This email from CFI Canada arrived in my inbox:
Tomorrow: Join CBC Studio Audience for “Is Religion Bad for the Environment?” featuring CFI representation
The Centre for Inquiry will be participating in an episode of Global TV’s Context, to be recorded at CBC Studios tomorrow (Monday) and was just alerted that the show is looking for CFI members to join their audience. Here are the details:
IS RELIGION BAD FOR THE ENVIRONMENT?
This Monday, September 24, we ask: IS RELIGION BAD FOR THE ENVIRONMENT?’ Bestselling author Andrew Nikiforuk has made a strong case that many religious people in Canada have little regard for the planet. U of Toronto’s star anthropologist Stephen Scharper, author of ‘Religion and Ecology’ weighs in along with the Centre for Inquiry’s Justin Trottier.
Join the studio audience this Monday night to add your voice. Filmed at CBC Broadcast Centre in downtown Toronto and aired on Global TV. Check-in at 5:30 PM, taping at 6.
Get your tickets now: tickets@contextwithlorna.com
Context with Lorna Dueck investigates where current affairs and spirituality converge. www.contextwithlornadueck.com
In preparation for this appearance, [Justin] would welcome thoughts and arguments relating to the following areas to be discussed:
1. Is religion to blame (at least in part) for the environmental crisis? (see for example Dr. Lynn White’s thesis in “The Historical Roots of the Ecological Crisis”).
2. How has Christianity been complicit in environmental degradation instead of an antidote to it? Why is this so?
3. New broad-ranging religious activism across religious lines in the name of “creation care” suggests that religion and science may not be as incompatible as is often assumed. Are we blaming the (religious) messenger when the message may be more nuanced than often assumed?
4. Has religion on balance been more of a curse than a blessing to the planet?
5. What is the humanist/skeptic’s positive case for a green ethic?
Justin Trottier jtrottier@cficanada.ca
National Communications Director & Chief Spokesperson,
Centre for Inquiry Canada