Where in the World are the World’s Faiths, and Who Cares?

Course Description:
Religious engagement has been on the rise worldwide, regardless of how any particular religious or spiritual tradition may be faring in Canada. The Pew Institute continues to count that from 80-85% of the world’s peoples self define as religious or spiritual. The old question is new again: are world religions stumbling blocks to building global community, or are they essential to its realization? In this six-week course, we shall examine some of those religious traditions: who they are, where they are, and what they have been doing, what they are doing, and what they yet may do.

• The Axial Age and its Echoes
  The Birth of the World’s Religions and Spiritualities.
  The world’s religions and spiritualities today: The ‘Dead Z Scrolls’
  Our story up to now: for better and/or worse

• From Chicago and Back Again
  A century of ups and downs.
  The Interfaith/Multifaith Movements in the 21st Century.

• Setting a Table
  Principles of Dialogue.
  The Dialogue Decalogue.
  The Discernment Decalogue.

• Cases in Point
  Case studies of achievements in Global Interfaith Collaboration.

• On the Home Front
  The United Church of Canada: 5 Signs of Hope
  The Canadian Council of Churches Interfaith Reference Group
  The Canadian Interfaith Conversation
  The Canadian Multifaith Federation

• Meanwhile, here in Winnipeg …
  The Mayor’s Multifaith and Cultural Liaison Circle
  ‘For the Sake of the City’
  The Lt. Governor of Manitoba Award for the Advancement of Interreligious Understanding
• Wrap up: Back to the Future: A New Axial Age
  For further study

Dates and time:
Wed Sep 18           9:30-11:30 am         Thomas Sill Multi-Purpose Room
Wed Sep 25           9:30-11:30 am         Thomas Sill Multi-Purpose Room
Wed Oct 2              9:30-11:30 am         Thomas Sill Multi-Purpose Room
Wed Oct 9              9:30-11:30 am         Thomas Sill Multi-Purpose Room
No Class Oct 16
Wed Oct 23            9:30-11:30 am         Thomas Sill Multi-Purpose Room
Wed Oct 30            9:30-11:30 am         Thomas Sill Multi-Purpose Room

Biography:  Ambassador, The Rev. Prof. Dr. James Taylor Christie
Pastor, scholar, author and essayist, dialogue theologian, ecumenist, and interreligious diplomat, Dr. Christie has devoted his life to Christian reconciliation, interreligious harmony and collaboration, and to building global community. Accordingly, he has served for over four decades in the ministry of The United Church of Canada, and for a quarter of a century with The Canadian Council of Churches, including a term as President and two terms as Chair of Project Ploughshares. Dr. Christie is Ambassador-at-Large for the Canadian Multifaith Federation and serves on the Board of Experts of the International Religious Liberties Association and the Board of the G20 Interfaith Forum Foundation. He is a life-long World Federalist, and is the longest serving Governing Council Chair, from 1995-2012. The inaugural Professor of Dialogue Theology and Whole World Ecumenism at The University of Winnipeg, Professor Christie was also Dean of Theology, the Inaugural Dean of Global College and Co-founder of the Ridd Institute for Religion and Global Policy. Dr. Christie has published hundreds of articles, essays and columns, both scholarly and popular. His two most recent co-edited volumes are The North American Churches in the Cold War, with Dr. Paul Mojzes; and Religious Soti Diplomacy and the United Nations.

If you are experiencing difficulty with the online registration process, please call (204) 988-7650 to register by phone.

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If you have any questions about this course, or would like to be added to a waitlist, please email b.doran@uwinnipeg.ca