{mosimage}While global capitalism went into convulsions at the Wall Street end of Manhattan Island, Archbishop Celestino Migliore was at the midtown headquarters of the United Nations wondering about the economic fate of 1.4 billion people who live on less than a dollar a day.

“How are we able to find funds to save a broken financial system yet remain unable to find the resources necessary to invest in the development of all regions of the world, beginning with the most destitute?” Migliore, the Holy See’s representative at the United Nations, asked delegates to a high level meeting on the Millennium Development Goals Sept. 27.

{mosimage}TORONTO - For 138 years the dogma of papal infallibility has inspired waves of harsh condemnation and deep suspicion from other Christians. The irony is that the church approved this teaching in the name of church unity.

Margaret O’Gara, president of the Catholic Theological Society of America and professor of systematic theology at the University of St. Michael’s College, has been thinking about papal infallibility more than 30 years. She thinks it’s time to rethink what the dogma means, and how Catholics put it into practice.

{mosimage}In the 14th century the Italian writer and scholar Dante Alighieri wrote his famous poem, the “Divine Comedy,” in which he presented a Catholic vision of the Inferno, the Purgatorio and the Paradiso — Hell, Purgatory and Heaven. But the Christian doctrine of the afterlife did not start with Dante. It predates the poet by more than 2,000 years and has its roots in ancient Jewish thought.  

The Old Testament speaks of the deceased descending to a subterranean place of the dead called Sheol. Part of Sheol was reserved for the righteous, who found rest and comfort there; another part, however, was set aside for those who did not keep God’s Covenant. This dark side of Sheol was identified with Hell or Gehenna.  

{mosimage}WINNIPEG - Any anthology of Christian writing in Canada cannot help but examine the intersection of faith and politics. In Northern Lights, readers can examine this through the eyes of someone who has lived it for almost three decades.

After almost 30 years as a member of Parliament, United Church Minister Bill Blaikie has taken on a different campaign — to encourage Christians to talk to each other, and the world, about who they are.

{mosimage}TORONTO - Science can't adequately explain the role of God in the universe, says Fr. George Coyne, S.J., the former director of the Vatican Observatory who, at one time, was referred to as “the pope's astrophysicist.”

But as a religious believer, the American professor said he is able to answer the question of God's role.

{mosimage}TORONTO - The Notre Dame Cathedral parish in Ottawa may have 460 volunteers, young and old, but that doesn’t mean there is never a void to fill.

Alannah Lennon has been volunteering at the cathedral with her husband Stan for about 12 years now. As retirees, they find it’s easier to be involved in parish life, from attending daily Mass to helping out, because their time is more flexible.

{mosimage}In 1952, Canadian and American culture collided over an unlikely cleric — Bishop Fulton Sheen. It was the dawn of the TV era and Sheen's Life is Worth Living had made him the most watched priest on television in the United States. But in Canada, for several years the CBC refused to broadcast the program. Find out why in this podcast of the Eighth Annual Somerville Lecture on Christianity and Culture.

This lecture was presented Nov. 6 at the Newman Centre, in the University of Toronto campus. It featured Dr. Mark McGowan, principal of the University of St. Michael's College, Toronto. He is well-known for his analysis of church affairs and as author of Waning of the Green: Catholics, the Irish and Identity in Toronto, and Michael Power: The Struggle to Build the Catholic Church on the Canadian Frontier.

The Somerville lecture is sponsored by The Catholic Register in co-operation with the St. Jerome's Lectures in Catholic Experience and the Newman Centre.

{mosimage}The church gives us four Sundays to get ready for the enfleshment of God. Four weeks is just enough to get organized for the office parties, gift exchanges, good cheer with good friends, family gatherings, etc. But it is impossible to be ready for God among us, God here and now, God in history — God as a concrete, physical reality. There is no strategy, no program, no scheme that will make such a thing easily acceptable or even understandable. Faith is a gift.

The nature of the gift is a clear sense of Christ and profound communion with reality.

{mosimage}TORONTO - The September apocalypse on Wall Street and Bay Street is no surprise to religiously and socially motivated investors, who are now contemplating their place in the post-meltdown economy.

“Socially responsible investing is going to be very well positioned coming out of this crisis,” said Jantzi Social Index founder Michael Jantzi.

{mosimage}TORONTO - With Christmas approaching, it’s important not to lose sight of the preparation that should come beforehand — and this doesn’t just mean picking out the right presents and decorations.

Fr. Vito Marziliano, pastor at All Saints parish in Toronto’s west end, has tried to make the Advent season really one of spiritual preparation for his parishioners by offering workshops to help them prepare their spiritual “inn” for Christ.