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September 2009

September 3

More police in Toronto schools this year

September 3, 2009

TORONTO - After a successful first year of school-based policing, 20 more officers will be patrolling hallways this September to bring the total number of officers in schools to 50, says Toronto Police. “These officers approached these assignments with insatiable energy and dedication. As a result, we have created new relationships with young people all over Toronto. They, in turn have come to respect police officers on an entirely different level,” said Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair in a statement.

Toronto bids farewell to Charlottetown-bound Grecco

September 3, 2009

TORONTO - Auxiliary Bishop Richard Grecco said his final goodbyes to the archdiocese of Toronto at a Sept. 1 Mass as he prepares to accept his new appointment as bishop of Charlottetown. His fellow bishops, parishioners, more than a hundred priests and deacons from across the diocese and staff from archdiocesan offices packed St. Paul’s Basilica to hear his homily of thanksgiving for time spent in Toronto, which centred on St. Paul’s message in the reading about encouragement.

September 4

Quebec court says parents can't pull kids from religion course

September 4, 2009

OTTAWA - A Quebec Superior Court judge has ruled against Drummondville parents who want to remove their children from a mandatory ethics and religious culture course. The parents had sued their local school board, arguing violation of parental rights and religious freedom. But the Aug. 31 decision ruled the course does not violate religious freedom.

Toronto parishes put words into action for refugees

September 4, 2009

TORONTO - With four months to go in 2009, Toronto parishes and religious orders have welcomed 45 per cent more refugees than they did in all of 2006. There will be five more landing in Toronto the second week of September. The 53 refugees welcomed in the first eight months of 2009, the 72 sponsorship applications submitted to Citizenship and Immigration Canada , the 37 parishes and six religious orders actively sponsoring refugees are just numbers. Every number masks a story.

Save Arrowsmith

September 4, 2009

The new supervisor of the dysfunctional Toronto Catholic District School Board will be among the busiest administrators in the province this fall, but we hope Richard Alway finds time to consider the displaced students of the mothballed Arrowsmith program. Alway was appointed by the Ontario government last month to succeed Norbert Hartmann, who had been appointed a year earlier with a mandate to balance the books of the disgraced TCDSB. Hartmann delivered a balanced budget and then resigned. He leaves behind a board that is in better fiscal health but otherwise remains sickly.

September 8

Schools prepared for swine flu

September 8, 2009

Ontario Catholic schools will be monitoring the swine flu and reinforcing the message of good hygiene when school starts on Sept. 8. Halton Catholic District School Board staff will be meeting with the local health department to discuss plans of effectively communicating information about the swine flu, also known as the HIN1 virus.

Legionaries of Christ visitation underway

September 8, 2009

TORONTO - A Vatican-led apostolic visitation of the Legionaries of Christ is underway in Canada and the United States to investigate allegations of sexual impropriety made against the order’s late founder. Francois Tremblay, a member of Regnum Christi , the Legion of Christ’s lay movement, says he welcomes the visitation. “People will have a better idea about the Legionaries of Christ and Regnum Christi because the visitation will bring light to people about what the movement and the congregation do and who they are,” the 23-year-old student from Saguenay, Que., said in an online interview.

Sisters of St. Joseph welcome first new Sister in 12 years

September 8, 2009

TORONTO - It was the most unexpected place to find God’s love. But newly professed Sr. Nida Fe Chavez, CSJ, says her ministry at a women’s maximum security prison helped affirm her call to religious life. “Some of them said they found God in prison, through the people who talked to them, listened to them and brought God’s word to them,” she told The Catholic Register. Chavez, 49, was a novice at that time with the Sisters of St. Joseph of Toronto and had been volunteering at a prison in Framingham, Mass.

New Regis College aims to anticipate God's glory

September 8, 2009

TORONTO - The new Regis College won’t be finished when theology students arrive for academic orientation Sept. 10, and even when construction wraps up before the end of September the academic home of the Jesuits won’t really be finished. However, Regis Dean Fr. Gordon Rixon couldn’t be happier. Weaving among the trucks in the driveway as he emerges from the dust and occasional thump of construction crews, Rixon is as calm and contented as a monk in a garden.

97 Greater Toronto Area students granted a Hope for Children Foundation scholarship

September 8, 2009

TORONTO - For most kids, foster care is no joy ride to a brighter future. “There’s so much else going on in your life. There’s the reasons you went into care in the first place,” points out 18-year-old Nevena Seke. This year Seke is one of 97 Greater Toronto Area students granted a Hope for Children Foundation scholarship to help launch her post-secondary education. This year the foundation which supports Catholic Children’s Aid of Toronto handed out $180,000 in scholarship money.

