Paganism, Religious Studies professor Torrance Kirby explained that there are many seminars and courses that spin Paganism into their content. For hundreds of years, alternative forms of belief have suffered from persecution – in particular due to the attempt to unite people under the one religion of Christianity. Paganism is a discreet yet long-standing victim of this. As a belief system targeted since the beginnings of Christianity’s spread almost 2,000 years ago, it has undergone such prolonged periods of discrimination and misunderstanding that it has been relegated to the realm of superstition and misconception. Its central beliefs and practices had a major influence on the traditions we stand by today. Only recently, however, has this been recognized and Paganism’s legitimacy begun to be restored.
Present-tense Paganism Ancient tradition campaigns for understanding Jessica Lukawiecki The McGill Daily
e have all heard of the terrors of the Second World War, when religious groups, particularly Jews, were among the minority identities persecuted, tortured, and mass-murdered under the Nazi regime. We know what happened when Europeans colonized new territory to the detriment of the indigenous populations. These are stories that we grow up with, that are printed again and again in textbooks and are meant to teach us about acceptance and the dangers that exist in discrimination. There are stories of persecution, however, that do not attract such recognition. Nestled among hundreds of books on Judaism and Christianity in the McLennan library exist a handful of texts which document the historical struggle of one of the most ancient religions of our world – Paganism. The term Pagan, originally derived from the Latin word paganus – mean-
ing “country folk” – has come to be one of perhaps the most commonly twisted words in the English language. Paganism was once a mainstream respected belief coexisting with Christianity, which until 300 A.D. was the minority. It consisted of a number of different belief systems which shared a common thread – they were all characterized for their reverence of and connection with nature, their belief in multiple deities (both male and female), and their egalitarian views toward women. The Roman Emperor Constantine’s conversion to Christianity in 312 A.D. set in motion centuries of persecution for all those religions that did not identify as Christian, generally placed under the umbrella term “pagan.” These non-Christians were labeled “heathens” who were said to practice devil worship, sexual deviance, and witchcraft. Their status as a legitimate religion diminished exponentially as Christianity gained a following. Ironically, many Christian traditions developed out of these dying Pagan beliefs. Constantine declared the official
celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ to be on December 25, which coincidentally was also the birthday of the pagan sun god. Such persecution and repression may seem like ancient history, but consider the fact that McGill had a Pagan Association until 1998 when the group was pressured to shut down for unclear reasons – both outcry from Christian Fellowships and managerial problems have been cited as catalysts. The group was revived in 2003 by U1 student Bruno Mastronardi, whose main goal, as he said in 2002 in an interview with the Tribune, was to “provide accurate information about Paganism to try to counteract the negative propaganda which has been associated with Paganism.” This hesitant but steadfast return of Paganism has become a trend during the past century. A number of different religious groups, collectively known as the Contemporary Paganism movement, have seen a dramatic increase in following. These beliefs developed mainly in Great Britain and centre around
Arts & Culture
Integration, an imfroshible mission?
Société | Life
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Une voie radiophonique vers le divin La foi sur 91,3 FM, la radio de Jésus? Véronique Martel Le Délit
adio Ville-Marie. Pour un sens à la vie!» Voilà tout un slogan qui semble annoncer un bien lourd programme. Le 91.3 FM serait-il donc destiné à nous convertir au christianisme? Par envoûtement musical? Par messages subliminaux? En fait, nul besoin de croire que Jésus a marché sur l’eau pour pouvoir profiter de la programmation de la station. Au contraire, depuis sa création, Radio Ville-Marie (RVM) tend à diversifier ses émissions. Lorsque, en 1995, RadioCanada décide d’éliminer toute trace de religion de sa programmation, trois animateurs de la société publique s’unissent et fondent Radio Ville-Marie. Consciente que la société québécoise n’était plus aussi intéressée qu’autrefois par la question religieuse –Révolution tranquille oblige–, RVM a dû faire preuve d’une grande ouverture d’esprit et accepter de travestir sa première idée, soit de créer une sta-
tion religieuse, en une mission plus vaste qui engloberait toutes les valeurs de la chrétienté. Ne liton pas: «Tu aimeras ton prochain comme toi-même»? Bien que le chapelet médité soit encore diffusé chaque soir de la semaine à 18h30, RVM propose de nombreuses émissions culturelles, telles que Carnet littéraire animée par Gilda Routy, Arts et lettres, L’âme des poètes, Vivante poésie, et les quotidiennes Passeport Matin et Temps libre, ou même des émissions d’actualité comme Culture et société, Au cœur de l’être, ou Questions d’aujourd’hui. Avis aux laïques, Carnet littéraire et ses acolytes ne traitent ni de la Bible ni de ses produits dérivés. Au contraire, Gilda Routy reçoit des auteurs, des commissaires d’expositions, des acteurs, des comédiens. Elle commente des publications récentes, parle de l’actualité littéraire et des événements qui y sont liés. Le tout sans faire une seule allusion à Satan, Yavhé ou le fait que certains invités puissent ne pas être baptisés! Alors, pourquoi RVM estelle définie comme une radio chrétienne? «D’abord, explique
Elizabeth-Ann Michel-Boulanger
Jocelyne Sagala, coordonnatrice du service aux donateurs et responsable des activités bénéfiques de la station, RVM n’est pas exclusivement chrétienne, mais œcuménique, c’est-à-dire, qu’elle regroupe tous les cultes religieux sans distinction aucune. Elle propose une programmation qui reflète certaines valeurs chrétiennes, telles l’honnêteté ou le respect.» Son statut d’organisme communautaire à but non lucratif permet à la station d’offrir des émissions qui traitent de nombreux sujets, souvent hété-
roclites. Les animateurs et chroniqueurs ne sont liés à aucun groupe ou mouvement, ils sont donc libres d’expression puisque rien ne guide leurs paroles (aucun engagement politique, social, religieux ou commercial). Jocelyne Sagala ajoute que «tous les animateurs sont bénévoles. Très peu d’employés sont rémunérés. Sans leur généreuse et constante aide, la radio n’existerait tout simplement pas! Nos animateurs sont passionnés, ce qui donne cette qualité à notre programmation». Contre toute attente, la pro-
grammation de RVM regorge d’émissions variées, intelligentes et divertissantes. Le fait qu’elles cherchent à promouvoir les valeurs d’intégrité, d’honnêteté, de respect et d’entraide, que l’on retrouve dans la foi chrétienne, n’entrave en rien la qualité des émissions de la station. Madame Sagala rappelle que Radio VilleMarie est la radio des sans-voix, qu’elle permet aux marginaux de dialoguer, de partager et de se reconnaître dans un autre modèle que celui que propose la société. Soyez à l’écoute! x
Opening the discourse Chaplaincy services aim to aid religious dialogue on campus with film competition James Farr
Culture Writer ast winter, I was broke and needed a job. After many fruitless emails and submitted writing samples, I found a job posting at the McGill Chaplaincy, which I’d never heard of. According to its website, Chaplaincy Services is “an interfaith organization dedicated to spiritual and religious care in the McGill community.” All I knew at the time, however, was that I was in desperate need of some cash. So I applied for a job, and soon I was hired on as an intern. In retrospect, it strikes me as utterly strange that I had never heard of the Chaplaincy before. It’s located on the fourth floor of the Brown Building, which was an old haunt of mine. I’d spent a fair amount of time on the third floor prostrating myself before financial aid advisors. Why had I never noticed the Chaplaincy before? What makes it even stranger is the fact that I am a deeply religious person. I was raised by a Bahá’í mother and a Roman Catholic father. Alongside my own investigations, this influence has made
