God and Wall Street: Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams

God and Wall Street By Rowan Williams | NEWSWEEK
Published Jan 29, 2010
From the magazine issue dated Feb 8, 2010

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, at Canterbury Cathedral

It is quite striking that, in the Gospel parables, Jesus more than once uses economics as a framework for his stories: the parable of the talents, the dishonest steward—even, we might say, the vignette of the lost coin. Like our coexistence with the earth, like familial bonds, like the tensions of public political life, economic relationships help us see our humanity in the context of God's actions. Money is a metaphor; our monetary dealings shed light on aspects of our human condition that, rightly understood, tell us something about how we might relate to God.


Recently I went to New York City to participate in a conference at Trinity Wall Street. It was called "Building an Ethical Economy: Theology and the Marketplace." In my view, the contribution of theology to economic decision making is not only about raising questions concerning the common good—questions that deal with how this or that policy grants or withholds liberty for the most disadvantaged. Obviously, these are important issues. But we need to look with great care as well at what our economic practices are assuming and promoting about human motivation and integrity.

In our culture, we have become used to an attitude in which economic motivations, relationships, and conventions are fundamental: the language of seller and customer has wormed its way into practically all areas of our social life, even education and health care. The implication is that the most basic interaction between one human being and another is the carefully calibrated exchange of material resources.


But we must hang on to the idea that not everything reduces to one standard of value. Treat economic exchanges as the only "real" thing that people do, and you face the same problems confronted by the evolutionary biologist (for whom the only question is how organisms compete and survive) or the Freudian fundamentalist (for whom the only issue is how we resolve the tensions of infantile sexuality). Traditional religious ethics—traditional ethics of any kind, in fact—do not require you to ignore the hidden forces that may be at work in any particular setting. Being human is learning how to ask critical questions of your own habits and compulsions, and it's learning how to adjust them against a model of human behavior—an idealized truth about the purpose of our humanity.

It is possible to see the various balancing acts we engage in—the calculations of self-interest and security, the resolution of buried tensions—as a means to finding our way to a life that manifests something, a life that doesn't just solve problems of survival and profit. Our job as human beings is to imagine ourselves—using all the raw materials that science, psychoanalysis, and economics provide us—in the hope that the images we discover and shape will have resonance and harmony with the rhythms of what Christians, and others, call the will and purpose of Almighty God.

Williams is the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury.

© 2010

Christian Bobin : « Croire rend la vie plus difficile »

J'ai touvé cet entretien avec Christian Bobin ici. 

La croyance en Dieu ne rend-elle pas plus fort ?
Pour moi, Dieu a partie liée avec le plus faible de cette vie : la petite enfance, les mourants… Et il se présente dans tout ce qui nous sort de la convention sociale : ruptures, douleurs, joies. Là où " c’est joli " d’en parler, je ne crois pas qu’il y ait Dieu. Le Dieu auquel croient – entre autres – les Américains, celui qu’ils ont mis sur le dollar, propose, selon moi, une manière d’être " cruellement optimiste ". C’est le petit Dieu mauvais du narcissisme, le Dieu magique de la toute puissance imaginaire, celui du nouveau-né qui pense que sa mère est une partie bienfaisante de lui et se met donc à hurler dès que cette partie s’éloigne ou ne répond pas à ses vœux. Je ne crois pas à ce Dieu-là, qui est comme un prolongement monstrueux de la personne. Celui auquel je crois est tout le contraire. Il est de l’ordre de la lézarde, du passage et du manque.


http://www.psychologies.com/Culture/Philosophie-et-spiritualite/Pratiques-spirituelles/Articles-et-Dossiers/Croire-aide-t-il-a-vivre/Entretien-avec-Christian-Bobin-Croire-rend-la-vie-plus-difficile/7

winning moment

WENDAKE COURSE DE TRAINEAUX À CHIENS

Fait-il Noël? : l'abbé Jacques Yvon Côté

Fait-il Noël?

Fait-il Noël dans le cœur du monde?
Fait-il Noël dans le cœur des malades,
des vieillards, des orphelins, des veuves?
Fait-il Noël dans le cœur des chômeurs,
des déshérités, des abandonnés, des prisonniers?
Fait-il Noël dans le cœur des torturés,
des exilés, des réfugiés des handicapés, des mal-aimés?

