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April 12, 2013
For the first time in history the United Nations has voted to put rules in place to regulate the $70- billion per year international trade in conventional weapons. On April 2, just two weeks before the 50th anniversary of Pope John XXIIIs encyclical Pacem In Terris, the UN voted 154 to 3, with 23 abstentions, to adopt the conventional Arms Trade Treaty.
OXFORD, England - Russia's Catholic Church expressed surprise and concern after a wave of raids on its parishes and charities, part of a government clampdown on organizations with foreign links.
In early March, the online magazine Slate posted a study on its crime blog about “religious” criminals. The study, originally published in an academic journal called Theoretical Criminology, found that religion might actually encourage crime. The sample consisted of 48 “hardcore” offenders from Atlanta. All of them identified themselves with the Christian faith.
TORONTO - Salesian Father Michael Pace need not look far to see vocations in many forms. One of his younger sisters is a consecrated Missionary of Charity in San Francisco, his brother and two older sisters are each married with 20 children between them, and his other younger sister, Antoinette, has discerned a call to the single life and works as her parish’s lay pastoral associate.
In his autobiography, Morris West suggests that at a certain age our lives simplify and we need have only three phrases left in our spiritual vocabulary: Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! He is right, if we understand fully what is implied in living out gratitude. Gratitude is the ultimate virtue, undergirding everything else, even love. It is synonymous with holiness.
Fourth Sunday of Easter (Year C) April 21 (Acts 13:14, 43-52; Psalm 100; Revelation 7:9, 14-17; John 10:27-30)
The late-March decision to declare Private Members’ Motion-408 “unvotable” has generated a debate about the control of party leaders and the Prime Minister’s Office over what Members of Parliament can and can’t say in the House of Commons.
On my desk sit two books, one on top of the other, spines facing outwards so that the titles are clear to the students and the parents with whom I meet. Both are authoritative texts in the context of Catholic education. One is the Education Act, the other is the Bible.
Voters in large, pluralistic democracies rarely reach consensus on any substantive issue, but the opinion of Canadians on sex-selective abortion is near unanimous. They overwhelmingly denounce it.
He spent a life chronicling show business, so why not a show at Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago for the funeral of Roger Ebert? Chicago’s great clerical showmen were on hand for the premiere. Jesse Jackson sent a message that Ebert “sought to explain America to itself,” which may well be apt if you consider America to be a vast, leisured people busy about entertaining themselves.
As someone who can smell the incense from the last pew of the church, it was no challenge for me to sniff the billows of the beer coming off Ralph Klein.
To paraphrase the title of an earlier movie about the national pastime, hate strikes out in the historical drama 42 (Warner Bros.) Writer-director Brian Helgeland's uplifting — if sometimes heavy-handed — film recounts the 1947 reintegration of professional baseball after decades of segregated play.
It’s a girl! But for some parents, this is bad news.
April 13, 2013
MISSISSAUGA, ONT - Teachers need to know that beyond their value of passing along Catholic teachings, they have a key responsibility in ensuring the very survival of the Catholic education system, says an American educator.
TORONTO - The Earth matters to students and staff at Cardinal Carter Academy for the Arts — it matters enough to inspire prayer, song and art.
Students from Hamilton, Ont.’s Bishop Ryan Catholic Secondary School are going for gold — again — at this year’s Heritage Music Festival May 1 to 5.
CHATEAUGUAY, QUE. - Since the nuns who owned the property until recently didn’t care for directional road signs, you may have to stop for directions on the way to Manoir D’Youville on the St. Lawrence’s south shore, just southwest of Montreal.
TORONTO - Can a wound be beautiful? According to the late priest and Catholic writer Henri Nouwen, it can.
April 14, 2013
Every immigrant who ever came to Canada dreaming of something better, something worthy of their best hopes, struggled, wished they had never come and wanted to go home has a soul brother in Br. Anthony Kowalczyk.
GUELPH, ONT. - The Ignatius Jesuit Centre startles the newcomer with its beauty and a sense of peace. The dozens of activities taking place seem to rise from the land itself, purposeful, harmonious and deeply satisfying.