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January/February 2011: the Soul of Activism

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Magazine Issues, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | No comments

What motivates us to fight for positive change? What role does our interconnectedness with other people and our environment play in the struggle for social and environmental justice? Where do religion and action meet? Briarpatch’s January/February 2011 issue, “The Soul of Activism,” explores the intersection between spirituality and activism, connecting the dots between our goals for positive change in the world and our inner personal (emotional and spiritual) revolutions.

To subscribe or order a copy of this issue, call 1-866-431-5777 or e-mail publisher AT briarpatchmagazine DOT com. Read the rest of this entry »

Letter from the Editor: Creative engagement

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 1 comment

By Shayna Stock
Briarpatch Magazine
January/February 2011

“If we focus our actions and ambitions on creating independent, atomized versions of ourselves, we will never find ease. If you look at the most contented people around you, you’ll see that the ease they exhibit is actually a peaceful and creative engagement with the world.”
-Michael Stone, “No priests, no temples: Yoga and the practice of change“

Spirituality and activism are not strangers. The intimate relationship between the two is evident in the work of icons like Gandhi, Harriet Tubman, Malcolm X and Desmond Tutu, for whom activism was part and parcel of their commitments to something or someone beyond the sensory world.

The very concept of social justice emerges from the recognition that we are all interconnected – that your freedom is vital to my own, and that so long as anyone remains un-free no one can truly be free. Read the rest of this entry »

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Faithful ally: The United Church and one father’s journey from homophobia to LGBT advocacy

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 1 comment

illustration: Nick Craine

By Marc Colbourne
Briarpatch Magazine

I remember the exact moment my Sundays changed forever. I was 14.

Sunday mornings in our house had always been filled with a routine chaos. Mom and Dad woke up first, showered and dressed, then called my two younger sisters and me in sequence. After our allotment of bathroom time, carefully monitored and often punctuated by knocking on the door, we each got dressed in the clothes my mom had laid out on our beds: dress pants and an ironed shirt for me, dresses reserved for Sundays for my sisters. All of this happened amidst constant complaints and pleas to stay home that week. New and creative excuses were tried and ignored. Finally, neither a moment too soon nor too late, we crowded into the car and arrived at the church in time to claim our regular pew – not too close to the altar but not far enough away to suggest that we really didn’t want to be there. Read the rest of this entry »

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Solidarity in Islamophobic times: Holding the state and the Left accountable

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 2 comments

Illustration: Nidal El-Khairy

By Sumayya Kassamali
Briarpatch Magazine

One icy evening in December 2007, a friend and I walked through a large Toronto mosque collecting signatures for a petition to grant members of the Toronto 18 – a group of young Muslim men arrested and imprisoned under allegations of terrorism in June 2006 – the legal rights of regular prisoners in the maximum security facility where they were being detained. Many of the men had been kept in solitary confinement since their arrest more than a year prior, and reports of routine humiliation, denial of access to prayer facilities, and targeted discrimination had begun to reach the mainstream media. The petition was put together by an ad hoc coalition of the group’s family members and community organizers, and cautiously abstained from commenting on innocence or guilt, instead requesting solely that they be treated like all other prisoners in the facility. Yet when approaching members of this mosque, many of whom I grew up alongside, I was surprised to be met with significant hesitation. While many signed willingly, grateful for the reminder that the devotional space was not isolated from its socio-political context, others did not. “I’m not sure…” one young woman trailed off. “Let me think about it,” muttered another, visibly uncomfortable with the request. Read the rest of this entry »

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Blood, sweat and prayers: Buddhism, (non)violence and the Tibetan independence movement

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 1 comment

illustration: Greg Horne

By Henry Martin
Briarpatch Magazine

Spiritual belief can be a potent political force. It can be wielded as a tool of oppression, and can also offer a wellspring of strength to people resisting oppression at the risk of violence and death. The sense of a reality greater than our individual selves, and the belief in a spirit that transcends the horrors and sorrows of the world around us, can spark courage, loyalty and hope in conditions where these might otherwise wither. This is particularly evident in the Tibetan independence movement, in which Buddhism has played a major role in the resistance to the totalitarian rule of the People’s Republic of China. Read the rest of this entry »

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Pedagogy of the Omitted: The Escola Fé e Política in northeastern Brazil breathes new life into Liberation Theology

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 1 comment

Roberto Saraiva, former director of the Escola Pe. Humberto Plummen, leads a discussion during a weekend module.