Noël, c'est un sourire à la personne souffrante.
C'est une main tendue à celle qui tombe.
C'est une bourse ouverte à celle qui crève.
Noël, c'est quand tu partages ton toit avec les sans-logis.
C'est quand tu offres ta table à l'affamé.
C'est quand tu donnes ton manteau au pauvre.
Noël, c'est une larme essuyée aux yeux d'un enfant.
C'est ta main dans la main de l'aveugle égaré.
C'est un baiser à la vieille du foyer.

Il fait Noël chaque fois que la contrainte
se transforme en liberté;
que le pouvoir se fait service;
que l'arrogance devient humilité.
Chaque fois que la tendresse accompagne l'amour;
que la douceur colore le dévouement, le bénévolat;
que l'amabilité tient la main du service;
que la paix remplace la guerre;
que la gratuité, le don détrônent la rentabilité.

Tu fais Noël...
Si tu ouvres tes yeux pour contempler.
tes mains pour donner.
Ton cœur pour aimer.
Si tu partages avec les plus pauvres que toi.
Si tu donnes ton temps à plus occupé que toi.
Suit tu donnes ton sourire à plus triste que toi.

Aujourd'hui, ce soir, Noël...
Donne ton parton que tu retiens.
Sème la joie autour de toi.
Soulage une misère que tu connais.
N'hésite pas.
Enfin, lève les yeux sur quelqu'un que tu as décidé de ne plus voir.

Oui, j'ai fait le rêve d'un Noël tout blanc,
celui de la vérité, de la pureté de mon regard...
J'ai fait le rêve d'un Noël tout coloré
de mom "moi" ouvert à mes proches,
famille, enfants, à mes voisins.
J'ai fait le rêve d'un Noël tout partagé.

Le Noël d'un Dieu vivant qui n'a désormais que mon regard,
 mes yeux, ma bouche, mes mains, mes pieds,
dans la marche vers un monde nouveau depuis le premier Noël.
Emmanuel Dieu avec nous.
Emmanuel en nous!

-----
(Merci au journal "Le Soleil" de l'avoir publiée.)
http://www.cyberpresse.ca/le-soleil/actualites/les-regions/200912/27/01-934366-une-homelie-poeme-de-noel-acclamee.php 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Fait-il Noël dans le coeur du monde?

Fait-il Noël dans le coeur
des malades,
des vieillards,
des orphelins,
des veuves?
Fait-il Noël dans le coeur
des chômeurs,
des déshérités, des abandonnés,
des prisonniers?
Fait-il Noël dans le coeur
des torturés, des exilés,
des réfugiés, des handicapés, des mal-aimés?


Noël...
c'est un sourire à la personne souffrante,
c'est une main tendue à celle qui tombe,
c'est une bourse ouverte à celle qui crève...
Noël...
c'est quand tu partages ton toit avec le sans-logis,
c'est quand tu offres ta table à l'affamé,
c'est quand tu donnes ton manteau au pauvre...
Noël...
c'est une larme essuyée aux yeux d'un enfant,
c'est ta main dans la main de l'aveugle égaré,
c'est ton baiser à la vieille du foyer...

Il fait Noël dans le coeur des gens
chaque fois
que la contrainte se transforme en liberté,
que le pouvoir se fait service,
que l'arrogance devient humilité...
chaque fois
que la tendresse accompagne l'amour,
que la douceur colore le dévouement,
que l'amabilité tient la main du service...
chaque fois
que la paix remplace la guerre,
que la gratuité détrône la rentabilité,
que la joie l'emporte sur la tristesse...

Tu fais Noël
si tu ouvres
tes yeux pour contempler,
tes mains pour donner,
ton coeur pour aimer...
si tu partages
ton pain avec plus pauvre que toi,
ton temps avec plus occupé que toi,
ton sourire avec plus triste que toi... si tu peux
donner ton pardon,
semer la joie,
soulager une misère...

Je rêve d'un Noël tout blanc!
d'un Noël tout joyeux!
d'un Noël tout partagé!



visitez le site magnifique du Père Beaulac ....
http://public.ntic.qc.ca/jbeaulac/index.htm

http://my.opera.com/Prayerman/blog/show.dml/5810981

Jesus is the reason for this season: Happy Christmas!!!

Thulasiraj Ravilla: How low-cost eye care can be world-class

I have always wondered how they do it....
everyone travels to ARAVIND for eye surgery....
here they tells how... a TED video

Now it is the turn of the son...

