Latest Announcements

You stand against religious extremism, authoritarianism, science denial, and hate.

SO DOES CFIC!

Help CFIC promote critical thinking to calm the chaos.

On Giving Tuesday and throughout the year, please give generously to CFIC.

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Throughout the year, CFIC brings you news, seminars, and podcasts to help you understand your world and to renew your commitment to critical thinking, science, and secularism. For people dedicated to unravelling the myriad sources of miscommunication, misunderstanding, and misinformation, CFIC helps with comprehending the world and making better decisions.

CFIC works to give people who wish to be a part of the solution the tools to do so. We provide a platform to share information about real science, unpacking the news, and verifying the information that riddles us daily.

Today, and throughout the month of December, CFIC is asking for your help to do more of this and to do it more effectively. Please consider making a one-time donation that will help us to calm the chaos. Better yet, why not consider a monthly donation that will allow you to spread your donation throughout the year?

The holiday season is full of hype, but for some people, it is the loneliest time of the year. If these celebrations might leave you feeling blue, please consider joining your friends across Canada for the CFI Canada’s Christmyth Social.

Who Should Attend?

• people without families
• people who have become estranged from their families because of religion
• any CFIC supporter who is looking for a non-religious, supportive, and fun group to spend a couple of hours with on Christmas Day

If you want to offer or receive support or hang out and socialize with other members of the secular community across the country, this event is for you.

Join us on Thursday, Dec. 25th, 2025, 3 pm PST: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88253121739 

Do you ever wonder how CFIC decides what to do and how to do it? Have you ever wanted to provide advice or direction? Do you have some great ideas about making CFIC better? If so, then CFIC would like you to consider becoming a Council member and even a board member. 

CFIC council members elect the board and assist the organization to move projects forward. Our board is elected from our council membership. If you have leadership skills and an interest in being more involved, please complete the Council Member application form here. 

Typically, we elect our council and our board at our AGM in March. Canada needs CFIC and CFIC needs you. Please consider joining our council and possibly, standing for election for our board.

If you have questions about the governance of CFIC, please contact Sandra (sdunham@centreforinquiry.ca).

Protecting Blasphemers is an annual discussion highlighting the most recent blasphemy issues of the year. We aim to discover the areas where the global secular community needs to make progress in terms of building support mechanisms to protect blasphemers experiencing persecution all around the world. This year’s speaker is Mubarak Bala, former president of the Humanist Association of Nigeria, who was imprisoned for 24 years for “insulting religion” via social media posts, a sentence that was reduced to five years on appeal in 2024, resulting in his release. After his release, he continued to advocate for freedom of belief and relocated to Germany. Your host Onur Romano is the director of the Atheist Refugee Assistance Program of Ateizm Dernegi Turkey, Case Manager of the Secular Rescue Program of Center for Inquiry USA, and the Human Rights Chair of Centre for Inquiry Canada.

Protecting Blasphemers VII Panel will be livestreamed on YouTube on International Human Rights Day, Wednesday, December 10th, 2025, 4 pm EST.

https://youtube.com/live/X10TdEeuwl4

The belief that Australia can decarbonise its economy by relying on the wind and the sun rests on a misplaced conviction about what the renewables rollout will entail. Advocates point to the increase in wind and solar from 1.5% of our electricity share in 2010 to around 33% today as a success, and evidence that the buildout can be further accelerated to achieve nearly twice this rollout in one-third the time, to meet targets set for 2030. This assumption is flawed. The intrinsic nature of uncontrollable, weather-dependent energy introduces faster growth in costs at higher penetrations, which mean the rollout gets harder as it proceeds, rather than easier. What we have experienced thus far is the renewable energy ‘honeymoon’ period, during which things were unnaturally simple. The true nature of the longer journey is one of formidable challenges, which we are only beginning to encounter

Read the report: The Renewable Energy Honeymoon: starting is easy, the rest is hard

Zoe Hilton is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Centre for Independent Studies in Australia, working in the Energy Program. She co-authored the energy team’s flagship paper The six fundamental flaws underpinning the energy transition and has written for The Australian, The Australian Financial Review and The Spectator Australia on the costs of renewables and nuclear energy. She also contributes to the energy debate through YouTube videos exploring energy policy and modelling. Zoe previously worked in the NSW Government as a Senior Policy Advisor to the Minister for Enterprise, Investment & Trade and Science, Innovation & Technology. This included overseeing government strategy and grant program design and launch for research, commercialisation and investment attraction. She managed policy issues across a range of areas, including universities, science, technology, investment, trade, the 24-hour economy, aerospace, defence, international education and skilled migration. Zoe has a passion for working at the intersection of science and policy. She previously conducted research and wrote policy proposals to government on energy, climate, and the environment. Zoe developed a keen interest in how behaviour influences complex systems through her study of science and arts at the University of Sydney.