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December 2010

December 1

Blair, Hitchens face off over religion in Toronto debate

December 1, 2010

Blair Hitchens [images/stories/canada/canada10/blairhitchens.jpg]TORONTO - Tony Blair and Christopher Hitchens duked it out to a draw in the biggest public debate on religion ever held in Toronto Nov. 26. At the start of the evening, 22 per cent of the sold-out crowd at Roy Thomson Hall were in favour of Blair’s proposition that religion is a force for good in the world. Fifty-seven per cent thought religion was a force for ill and 21 per cent were undecided. Before the debate, fully 75 per cent of the live audience claimed they were open to changing their mind.

December 2

Pray for life

December 2, 2010

baby [images/stories/misc/baby.jpg]It was a welcomed coincidence that the inaugural worldwide Prayer Vigil for All Nascent Human Life occurred as The Register was preparing our annual issue dedicated to Life and Family. At the request of Pope Benedict XVI vigils were held Nov. 27 around the world. It was an extraordinary undertaking and many bishops commented that they could recall nothing like it in the history of the Church.

Cardinal calls for campaign to end Christian persecution

December 2, 2010

Burnt church [images/stories/international/international10/church.jpg]VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The international community must begin fighting discrimination against Christians with the same determination it shows in opposing intolerance and discrimination against members of other religious groups, said the Vatican secretary of state. Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone told the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe Dec. 1, "It has been widely documented that Christians are the most persecuted and discriminated against religious group. More than 200 million of them, belonging to different confessions, find themselves in difficulty because of legal and cultural structures."

Love over latex

December 2, 2010

There is so much that can be said about the Pope’s recent comments about the use of condoms and the coverage it received in the media. First, what did he say? Actually not very much at all. The Church’s teaching on sex, love, contraception and life remains the same; of course it does, in that the Church is given to us by the same God who gives us natural law, logic and the very sexuality that we’re discussing. All the Holy Father said was that in the most extreme and rare circumstances where intercourse is going to occur and death may ensue, a condom may be a better option. Not the best option, not the desirable option, but an option preferable to agonizing death.

Pope Benedict — love and the law

December 2, 2010

What does the law have to do with love? Are they not antithetical? To follow the law is to be under a burden, to be compelled, to be constrained. To love, on the other hand, is to embrace the capacity to choose, to be creative, to be liberated.

Catholics, condoms and contraception

December 2, 2010

Me, I’m a nice Catholic girl. There are some things I just don’t like talking about in mixed company or, for that matter, in print. My mother reads this column, you know. And so I am aggrieved that my conscience says I have to write about what the Holy Father said about condoms, and what the secular press said he said, and what Catholics are saying he said. But it’s either that or I write about the Muslim kid who tried to blow up thousands of Christians in a tree-lighting ceremony in Portland.

Waiting for the Spirit

December 2, 2010

Third Sunday in Advent (Year A) Dec. 12 (Isaiah 35:1-6, 10; Psalm 146; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11) When water is withdrawn from the land life virtually ceases. We have all seen the pictures of parched devastation in the countries of the sub-Sahara where creeping desert has reclaimed the land. Areas hit by drought in other countries yield only the withered remnants of fruit and grain. But the addition of even a small amount of water can make the desert areas come to life and bloom.

What's on your gift list?

December 2, 2010

For some time, I’ve been part of a ministry called Project Rachel. Here I’ve seen women weep like Rachel (Jeremiah 31:15-17) for their children, lost to them through abortion. They carry, often for years, a many-faceted pain. It’s about death of the most anguishing kind, a child’s death; about guilt, the awareness that one’s own actions have helped bring about that death; about oppression, the tacit sense that one shouldn’t be grieving or suffering at all, because it’s a suffering our world prefers not to acknowledge.

Give back Carleton Lifeline's club status

December 2, 2010

As a Catholic and a pro-life supporter, it was disappointing to hear that the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) banned our campus pro-life club. Carleton Lifeline lost club status because the student union said being anti-abortion violates the university’s anti-discrimination policy. In order to receive student union funding and recognition on campus, the club must become pro-choice. The irony is obvious.

Jesuit author makes atheist arguments against God look silly

December 2, 2010

New Proofs [images/stories/books/0802863833.jpg]New Proofs for the Existence of God: Contributions of Contemporary Physics and Philosophy, by Robert J. Spitzer, (Wm. B. Eerdmans, 319 pages, softcover, $30.99). Post-Newtonian physics has put philosophy and theology in the curious position of having to turn back to the Middle Ages. Suddenly what the scholastic theologians had to say about metaphysics and ontology is au courant. When the apple fell on Newton’s head he came up with laws of physics which described a fully functioning closed system. Those laws could keep the whole thing going forever and had no absolute need for God. St. Thomas Aquinas’ “uncaused cause” argument thereby fell into disfavour. Metaphysics lost credence and was replaced at the centre of philosophy by epistemology — the question of how we know what we know. Ontology, the study of being, which had been the main preoccupation of medieval Western metaphysics, was bypassed.

Colleagues recall four churchwomen slain 30 years ago in El Salvador

December 2, 2010

MELBOURNE, Fla. - Dec. 2 marks the 30th anniversary of the martyrdom of Ursuline Sister Dorothy Kazel, lay missionary Jean Donovan and Maryknoll Sisters Maura Clarke and Ita Ford, the four churchwomen of El Salvador who were savagely brutalized and killed for spreading the good news and teaching people to read and pray. “I can’t say this to anybody because they wouldn’t understand,” Kazel wrote to her former missionary partner, Sr. Martha Owen, in October 1980. “I want you to explain why I have to stay.”

