Faith & Public Life
Faith commitments – each person’s deepest commitments, whether formally religious in nature or not – shape how each person interacts with our neighbours, our institutions, and our environment. CPJ is convinced that Canada needs to engage in serious reflection on core values and faith perspectives and their implications for our public life together – the common good. Without such a debate, the public sphere will continue to be a place for individuals or groups to advance only their own particular interests rather than come to meaningful consensus on how to address important public issues.
One of the key components of a person’s and a community’s identity is the deepest convictions they hold which shape their private, but also their public life. Faith shapes the most basic questions of identity: Who am I? How did I get here? What is wrong in the world? How can it be fixed? The faith perspectives of Canadians, whether Aboriginal, Muslim, Jew, Christian, Hindu, Sikh or Humanist, shape how they participate as citizens in building and shaping a cohesive and inclusive Canadian society.
Some have argued that people must deny their religion, ethnicity, and culture to participate fully in Canadian life. Some have a deep distrust of religion and a tendency to regard public life as distinctly secular – having no room for faith perspectives. CPJ believes that differing faith convictions should be acknowledged as key elements of how individuals and communities can best contribute to the common good. Learning how to do that in a multi-cultural and multi-faith society is crucial to the common good.
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It’s hard to believe that my year at CPJ is coming to an end! It has been a busy year at CPJ with many events, meetings, paper launches, conferences and much more. I want to take a moment to reflect back on the past year, especially some of the highlights.
Canada is hosting the G8 and G20 summits in June this year. Among the flurry of advocacy and education on global issues, this year there is a new coalition of faith communities organizing to make a difference. For the first time in Canada, national organizations of Christian, Baha’i, Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, and First Nations faith communities are working together at a 