Fostering prayer on campus

September 8, 2009

I once prayed the rosary while sitting in a tree. That might sound a little bizarre, but as a student on a secular campus I often found myself getting creative in the search for a place to simply be with God.

Fashion show gives models their dignity back

September 8, 2009

TORONTO - Fashion and modesty shared the runway at the Pure Exposure fashion show Aug. 20. The show, created by summer interns at Campaign Life Coalition in Toronto, featured a team of nearly 30 young models at the Woodbine Banquet and Convention Hall, with pulsing music and a classy backdrop for the benefit of pregnant mothers in need.

OCY launches leadership program

September 8, 2009

TORONTO - The Office of Catholic Youth is launching a leadership program this year to strengthen young leaders in their schools, parishes and communities. The nine-month leadership training program is open to 16- to 19-year-olds in the archdiocese of Toronto and aims to develop their skills and equip them to be active witnesses of the Gospel not only in youth ministry but in all aspects of life.

God will show us the way

September 8, 2009

23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B) Sept. 6 (Isaiah 35:4-7; Psalm 146; James 2:1-5; Mark 7:31-37) To those who have been uprooted and driven from their homes the world seems to have ended. In the past century more people were displaced than at any other time in history. That century also gave birth to wars, genocides and persecutions on an unprecedented scale. What words of comfort can we possibly have for the victims? What can we do to ease their inner suffering?

Through the cross, divine love penetrates our suffering

September 8, 2009

It was a beautiful, comfortable hotel, but it couldn’t protect us from reality. Before dawn, we heard hostile voices from the adjacent room. A woman and man were arguing. Later, I went out to the elevator area to get a newspaper. Down the hall rushed a weeping woman with a suitcase; she waited for the elevator, sobbing, then exclaimed, “My sunglasses,” and went back down the hallway. Loud, persistent knocking and cries of “I just want to get my sunglasses” were followed by her hurried return to the elevator amidst a renewed storm of sobs. The doors opened and she was gone. It all took a couple of minutes.

In my day, back at the Abbey

September 8, 2009

This week I didn’t want to write about anything controversial. I wanted to write about something fun. “Why don’t you write your article about school uniform kilts?” asked my husband. “You were putting it off until September.” “I decided kilts were too controversial,” I said.

The church is finding its balance again

September 8, 2009

It’s been more than two years since Pope Benedict allowed the Mass to be said more freely in Latin. Fears allegedly abounded. One was that Catholics would start robotically praying for the conversion of “the perfidious Jews.” All the papal statement actually said was that “In parishes where there is a stable group of faithful who adhere to the earlier liturgical tradition, the pastor should willingly accept their request to celebrate the Mass according to the rite of the Roman Missal published in 1962.” In fact the announcement stressed that there were certain areas where the public liturgy had to follow the more modern form, including when it speaks of the Jews. The Good Friday service did once use the word perfidious, an ugly translation from “perfideles” or half-believer. In earlier times the congregation prayed first for the “fideles,” meaning believers or church, then for the Jewish people and then for the “infidels” or unbelievers. The deeply troubling word was expunged more than 40 years ago.

September 9

Canadian Council of Churches wades into U.S. health care debate

September 9, 2009

The Canadian Council of Churches launched a letter into the shark tank of American debate over health care and saw some surprising ripples on the surface. The Aug. 10 letter to the National Council of Churches, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and the National Association of Evangelicals became the starting point for journalist David Waters' Aug. 29 "Under God" column in The Washington Post.

September 11

Vatican caught up in war of words over Italian PM

September 11, 2009

VATICAN CITY - An unusually acrimonious fight has erupted this summer between the Vatican and the government of Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, fueled by growing unease over Berlusconi’s personal life and some of his government’s policies. The conflict was unusual because church leaders in Italy have generally supported Berlusconi’s centre-right coalition, which in turn has favoured church interests in areas like state aid to private schools and pro-life issues. After Pope Benedict XVI met with Berlusconi in 2005, a statement from the prime minister’s office trumpeted the “special convergence between the direction of Italy and the moral and religious objectives of the Catholic Church in the world.”

Canadian Jesuit named expert for African Synod

September 11, 2009

A Canadian Jesuit based in Nairobi, Kenya, has been appointed one of about 30 experts who will assist bishops at Synod of Bishops for Africa at the Vatican Oct. 4-25. Fr. Michael Czerny founded the African Jesuit AIDS Network in 2002 as a way to help Jesuits in Africa work on the problem of AIDS. His appointment as “adiutor secretarii specialis” to the second Synod of Bishops on Africa will require him to step away from running AJAN at least temporarily.