Equity policy won't trample Catholic rights

December 2, 2010

Teacher pupils [images/stories/education/education10/teacher_pupils.jpg]TORONTO - Ontario Catholic schools will not be required under the province’s controversial equity and inclusive education strategy to maintain gay support clubs, according to a ministry spokesman. Gary Wheeler said in an e-mail that the province’s new equity policy, which has sparked concern from Ontario bishops and Catholic educators, has “flexibility” that will permit Catholic boards to operate “within the context of denominational rights of Roman Catholics.”

Governor General recognizes teacher for bringing history to life

December 2, 2010

Diane Vautour [images/stories/education/education10/diane_vautour.jpg]TORONTO - Diane Vautour likes to bring history to life. And for doing so on a daily basis at Toronto’s Loretto College High School, she was awarded a Governor General’s Award for Excellence in Teaching Canadian History at a ceremony at Rideau Hall on Nov. 19. “Teaching at an all-girls’ school, I want to emphasize women’s history, from a women’s point of view,” Vautour, 32, told The Register. “It’s not just an add-on or an extra page in a textbook.”

Orangeville Knights are family's 'little angels'

December 2, 2010

flynn family [images/stories/toronto/toronto10/flynn-family.jpg]The Flynn family needed help. They were paying $1,000 every month for bariatric diapers for their daughter Jennifer who has a rare chromosome disorder, making her one of 40 such cases in the world. So Julie Flynn, Jennifer’s mother, asked for help — and she received. “My husband has had to give up his job to take care of her,” said Flynn, who lives in Orangeville, Ont. “We’re a one-income family and we’re paying $1,000 every month for diapers. And we were thinking and in desperation I wrote to every service club in the Orangeville area. The Knights of Columbus responded and it just went from there.”

Inter-faith dialogue pioneer Rabbi Erwin Schild honoured

December 2, 2010

Rabbi Schild [images/stories/toronto/toronto10/schild.jpg]TORONTO - Christian-Jewish dialogue isn’t just about Christians and Jews. It’s about how human beings should conduct themselves, how we secure a future of peace, how we know God and how we repair the world, said one of the pioneers of religious dialogue in Canada. Christian-Jewish Dialogue of Toronto, along with the Canadian Jewish Congress, put on a gala dinner to honour Rabbi Erwin Schild and his wife Laura Schild at the Liberty Grand banquet hall in Toronto Nov. 24. Bishops, rabbis, reverend doctors and theologians were among those gathered to honour him

Catholic values can help with Alzheimer's, says Dr. Bill Sullivan

December 2, 2010

Dr. Bill Sullivan [images/stories/features/feature10/sullivan.jpg]TORONTO - For people struggling with Alzheimer’s Disease, the experience can be painful, bewildering and frightening. But the journey can also be one filled with hope when we apply Catholic values like the inherent human dignity of all and justice for the most vulnerable, said leading Catholic bioethicist Dr. Bill Sullivan at the annual Canadian Catholic Bioethics Institute lecture on Nov. 24. More than 100 people came to hear Sullivan deliver his talk “Ethical and Loving Care of Persons Living with Progressive Cognitive Impairments and Their Families.” The lecture took place at the University of St. Michael’s College.

Toronto Catholic board supervision likely to end in new year

December 2, 2010

TCDSB Logo [images/stories/schoolB_logos/TCDSBLogo.jpg]TORONTO - Provincial supervision of the Toronto Catholic District School Board is likely to end in January, according to supervisor Richard Alway. The board and its trustees are turning over a new leaf with a mix of incumbent and new trustees elected in this past October's election, said Alway. He said the new group is “very anxious to work together and build a positive relationship amongst themselves, between the board of trustees and staff leadership.”

Unlikely beginnings for young pro-life leaders

December 2, 2010

Richmond Mills [images/stories/features/feature10/richmondmills.jpg]OTTAWA - Lia Mills and Rebecca Richmond never suspected they would one day be at the forefront of the pro-life movement. But circumstances have conspired to make it so. The two recently shared their stories at the International Pro-life Conference held in Ottawa. For Mills, her step into the breech came when she gave a speech on abortion to her seventh grade Toronto class two years ago. It was recorded and uploaded to YouTube where it has gone viral. Richmond, on the other hand, merely intended to bake cookies to support her university pro-life group. She never thought she would become the group’s leader and eventually the executive director of the National Campus Life Network, mentoring leaders across the country.

Ruth Lobo’s pro-life passion stems from her own origins

December 2, 2010

Ruth Lobo [images/stories/education/education10/ruth-lobo.jpg]OTTAWA - Ruth Lobo’s commitment to the pro-life cause is a deeply personal one that began 23 years ago in her native India. All Lobo knows about her birth mother is that she was 19, most likely poor and “most likely ostracized by her family for being pregnant.” She sought shelter in a Bangalore convent that provided help for single mothers. She looked after Lobo for three months before giving her up to a woman who would become her adoptive aunt.

UBC students have a 'Dish with the Bish'

December 2, 2010

VANCOUVER - Food for the body and food for the mind were the two focal points at Dish with the Bish: Reheat, a combined potluck dinner and question-and-answer session for students with Vancouver Archbishop Michael Miller.