me a dedicated Bahá’í with a deep love for Jesus Christ. As I typed that last sentence, I felt in myself a familiar sense of confession. Not to any divine power, but rather to you, the reader. Since the time I was in public school, there has always been a mild sense of shame associated with my religious affiliations. The title of “the religious kid” has never been tantamount to cool, and throughout all of my education I have always been hesitant to reveal my faith. In my experience, it has often led to dismissal, ridicule, and sometimes cruelty. I never had to ask why, because the people always told me: “Religion is responsible for all the wars in the world!” “How can you believe in a God who allows people to suffer?” “If God exists, then show Him to me!” As I grew older, these arguments became more elegant and sophisticated, but their essence remained the same. This is not to say that the arguments are crazy or totally false; they aren’t. I found in them, however, a curious irony: one that perhaps explains my initial ignorance of the Chaplaincy. That is, my faith in God was oppressed by those who claimed that God was a supremely oppressive idea. Let it be known: I do not deny that God (or, perhaps, the
idea of God) has been an extremely oppressive force in human history. Let it also be known that I hesitate to use the word “oppression,” as there are causes that are far more worthy of the term than mine. The irony, nevertheless, still stands. What it demonstrates, at least to me, is that oppression is completely contextual: religion may well be oppressive on a global scale, but in my life it has been the victim. I see particularly potent examples of this oppression here on campus. The continued lack of an adequate prayer space for Muslims immediately comes to mind. More generally, however, I think of the general sneer worn by the face of academia with respect to religious belief, and the pervasive fear of students and professors alike to discuss their faith commitments. Is this all in the name of some long-gone notion of academic objectivity? Are we so blind as to believe that our biases will simply go away if we ignore them? What is called for here, as has been repeated time and time again by far better people, is dialogue and openness. It is no longer acceptable to engage neutrally (and ultimately, superficially) with our peers. Rather, it is my firm belief that in order to avoid misunder-
standing and further oppression from religious or secular sources, we need to look each other in the eyes and ask, “What do you actually believe?” As the late David Foster Wallace once said, “In the day-today trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships.” The only choice we get is what to worship”. To modify this statement for my current purposes I would say that we also get another choice, one that is almost equal in importance. That is, what do we do when we encounter someone who worships something different than us? Because guess what: the question is no longer, “Why can’t we all just get along?” In the wake of globalization, the development of devastating weapons technology, and an unmitigated tension of innumerable ideologies, we should now say: “How can we get along before we all die?” This statement sounds melodramatic delivered in a campus newspaper, but, as with oppression, the matter is contextual. On a global scale, the idea is not melodramatic at all, but of incalculable importance. As such, McGill’s students and faculty need to step up and facilitate this fundamental dialogue.
I applaud such efforts as the recently-instigated class “Religion and Globalization.” I would also like to call your attention to another, which is where the Chaplaincy comes in. In the early winter semester, the Chaplaincy will be holding their inaugural Faith in Film competition. Students will be asked to submit short films between ten and thirty minutes in length that deal creatively with their spirituality (or lack thereof). There will be a screening event on March 4, during which the submissions will be judged by a panel comprised of students, professors, and a representative from the National Film Board of Canada. The winner will receive a $500 certificate to the McGill Bookstore or Future Shop. The real allure here, though, should be the opportunity to participate in an important and underrepresented conversation. Be you Christian, Jewish, Atheist, Agnostic, Hindu, Deist, or AnarchoFeminist – we want to hear from you. What makes a dialogue instructive and important is that there are at least two voices sharing their thoughts. You have heard mine. The invitation is open and I anxiously await your response: james. farr@mail.mcgill.ca
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Koudiadiène, Sénégal, été 2009. Un monde dominé par la foi. Le Délit
Histoire d’une mixité compliquée ers le VIIe siècle, les Royaumes du Tekrour, du Namandirou et du Djolof se forment progressivement. En ces temps reculés, les peuples et leurs croyances cohabitent sans friction. L’arrivée de l’islam au Sénégal remonte au VIIIe et au IXe siècle. Introduite par les commerçants arabo-berbères, la religion est diffusée pacifiquement. Une fois convertis, les Toucouleurs et les Sarakhollés la propagent partout au Sénégal. Puis, au XIXe siècle apparait le colonisateur français, majoritairement catholique, qui se fait un devoir d’enseigner et/ou d’imposer ses pratiques. Aujourd’hui, malgré son indépendance, le Sénégal demeure officiellement catholique et musulman. Cependant, les Sénégalais suivent-ils vraiment les principes fondateurs de ces religions ou ont-ils, avec le temps, combiné les éléments qui les intéressaient le plus?
rassurant, comme si les cloches mettaient des balises dans un espace-temps où les horaires sont très malléables, les contraintes temporelles quasi inexistantes. De plus, si la religion catholique ou islamique s’inculque dès le plus jeune âge dans la famille sénégalaise, l’éducation religieuse continue en dehors du foyer familial. Les cours de religion (islamique ou catholique) apparaissent donc aussi à l’ordre du jour des jeunes étudiants. Pour les catholiques, le catéchisme enseigné à l’école primaire vise entre autre à préparer
respectées, plusieurs grandes lignes manquent tout de même à l’équation. Les traditions ancestrales côtoient notamment beaucoup les deux grandes religions «officielles». Les rites animistes, en ce qui a trait aux mauvais esprits et aux malédictions, restent centraux à leur mode de vie. Comme si les peurs étaient dans les gènes, transmises de génération en génération, les malédictions demeurent encore actives malgré leur contradiction avec les préceptes catholiques. Étrangement, les croyances en
À la veille d’un mariage, les femmes portent leur plus beaux atours pour la célébration en l’honneur de la mariée. Anabel Cossette Civitella / Le Délit
Dans un village ou la religion est partout À l’intérieur du village de Koudiadiène, les personnes de croyance islamique et catholique cohabitent très bien. Si les mœurs diffèrent d’une religion à l’autre (polygamie et appel à la prière pour les musulmans et monogamie et visite à l’église pour les catholiques), les différences semblent très bien intégrées dans leur mode de vie. La grande majorité des familles catholiques dans le village de Koudiadiène voient leur vie influencée par le dogme catholique. Tout chrétien doit minimalement assister aux messes célébrées à l’Église le dimanche. Tout le monde ne suit pas scrupuleusement ces indications, mais, de manière générale, la messe dominicale est un événement qui rassemble une majorité de citoyens, des plus petits aux plus grands. D’ailleurs, les jeunes en âge de faire leur première communion ou leur confirmation doivent impérativement y être, faute de quoi ils seront réprimandés par le Père en charge de leurs sacrements. Les familles musulmanes, quant à elles, vivent au rythme des appels à la prière et se rendent à la mosquée régulièrement. À Koudiadiène, le son des cloches de l’église est une symphonie orchestrée par les novices de la paroisse du village. S’il est impossible de savoir exactement l’heure à laquelle se passera un événement, il est tout de même possible de se fier aux cloches de l’église pour s’orienter. Le tintamarre des cloches ponctue le quotidien d’un je-ne-sais-quoi de
La foi comme moteur d’une nation «Sans foi, sans Dieu, nous ne sommes rien. Comment pouvez-vous [les occidentaux] ne croire en rien?», questionne avec étonnement un homme rencontré au village. Lui répondre que je crois en moi ne lui suffit pas… L’absence d’une pratique de la spiritualité chez la majorité des occidentaux contemporains est incompréhensible pour beaucoup de villageois. «Vous pouvez bien croire en ce que vous voulez, Anabel Cossette Civitella / Le Délit
Anabel Cossette Civitella
On prend la pose avec l’indispensable icône de Jésus-Christ.
