Michael Swan

The Church’s new reality reveals the same old divisions

June 18, 2011

ANTIGONISH, N.S. - As Catholics of Antigonish ponder their post-Raymond Lahey life of faith, duelling groups are holding discussions about what a rebuilt Church should look like. A left-leaning group fired the first salvo last October with a conference featuring academic theologian Paul Lakeland of Fairfield University. A right-wing group will respond later this month with a conference featuring Michael Voris, a conservative apologist and commentator with a dedicated Youtube following. “We don’t think the Lakeland conference was really a conference that is in conformity with the true teachings of the Catholic Church,” said Wayne Murphy of Port Hood, organizer of the June conference, titled For the Beauty of the Church. For Murphy, the only good Catholics are right-wing Catholics.

Nobody likes talking about sexual abuse in the Church

June 18, 2011

I hate this story. I don’t hate it because some people fear stories about sexual abuse by priests could tear apart the Church. Journalism can’t destroy the body of Christ. All men who use sex to dominate the weak, the vulnerable and the innocent are evil. Men who camouflage predatory sex behind the Gospel, who preach mercy, justice and forgiveness by daylight and consume young souls in the dark, they’re worse. The unfolding of this story ever since Mount Cashel hit the headlines in 1989 is still news. There is still evil to be unmasked. As a journalist in the Church, I should embrace that challenge. Unmasking evil is part of what journalists do. What could be a greater service to the Church? But I hate it. When I worked for The Guelph Mercury in 1990, editing the crime page for our weekend edition, I always put the arrest of priests on sex charges at the top of the page with the biggest headline. That was an easy decision. Predatory priests are bigger news than desperate addicts robbing gas bars. Unexpected reversal is what makes a story news.

The gift of cherry blossoms to ‘grow along with Japan’

June 18, 2011

Within days of a violent storm that tore limbs from dozens of mature trees and uprooted others, the Scarboro Missions celebrated a gift of 15 new cherry blossom trees on their property. The gift from the Sakura Project brought out Toronto’s Japanese Catholic community and a Japanese folk dance group in a show of solidarity with Japan June 12, three months after a devastating 9.0 earthquake and tsunami killed more than 15,000 and pushed the Fukushima nuclear power plant into a meltdown. “These trees, in a sense, mark this disaster. But also, these trees will grow along with Japan,” said Masaya Otsuka of the consulate general of Japan’s office, which supports the Sakura Project. The Scarboro Missions headquarters on Kingston Road was chosen as one of 55 sites in 18 municipalities across southern Ontario where the Japanese consulate has planted trees. Since the Second World War the Scarboros have sent 40 missionaries to Japan. Several Scarboros served over 50 years in Japan and six are buried there.

St. Jerome’s University unveils future plans

June 15, 2011

St. Jerome’s University is dreaming big. By 2015 the Catholic college at the University of Waterloo hopes to be well into a building and expansion program that will begin with a new residence and include an updated library and classrooms, a new student centre and a new graduate program. St. Jerome’s “Strategic Vision: 2015 and Beyond” lays out the broad strokes, but by fall a campaign team expects to present to the board of governors fundraising goals and priorities, St. Jerome’s president and vice chancellor Fr. David Perrin told The Catholic Register. “What the vision (statement) strives to do is articulate who we are and who we are proud to be, and where we want to go,” Perrin said. The vision should start to become a reality in time for the college’s 150th anniversary in 2015, said Perrin.

D&P flexes its muscles

June 15, 2011

Canadian bishops are welcome to advise Development and Peace about overseas partnerships but D&P members are asserting their right to make final decisions about which organizations are funded. D&P’s national council passed a unanimous resolution at a June 10-12 meeting that essentially reaffirms that funding decisions will be made by the council and its 12,000 strong predominantly lay members. The national council consists of 20 elected, volunteer representatives from across Canada, plus bishops Richard Grecco of P.E.I and Claude Champagne of New Brunswick. D&P acts as the international development organization of the Catholic Church in Canada. The national council resolution came in the wake of a recent decision by the D&P executive, acting on abortion-related allegations expressed by a Mexican cardinal, to revoke the funding of the Mexican human rights organization Centro PRODH. That decision prompted a defiant resolution from D&P members in Quebec and New Brunswick in support of Centro PRODH and calling for restoration of its funding.

