Lois Wilson is a
giant in so many ways in Canada and around the
world. She has left a trail of accomplishments
from her appointments by successive
Canadian governments to head missions in Korea,
El Salvador, Guatemala, and Sudan among others,
from her work as
president of the World Council of Churches, and
then from her work as Senator Wilson and then
beyond that.
When approached about
the book, Lois wanted a book that was not about
her, but that is about continuing work for the
common good. And it has arrived: For the
Sake of the Common Good: Essays in Honour of
Lois Wilson, Edited by Kate Merriman and
Bertha Yetman, Foreward by Louise
Arbour, McGill-Queens University Press, 2022.
The co-editors note that the book is continuing
work for the common good. I offer a short
summary.
The contributors are
impressive. A cloud of witnesses has been
influenced by her. Louise Arbour’s Foreward
is a warm honouring of Lois with memories of
parallel work around war crimes, genocide and
crimes against humanity. Louise says Lois is a
“trailblazer” and “her place in the Canadian
narrative is characterized by a spirit of
compassion, goodwill, implacable determination
and joy”. Lloyd Axworthy is internationally
known for his work as Minister of Foreign
Affairs, serving a term as President of the UN
Security Council. He made significant
contributions to the international campaign to
ban landmines and the UN policy of
Responsibility to Protect. Irwin Cotler, a
lawyer who served as counsel to Nelson Mandela
and other political prisoners, is also well
known internationally and shares with Lois a
concern for political prisoners. The essays in
the book are wonderfully eclectic and
informative.
Allan Saunders
begins the book with his essay on personal faith
in Lois’ life and work. It is a beautifully
written tribute to Lois, packed with information
about the stages and exploits of her life.
The remaining essays
are grouped under three themes devised by Lois
with the editors, and then there is an Afterword
by Michael Blair.
Part 1 is
about ecumenical and interfaith work:
Chris Ferguson
ably fills out the reader’s understanding of
ecumenism and brings things up to date with the
Global Christian Forum and also with the
weakened ecumenical movement. He calls us to go
beyond dialogue to “radical interreligious
cooperation for transformative coalitions for
justice and peace.” Referencing Bonhoeffer,
Ferguson calls the church to become the church
for others, “to follow the leadership of the
marginalized and dispossessed … in common cause
with social and poor peoples’ movements.”
Erich Weingartner
brings the reader up to speed on the story of
the interchurch project for peace and
reconciliation on the Korean peninsula. He ends
telling readers they “are living in an age of
fear that has done violence against people
living in hope.” And “The antidote to despair is
a stubborn determination to persevere against
the odds. It is in the soil of commitment and
action that hope can proliferate and prosper.”
Diana Eck
writes an inside story of women in the
interfaith movement from the late 1980s, with a
gathering in Toronto of women from major
religions as well as from a variety of
traditions and contexts. They were involved in
what Diana calls “a dialogue of life” – talking
with each other about things that mattered to
women. Her article ends with some of the current
interfaith writing and dialogues among women.
Alia Hogben
gives a Muslim women’s perspective on the common
good. There is a brief history of the Muslim
presence in Canada, insights into Islamic law
and practice like sharia, fiqh and hadith. Her
last section is “Protecting Human Rights: A
Mutual Responsibility”. She urges Muslim women
to advocate for the application of the framework
of human rights and to ensure these are
congruent with Islamic ideals of social justice
and equality for all.
Sean Mulrooney
tells us about Visio Divina, images and a method
giving insights into God and spirituality,
rather than the hearing of the word of God. The
veneration of icons by the Eastern church is
given as an antecedent.
Part 2 is
about faith and public policy:
The late Bill
Blaikie gives the title essay on faith
and public policy. He sees difficulty from the
rise of forms of religious extremism. “Lois
Wilson lived in a more biblical Christianity in
which Christians were a justice-seeking
self-sacrificing minority challenging
principalities and powers.” Blaikie sees hope
stemming from Charles Taylor’s inclusive
secularization. We must find a powerful
political ethic of solidarity grounded in the
presence and acceptance of differing points of
view if we are to deal with the impending
existential risks to humanity of climate change,
radical inequality and nuclear weapons.
Alexa Gilmour gives
an account of public witness in her local urban
congregation. Acting as a voluntary chaplain for
the “occupy” movement, she discovers some
support in her congregation. When the church is
asked to offer sanctuary to a refugee family,
the church agrees. A “stone soup” network
reaches out to neighbours living with poverty.
When covid closed the church for worship, the
community service programs stayed open as
essential services.
Betsy Anderson
writes about the whole church of God being the
church in the world, citing “the God of mission
has a church in the world”. The vocation of the
laity is in and for the world, citing: it is in
imitation of Christ, broadly inclusive, action
oriented. It uses compassion and solidarity, is
tough, resilient and persistent. It is rooted in
a “preferential option for the poor”. Our work
is our vocation.