Last re-post was a TED-talk by sashi tharoor.
now, a re-post from his son,  Ishaan Tharoor, from time.com.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1947392,00.html

How to Rule India: Break It Into Even More Pieces? 

In mid-October 1952, an acolyte of Mahatma Gandhi named Potti Sriramulu invoked the tactics of his teacher and went on a hunger strike. The nation of India — at the time just five years old — was still finding shape after centuries of division and colonial rule, with many of its diverse regions clamoring for greater political recognition. Sriramulu's fast came on behalf of tens of millions who, like him, spoke Telugu, a prominent south Indian language, and wanted their own state within the country.

Yet his protest went unheeded for weeks by New Delhi and, 58 days after it began, Sriramulu died, a sacrifice that triggered widespread rioting and eventually forced the government into forming the Telugu-speaking state of Andhra Pradesh in 1953, as well as other new states organized on linguistic lines. No small irony then, that, almost 60 years later, another hunger strike threatens to dismember the state Sriramulu first won and revive a fierce debate about the nature of the federal Indian nation-state.

Late Wednesday, the Indian government announced it would approve the carving out of a separate state known as Telangana from Andhra Pradesh. The movement for Telangana secession is virtually as old as the Indian republic itself, but it gained traction this month after its main political leader, K. Chandrashekar Rao, commenced a week-long fast. Rao's deteriorating health as well as coordinated protests — some violent — across the 10 districts of Andhra Pradhesh's 23 that comprise Telangana, including the influential hi-tech capital of Hyderabad, seemed to force New Delhi's hand. But it could open a whole series of controversies for the Indian government as many other regional movements have now stepped up their own demands for statehood.

Though Telugu-speaking as well, Telangana had once been part of a separate kingdom ruled from Hyderabad, which recognized British suzerainty during the colonial period but was not administratively part of British India. It was subsumed into the territory of Andhra Pradesh only in 1956, after a further dismemberment of the once-independent Hyderabad kingdom. Though the city of Hyderabad was made the capital of the united Andhra Pradesh state, calls for greater autonomy have lingered, with many in Telangana complaining of marginalization at the hands of the coastal Andhra population.

But if New Delhi imagined it would calm tensions with its nod toward accepting a new state, the move backfired. Dozens of local legislators in Andhra Pradesh have resigned their posts and strikes by those opposing Telangana's secession have paralyzed much of the state. Trains have been blocked, businesses shut down. According to news reports on Saturday, two activists in favor of a "United Andhra" took their lives in protest of the state's splitting. The turmoil has also plunged Hyderabad, a booming, cosmopolitan I.T. hub, into panic as politicians and business leaders fret over the costs of the current instability. "This will be a total flop as investors will flee," says Amruthraj Padmanabhundi, a 27-year-old I.T. professional in Hyderabad. "I am very worried [about] my prospects slipping."

The prospect of Telangana's creation has buoyed similar causes elsewhere as calls for secession echo in nearly a dozen states in India. A four-day strike is under way among the picturesque hills and tea estates of Darjeeling, in northern West Bengal, with protesters intensifying demands for a new state of Gorkhaland that would better address the needs of the area's ethnic Nepalese population. More than 100 activists have begun what they call a "fast-unto-death." On the other side of the country, in the vast desert state of Rajasthan, a caravan of some 5,000 demonstrators and 500 camels paraded into the capital of Jaipur on Friday, agitating for the formation of Maru Pradesh, a state that would be carved out of some of Rajasthan's poorest districts. "Rajasthan is huge. It is not easy to keep track of all the villages, of the development or the lack of it," says Jaiveer Godara, the leading voice of the movement. "The person who lives in the last village of Maru Pradesh has to wait for three days to get supply of water from outside... [And] there are no roads that lead to his village."

At the root of this looming crisis lies the still unresolved question of how the world's largest democracy ought best to govern itself. Independent India was at first a patchwork of former British provinces and princely states threaded together into a federal republic. Some of its states remain huge and unwieldy — for example, the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, with its estimated 190 million people, would be virtually tied with Brazil as the fifth most populous country on earth but it would also possess 8% of the world's population under the global poverty line. With a country of India's size and diversity — as well as poverty — there is logic in having smaller states. "It will in fact strengthen [governance] through economic and administrative convenience," says Delhi-based political analyst Paranjoy Guha Thakurta. "India can survive and prosper by breaking up."