«le catholicisme les imbibe de son aura de foi et d’encens» les jeunes aux sacrements tels que la première communion et la confirmation. Les enfants apprennent aussi à réciter les prières destinées à l’église. Le petit catéchisme copié, recopié, étudié, appris et finalement récité en vue d’être évalué n’est toutefois pas toujours compris par les plus jeunes. Les enfants ne comprennent probablement pas la moitié des préceptes enseignés, mais ils les clament à qui mieux-mieux dès que l’occasion se présente. Par exemple, savoir qui sont Jésus, Marie et Joseph semble étrangement intégré lorsqu’ils se réunissent et entonnent en chœur des chants religieux… en chemin vers le terrain de soccer ou au retour de l’école. Ainsi, dans le village, à l’église et à l’école, les religions s’enseignent et s’apprennent dans les règles de l’art. Mais la pratique est-elle représentative des croyances profondes ?
Un mélange qui s’inspire de l’histoire Si certaines règles du catholicisme sont scrupuleusement
La croix de l’église catholique se dresse derrière un baobab. Nicolas Beauchemin
les mauvais esprits (qui prennent le plus souvent la forme d’un singe) côtoient quotidiennement et depuis longtemps la religion catholique. Autant le catholicisme les imbibe de son aura de foi et d’encens protecteur, autant ils restent craintifs face aux forces occultes qui paralysaient déjà de peur leurs arrières-arrièresgrands-parents. Une autre présence évidente des rites ancestraux s’exhibe dans la médecine traditionnelle qui fait encore beaucoup d’adeptes. Quel paradoxe de croire fermement en les préceptes catholiques, de scrupuleusement suivre les règles qu’elles impliquent mais de tout de même être influencé par de vieilles peurs! Et de ce mélange, quel est le dénominateur commun?
mais vous devez croire en quelque chose, tout de même!» La foi demeure toutefois ce qu’il y a de plus intelligible pour les occidentaux que nous sommes lorsque nous tentons d’analyser la structure religieuse des communautés comme celle rencontrée à Koudiadiène, au Sénégal. En effet, ce n’est pas la religion catholique, musulmane ou animiste qui caractérise les habitants du Sénégal, mais bien un amalgame de ces trois croyances. Et la foi en est le dénominateur commun. La participation active des religieux dans la vie du village est comparable à celle des prêtres québécois des années 1940. Ce fait est impressionnant à un moment où la pratique de la religion s’efface tranquillement du quotidien pour devenir occasionnelle, sinon inexistante pour certains. En fait,
l’action des pères à Koudiadiène dépassent leur simple mandat religieux: ils prennent part à la survie et la continuité du village. Père Yves, le supérieur de la paroisse, organise, à fréquence irrégulière, des soirées «thédébat» où tous et chacun sont invités à discuter des enjeux de la vie à Koudiadiène. Quoique tout le monde reste le bienvenu (y compris les étrangers), les échanges de la sorte visent principalement les jeunes de la communauté, ceux les plus susceptibles de changer la société, de bouleverser l’ordre établi. En effet, les «thédébats» demeurent le meilleur moment pour s’asseoir et discuter des problèmes rencontrés dans l’immédiat ou dans le futur, discuter des manières les plus efficaces pour les résoudre et améliorer ce qui a déjà été implanté. Lors d’une séance spéciale, père Yves tente de brosser un large portrait de la situation du village. N’épargnant pas les sujets les plus délicats comme les problèmes d’alcoolisme qui monopolisent une bonne part de la population masculine ou l’évidente carence d’emploi pour les hommes de la région, père Yves tente de faire comprendre aux jeunes présents qu’ils doivent avoir de l’espoir. Il leur enseigne que l’espérance en un avenir meilleur se doit d’être leur allié. Ce soir-là, les paroles de père Yves, transmises avec la foi coutumière des croyants, restaient toutefois entièrement dépourvues de toute allusion à la spiritualité. Même lorsque la discussion a convergé vers les croyances animistes qui empêchent l’exploitation de certaines terres par peur des mauvais esprits, père Yves a tenu à maintenir la religion catholique à l’écart: «Est-ce bien logique de laisser de belles terres en latence par peur d’éventuels esprits vengeurs? Je ne suis pas contre l’idée que le malin existe, mais vous devrez me le prouver avant que je mette une croix sur la possibilité d’exploiter les terrains actuellement gaspillés par une peur irrationnelle.» À l’heure actuelle, plus de la moitié de la population du Sénégal vit sous le seuil de pauvreté, le taux de chômage est de 40% et les ressources naturelles sont épuisées par des années de surexploitation. L’état de la politique, de l’économie, mais aussi de la culture sont autant conséquences d’un passé marqué par la colonisation. La foi peut se déployer sous plusieurs formes, et dans ce pays le plus à l’Ouest du continent africain la foi demeure forte. Pour les Sénégalais de Koudiadiène, elle peut être vue comme le dénominateur commun des diverses croyances qui se côtoient quotidiennement. Pourtant, pour les sortir d’une pauvreté galopante, pour leur redonner la fierté d’être Sénégalais, ils doivent avoir foi en leur capacité. x
Société | Life
Tolérance et foi en terre brûlée
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Multiple universes, myriad fragile coincidences Stephen Hawking’s The Grand Design purports to know the very origins of the universe Mehur Chahal
The McGill Daily
he ability of scientists to account for and explain “mystical” phenomena has eroded religious credibility for centuries, but religion continues nonetheless. Though the barometer may have proven more effective at “summoning” rain, several Balkan villages, for example, continue to rain dance. Even if science can better explain certain phenomena, like rain, how could a universe so seemingly tailored to human existence not be the work of some benevolent creator? Strange that everything (from the Earth’s position in the solar system to the weight of subatomic particles) should be exactly the way it is, finely-tuned for the existence of life – it’s eerily serendipitous. According to Stephen Hawking, Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge University and the most revered scientist since Albert Einstein, science can explain all of this. Hawking’s work attempts to marry Einstein’s general theory of relativity with quantum theory. In his new popular science novel The Grand Design, the emboldened professor claims to know what really created the universe, and what role God would have played in it.
Since its release in September, Grand Design has been making waves. In the book, Hawking contends that recent cosmology supports two assertions: first, that multiple universes supporting life are possible, and more interestingly, that none of them require a God. While he concedes that the myriad fragile coincidences that have led to human existence are intriguing, they do not in themselves prove the existence of a grand designer. Rather, recent advances in cosmology show that universes are created from nothing through a process known as “spontaneous combustion.” Just as our planet is one of many, and just as our galaxy is one of many, our universe – Hawking explains in the book – is one of many. Each universe has different properties, some with the possibility of supporting life. Ours is one of those. Where the laws of nature that support life forms do exist, they exist by pure chance. While the data that support Hawking’s assertions would be lost on most, his ideas still merit reflection. Hawking and his coauthor Leonard Mlodinow may not be so much radical as they are simply privy to updated information. However, at the same time that as one ponders Hawking’s assertions, one also ponders the limits of scientific knowledge. Could Hawking be wrong? Gil Holder, Canada Research Chair in Cosmological
Stacey Wilson | The McGill Daily
Société | Life
Foi | Faith
Astrophysics and assistant professor of Physics here at McGill explained that in fact, evidence used in astrophysics is “tricky” to construct, as experiments are hard to control. An experiment attempting to recreate primordial conditions is impossible, and this results in a dependence on theories that explain future data. This of course leaves room for error, especially when tracing back 13.7 billion years to the beginning of the universe.