Mary Jo Leddy writes about
borders, barriers and blessings. Familiar with
borders in the Americas, she tells of the
spiritual insights she was taught by refugees
who cross them. She understands the language of
border guards. And she notes we must convert to
see our country not as a place we own, but a
place we share as a gift and for which we have
responsibility.
Lloyd Axworthy writes about “the
last in the queue” - the overwhelming numbers of
refugees and displaced persons in today’s world.
He begins with a tribute for Lois from his place
as a youth in the pews in Winnipeg where he
heard her social gospel. The needs of displaced
people for a safe stable place to build a life
are simply not met. “The humanitarian commitment
of nations has given way to nativism.” After the
surge across the Mediterranean in 2015, the
European Union adopted a containment policy –
limiting access and paying Turkey and African
countries to restrict travel and offer
resettlement. Axworthy writes of hope that the
language of security in the UN Responsibility to
Protect can act “as a way of drawing a larger
circle of interlaced issues together.” He wants
“global cooperation that works towards values of
human security, well-being, and justice beyond
our borders.”
Stephen Bede Scharper
writes about faith and the fate of the earth.
Lois is one of the most powerful homilists he
has ever heard. Scholars study world religions
and ecology. Faith for Earth links faith-based
organizations to the UN Sustainable Development
goals. The Climate Action Task Force of the
Parliament of the World’s Religions aims to
enable action to address human-caused climate
change. The Interfaith Rainforest Initiative
aims to end tropical deforestation.
Stan McKay
writes informatively on living on the earth with
all creation. He recalls seeing slides of Lois’
and her parents’ summer holiday at Lake of the
Woods where they “load supplies into a canoe and
then camp by the lake and live off the land.”
McKay recalls a sustainable earlier indigenous
“semi-nomadic lifestyle”, with summer home by
the lake with fishing, and winter home near the
trap line. That ended when children had to go to
school. McKay offers insights on the church and
indigenous mission. His essay reaches for a
visionary collaborative way to make peace and
create justice, for “we are interdependent with
all humans and all of Creation”.
Bertha Yetman
tells of fishing communities in decline in
Newfoundland. The principal renewable resource,
cod, was being destroyed, threatening the very
existence of communities. Offshore companies
with lobbyists, in contrast to inshore fishers
with poverty and silence, meant fishing kept
going until then 1992 moratorium. Then came the
largest layoff in Canadian history. The
communities were in crisis. Today there is a
flowering of arts and culture with tourism.
Community based initiatives are restoring life
to small communities.
Brent Hawkes and
Kimberley Vance-Mubanga give an
informative review of “A Not So Gay World”, with
some gains - like participation in the Toronto
conference of the Parliament of the World’s
Religions. In the end, “faith-based
discrimination has been a significant factor in
the development of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation,
discrimination and violence …” leading to more
state-sponsored murder. Religions need to play a
bigger role towards a solution.
Part 3
covers human rights:
Aruna Gnanadason writes about the
global women’s movement “gently holding each
other up.” She tells of India and the commitment
and energy of women speaking out, refusing to be
silenced, determined to overcome differences
and, with women elsewhere, determined to
overcome oppression. She acknowledges
differences among women, including Muslim women,
and the importance of holding together all
struggles that would challenge patriarchy and
its links to forms of imperialism. Keeping in
dialogue can give a space to find the liberatory
potential of all religions.
Noa Mendelsohn Aviv writes about
the fallacy of ‘cancel culture’ and the power of
solidarity, giving insights into the life of the
human rights community. Marginalized individuals
and groups need to speak in their own voices
about their concerns. When they call out
powerful individuals they are not censors, nor
do they have political power. Divisions are
touched on, yet there is evidence of pragmatic
solidarity in work before the courts and in
Pride Toronto and Toronto’s Pride Parade.
Irwin
Cotler advocates for a wider concern
arising in five particular cases of political
prisoners. He urges a broader resisting of the
current pressures on constitutional democracy –
opposing authoritarianism, promoting and
protecting democratic values and institutions,
standing with political prisoners, upholding our
Charter of Rights and Freedoms and supporting
freedom of expression – the pillar of democracy.
Michael Blair, in
Afterword, reminds us
that Covid in 2020 revealed “the vulnerability
of a large part of Canadian society”, and that
during the pandemic, “the realities of systemic
racism were unmasked”. He thinks of Lois as he
writes about two current justice themes:
guaranteed basic income; and black lives matter.
The essays make readers think
about ways they can advance the common good:
welcoming refugees, developing ecologically
sustainable ways of life, repairing relations
with Indigenous Peoples, protecting the rights
of LGBTQ+ people, supporting all who are
oppressed, defending political prisoners, and
respecting religious rights and the place of
faith in public life. The Afterword adds
a call to work for guaranteed basic income and
to work for social justice with Black Lives
Matter. Amen to every bit of that!