BC Humanists Podcast

Bettianne Hedges of Humanist Canada hosts Leslie Rosenblood from Centre for Inquiry Canada alongside Teale Phelps Bondaroff and Ian Bushfield of the BC Humanist Association, who will discuss the many ways Canada still tangibly privileges religion and its institutions over similar non-theistic organizations. Just a few policy choices cost Canadians billions - yes, with a "b" - each and every year...

Join Megan Sheldon of Be Ceremonial as we explore the foundations of ceremony, including how we can create our own rituals to acknowledge times of change in life, death, and everything in between. You will learn how to craft a ritual, design a ceremony, and mark the seemingly invisible moments that often go unnoticed in our society...

Despite decades of calls to action, our emissions are not on a path to stave off a horrific future for our children and future generations. The BC Climate Emergency Campaign is a group of civil society organizations, anxious about the climate emergency, who are collaborating to increase the ambition of climate policy and action in BC. We are not a formal coalition, but have chosen to work together on a joint campaign...

Despite a 2015 Supreme Court of Canada ruling that prayers at municipal council meetings are unconstitutional, multiple communities across British Columbia still opened their 2022 inaugural council meetings with a prayer.

This is a recording of a discussion about prayers with BCHA Research Coordinator Dr Teale Phelps Bondaroff where he explores our latest work updating the status of prayers at BC municipalities...

The Government of British Columbia's Master Agreement with religious healthcare facilities allows some hospitals to 'opt-out' of providing patients with procedures that they're legally entitled too.

This means your right to MAID or an abortion is subject to the whims of Catholic Bishops and not the rule of law.

Find out about the history of religious hospitals in the province and how this agreement came about...

The Canadian constitution does not have a formal establishment clause separating church and state as the USA does, so can Canada be considered a secular country? In this presentation, BC Humanist Association Executive Director Ian Bushfield will argue that Canada’s unique legal and political history, coupled with a forward-looking Charter of Rights and Freedoms and judiciary, has resulted in more robust protections for the nonreligious and state neutrality than presently exist in America...

The BCHA team discusses its newly released report: Open for Unconstitutional Business.

Read the full report

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In honour of Black History Month 2022 (February), we hosted “Black in British Columbia: Resilience and Erasure” presented by Kathleen Johnson (founder of the Facebook group “Critical Black Thought Society” and Alberta Representative for Humanist Canada)

This talk was recorded February 22, 2022 via Zoom

Kathleen shared a look at how Black settlers came to British Columbia, what life was like, how they contributed, and how that history has been all but erased from the culture of...

The Government of British Columbia gives hundreds of millions of dollars to private schools in the province.

Our new research shows that the overwhelming majority of these schools are for the religious or economic elites.

In this talk, BCHA Executive Director Ian Bushfield and Policy Research Adriana Thom will detail where this money goes, what these schools are teaching and who gets shut out.

Learn more: 

https://www.bchumanist...

This is a recording of a live event held in collaboration with Nonreligion in a Complex Future in March 2021.