CARDUS

Home | Press Releases | Canadian Millennials Take Up Challenge of Living a Public Faith

Canadian Millennials Take Up Challenge of Living a Public Faith

Initiative will help train young Canadians from coast to coast to bring their faith into the public square.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

June 6, 2019

OTTAWA, ON – The Cardus Religious Freedom Institute (CRFI) today launched its Faith in the Future Initiative – a project designed to help young people live a public faith. The initiative will support Canadian millennials in their efforts to live out their faith publicly in an authentic and integral way. Rejecting relativism, syncretism, and a mushy middle consensus, which involve a compromise of belief, the Initiative involves authentic engagement, requiring delegates to be honest about their beliefs.

“Faith in the Future recognizes that we hold many different beliefs, but that we need to engage one another in these differences in order to better recognize our shared humanity which is so necessary if we are to live a common life together,” says Father Deacon Andrew Bennett, Director of the CRFI.

The Faith in the Future Initiative aims to build a network of 100 young faith leaders from Christian and other religious traditions across the country over the next three years. This initiative will support the development of public faith among Canadian millennials by organizing events, creating tools, maintaining engagement, and convening conferences with young faith leaders.

“Faith in the Future is off to a running start, with fifty young leaders from various faiths involved already thanks to ten coffeehouse meetings we have held in seven different provinces across Canada,” said Fr. Dcn. Andrew. “But all that was in preparation for the real work, which begins today.”

What will Faith in the Future delegates do?

  • Throughout the summer and into the autumn of 2019, Faith in the Future delegates will meet in their local communities to study and discuss various materials related to religious freedom and living a public faith, including An Institutional History of Religious Freedom in Canada, a foundational CRFI report. 
  • In the autumn, delegates will gather at two regional conferences – one in Western Canada, one in Eastern Canada to consolidate their learning and expand their multi-faith networks. At the same time they will engage their own faith communities in examining how effective they are in living their faith publicly and contributing to a deep pluralism.
  • In early 2020, delegates will design and propose projects for which they will be solely responsible. The projects will support and encourage delegates’ own faith community to live a public faith.
  • Delegates will have the opportunity to submit articles for consideration to Convivium magazine’s Voices from the Crowd series, giving them a platform to articulate the importance of public faith in their lives.

The CRFI Advisory Council will mentor local Faith in the Future communities. Each community will have its own mentor to support them in living a public faith.
 
 More information on the Faith in the Future Initiative is available online.

-30-

MEDIA INQUIRIES
Daniel Proussalidis
Cardus – Director of Communications
613-241-4500 x508
dproussalidis@cardus.ca

About the Cardus Religious Freedom Institute
The CRFI researches Canadian religious freedom issues in order to educate Canadians and to strengthen the national network of religious freedom advocates. Central to the Institute’s work is the understanding that religious freedom is the fundamental right of all people, their communities, and their institutions to live out their most deeply held beliefs in both public and private contexts without interference from the state or other authorities. To learn more, visit the Cardus website.