Michael Swan

Continental synod package getting clearer

March 1, 2023

Ten Americans and seven Canadians have less than 30 days to sum up the life of the Church in North America — everything the baptized know and love and dream and hope for.

Psychiatrists fear for patients despite MAiD for mentally ill delayed

February 24, 2023

On the rare occasions when one of Dr. Jack Haggarty’s patients commits suicide, he mourns. He grieves. The prospect of psychiatrists like him having to sign off on a request for a medically assisted death has Haggarty wondering how his psychiatric practice, and the profession in Canada, may be altered one year from now, when the legal exception to Medical Assistance in Dying for the sole reason of mental illness is set to expire.

Turkey’s loss

February 23, 2023

There’s something missing in Turkey’s response to the string of earthquakes across its southern frontier with Syria, and Metin Cetirner knows exactly what it is.

Indigenous Catholics seek more detail on bishops’ plan

February 15, 2023

If Canada’s bishops are setting an agenda in their letters to Indigenous Canadians, that agenda needs more detail, Catholic Indigenous leaders told The Catholic Register.

Homeless: Search for solution grows more urgent than ever

February 10, 2023

As number of violent incidents on Toronto streets rises, attention turns to finding new ways to deal with mental illness and addiction among the homeless.

Pastoral letters set bishops’ reconciliation agenda

February 10, 2023

Four letters and 26 promises from Canada’s bishops to Indigenous Canadians set an agenda for reconciliation that bishops like Calgary’s Bishop Bill McGrattan intend to act on before February turns into March.

Schools grapple with strategies for teen violence

February 8, 2023

From stabbing and killing a homeless man to swarming TTC bus drivers to random BB gun attacks, some of the most disturbing incidents of violence in Toronto over the last two months involve teens.

Bishops put Reconciliation commitments in writing

February 8, 2023

Canada's Catholics are not done with reconciliation. Four pastoral letters from Canada’s bishops released today urge Indigenous and non-Indigenous Catholics to seek ways to journey together, build relationships, know and understand their history and end the two solitudes in the country and in the Church of Indigenous and settler societies.

Yanomami tragedy called ‘genocide’

February 3, 2023

At least 570 children dead, images of emaciated women desperately trying to feed babies who seem to be swimming in and out of consciousness, adults with skin stretched over shoulders and rib cages — these revelations strewn across Brazilian media have missionaries, Brazil’s bishops and even newly installed Brazilian President Luiz Ignacio Lula da Silva using the word “genocide.”

Canadians rank low in Mass attendance

February 2, 2023

In Nigeria, 94 per cent of Catholics say they go to Mass at least once a week. In Canada, 14 per cent. In Quebec, two per cent.