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Close to 400 souls braved the snow and the cold to attend this year’s World Religion Day Celebration held at the All saints Cathedral in Halifax this weekend.

The program opened with the Baha’i Army of Light Dance Troupe who combined dance and rhythm with readings from the Words of Baha’u’llah.

Kitpu Mi’kmaq Youth Drummers and Dancers then held a Smudge ceremony with an elder, followed by drumming.

The Beechville Babes, a dance troupe of children and youth from Beechville Baptist Church, performed an interpretive dance, accompanied by the Church’s choir, Beechville Worship Warriors.

They were followed by readings from the Bible by a minister of The Cathedral of All Saints Anglican Church and readings from Hindu Scriptures by a member of the Vedanta Ashram Society.

The rousing gospel songs of the special musical guest, the Nova Gospel Ensemble, had the audience clapping, singing and dancing.

A Bible story was dramatized by members of Saint Matthew’s United Church and there were songs by choirs from the Halifax Shambhala Centre and the Universalist Unitarian Church. A drama perfomed by Brahma Kumaris members depicted the soul returning to its true nature.

The Leblanc family of the Baha’i community sang a prayer by the Bab, “Say God Sufficeth”. The traditional finalé garnered singers from the Baha’i, Shambhala, Unitarian and Saint Matthew’s communities performing a song selected especially for World Religion Day called “Can You Hear” by composer Jim Papoulis.

The Mayor and Councilors of the Halifax Regional Municipality issued a proclamation that January 18th was World Religion Day in HRM and they sent a representative, Councilor Jennifer Watts, who spoke to the audience and participants at the start of the program.

The visual arts were also incorporated into the program. During the Celebration, artist Sharon Hodgson created a painting of the event and sculptor Rhiannon Wyatt created a sculpture in clay that was based on the event.

Check it all out by going to World Religion Day. http://worldreligionday.ca

This year’s celebration of Human Rights Day had a youthful infusion that kept you on your feet. Optimism gets a little higher when you see hundreds of people gather to celebrate diversity and understanding.

It was an additionally special day for me because a long-time client of mine, the reachAbility Association was nominated for the Partners for Human Rights award & accepted by one of mentors, Tova Sherman.

reachAbility shared the stage with another nominee, Logan MacGillvray who, at the age of twelve, produced and directed a short-film entitiled Listen to the Children in support of children in Sierra Leon.

There was a small amount of pomp & circumstance with the attendance of the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia, Mayann E. Francis but overall the event was attended by about 300 people and the youth really kept the place alive.

The YMCA Youth Drummers rocked the house with there skills with the Djembe drum and an unabashed young drummer who circled the audience of the Common Room at a leisurely pace as he continued to beat out the rhythm (paparazzi in tow).  11 year old Hisham Hamdan even made the Chronicle Herald.

You can hear their music as you watch the slide show.

In the News:

Celebrating the Declaration of Human Rights -Metro News
http://www.metronews.ca/halifax/local/article/153530

International Human Rights Day -The Weekly News
http://www.halifaxnewsnet.ca/index.cfm?sid=198832&sc=608

Nova Scotia December 8, 2008 Press Release -NS Government
http://www.gov.ns.ca/news/details.asp?id=20081208001

YMCA Youth Outreach Drum Group -Chronicle Herald
http://thechronicleherald.ca/NovaScotia/1095261.html

http://thechronicleherald.ca/viewfullsize.html?photo=GREY_tk121008humanrights2_Provincial_12-11-08_RKA3SGK.jpg

See photos & slideshow:

http://ampwerxmedia.com/site/government/international-human-rights-day-in-ns-gallery/

Home Page:  http://ampwerxmedia.com/

It also had a separate sister ‘text site’ to allow vision impaired readers access to the content. This was replace with a small amount of javascript offering zoom buttons for larger/smaller and contrast text on the site.

I’ve tried to keep the site as accessible as possible for people with various disabilities with text size options, style options, and relative meta tags and tab indexes.

To give the web site more visibility and to help expand their visitor base I’ve added  short videos and photo galleries to give the reader a slice of the reachAbility life, happenings and events. The links section is one of the most exhaustive compilations of links for education, employment, government and a wide range of organizations and helpful sites.

It has been over a year since we first began, and working with the staff and volunteers at the organization has broadened my vision and I consider this site my labour of love.

*UPDATE-This is no longer an AMPwerx project.

http://reachability.org/
   Check out the new digs!!