Tag: Nicolas Chevalier

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News

Concordia announces plan to divest

The Concordia University Foundation announced its intention to withdraw all of its investments from the coal, oil and gas sector before 2025.

The Concordia University Foundation plans to be the first Quebec university with 100 per cent sustainable investments within five years. Currently, $14 million of Concordia’s $243 million assets is going into the coal, gas and oil sectors.

“We believe that being socially and environmentally responsible in our investments is the surest way to be Concordia University’s best possible fund management partner,” said Howard Davidson, Chair of the Board of the Concordia University Foundation, in a press release Friday. “Investing in sustainability is not just the right thing to do, it’s the smart thing to do.”

While Concordia cancelled classes for the climate strike on Sept. 27, some questioned why the university still invested in fossil fuels, as pointed out by Jacob Robitaille, internal coordinator of Concordia’s La Planète s’invite à l’Université in a previous interview with The Concordian.

“It doesn’t send a straightforward message,” Robitaille said of Concordia’s environmental position.

But now, the university is aiming to double investments that generate social and environmental impact with a financial return. For instance, Concordia partnered earlier this year with Inerjys Ventures, a global investment fund promoting the adoption of clean tech.

“It’s a social movement as much as a financial one, and this announcement has a lot of power for the climate justice movement across the country,” said Divest Concordia representative Emily Carson-Apstein. “We’re looking forward to keeping the students updated as this process goes on.”

“Promoting sustainability and fighting climate change are priorities for the Concordia community,” said Concordia’s interim President Graham Carr in a press release. “Our researchers, students, faculty and staff are all engaged around this issue and want to be part of the solution. The Foundation’s commitments are crucial next steps in our sustainability journey.”

Student organizations, such as Divest Concordia have long advocated for the withdrawal of the university from those investments. In a previous article for The Concordian, Alex Hutchins reported that since its creation in 2013, Divest Concordia has been continually pressuring the foundation to freeze its assets.

In 2014, the student-run group joined forces with the CSU to create the Joint Sustainable Investment Advisory Committee (JSIAC). Now, they see their own $10 million investment in sustainable funds from 2017 as laying the groundwork for the university’s decision, Divest Concordia explained in a statement sent to The Concordian.

“This has always been an issue of priorities, and it’s great that the foundation agrees with what the students have been shouting about for years,” said Emily Carson-Apstein, the Divest Concordia representative on the committee. “It’s a social movement as much as a financial one, and this announcement has a lot of power for the climate justice movement across the country. We’re looking forward to keeping the students updated as this process goes on.”

Long-time member of Divest Concordia Nicolas Chevalier agrees. “Concordia has finally decided to listen to the voices of the student body and align their investment portfolio in a way that doesn’t fund our collective demise. Climate change is one of the most important issues of our time, and the institutions that produce research on this crisis should strive to align their operations with the science, fossil fuel divestment is no exception.”

Divest Concordia members work across multiple environmental advocacy organizations. Hania Peper, a representative of Divest Concordia and LPSU (La planète s’invite à l’Université), was hopeful in the wake of Concordia’s decision: “Last week, Concordia took its first true steps towards addressing climate injustice by divesting from an industry that has been funding both climate change and the degradation of human and environmental communities all over the globe. While the ripple effects of this decision have yet to be seen, I’m hopeful that this can serve as inspiration for other Canadian universities to follow-suit and begin divesting from fossil fuels and non-renewable resources.”

This article is an updated version from a previous article published on Nov. 8

Feature graphic by @sundaeghost

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Student Life

A non-believer embraces faith

Photo by Kenneth Gibson

Secular students find value in wisdom and practices of faith traditions

An atheist looking for guidance among religious people may seem ironic at first. Some students that frequent Concordia’s Multi-faith and Spirituality Centre (MFSC), like Nicolas Chevalier, identify as non-believers but still derive benefits from being involved.

Chevalier admits that he had some reservations about Christianity and other religions, but was still curious about them. “At the same time, faith can be something that brings people together, and that is something that is clearly lacking in our society,” he said.

Chevalier met Ashely Crouch, the interfaith facilitator at the MFSC, through a mutual friend. Chevalier often attends events put on by Sustainable Concordia, and since it shares the same building as the MFSC, he ended up participating in a few events there as well. Chevalier considers himself an atheist, yet his involvement with environmental activism complicates that perspective. “With my environmental background, I do believe everything is connected. We’re not just here in a cold existence to reap everything from the earth,” he said.

In all his intersectional organizing and activism efforts, Chevalier tries not to take a “finger pointing” perspective. He said he is drawn to similarities in how interfaith communities create respectful dialogue, even when they disagree.

Chevalier’s family is Christian, but they rarely went to church during his childhood. So while he didn’t know much about religion growing up, Chevalier was never anti-religious, and was always respectful of people’s faith.

A turning point came when his mother passed away from lung cancer about four years ago. It so happened that his family’s neighbour was a priest. “He would come in and he would talk about nothing and everything, in a way that was very comforting. That was definitely something that helped change my view about people who have faith,” Chevalier said.

The role of the campus chaplain at Concordia has been constantly evolving to reflect the changing religious beliefs of the student body, said Ellie Hummel, the chaplain and coordinator at the MFSC.

The chapel at Loyola College became an ecumenical place of worship when Loyola joined with Sir George William College to form Concordia in 1974. The chaplaincy gradually grew to embrace the increasing number of non-Christian students coming to Concordia, becoming multi-faith.

In the last 19 years, since Hummel has been at Concordia, spiritual yet non-religious people have also been welcomed. “We are adjusting our language more,” Hummel said. “We realized there are people who name themselves as secular and humanist, and we want them to know they are included.”