Holder’s work involves measuring the conditions of the universe when it was 10 -32 seconds old. Until now, humans haven’t been able to measure the universe at time zero. The implications of this for the creation of the universe are massive. Do we really need to get to time zero to understand the creation of the cosmos? “If so, then I don’t see how any enterprise based on any variant of the scientific method has a chance,” said Holder.
Humans, and that includes Hawking, attempt to draw conclusions on the origin of universe by studying its evolution and using the laws in place. However, as Holder explained, “It is certainly possible that there is no information about the origin of the universe encoded in its subsequent evolution. I can measure everything about a ping-pong ball after it has been hit but I may never be able to tell you the colour of the racquet.”
the platform’s rotation, they risked bumping into the screen and, potentially, falling into the water. Rechtshaffen monitored the brain waves from one of the rats. When the rat’s waves started to show the rhythmic signs of sleep, he rotated the platform to keep it awake. As a control, he ignored the waves from the second rat, allowing it to sleep when it could. Within days, reported Rechtshaffen, the effect of sleep deprivation was noticeable in the rat forced to stay awake. Its fur changed color from white to brown, it lost weight even though it ate more, and its heart rate soared. Within a month the animal was dead. But the control rat, able to sleep whenever its cage mate’s brainwaves didn’t trigger rotation of the platform, showed no ill effects.
Rechtshaffen’s experiment has been repeated in humans – of course, not by scientists. Fatal familial insomnia, a rare genetic disorder, causes perpetual sleeplessness when the midlife disease kicks in. The syndrome has only afflicted a few dozen people worldwide, but, just like Rechtshaffen’s rats, those that do carry the gene always die shortly after the onset of insomnia. Sleep, somehow, keeps us alive. In the end, Tyler Shields’ forty days and forty nights without sleep, if they happened, were all for naught. Not wanting to risk anyone’s life, The Guinness Book of World Records stopped honouring sleep deprivation in 1990. The world record for sleeplessness will forever belong to Robert McDonald, a resident of California, who, in 1986, survived 19 days in a rocking chair, wideawake.
Do we really need to sleep? The dangers of staying awake, across species The Split Brain Daniel Lametti
danllametti@mcgilldaily.com
ast month, a celebrity photographer in Los Angeles named Tyler Shields claimed to have set the world record for sleeplessness – forty days without a wink of sleep; more than double the current record. He blogged about the experience on his website – a site that also boasts an underwear-only clad Lindsay Lohan lounging beside a blood spattered wall. Scientists were skeptical about the claim. “In all likelihood,” sleep researcher Michael Breus told AOL News, “Shields slept” during the forty days. It would be impossible, he added, for a human to go that long without
sleep. He’s probably right. Sleep – on paper, a boring activity that frustratingly occupies nearly a third of our lives – is a controversial topic for neuroscientists. As of this column, researchers have no idea why we do it. “As far as I know,” the famous Stanford neuroscientist William Dement recently said, “the only reason we need to sleep is because we get sleepy.” Scientists might not know exactly why we need to sleep, but they do know what happens when we don’t, which is why Tyler Shields’ claim seems unlikely. In 1989, Allan Rechtshaffen, a sleep researcher working at the University of Chicago, built a device to keep rats awake. His contraption was based on the idea that brainwaves signal the onset of sleep; by monitoring the brainwaves from
rats he could prod the animals at just the right moment to keep them awake. Brains, like toasters and televisions, emit waves of electromagnetic radiation. Awake, our brains emit chaotic-looking waves: waves filled with precipitous peaks and valleys that seem to occur at random. But as we drift off to sleep the chaos subsides, and the waves start to rise and fall with a predictable rhythm. Rechtshaffen implanted brainwave-monitoring electrodes in the heads of two rats. He then placed the rats on opposite sides of screen on a platform suspended over a shallow pool of water. The platform rotated under the vertical screen such that, when in motion, like on a treadmill, the rats had to walk against the movement of the platform to stay in the same spot. If they ignored
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Societé | Life
Superstitious for success The idiosyncratic rituals of athletes Paging Dr. Gonzo Ben Makuch
benmakuch@mcgilldaily.com
must have played with the filthiest scum-urchin in history ever convinced to play human sports, and he also doubled as a successful striker. Worse yet, I had the tremendous misfortune of being located beside him in the locker room. You know mould? He had it growing on his clothing. I’m not sure how that even happens, but it did. I’ve witnessed it. It’s blackish grey – mobile I suspect – and irresistibly ugly; like a hairless shih tzu lounging in a lawn chair, except this was quickly spreading fungi on his pair of blue Kappa shorts. I couldn’t look away. He even wore them to practice, smearing the black powdery organism on the clean, muddy field. The interesting thing was that we had our laundry taken care of by the university athletics department. Clip your shit together with a laundry tag, put it into a basket, and the next day you looked like the cleanest kid out of a Tide commercial. In fact, not only was it free, the process was painstakingly easy. But I guess every dirty dog likes his scent, and Andrew was committed to a culture of atavism. We’re talking about a guy whose diet relied on microwaved roast beef. Yeah, he’s the one who buys those rubber lumps of brown salt they advertise as bovine gourmet.
I had enough; I could taste the air now. “You smell like a fucking fungus tree – and I’m not even sure that’s a real tree.” “You smell like a virgin.” “You smell like Tony Danza’s ass.” “Who’s the boss?” “Definitely not you, you Neanderthal.” “Who has six snipes in six? Eh? By the way I slept with your mom, she says hi...” He had a point. While I scored maybe once all season, he was somewhat of a semi-prolific striker and was lighting it up. What was the key to his success? Was it a rugged playing style that involved the unapologetic maiming of opposing defenders? An uncanny ability to invert insults that had a knack for poisoning your thoughts? A strong right-footed shot? His pre-game fights at bars? No, sir. There was an ancient ritual he invoked for his own success. Like the great Spartans before him and the countless other warrior poets who have trod the land of sport, he had another ally altogether: superstition. It makes perfect sense, because the athlete, if my knowledge serves me right, is very much like Tom Cruise: a profoundly superstitious creature also deathly afraid of doctors. Andrew was no different. “Oh yeah? What’s the secret to your success, Ronaldo?” My guess was milkshakes made of JeanClaude Van Damme’s body odour
harvested from the original set of Bloodsport. “After I snipe I don’t change a thing.” “What? You can’t be serious?” It was all making sense. “Not even the gitch [underwear].” I gagged tremendously. “You mean to tell me you stop washing your uniform after you score for the rest of the season?” This was an appalling discovery for a part-time germaphobe such as myself. “Does it even remotely bother you that you might be inadvertently growing anthrax?” “I don’t give a shit. Six snipes,” he repeated calmly. This isn’t anything new – there are countless oddities in the sports world that mimic a similar script. I’ve heard of players needing to throw up before every game, putting on the left side of their equipment first, avoiding the colour yellow at all costs, and eating a blade of grass before taking the field. It’s a game of chance that athletes respect, as if some omnipotent being is waiting for them to step out of line and unleash something biblical. And if you do adhere to the holy rules, you will be victorious. But really it all seems to come down to preparation. Are you focused? What is it that you need to do to go to a primal place where you can rise above your adversary? Anyway, I’m not one for dramatics. I think the answer is pretty simple: smelling like a bucket of wet garlic.