The Indian government last fashioned new states in 2000, when three largely remote and impoverished regions were elevated in status. At least two of them — Chhattisgarh and Uttarakhand — have shown marked progress since their inception. Small states like Kerala in the south and Haryana in the north, both with populations under 30 million, boast some of India's highest development indicators. Backers of further decentralization even point to the original, idealistic Gandhian vision for India — of a republic brought together not by a strong central government, but an "ocean" of egalitarian and self-sufficient villages.

Of course, that sort of utopianism has little place in the current hurlyburly of Indian politics. Experts worry that new states may simply mean more jockeying for power and expanded bureaucracy in a country already notorious for its spools of red tape as well as its perpetual political horse-trading. "Ultimately, fragmentation is not a substitute for good governance," says C.V. Madhukar, director of PRS Legislative Research, a Delhi non-profit which advises the government.

Hoping to dampen a few of calls for new and smaller states ignited by the Andhra controversy, New Delhi has dialed back its support for Telangana, insisting that the matter now find a resolution through a vote in the Andhra Pradesh legislature. Given the current tumult, it's unclear when or how such a motion may go through. The political party headed by Rao, the Telangana separatist leader, was trounced both in recent state and national polls. His hunger strike — now ended — and the disturbances organized around it were likely an act of desperation of a movement shorn off much of its real political capital. "Having the government buckle to this kind moral blackmail is not a healthy way to go about things," says Madhukar. "There shouldn't be this sword of Damocles hanging over peoples' heads." A young India may have come of age through such dramatic acts of Gandhian sacrifice, but a more mature nation needs more measured habits.

With reporting by Nilanjana Bhowmick/New Delhi

Shashi Tharoor: Why nations should pursue "soft" power

Fratello Metallo(Metal Friar)

Italy's heavy metal monk retires from the limelight

 Reuters November 13, 2009

  Italian Friar Cesare Bonizzi, also known as Fratello Metallo(Metal Friar), is quitting his heavy metal music career, saying the devil had made him too much of a celebrity for his own good.
Photograph by: Alessandro Garofalo, Reuters




MILAN - Italy's "Brother Metal," a 63-year-old monk who became famous for singing in a heavy metal band — habit and all — is hanging up his microphone, saying the devil made him too much of a celebrity for his own good.

The white-bearded Cesare Bonizzi, a Capuchin who recorded CDs for a punk label and was the lead singer for the band Fratello Metallo (Metal Brother), said the devil was up to his usual mischief.

"The devil has separated me from my managers, risked making me break up with my band colleagues and also risked making me break up with my fellow monks. He lifted me up to the point where I become a celebrity and now I want to kill him," the monk said in his farewell video.

The video shows one of the monk's band members shaving off Bonizzi's long mane of white hair as a sign of his turning a new leaf on life.

For years Bonizzi performed at concerts wearing his traditional Franciscan brown robe, sandals and white rope around his waist.

His second heavy metal CD was called "Mysteries," and was inspired by a group of southern Italian women who sang about the Virgin Mary.

Bonizzi, who fell in love with heavy metal when he attended a Metallica concert some 15 years ago, says fame had put him on the wrong path. But he still thinks heavy metal can be a means to spread the gospel message of pace and love.

"I think that metal is the strength of music itself. Metal is a brother," he said in the video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GgTkWc9aLPo  ( Reuters video)

 

India is morphing into a global R&D hub, but can it ever take on Silicon Valley?

by Vivek Wadhwa

When Americans think of the Indian technology sector, they still perceive a nation of call center workers and low-level computer programmers administering databases and updating websites. But while the West was sleeping, Indian IT morphed into a giant R&D machine. Indian companies that started out doing call center and low-level IT work have climbed the value chain to become outsourced providers of critical R&D in sophisticated areas such as semiconductor design, aerospace, automotive, network equipment and medical devices.

This is happening as multi-nationals set up their own R&D operations in India and partner with local shops. Both the Palm Pre smart phone and the Amazon Kindle, two of the hottest consumer electronics devices on the market, have key components designed in India. Intel designed its six-core Xeon processor in India. IBM has over 100,000 employees in India. A large number of these are building Big Blue’s most sophisticated software products. Cisco is developing cutting edge networking technologies for futuristic “intelligent cities” in Bangalore. Adobe, Cadence, Oracle, Microsoft and most of the large software companies are developing mainstream products in India.

Equally important are the arrival of Indian multi-nationals who are tackling global markets, such as Tata with its dirt cheap Nano car that the company is now positioning for a European market entry and Reva, which recently announced it was planning to build an electric car factory in New York state to address the U.S. market for electric vehicles.