“People could have their typical view of ‘oh, it’s a preacher person just coming here to push their religion’ and that’s not at all what I get from either Ellie or Ashely,” Chevalier said. “They invite people in to come as they are, whether they have faith or not.”

Chevalier thinks the main issue with organized religion is that concentrating power in an institution eventually leads to the people running it being corrupted by that power.

The MFSC’s approach to cultivating a faith-based community is more informal and non-hierarchical. Crouch became the interfaith facilitator at the MFSC a little over a year ago. She said that a lot of new students, when they come to the MFSC for the first time, ask about how they can join. “You don’t have to join, you just belong, you’re just here,” Crouch said. “It’s very intentionally kept that way.

Ultimately, compared to what capitalism and consumer culture offer in terms of living a fulfilled life, Chevalier said he sees a lot of good things coming out of the multifaith chaplaincy. However, he doesn’t necessarily see his participation as political.

“In the traditional politics type of sense, I don’t see it like that, I just see it as people sharing ideas” Chevalier said. “[But] some of my friends who are stronghold atheists would go ‘why are you even talking with these people?’”

While the MFSC offers varied programing, from drumming circles to meditation groups, Hummel said the most important thing they offer is simply the space—a place where people can just drop in and talk to religious people.

“[It] helps you […] realize that you can live with people who don’t necessarily agree and to have a respect around those sorts of things,” Crouch said. “Everybody can grow from that.”

Feature image by Kenneth Gibson

Categories
Student Life

Thousands rise for justice

The Montreal Raging Grannies is a non-profit organization that has been active in Montreal for 25 years. Through songs and other political demonstrations, they bring attention to a variety of social justice and environmental issues. Photo by Alex Hutchins.

Action against climate change and divestment is needed, now.

With signs held high and voices ringing clear above the blaring traffic on Commune St. E. in the Old Port on Saturday Sept. 8, more than 200 protesters united against the climate change crisis. Rise for Climate was supported by non-profit organization 350 Canada, in collaboration with a handful of local grassroots initiatives such as Leap Montreal, Rap Battles for Social Justice (RB4SJ) and the Montreal Raging Grannies. The gathering was one of more than 900 rallies simultaneously taking place across 95 countries worldwide, all demanding divestment from fossil fuel industries, among other things.

“Indigenous women and girls are three times more likely to experience violence, and six times more likely to be murdered than non-Indigenous women,” said Beatrice Dimaculangan, an activist, rapper, and community organizer with RB4SJ.

“We’ve already passed the point of no return,” said Sally Livingston, a Concordia alumna and member of the Montreal chapter of the Council of Canadians. “We do not want our tax dollars going to any more fossil fuel investments.” Toward the end of August, according to Global News, the Federal Court of Appeal quashed the Trans Mountain Pipeline plans due to insufficient consultations with Indigenous communities. However, according to the same article, Trudeau has not yet ruled out appealing the court’s decision, and “is maintaining that it will get built.”
“The fact that [the federal government] is pushing the Trans Mountain Pipeline through […] shows us that they haven’t changed their ways,” explained Nicolas Chevalier, one of the founding activists of the non-hierarchical organization Leap Montreal. “They don’t understand what it means to be in a climate crisis.”
“I think the Kinder Morgan Pipeline is totally retrogressive,” said Carole, a protester. There are three things Trudeau has shown us by spearheading this project, she explained: “He has broken his primary election promise, he has ignored consensus, and he is going backwards – just like Mr. Trump.”
Rise for Climate was attended by people from all walks of life: activists from various backgrounds, patrons, both young and old, families with children—all united as a community trying to salvage this planet we call home.

“The same system (capitalism) that drives climate change is the same system that drives inequality,” said Bianca Mugyenyi, a member of Leap Montreal. “At the end of the day, we want to do more than just avoid catastrophic climate change,” she said. “We want better lives.”

But the window for avoiding catastrophic climate change is quickly closing; we are and will continue to experience the effects of rising global temperatures throughout our lifetimes, albeit with regional variances. During a press conference on March 29, Amina J. Mohammed, secretary-general of the United Nations, explained that, unless accelerated action against climate change is adopted by 2020, the 2016 Paris Agreement goals will become unattainable. According to the 350 Canada website, 97 per cent of scientists agree that climate change is caused by human greenhouse gas emission. “So then why do our politicians keep making the wrong decisions?” asked Mugyenyi. “They’re moving in the wrong direction.”

Bea Dimaculangan spoke about how climate change disproportionately affects marginalized communities. Photo by Alex Hutchins.

Capitalism benefits from the existence of systemic oppression: from racism, from sexism, from violence against Indigenous communities. Capitalism is rooted in the mass exploitation of resources, and exponentially increasing profit margins somehow justifies the further exploitation of those resources and the political violence directed to already marginalized communities.
“Indigenous women and girls are three times more likely to experience violence, and six times more likely to be murdered than non-Indigenous women,” said Beatrice Dimaculangan, an activist, rapper and community organizer with RB4SJ.
“When Indigenous girls are trafficked into sex trade […] where is left for these girls to turn to when the very system meant to protect them proceeds to exploit and neglect them?” Dimaculangan held back tears as the power of her voice kept the crowd locked in to her every word. “These women are not solely victims of violence, but also of a justice system that doesn’t seem to give a shit about them.”

We have a responsibility—as Canadians, as allies, as human beings—to speak up. Not after the next major environmental catastrophe; not after coastal cities are completely underwater; not after the next oil spill wreaks havoc on another Indigenous community. The time for change is now. “The science is indisputable,” said Mugyenyi. “Enough is enough.”

Feature photo by Alex Hutchins

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