By D. Henry Claflin
Briarpatch Magazine

“Our action is our spirituality. It’s my faith that makes me fight.” When Rubens Pita said this, nearly everyone in the room spoke up to offer their own reflections.

“Faith responds to the action of politics,” said one woman in the circle.

“Prayer is reflecting, but also acting. Otherwise, prayer is just repeating words,” said another.

Rubens is an educator and coordinator at the Escola Fé e Política: Pe. Humberto Plummen (School of Faith and Politics) in Recife, Brazil. The school is one of five Escolas Fé e Política in Brazil that use experiential learning to raise the social and political awareness of the nation’s people. Read the rest of this entry »

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Interconnectedness in action: A politically radical and spiritually evolved vision for the future of human communities

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | No comments

By Zainab Amadahy
Briarpatch Magazine

“Politics and spirituality are both about taking care of the people.”
-Renee Thomas-Hill, Turtle Clan Mother, Mohawk

“Life in the cities is connected to abstracts like economics, nationalism, capitalism and militarism. These, as ideologies, are not connected to the great source of life. They are connected to an indirect, obtusely subconscious, misogynistic mini-reality.”
-Gkisedtanamoogk, Wapanoag

On Turtle Island, struggles for Indigenous sovereignty and decolonization cannot be fully understood outside of their cultural and historical contexts. First Nations political struggles are informed by Indigenous world views, values and histories that are infused with our spiritualities. Read the rest of this entry »

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No priests, no temples: Yoga and the practice of change

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 2 comments

An interview with Michael Stone


By Dave Oswald Mitchell
Briarpatch Magazine

Many activists practice yoga, but few would describe their yoga practice as a form of activism or treat their activism as an expression of their yoga practice. Michael Stone is working to change that.

An unapologetic misfit in almost any category, Michael Stone is a non-practicing psychotherapist, a devout iconoclast, a dissident Buddhist and a yoga teacher whose students won’t wear lululemon clothing to class for fear of being teased. His work at the intersection of yoga, Buddhism, psychotherapy, ethics and social action is refreshingly direct, pragmatic and free of dogma. He heads the thriving Centre of Gravity sangha in Toronto, and is the author of several books, including Yoga for a World Out of Balance: Teachings on Ethics and Social Action. Read the rest of this entry »

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Love in a time of climate crisis: How can humanity’s greatest challenge be transformed into the greatest love story on Earth?

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 2 comments

The annual Parihaka International Peace Festival, set in a small coastal Māori village in New Zealand, honours the village’s history of non-violent resistance, based on ancestral and Christian teachings, to the armed invasion and colonization of their land in the 19th century. All photos by Velcrow Ripper.

By Velcrow Ripper
Briarpatch Magazine

It’s the year 2011. Icebergs are melting, forest fires are raging out of control, sea levels are rising, drinking water is becoming scarcer, droughts, famine, conflict and other climate-related pressures are growing exponentially. If we continue to drag our feet, resisting the changes we need to make, the majority of scientists are predicting that we will experience runaway climate destabilization within this century.

How can this crisis – the greatest challenge humanity has yet faced – be transformed into the greatest love story on earth? Read the rest of this entry »

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Review: This is an Honour Song

January 18, 2011 in Briarpatch Articles, Jan/Feb 2011: the Soul of Activism by admin | 1 comment

This is an Honour Song: Twenty years since the blockades. By Leanne Simpson and Kiera L. Ladner, eds. Arbeiter Ring Publishing, 2010.

Reviewed by Tyler McCreary
Briarpatch Magazine

In the summer of 1990, a group of Kanien’kehaka (Mohawk) people took a stand in defence of their territories. Conventionally known as the Oka Crisis, that summer represented a flashpoint in the relationships between settlers and Indigenous peoples in Canada. While the land dispute ostensibly centred on a proposed golf course to be built over a sacred grove of pines, it represented something far larger. For the Kanien’kehaka of Kanehsatà:ke, it represented the culmination of hundreds of years of resistance to colonial policies. For Indigenous peoples across North America, particularly those contending with the Canadian state, it signalled the continued resilience and strength of Indigenous peoples in the face of brute colonial aggression. Read the rest of this entry »

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