What has been missing to date in India, however, is early stage venture activity and the type of grass-roots entrepreneurism that is the hallmark of American capitalism and Silicon Valley. In that respect China is way ahead of India with many startups taking advantage of huge government incentives and reeling in talented native Chinese returnees to serve as CEOs and CTOs. Note that Kaifu Lee, formerly Google’s top guy in China, was able to launch a $100 million startup incubator focusing entirely on the mobile sector — and he was flooded with business plans within days of opening his doors in the Middle Kingdom.

On my recent trip to India I started to see new signs of life in tech entrepreneurship. Many of the startups that Sarah Lacy and I met were really smart and hungry. Some were even doing things better than their Silicon Valley counterparts. Not all of these startups are developing breakthrough technologies but many of them are solving problems that U.S. companies have thus far failed to solve and doing it with fewer resources.

One of the most interesting companies I met is in the mundane business of developing offset printer ink. Their ink is made from vegetable oil and is entirely bio-degradable. The offset printing industry consumes 1 million tons of petroleum products and emits 500,000 tons of volatile organic compounds every year. An IIT-Delhi incubated startup called EnNatura developed a printing ink which emits no volatile compounds and is washable. And the overall cost of their solution will be significantly less than all present compounds when produced at scale. I can see a company like this growing into a billion dollar global business.

Another interesting company was LiveMedia. This is an out-of-home advertising company that has 4,500 screens in 2,200 destinations with a total reach of 50 million people. Of course, you can find exactly these sorts of TV screens in thousands of places across the U.S. Unfortunately, it has been very hard to make real money selling advertising on these networks. LiveMedia appears to have cracked that by creating specialized content that is more engaging and interactive than a box droning CNN or the Disney Channel. LiveMedia content includes games, quizzes, horoscopes, a few short animations, and other content that is both cheap to produce and easy to play along with or understand. LiveMedia has also perfected context-relevant advertising spots keyed to the crowds at the screen location.

LiveMedia is in the process of building out a partnership with Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs India that would give the network even more interactive capabilities. Bell Labs has developed a content management and routing system, dubbed Mango, that makes it much easier and efficient to deliver high-bandwidth, high-quality video and interactive content over existing networks. In the developing world, everyone wants a TiVO-like capability to share, store and manage content. But existing GPRS or EDGE-based cell networks are not up to snuff. And the broadband infrastructure still lags behind that of the most developed telecom networks in places like Japan, Korea and Scandanavia. A product like Mango is tailor-made for VC investment to get it out of the lab and into a spin-off company.

This is partly why so many U.S. venture capital shops have opened up branches in India. In fact, the two lead investors in LiveMedia are both U.S. venture capitalists including the respected Valley firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson. But India lags in home-grown venture capital activity. As I have previously discussed, VCs follow the innovation. So the lack of native VC in India is notable in that it implies a critical mass of activity remains lacking, as well.

For example, in the first nine months of 2008, total early stage VC investments in India totaled $678 million, according to the Global India Venture Capital Association. In the U.S. over that same period early stage investments tallied $5.2 billion according to the U.S. National Venture Capital Association – and that number is not entirely reflective of the real situation. The economic downturn hit the U.S. much harder than the Subcontinent and VC activity in the U.S. fell faster and harder. Regardless, a 10-fold difference between early stage venture activity clearly illustrates the capital is not there yet.

So when will there be enough innovative startups to support an explosion in venture capital? I’d argue, sooner than you realize. During my week in India I spoke to close to 100 startups. A few of them had products or prototypes that would easily compete in Silicon Valley. Some of the leading lights of the legacy Indian IT giants are also moving quickly into VC. Infosys founder Narayan Murthy recently sold millions of dollars of shares in the company in order to launch a venture capital fund targeting investments in India.

The dynamics of entrepreneurship are the same in India as in America. Company founders usually come from the ranks of experienced business executives and are middle-aged. They get tired of working for others and want to make an impact and build wealth before they get too old. Given that there are now hundreds of thousands of R&D workers in India who are gaining valuable experience and are getting old, it is simply a matter of time before they begin to hatch their entrepreneurial plans. After all, their colleagues who migrated to the U.S. now start nearly one in six of Silicon Valley’s tech firms.

