Canada can expect to see more asylum seekers crossing its 9,000 km, mostly unguarded, border with the United States as enforcement toughens at the U.S.-Mexican border and President Donald Trump continues to issue executive orders to restrain refugee arrivals, Catholic refugee advocates have told The Catholic Register.

As their U.S. brethren bask in finding an ally in the Trump administration, pro-lifers in Canada understand they still have much work to do in turning the tide in favour of life north of the border.

Recent events have been dark and disturbing. First we saw U.S. President Donald Trump put a “temporary” travel and immigration ban on seven mostly Muslim countries. Then there was the tragedy in Quebec City where six men were killed and several wounded while praying.

Before Christmas last year, Wartohi Myrdijian had to worry about the bombs falling on either side of her house in Aleppo. She was most afraid of the crude, unpredictable, improvised bombs that came from the ISIS side of the conflict.

Will Month 13 unsettle thousands of Syrian refugees who have already settled in Canada?

ISTANBUL – Sami Dankha, his three brothers and their families used to kick off Christmas celebrations by attending a packed Christmas Eve Mass at St. Thomas Church in Baghdad. Wearing brand new clothes and sporting fresh haircuts, they would spend the night chatting, singing and eating pacha, a dish made from sheep's head that Iraqis consider a delicacy and a staple of Christmas.

There can hardly be a voter or politician who doesn’t believe Canada’s shamefully high rate of child poverty should be promptly reduced and eventually eliminated.

If there’s anything that unites Canadians, it’s their overwhelming support for something very few of us have.

A federal government decision to restore funding to a United Nations agency that supports Palestinian refugees is being applauded by a Catholic aid group.

Minneapolis, MN – To our soon-to-be-compatriots: thank you for making Canada a destination of hope.

WINDSOR, Ont. – Opponents of assisted suicide face “significant challenges” following the Canadian government’s official endorsement of medically-aided death in legislation enacted last June, a symposium was told.

MONTREAL – Canada and Western nations can and must do more to stop the war in Syria, said Father Jacques Mourad, a Syriac Catholic priest who was abducted and held captive for nearly five months by the Islamic State group.

VANCOUVER – How far will a man go to follow his dreams? For Fr. Joseph Thoai Le, labour camps, imprisonment and perils at sea could not block his destiny to become a priest.

TORONTO – By 2030 a quarter of Canadians will be over the age of 65. Over the next 50 years the number of us over the age of 80 will more than triple to somewhere north of five million.

Canada Day often seems a rather tepid, bureaucratic affair celebrating the day Great Britain’s Parliament managed to pass a law granting four small North American colonies the right to elect their own politicians to a single House of Commons — not a shot fired and no declaration of independence. But why limit ourselves to such a paltry notion of Canada’s origins?