Eric Wen | The McGill Daily
Keeping the faith For many, sports are a religious experience The foul line Nader Fotouhi
naderfotouhi@mcgilldaily.com
n secular societies, sports teams are the subjects of near-religious following. The term faith is most commonly used in reference to spirituality, but it can also refer to a belief in something unproven. Sports fans, in particular, believe in and have loyalty toward their team; the best players are gods, the worst are unworthy, and rooting for your team can be a religious experience. Optimists for teams of all calibres have a firm belief in their team’s impending success in spite of past performance or disparate talent levels. Regardless of one’s religious
beliefs, faith in sports is a major part of the fan experience. Faith is an integral aspect of religion – without it, people would question the existence of a higher power without reservations. For many, religious faith is an order of belief in something unseen and unfelt. The difference between religious and sports-inspired faith lies first and foremost in their contradictory avenues of scripture. Religious writing is set in stone for most popular organized religions. Every action and moment that matters to the history of a given religion has, for all intents and purposes, come and gone – at least until the Rapture. Sports are an opportunity to invest those hopes and volitions in a visible, if not tangible, result. The presence of subjects of sports-based
faith is indisputable – their faces, actions, and even salaries are all accessible. The allure of sports, for those with a vested interest in the outcome, is the opportunity to experience the range of emotions as history writes itself before your eyes. Faith is validated or proven futile in a matter of seconds. Having a team to fervently cheer on adds to the sports experience, but is certainly not vital to it. One of the simpler pleasures is watching a highly-contested competition, regardless of the sport, without a favoured team or individual involved. The absence of faith alleviates the anxieties natural to a die-hard fan. Indeed, that’s how fandom starts for many people – but after a while, it’s hard not to pick a team to associate with. It’s a quality that makes
the narratives of sports that much more compelling. The return of a player once deified by a fan base only to turn his back on them, for example, is a recurring storyline in sports. This particular situation manifested itself again on November 20 in Montreal when former Canadien Mike Komisarek – who channelled Judas in spurning the team to sign with Toronto two off-seasons ago – continued the Sisyphean start to his Leafs career. With his new team down 1-0 in the third period, Komisarek gave away the puck to Michael Cammalleri, Montreal’s new saviour, whose signing was made possible in part by Komisarek’s departure. In poetic fashion, Cammalleri received Komisarek’s tape-to-tape gaffe and rifled it into the top right corner to ensure Montreal’s victo-
ry. Cammalleri proved his mettle again while the once-prodigal son was left to fume, chewing on his mouth guard under a torrent of jeers. In the end, faith is a facet: one which religions use for growth, but also one from which people can find comfort. Faith is also the catalyst for myriad emotions. The strongest positive feelings arise when one’s faith has been rewarded. When it is abused, it causes one to abandon faith, in addition to generating a stark sense of betrayal. Faith in sports, however, just makes the process more engaging. Being a sports fan is often about the highs and lows of emotions in fandom, which is only accentuated by ardent faith in a team. And the good news is that you can’t go to hell for being a sports fan.
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Sensitivity training Quebec schools’ new Ethics and Religious Culture program, two years later Lisa Routly
Health&Education Writer aith-based education has long been a contentious issue in Quebec. With the adoption of Bill 109 in 1997, Quebec’s long-standing religious school boards were abolished and a system of linguistic school boards was established, reflecting the growing secularism the province had experienced since the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s. The issue of Catholic versus Protestant education became a matter of French versus English, a divide that continues to mark the province’s society. In the fall of 2008, the bilingual Ethics and Religious Culture program (ERC) was introduced as a mandatory course for all elementary and secondary school students in Quebec. It replaced Catholic, Protestant, and moral education programs that had previously been taught with a secular, or “non-confessional,” program offering what the Ministère de l’Éducation, Loisirs et Sports explains is “the same education to all Quebec students while respecting the freedom of conscience and religion of parents, students and teachers.” ERC aims to develop in students a sense of “recognition of others” and the “pursuit of the common good,” by teaching students about the various religions present in Quebec society as
well as worldwide, and encouraging them to reflect on ethical issues through classroom dialogue. The greatest challenge the ERC program faces rests on the shoulders of teachers underequipped to teach it. The new curriculum puts the onus on teachers to become knowledgeable in the fields of ethics and religious studies in their own time, on top of their already heavy workloads. Ron Morris, a McGill professor in the Faculty of Education and expert in the field of values education, noted. “Where everyone agrees is that the Achilles’ heel [of the ERC program] is teacher preparation.” In September 2008, when ERC was incorporated into the social studies department at the anglophone Laval Junior High School, teachers who specialized in history or geography took on the challenge of teaching this new and unfamiliar material. “We inherited it,” Sunday Skoufaras, a McGill graduate and high school history teacher of 15 years, noted with a hint of irony. She went on to add that, “The Ministry knew for many years that the reform was coming, and still the English teacher’s manual isn’t ready.” Students at Laval Junior curious about the subject matter expressed their disappointment with the minimal depth of their in-class explorations into other religious traditions. One student,
Dounia spoke for the class, saying ERC would be “better if there were more teachers educated about ethics.” Another, Jean-Michel agreed, offering a suggestion to future ERC teachers: “Maybe at some point bring in guest speakers from other religions, because here we’re all Catholics or Greek Orthodox.” While the goals of the program are hard to contest, ERC has faced its share of criticism and controversy in the two years since it began. Morris explained that because the topic of religion is so controversial in today’s secular society, the Ministry has “made [the ERC program] more and more abstract. They’ve evacuated a lot of the personal and subjective elements.” As a result, he believes students’ potential for learning and personal growth has become impoverished. He compared the controversy with ERC to sex education in Quebec, explaining that by promoting a very “safe” education, a great deal is lost in terms of what students can learn about themselves. With regard to having the opportunity to share their own beliefs about religious and ethical issues, eighth-grader Yanni at Laval Junior remains hopeful. “We haven’t [had the chance] yet. … But maybe we will in the future,” he said. Further complicating the matter is the fact that ERC is taught twice in a nine-day cycle, which comes out to three to four times each month. This is “not enough
Carly Shenfeld for The McGill Daily
Societé | Life
Foi | Faith
time to cover the material,” said Skoufaras. The students noted the detrimental effect of the time constraints on their learning experience and enjoyment. Nicholas, another eighth-grade student also at Laval, was disappointed: “This year we haven’t done a lot of ERC. We have it a few times a month, or even a year. … We do ethics here and there.” Despite the setbacks facing the program, students, teachers, and experts alike are hopeful about the future of the program. Spencer Boudreau, a McGill
professor of Education and former high school moral and religious education teacher, who worked closely on the ERC program from its inception in 2005, emphasized that in order for students to get the most from the program, “there has to be a passion for the subject” in the classroom. Reiterating the need for the potential that the program still carries, Morris added, “I think the really creative teachers will have all kinds of opportunities to do really interesting work with this program.”