I’ll bet that in 5 years, if you stacked up a TechCrunch 50 of Indian start ups versus a comparable number of U.S. startups, it would be a pretty even match. That’s pretty amazing considering the relatively short length of time that the Indian startup scene has existed. And it’s a good lesson for America that the barriers to starting a company are lower than ever before—and some ambitious engineer in India will eat your lunch if you don’t get your prototype built and perfected ASAP.

Editor’s note: Guest writer Vivek Wadhwa is an entrepreneur turned academic. He is a Visiting Scholar at UC-Berkeley, Senior Research Associate at Harvard Law School and Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke University. Follow him on Twitter at @vwadhwa.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/11/14/india-rd-hub-silicon-valley/

Canada and India: why should the worlds meet?

With Canadian primeminister stephen Harper soon visiting India, i was googling to find some more info on it.
Here is an article by Haroon Siddiqui in www.thestar.com ( http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/724584)
.....................................................................................................................................
Tips for Harper's trip to India
Ottawa has been far too slow to recognize its dynamic economy and geopolitical clout


If I were Stephen Harper and going on my first visit to India – landing in Mumbai Sunday to meet business leaders, then New Delhi to confer with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and others – I'd do the following:

Ignore the Canadian media's portrayal of India as orientalist exotica and the epicentre of some of the world's worst problems.

India is also an economic and geopolitical giant, in some respects more important than China. Besides democracy and English, it boasts a population that's much younger than China's.

Its $1 trillion economy equals Canada's, and is growing at 6.7 per cent this year, compared with the stagnant economies of the West.

India is spending as much as Canada, more than $1 billion, on development projects in Afghanistan.

India's army is the fourth largest in the world. Its navy rules the Indian Ocean. Its capacity to build satellites, missiles, fighter jets, etc. exceeds ours.

India is a serious global player.

Understand also that Ottawa has been painfully slow to recognize this reality.

The U.S. has been wooing India for years. Bill Clinton's 1999 visit was one of the best foreign policy charm offensives I've ever seen. George W. Bush followed with a realpolitik gift of a civilian nuclear deal, setting aside American anger over India turning nuclear and balking at the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Russia and France have since negotiated their own accords, wanting to tap the $100 billion bonanza of Indian nuclear energy needs.

Ottawa could have taken a principled stance and refused to sell uranium (as has Australia). Or it could have stopped acting peeved and opened some doors for our (largely Ontario-based) nuclear sector.

It did neither and has been plodding along, despite Harper's initial enthusiasm. Unless he has something dramatic to say, a photo-op on the nuclear file will only draw yawns in Delhi.

Know that while bilateral trade jumped to $4.6 billion in 2008, rising by a fifth over 2007, India's trade with the U.S. and China rose proportionately more (each now in the $45 billion range).

Believe it or not, India is investing more in Canada than we are there ($1.02 billion vs. $800 million). Indian conglomerates have taken over Canadian firms in the forestry, steel and pharmaceutical sectors, and are using Canada as a gateway to the U.S.

Remember that there are 100,000 Indian students in the U.S., 80,000 in Australia, 30,000 in the U.K. but only 4,000 in Canada.

This even though our universities are top-notch, cost less and provide a welcoming environment (unlike Australia, where Indian students have faced racist incidents). Plus Ottawa is offering foreign students the opportunity to eventually apply for immigrant status (eminently sensible, given that they're likely to integrate more easily).

"My assumption is that Canada does not sell itself aggressively in India," says S.M. Gavai, India's high commissioner in Ottawa.

Not just that. The provinces compete with each other in India. And they and the feds don't coordinate their actions.

"Canada has lagged hopelessly behind in the higher education field," writes David Malone, our former high commissioner to India (2006-08), one of our most successful envoys there. His article, Building Stronger Ties Between India and Canada: Better Late Than Never, posted on the Asia Pacific Foundation website, is very much worth reading.

Resist partisanship and promote the visits to India of Dalton McGuinty (Dec. 6-11, his second) and Jean Charest (in February).

Some Ontario universities – York, McMaster, Toronto, Waterloo and Windsor, in particular – have been working hard to forge links in India. They could use a prime ministerial push.

So could the 25 clean energy companies going with McGuinty.

Don't lecture the Indians on the environment. They, like the Chinese, balk at binding limits on carbon emissions.

India will not be deprived of economic uplift, especially by those who have been polluting for a century or more.

To the counter-argument that global warming cannot be reduced without India's and China's help, India says: If that's the case, subsidize our conversion to green technologies. What's our response?

