Christian Legal Fellowship Executive Director and General Counsel Derek Ross opens first full day of conference on Friday, March 2, 2018
The University of Alberta chapter of the Christian Legal Fellowship (CLF) kicked off the 13th annual CLF Law Student Conference on March 1, 2018.
The four-day event welcomed law students from across Canada and hosted discussions on issues ranging from court cases centred on human rights and freedom of religion to the relationship between faith and legal practice.
"This weekend is all about integrating our faith and the practice of law," said conference co-organizer Jisoo Vis of the University of Alberta Christian Legal Fellowship.
CLF executive director and general counsel Derek Ross opened the first full day of the conference on Friday, March 2.
"It is a great honour to welcome you all here today. My work with the Christian Legal Fellowship, as well as events such as this, has shown me that my faith and my chosen vocation are not only reconcilable, but are in fact deeply enriching of one another," he said.
The theme of this year's CLF conference was Quaecumque Vera (Whatsoever Things Are True), a Latin phrase familiar to UAlberta students as the university's own motto. The phrase, taken from the Epistle of St. Paul to the Philippians in the New Testament, is part of a passage which encourages believers to focus on those values which transcend all else, namely truth, beauty, honesty and goodness.
The conference began in the evening of Thursday, March 1 and continued with two full days of conference sessions culminating in a Celebration Dinner on Saturday, March 3, featuring retired Alberta Court of Appeal Justice Clifton O'Brien, QC. The conference concluded with a Sunday service at McKernan Baptist Church.
Dean Paton also extended his well wishes to the conference attendees and reaffirmed the importance of dialogue on the meeting point between religious faith and the legal profession.
"We're deeply honoured to play host to this year's Christian Legal Fellowship Law Student Conference and in doing so contribute to the lively dialogue we've seen emerge in recent decades on the importance of addressing religious faith and spirituality in the context of legal practice," he said.