mangent ce qu’offre leur IGA du coin, mais aussi à l’occasion ce que propose leur preacher gastronomique préféré (tels le curé Ricardo ou la sœur Di Stasio). Qui tentent parfois même l’exotisme au restaurant ou en voyage en mangeant du boudin noir, voire des insectes. Mais qui au grand jamais n’oseraient même goûter à l’hérétique, dont la seule pensée est beaucoup trop immonde: la cervelle d’agneau, les foies de volaille, les tripes de porc, la langue de bœuf... Ceux-là qui se scandalisent, en chœur avec les extrémistes, parce que les Chinois osent manger nos animaux sacrés, les chats et les chiens, mais qui participent aveuglement au gaspillage massif de milliers de pièces de viande par dédain pour tout ce qui n’est pas prescrit par leur «foi». Faisant ainsi monter inutilement le prix du bétail; ce qui pousse les Chinois à manger d’autres
chats et d’autres chiens pour ne pas crever de faim. Mais, tant qu’il a son filet mignon, le croyant préfère ne pas se poser trop de questions. Et puis il y a les agnostiques, qui vont au-delà de la foi collective et s’interrogent sur ce qu’ils mangent, mais surtout ce qu’ils ne mangent pas. Certains sont pratiquement végétariens, sans toutefois s’identifier au mouvement. D’autres sont plutôt satanistes et se plaisent à manger le plus souvent possible ce qui est contraire à cette foi. Cependant, tous ont un point en commun: ils ne refuseraient sous aucun prétexte un plat préparé amicalement par un autre. Que ce soit du cheval, du dauphin, du chat ou de l’ornithorynque. À vous de voir à quel groupe vous appartenez. x
Grasse foi Chronique culinaire| Société: Les pieds dans les plats
ucun rapport, direzvous, entre nourriture et foi. L’un est on ne peut plus physique, l’autre absolument métaphysique. En effet, mis à part les interdictions alimentaires des religions, le lien entre foi et alimentation est a priori minime, voire inexistant. Et pourtant…
afin de pouvoir se saouler sans avoir l’impression de caler (parce que c’est bien ce qu’on faisait à cette époque) un verre de levures ou de raisins fermentés à l’état brut. Même chose pour le fromage: sans les moines Trappistes, les Bénédictins et les Cisterciens, pas de Roquefort, de Saint-Paulin, de Munster et… d’Oka. Vous saurez qui remercier la prochaine fois que vous dégusterez un verre de Bourgogne ou une pinte de Leffe en mangeant un bout de Tête de Moine.
Un peu d’histoire
Don’t Eat, Pray & Love
Les grandes religions ont beaucoup plus à voir avec ce que nous mangeons et buvons que ce que l’on pourrait croire. En fait, sans la contribution des nombreux abbayes et diocèses européens, la bière et le vin seraient sûrement encore ces boissons quasi imbuvables qu’on mélangeait jusqu’au Xe siècle avec de l’eau et du miel
Toutefois, le lien entre foi et nourriture n’est pas qu’une chose du passé, mais bien quelque chose d’encore très manifeste qui va bien au-delà de l’influence des grandes religions. Et je ne parle pas ici d’une spiritualité à deux cents à la Eat, Pray & Love. Il s’agit plutôt ici des choix que nous faisons quand vient le
Christophe Jasmin Le Délit
temps de choisir quoi manger. De fait, ces choix sont tous plus ou moins guidés par une certaine croyance, une foi en ce qui est bon (au sens du goût, mais aussi de la morale) et ce qui ne l’est pas. Comme dans toute foi, on trouve des extrémistes, tels certains adeptes zélés du végétarisme, voire du végétalisme qui sont plus ascétiques que le pape lui-même et qui voudraient que tous partagent cette diète qui se résume en un mot: privation. Il y a aussi des athées, ceux «qui mangent pour manger» et qui trouvent ridicule l’idée même qu’on puisse manger pour des raisons autres que pour ne plus avoir faim. La majorité, évidemment, est formée de simples croyants qui mangent ce dont ils ont envie sans trop se poser de questions. Ceux qui se foutent des sermons des extrémistes et ne comprennent pas trop les athées. Qui
La gastronomie est une profession de foie. – Paul Carvel
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
À l’aube de la période des examens: une pilule, une petite granule Andréanne Martin Le Délit
e fait n’est ni récent ni inconnu: les étudiants d’université sont stressés. Cela peut être dû à plusieurs facteurs comme la volonté de réussir ou encore un emploi en parallèle des études. Bien que certaines personnes perçoivent le stress comme bénéfique (il nous pousserait à atteindre nos objectifs), il ne faut pas négliger les conséquences négatives sur notre santé physique et mentale. En
fais», explique Nicolas, un étudiant au bac en bioinformatique à l’Université de Montréal. Le docteur Ted Baker, directeur du Counselling Service de McGill, abonde dans le même sens: «La société agit sur le stress. De nos jours, la croyance populaire est qu’il faut réussir dans ses études, si on veut réussir plus tard.» Par ailleurs, les frais associés aux études universitaires poussent plusieurs étudiants à travailler à l’extérieur de leurs études. Ces heures passées à travailler le sont souvent au détriment de celles consacrées aux études, ce qui a comme consé-
que certains d’entre eux se dépourvus de moyens. «Je me réveille avec peu d’intérêt pour quoi que ce soit, je me sens comme une machine, je suis triste et je manque d’assurance», confie Paul. «Les étudiants qui viennent à McGill sont habitués à être des premiers de classe, et la situation change souvent lorsqu’ils commencent leurs études universitaires. La charge de travail augmente, ainsi que les responsabilités, et cela en rend plusieurs anxieux» précise Dr Baker qui en rencontre plusieurs dans cette situation au Counselling Service.
des médicaments sans prescription pour améliorer leurs performances cognitives varie de 3% à 11%», peut-on lire dans un article de Daphnée Dion-Viens paru dans Le Soleil en 2008. Quoique Paul n’ait jamais tenté l’expérience, il précise qu’il connaît des étudiants qui eux, ont déjà essayé. Il ajoute que: «l’éphédrine et la pseudoéphédrine contenue dans les décongestionnants nasaux, à dose suffisante, produisent un effet stimulateur similaire aux amphétamines traditionnelles [utilisée comme coupe-faim, stimulant du système nerveux
des infections respiratoires par exemple, du fait que notre corps ne les combat plus aussi efficacement. De plus, le stress peut avoir un effet sur la glycémie, soit la concentration de glucose dans le sang: la sécrétion d’hormones telles que le cortisol peut augmenter la production de glucose par le foie, de sorte que l’organisme dispose de plus d’énergie, puisque le cerveau et les muscles d’une personne en situation stressante brûlent plus de sucre qu’en temps normal. Lorsque vécu modérément, l’inf luence du stress sur la santé est négligeable, mais il y a une limite, car une fois l’homéostasie [capacité du système à maintenir son équilibre] perturbée, le diabète fait son apparition. Également, le stress peut augmenter les conditions du diabète chez les personnes qui en sont déjà atteintes.
Des remèdes
effet, le stress peut avoir des effets négatifs à long terme sur notre cerveau; il est également une cause potentielle du diabète, en plus de favoriser l’hypertension et d’affaiblir, voire de supprimer, le système immunitaire.
Société oblige Nous sommes tous accablés plus ou moins fortement par le stress, et ceci ne remonte pas à l’avènement des technologies: les hommes préhistoriques, par exemple, devaient combattre toutes sortes de prédateurs pour assurer leur survie. Les causes du stress ont sans aucun doute changé au fil des siècles, mais il façonne toujours notre existence. Les étudiants sont parmi les groupes de personnes les plus exposés au stress. Lorsque l’on pense que notre vie peut être déterminée par ces quelques années cruciales passées aux études, que ce sont les premières pierres de notre fondation future, il est difficile de prendre les choses à la légère. «Les études me stressent parce que j’ai l’impression de devoir être le meilleur dans ce que je
quence d’augmenter le stress, l’étudiant devant mieux gérer son temps. «J’ai un emploi à temps partiel et je fais un stage non crédité depuis huit mois avec un de mes professeurs, convaincu que je ne dois pas «rater» cette opportunité. Je travaille donc de dix à vingt heures par semaine. Je n’ai pas le temps de faire autre chose et mes notes ne sont même pas indicatives de l’effort que je consens pour mes cours. Je deviens malgré moi un reclus social!», explique Nicolas. Pour ceux qui quittent le nid familial pour poursuivre leurs études universitaires, cela entraîne évidemment de nouvelles responsabilités, tout en devant maintenir un haut niveau de performance académique. Lorsqu’une personne manque de ressources, qu’elle se sent dépassée, que ce soit une impression ou une situation précaire réelle, ceci augmente son stress. Les étudiants se sentent souvent submergés par la quantité de travaux à remettre, les examens à préparer, et si on ajoute un loyer et des études à payer, il n’est pas surprenant
Ritalin: Stéroïdes pour matière grise Quand le café et les boissons énergisantes n’aident plus, certains étudiants adoptent une tierce méthode pour les aider à mieux se concentrer: le Ritalin. Selon un reportage effectué par Marie-Laurence Delainey pour Radio-Canada, cette pratique est devenue «presque une mode à la faculté de médecine de l’Université de Sherbrooke», ainsi qu’à d’autres universités à travers la province. Le Ritalin est une drogue prescrite aux enfants et aux adultes atteints de troubles d’attention et d’hyperactivité, et sa consommation par des étudiants universitaires dans le but d’obtenir de meilleurs résultats académiques soulève une polémique. La pratique, banalisée chez certains étudiants qui y voient une façon de passer à travers une fin de session difficile où le temps d’étude manque souvent, semble de plus en plus populaire. En effet, «selon différentes études américaines, la proportion d’étudiants qui consomment
central et pour le traitement de l’hyperactivité] –quoique sans euphorie)». La situation est inquiétante si on pense aux effets secondaires qu’entraînent les drogues psychotropes comme le Ritalin sur la santé: les stimulants ont tendance à augmenter le rythme cardiaque et la tension artérielle, ce qui pourrait être potentiellement dangereux pour les gens prédisposés à des problèmes cardiaques.