A modern-day Superstar

June 12, 2011

Paul Nolan stars as Jesus in the Stratford Festival’s presentation of Jesus Christ Superstar. (Photo by David Hou) [images/stories/arts/arts11/superstarstratford2.jpg]STRATFORD, Ont. - Forty years on we might suppose Jesus Christ Superstar has slipped into our culture’s vast pool of nostalgia — another thing to be revived by and for the generation with money and memories to spare. For the first third of a preview performance of the Stratford Festival’s new production of Jesus Christ Superstar there’s a hint of that sort of cynical, money-spinning spectacle. It rushes through hit songs with the overbearing efficiency of a K-tel commercial. The clockwork efficiency gets an injection of life when Lee Siegel emerges as Simon Zealotes to tempt Jesus into political power and guerrilla war. Suddenly the production has a pulse and passion. Siegel sings with genuine rock’n’roll intensity, excitement and energy. From this moment forward, the Stratford Jesus Christ Superstar has something new to say.

Jesuits welcome two new priests

June 8, 2011

TORONTO - When Canada’s first Jesuits, Frs. Pierre Biard and Ennemond Massé, arrived 400 years ago, the ship they were sailing was called the Grace of God. As William Mbugua and Michael Knox were ordained by Ottawa’s Jesuit Archbishop Terrence Prendergast June 4, the two new Jesuit priests found themselves in the same boat. Prendergast called the two young priests “Fresh hope for the mission of the Jesuits today.” With dozens of Jesuits present from all over North America, Knox and Mbugua stood up and lay down for the same ordination. But they came from vastly different starting places. Toronto boy Knox entered the novitiate in 1997 at 18, straight out of Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts. Mbugua started off in small-town Kenya and worked his way to the University of Manitoba where his encounter with Canadian Jesuits changed his life.

Mexican cardinal's letter led to D&P funding cut

June 3, 2011

The Canadian funding of a Mexican human rights organization was cut following a letter from the archbishop of Mexico City that directly accuses the Jesuit-founded body of supporting pro-abortion groups. The Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (D&P) cut the funding for Centro PRODH, whose director recently had speaking engagements cancelled in Ottawa and Cornwall, after Mexican Cardinal Norberto Carrera said the organization "does NOT represent the sentiments of the Church and has been characterized by its support and encouragement of groups and activities that are an affront to Christian values." "With respect to the theme of defence of life, the organization has supported pro-abortion groups and promoted the purported woman's right over her body, against unborn life," said a translation of the letter obtained by The Catholic Register. Carrera's letter was sent to the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, which two years ago cleared Centro PRODH of similar accusations.

French arm of D&P demands restored funding to Mexican group

June 1, 2011

Members of D&P in Francophone Canada have demanded restoration of funding to the Mexican human rights organization that apparently endorses a campaign for legal access to first trimester abortions throughout Mexico. [images/stories/logos/logos11/dplogo2011.jpg]New funding rules and the process of setting new directions for the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (D&P) are running into stiff opposition in Quebec and New Brunswick. Members of D&P in Francophone Canada used their regional assembly meeting to demand restoration of funding to Centro PRODH, the Mexican human rights organization that has drawn heat for apparently endorsing a campaign for legal access to first trimester abortions throughout Mexico. D&P had ended its funding relationship with Centro PRODH based on doubts expressed by Mexico’s conference of Catholic bishops. In April Archbishop Terrence Prendergast and D&P cancelled an Ottawa speaking engagement with Centro PRODH executive director Fr. Luis Arriaga. Arriaga was photographed accepting an award from an organization that promotes legal access to abortion.

Prevention of trafficking begins with education

May 29, 2011

TORONTO - Traumatized, guilt-wracked victims of human trafficking don’t often disclose what’s happened to them. Despite the reluctance to talk, Toronto’s Covenant House deals with a constant stream of both international and domestic victims, said social work manager Helen Winters. “We don’t know how many youth who come in here have been involved in trafficking. We know they come through here with trauma, with addictions,” Winters said of the downtown Toronto agency that aids young street people. “The tip of the iceberg are the ones who actually reveal to us.” Lately, many of the international victims turning up at its doors have come from Africa. There have always been aboriginal girls off reserves and runaways from small towns. In some ways it’s an old story. Men who hang around shopping malls, hostels and bus stations offering a little kindness and attention to vulnerable, lost young women. “Often the pimps will act like a boyfriend. They’re special. They (the pimps) will wine and dine them. Then they use and abuse them,” said Winters.