TORONTO - Women are not getting all the facts about the link between abortion and breast cancer, says Dr. Angela Lanfranchi.

"It doesn't matter if you're pro-life or pro-choice," she said, "women and the population just want the facts." 

And the facts are, simply put, abortion increases the risk of breast cancer, Lanfranchi told an audience of about 50 people gathered at the deVeber Institute's annual public lecture Oct. 26.

TORONTO - There are 29,000 Catholics held captive behind a rusty, two-metre high, chain-link fence in the middle of downtown Toronto. Mind you, they’re not clamouring to get out. They’re dead and buried in St. Michael’s Cemetery, a little south of St. Clair Avenue and hidden behind the stores on the west side of Yonge Street.

Martha Crean and Mary Egan want to get in. Each of them is related to early sextons (maintenance men) of the 156-year-old cemetery. They have relatives buried there and they would like to see the historic gem opened and advertised to Torontonians.

Vandalism, dog-walking, skiing, neighbourhood fireworks displays, baseball games and litter on the cemetery grounds forced Catholic Cemeteries, Archdiocese of Toronto to lock the gates in 2005, said executive director Richard Hayes in an e-mail to Crean and Egan.

CORNWALL, ONT. - Edmonton Archbishop Richard Smith is looking forward to serving “my brother bishops” in his new role as president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"It’s not something I was looking for, by any stretch of the imagination,” Smith said in a telephone interview Oct. 20, the day after he was elected CCCB president. “But it’s a unique privilege.”

The choice of Smith, 52, came as no surprise. He has been the conference’s vice-president the last two years and was unopposed in the election.

TORONTO - Hundreds of people gathered at Queen’s Park Oct. 22 to send a message to the newly elected provincial government: stop using taxpayers’ dollars to fund abortions.

“This is outrageous that we are forced to fund an elective, medically unnecessary procedure,” said Alissa Golob, the youth co-ordinator for Campaign Life Coalition and organizer of the Defund Abortion Rally.

In Ontario, abortions are funded by taxpayer dollars. That’s about $30 million for at least 30,000 abortions a year, at a cost of $1,000 each, Golob said.

Instead of asking for candy on Halloween night, students at St. Thomas More Catholic Secondary School in Hamilton will be trick-or-treating for non-perishable food items.

The school will be holding its 12th annual Halloween for Hunger campaign to raise money for the Neighbour to Neighbour Centre with a goal of collecting a record-breaking 70,000 pounds of food.

Hamilton’s Good Shepherd Refuge has passed the halfway mark of its $10-million fundraising goal to complete Good Shepherd Square, the city’s first complex of buildings that will house social services to combat poverty.

Alan Whittle, Good Shepherd’s director of community relations and planning, says it’s an innovative approach in tackling poverty that includes access to affordable housing and social services within the same vicinity.

The Jesuit priest who helped bring us Law & Order — the TV show as opposed to the socio-political ideal — received a medal for his efforts.

On Oct. 18, Fr. Jack O’Brien was awarded the Loyola Medal at Concordia University in Montreal.

OTTAWA - Canada’s Catholic bishops remain confident in the renewal of the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (CCODP), despite concerns about “hysteria” and “misinformation” on both sides.

At the close of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) annual plenary Oct. 17-21 in Cornwall, Ont., the CCCB’s new president Edmonton Archbishop Richard Smith said the bishops expressed a desire for CCODP to continue “as a vibrant institution that operates within our Catholic identity.”

OTTAWA - The new English translation of the Roman Missal was unveiled to Canada's Catholic bishops as they met for their annual plenary in Cornwall, Ont., Oct. 17-21.

On Oct. 17, Bishop Pierre Morissette, outgoing president of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB), presented Archbishop Pedro Lopez Quintana, apostolic nuncio to Canada, with the second copy of the new missal. The missal’s first copy will be delivered to the Holy Father when Archbishop Richard Smith, the CCCB's new president, and members of the executive visit Rome in November.

Smith said the launch of the new missal provides a “great opportunity” for liturgical catechesis on the mystery of the Eucharist, the mystery of Real Presence that goes beyond the changes in the words and gestures that will begin on the first Sunday of Advent.

OTTAWA - Controversy surrounding the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (CCODP) continued to dog Canada’s bishops as they began their annual plenary Oct. 17-21 in Cornwall, Ont.

On day one of Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops' gathering of 90 bishops from across Canada, a Quebec pro-life group dropped off a 400-name petition demanding a complete review of CCODP, while the editor of LifeSiteNews.com, whose coverage has fuelled much of the controversy, was asked to leave the premises.