Les maladies du stress Tout ce stress n’est pas neutre. Au contraire, il contribue à une variété de maladies physiques et mentales. Lorsque nous sommes stressés, notre corps a tendance à augmenter la sécrétion de glucocorticoïdes, des hormones essentielles au bon fonctionnement du corps humain, mais qui, lorsque secrétées à long terme, suppriment l’activité du système immunitaire. Conséquemment, nous sommes plus susceptibles d’attraper des maladies, Raphaël Thézé/ Le Délit
Y a-t-il un moyen de se sortir de cette situation? Sommesnous condamnés à un avenir riche en drogues stimulantes, en maladies cardiovasculaires et en diabète? Il existe plusieurs méthodes pour gérer le stress. «Les étudiants viennent durant toute la session, mais on remarque un achalandage accru vers le mois de novembre, juste avant la période d’examens», affirme le Dr Baker. «Dépendamment des raisons pour lesquelles ils viennent, nous donnons différents conseils aux étudiants. S’ils viennent en fin de session, nous les préparons pour la session prochaine. Nous leur donnons des conseils pour gérer leur stress, des stratégies cognitives, comment s’en sortir avec certaines pensées.» Quoiqu’il en soit, une chose est certaine: les étudiantes ont davantage tendance à rechercher de l’aide professionnelle, comme le Counselling Service, que les étudiants masculins: «Je crois que ces derniers ont plus tendance à chercher de l’aide informelle, en allant voir leurs amis par exemple», avance Dr Baker. Une méthode d’intervention ciblée individuellement est souvent plus efficace que les programmes de gestion de stress plus généraux. Dans tous les cas, il faut reconnaître notre source de stress et faire face à la situation, que ce soit en essayant de changer notre environnement ou en essayant de changer la signification que les événements ont pour nous, soit notre réponse émotive face aux situations qui se présentent, car il est bien évident que «souffrir en silence» ne peut qu’apporter encore plus de problèmes. Sur ce, bons examens! x
Societé | Life
Sous pression
Essai photo | Photo essay
Rêveries mortuaires Luba Markovskaia
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
Compendium!
29.11.2010
READING THE STARS WITH MISS TICKLE
Pizza problems
U
December divinations
pon exiting class today I heard a kid from the northeastern U.S. say the following: “There is no real pizza in Canada.” I’m sorry that you haven’t been able to find slices to your satisfaction in our country, good sir, but let me say this... Canadians (French and English) are fucking sick of you complaining about how our country isn’t exactly like yours! You chose to come to school here, not the other way around. So for fuck’s sakes, keep your complaints about minute differences between our countries to yourself!
How could you fucking kill Houdini?
Y
ou’re telling me that a McGill student killed Harry Houdini? Great fucking work, J. Gordon Whitehead. Way to punch Houdini three times before he could tighten his stomach muscles. He’d been suffering from appendicitis for a week, but refused to get medical attention because, guess what, he’s Harry FUCKING Houdini. Two thousand people came to his funeral and we all talked about what an asshole you are, J. Gordon Whitehead. I hope that Death called you a loser and pants’d you before drowning you in your own tears. FUCK THIS! I’m dropping out. What’s the point in applying for jobs when any employer’s going to see that I went to the school that killed magic? And what’ve we offered as collateral? Those kids who play Quidditch on Fuck ya later! Fuck this! takes a break ’til lower field and who’re the world’s most painful reminder January. Send us your holiday gripes and that some 23-year-olds are still experimenting with sex for the first time? grins: fuckthis@mcgilldaily.com.
Aries the Ram // March 21—April 20 Do you think you’re better off alone? Compatibility: Sagittarius & Leo Famous Aries: Mariah Carey Taurus the Bull // April 21—May 21 Your purse strings are getting tight, but that should be no cause for consternation. Everything you need, you already have, and what you don’t have, you simply do not need. Of course, there is no harm in doing groceries occasionally. Compatibility: Virgo, Capricorn, & Scorpio Famous Taurus: Sigmund Freud Gemini the Twins // May 22—June 21 It’s not unusual to apologize. Compatibility: Pisces & Aquarius Famous Gemini: Tom Jones
intentions close to your heart in the next month. Try to remember that jealousy is all in your head. Compatibility: Pisces & Cancer Famous Scorpio: Le Corbusier
Cancer the Crab // June 22—July 22 Familiarity breeds contempt. Compatibility: Virgo & Scorpio Famous Cancer: Bob Fosse
Sagittarius the Archer // November 23—December 21 Keep your guard up. Hide your secret diary. Lock your windows!!! Compatibility: Aries & Gemini Famous Sagittarius: Woody Allen
Leo the Lion // July 23—August 23 Shit’s been hitting the fan lately, and – understandably – you’re not all that thrilled. Get a friend, a mop, some bleach, maybe a few paper towels. You might need someone to hold you while you cry. It’s okay, Leo. It’s going to be just fine. Compatibility: Sagittarius & Aquarius Famous Leo: Aldous Huxley
Capricorn the Goat // December 22—January 20 You have to try something 8-10 times before you can decide whether or not you actually like or dislike it. It’s a fact. No more flippant pickiness, you hear? Compatibility: Taurus & Aquarius Famous Capricorn: J. R. R. Tolkien
Virgo the Virgin // August 24—September 23 Someone is going to ask you for important advice very soon. Compatibility: Cancer & Pisces Famous Virgo: Ingrid Bergman
Aquarius the Water-Carrier // January 21—February 19 Choose your words carefully; each letter costs a pretty penny… or maybe you should just get a new texting plan. Compatibility: Capricorn & Virgo Famous Aquarius: Rosa Parks
Libra the Scales // September 24—October 23 Remember that time you did a bad thing in what felt like complete secrecy? There was a video camera. It has been recorded. A stranger knows what you did. But it’s okay, you’ll probably never meet them… if you’re luck doesn’t run out by the end of this year! Compatibility: Libra Famous Libra: T. S. Eliot
Pisces the Fishes // February 20—March 20 Get your head out of the sand, or at least out of the books. I don’t wanna hear “It’s due tomorrow” or “It’s 30 pages,” because you need a break from the library. Why don’t you join a tai chi class? Or watch a movie with someone you think is cute? At the very least, you need to look in the mirror and think to yourself “DAMN, my skin is perfectly moist despite this dry and cold climate.” You also need to stop biting your nails. Compatibility: Scorpio & Cancer Famous Pisces: Bruce Willis