It is what many Indian scientists themselves are saying: India cannot reach its economic goals amid environmental degradation: deforestation, sinking water tables, rising salinity, drying rivers and lakes.

Joint projects are the way to go.

Don't let Prime Minister Singh's modesty, mild manner and soft voice lull you into forgetting that he is one of the world's foremost economists, who also happens to hold power. Ditto his economic adviser, Montek Singh Ahluwalia (who was in Toronto in April, for an energy conference).

Don't even try to play in their economic league. Cultivate them instead on what interests them – India's role in the G20, which Canada is hosting next June in Huntsville, and for which Ahluwalia is India's designated envoy.

Prevail on Prime Minister Singh to also visit Montreal to receive his honourary doctorate from McGill.

Treat him as the historic figure he is. He was the architect of India's economic turnaround in the 1990s as finance minister. With his innate decency and honesty, he has as prime minister single-handedly broken the decades-long grip of corrupt and parochial regional leaders, and restored a national vision, thereby positioning India for yet another giant leap forward.

http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/724584

Haroon Siddiqui is the Star's editorial page editor emeritus. His column appears Thursday and Sunday.

Non-violence and Gandhi

In  American Chronicle, i found a well written article on
INDIA´S CONCEPT OF NON-VIOLENCE AND GANDHI by Dr. Ravindra Kumar

He writes:

'' ...........................................................
.............................................................
The four common points which we find in the context of non-violence in the four chief philosophies established and developed in India that played vital roles in making India great by strengthening the Indian Way are as follows:

1. Within the domain of non-violence are all living beings;

2. In spite of being eternal, natural and the first human value, it is a subject of practice according to the demands of time and space;

3. It is an active value; it has nothing to do with cowardice as it is an ornament of the brave; and

4. It is not a subject to be practiced occasionally; in theory and in practice it is all-timely
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( you can find the full article here)

Why wasn’t Gandhi bestowed with Nobel Prize?

With all the Obama nobel news, Gandhi is back in news.
I was asked, why Gandi did not win any Nobel, while his fans did.?
I vaguely replied Gandhi was too big and far above the Nobel.
In fact, i was never got interested in such a question ever before, except now.
today i saw this article in THE HINDU  on this issue.
It gives some historical insight in to this question often asked but less discussed.
have a great read.


http://beta.thehindu.com/news/national/article32222.ece?homepage=true

Many ardent fans of Mahatma Gandhi have won the Nobel Peace Prize with the latest being US President Barack Obama, but why was not the ‘Apostle of Peace’ bestowed with the honour despite being nominated five times?

Though he was shortlisted thrice, the selection committees had given different reasons why Gandhi was not conferred the honour, like “he was too much of an Indian nationalist” and that he was “frequently a Christ, but then, suddenly an ordinary politician“.

One of the committees was also of the view that he was “no real politician or proponent of international law, not primarily a humanitarian relief worker and not an organiser of international peace Congress“.

Gandhi, who showed the world that anything can be achieved through ‘Satyagrah’ (passive resistance) and non-violence, was nominated for the award in 1937, 1938, 1939, 1947 and finally a few days before he was martyred in January 1948.

When Gandhi was first nominated in 1937, the selection committee’s adviser Prof Jacob Worm-Muller was critical about him. “He is undoubtedly a good, noble and ascetic person -- a prominent man who is deservedly honoured and loved by masses.

“There are sharp turns in his policies which can hardly be satisfactorily explained by his followers...He is a freedom fighter and a dictator, an idealist and a nationalist. He is frequently a Christ, but then, suddenly an ordinary politician,” he had commented, according to the Nobel Foundation.

Worm-Muller also referred to Gandhi’s critics in the international peace movement and maintained that he was not “consistently pacifist” and that he should have known that some of his non-violent campaigns towards the British would degenerate into violence and terror.

He was referring to Non-Cooperation movement in 1920-1921 when a crowd in Chauri Chaura attacked a police station, killed many of the policemen and then set fire to the police station.

Worm-Muller was also of the view that Gandhi was too much of an Indian nationalist. “One might say that it is significant that his well-known struggle in South Africa was on behalf of the Indians only, and not of the blacks whose living conditions were even worse,” he said in his report to the selection panel.

Though Gandhi was nominated for the Prize in 1938 and 1939, he made it to the shortlist for the second time only in 1947 after India gained independence. Freedom fighters Govind Vallab Pant and B G Kher were among those who nominated him.