Scorpio the Scorpion // October 24—November 22 You are a rascal through and through, no matter how many times you iron your dress shirts or perfume your wrists. Keep good
Your quality of life, in review, and The Future 400 30 S
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Pavel Chalupnik | The McGill Daily
Quality of life Projected line of best fit
You’ll solve this with flying colours Miss Nomer 1
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1. Ridicule 5. Too sentimental 10. Sly 14. Assist 15. Batter’s location 16. Pre-euro money 17. Angers 18. Fake name 19. On a cruise 20. Gave temporarily 21. Element with the shortest name 22. Lots 23. Migration to a new location 27. Measure again 30. Bacon unit 31. Immediately 33. Animal in a sty 34. ___ good example 38. Found committing a crime 41. Building additions 42. Spicy 43. Swapped 44. Pedestal parts 46. Image, variation 47. Occasionally 52. Do 7-Down 53. “Ready or ___...” 54. Color of la mer 58. Biblical twin 59. ___ cotta 61. Charged particles
62. “The Fountainhead” author 63. Mill output 64. Excursion 65. On the safe side, at sea 66. Rice ___ 67. Wraps up
Down
37. Attaches 39. Anagram of a pathway 40. Seed cover 44. Type of project 45. Stuck on land 47. Met production 48. Twangy 49. Construction site sight 50. Chopin piece 51. Milan’s land 55. Forsaken 56. “Idylls of the King” character 57. Mail org. 59. Cooking meas. 60. In-flight info, for short
1. Where you may end up if you’re 38-Across 2. Dublin’s land 3. First garden 4. Fix, as a guitar 5. Arguments 6. Friends in war 7. Go out in the city 8. Sch. group 9. Affirmative 10. Allegation Solution to “Friendshiptastic Girlfriend” 11. Bridal path A B L E S H E E T S K A T 12. Eco-friendly H O L L O H O M E H E A R 13. Bakery supply A R G A L I R A N E A S Y 22. Spirit M U S T A R D A N D C R E S S 24. Carve in stone H I K E R U K A S E 25. Walked H E M S C A P E R S 26. Proverbial end of L O O M K H A K I D O C a tunnel U N P A R L I A M E N T A R Y 27. Compete H A N D S U R E A B E E 28. List-ending abbr. K I D D C A R T O N R E A R M S P A I N 29. Referee’s call T E N C O M M A N D M E N T S 32. Actor Hawke E I D E R R A I L R A N K 34. Desert danger? S L I M E I S L E E R I E 35. Taro root A L I A S C H E W P L E D 36. Adolescent
Volume 100 Numéro 12
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
le délit
Le seul journal francophone de l’Université McGill rédaction 3480 rue McTavish, bureau B•24 Montréal (Québec) H3A 1X9 Téléphone : +1 514 398-6784 Télécopieur : +1 514 398-8318 Rédactrice en chef rec@delitfrancais.com Mai Anh Tran-Ho Nouvelles nouvelles@delitfrancais.com Chef de section Emma Ailinn Hautecœur Secrétaire de rédaction Francis Laperrière-Racine Arts & Culture artsculture@delitfrancais.com Chef de section Émilie Bombardier Secrétaire de rédaction Annick Lavogiez Société societe@delitfrancais.com Anabel Cossette Civitella Xavier Plamondon Coordonnatrice de la production production@delitfrancais.com Mai Anh Tran-Ho Coordonnatrice visuel visuel@delitfrancais.com Élizabeth-Ann Michel-Boulanger Coordonnateurs de la correction correction@delitfrancais.com Anselme Le Texier Anthony Lecossois Coordonnateur web web@delitfrancais.com Hoang-Son Tran Collaboration Rosalie Dion-Picard, Christophe Jasmin, Luba Markovskaia, Véronique Martel, Andréanne Martin, Raphaël Thézé, JeanFrançois Trudelle Couverture Olivia Messer bureau publicitaire 3480 rue McTavish, bureau B•26 Montréal (Québec) H3A 1X9 Téléphone : +1 514 398-6790 Télécopieur : +1 514 398-8318 ads@dailypublications.org Publicité et direction générale Boris Shedov Gérance Pierre Bouillon Photocomposition Mathieu Ménard et Geneviève Robert The McGill Daily • www.mcgilldaily.com coordinating@mcgilldaily.com Emilio Comay del Junco Conseil d’administration de la Société des publications du Daily (SPD) William M. Burton, Emilio Comay del Junco, Humera Jabir, Whitney Malett, Sana Saeed, Mai Anh Tran-Ho, Will Vanderbilt, Aaron Vansintjan, Sami Yasin
L’usage du masculin dans les pages du Délit vise à alléger le texte et ne se veut nullement discriminatoire.
Les opinions exprimées dans ces pages ne reflètent pas nécessairement celles de l’Université McGill.
Le Délit (ISSN 1192-4609) est publié la plupart des mardis par la Société des publications du Daily (SPD). Il encourage la reproduction de ses articles originaux à condition d’en mentionner la source (sauf dans le cas d’articles et d’illustrations dont les droits avant été auparavent réservés, incluant les articles de la CUP). L’équipe du Délit n’endosse pas nécessairement les produits dont la publicité paraît dans ce journal.Imprimé sur du papier recyclé format tabloïde par Imprimeries Transcontinental Transmag, Anjou (Québec). Le Délit est membre fondateur de la Canadian University Press (CUP) et du Carrefour international de la presse universitaire francophone (CIPUF).
La présence d’un journal francophone à McGill serait impossible sans l’apport de précieux collaborateurs. Le Délit tient à remercier tout ceux qui ont participé et vous attend en janvier! Louis Aimé, Sabrina Akil Ait, Ramani Balendra, Marie-France Barrette, Renaud Bécot, Émilie Blanchard, Alexandre Breton, Augustin Chabrol, Martine Chapuis, Elena Choquette, la Commission aux affaires francophones (CAF), Florent Conti, Catherine Côté-Ostiguy, Max Dannenberg, Thomas Didier, Rosalie Dion-Picard, Marie-Lise Drapeau-Bisson, Édith Drouin-Rousseau, Stéphanie Dufresne, Frédéric Faddoul, Audrey Gauthier, Benoît Gautier, Habib Hassoun, Laure Henri-Garand, Andreea Iliescu, Humera Jabir, Christophe Jasmin, Geneviève Lavoie-Mathieu, Eve Léger-Bélanger, Camille Lefrançois, Francis Lehoux, Amélie Lemieux, Annie Li, Jimmy Lu, Élise Maciol, Anouk Manassen, Luba Markovskaia, Véronique Martel, Valérie Mathis, Marie McCulloch, Margaux Meurisse, Et-Anne Moinsourath, Marine Moulin, Devon Paige Willis, Hannah Palmer, Maysa Phares, Marion Provencher-Langlois, Victor Raynaud, Catherine Renaud, Julie Rich, Maya Riebel, Edith Rousseau, Yéraldyn Rousseau, Andrea Saavedra, Véronique Samson, Christian Scott Martone, Ginga Takeshima, Philippe Teisceira-Lessard, Raphaël Thézé, André Thiel, Jean-François Trudelle, Jade Weymuller
La plume francophone vous pique? Écrivez-nous à redaction@delitfrancais.com
29.11.2010
Foi | Faith
Le Délit & The McGill Daily
29.11.2010
volume 100 number 13
The Daily would like to thank everyone who helped fill its pages this fall. There’s no way we could have done it without you and we hope to see you next semester! PHOTOS
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