The then Nobel Committee Advisor Jens Arup Seip’s report was not as critical as that of Worm-Muller but panel chairman Gunnar Jahn wrote in his diary: “While it is true that he (Gandhi) is the greatest personality among the nominees -- plenty of good things could be said about him -- we should remember that he is not only an apostle for peace; he is first and foremost a patriot.

“Moreover, we have to bear in mind that Gandhi is not naive. He is an excellent jurist and a lawyer,” Jahn said.

http://beta.thehindu.com/news/national/article32222.ece?homepage=true

image URL: http://beta.thehindu.com/multimedia/dynamic/00007/IN11_MAHATMA_GANDHI_7553f.jpg 

Winning the Prize, Losing the Peace : http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/09/AR2009100903650.html

psaumes du temps présent: Alina Reyes

Je passais mon chemin près de toi sans te voir,

croyant que tu ne me voyais pas.

Ô mon Aimé, vite, embrasse-moi...  (page: 20) 


je vis en toi, je vis par toi, je meurs de vie.  (page: 43) 


Je t'aime, pour ce que tu me fais et me fais faire. (Page:42)

La vie, l'amour, la mort (Félix Leclerc)

C'est beau la vie,
comme un nœud dans le bois
C'est bon la vie,
bue au creux de ta main
Fragile aussi,
même celle du roi
C'est dur la vie,
vous me comprenez bien.

C'est beau l'amour,
tu l'as écrit sur moi
C'est bon l'amour
quand tes mains le déploient
C'est lourd l'amour
accroché à nos reins
C'est court l'amour
et ça ne comprend rien.

C'est fou la mort,
plus méchant que le vent
C'est sourd la mort,
comme un mort sur un banc
C'est noir la mort
et ça passe en riant
C'est grand la mort,
c'est plein de vie dedans.
(Félix Leclerc)

Chandrayaan-I: the reason why India should re-invent the wheel.

"It is not a question of whether we can afford it, it's whether we can afford to ignore it."                                      

( Dr K. Kasturirangan, chairperson,Indian Space Research Organization)  

Chandrayaan-1 ( launched last October), the Indian lunar mission became a part of history in late august-2008, when its communication system shut down.
Criticism was abundant.
They said,the Indian space program is like re-inventing the wheel.
Questions were posed one upon another, even without waiting for any answers.
This week (2009/09/25) when NASA declared about the Chandrayaan's finding of water on Lunar surface, it really made History and hand-signed it.

It was indeed a brilliant question: Do we need to re-invent the wheel? 
It seems to me it has to be so,if we need to advance further on.
It is an inspiration and an ambition.

If a $80 million program can serve as a dream and inspiration for the Indian generations and to mark a leap in the human scientific knowledge.... 
how we can afford to ignore it?


image: India's Chandrayaan-1. (EPA)
 

“Selling God”: The Age of Persuasion

Pls find the link to one of my never-miss radio broadcasts on CBC Radio.The Age of Persuasion

This week Terry O’Reilly marches you boldly where the angels of marketing fear to tread: he looks at the delicate, always-controversial relationship between faith and advertising. He’ll look into the controversy surrounding recent bus ads, which read “There Probably Is No God. So Stop Worrying and Enjoy Your Life.” And he’ll explain why not all people of faith embrace the marketing tactics popular in some of today’s churches. 

http://www.cbc.ca/ageofpersuasion/2009/08/season_3_episode_10_selling_go.html

it is curious...

it is curious that people who taught others for many long years,
never learned themselves the basic lessons of living.
Then, it tempts to ask ' what the hell did you teach and did you learn?'

Sometimes, they even risk becoming small people,
in their own small world with an even more smaller heart.

Indeed, learning and teaching are two different things.
Blessed are you those who lean  by teaching.

Psaumes du temps présent ( modernday psalms)

It has been quite a long blog-break.
Now, let me come back home.














I found a beautiful book.
It is a collection of poems.

Psaumes du temps présent by Alina Reyes 

Mais Dieu évolue comme sa créature
Dans le temps, hors du temps, il lui faut
Faire des sauts, préciser son être.


I would do a free translation of these lines in this way

But God too evolves like his creature
in the TIME, out of the TIME,
he has to make certain leaps,
he has to precise his being. 

Needless to say, i am not so happy with this translation.
However it gives a glimpse of the original French lines.

It's interesting that God also evolves....