NEWS

{mosimage}TORONTO - They decorated his favourite jeep with white flowers, wore buttons emblazoned with his military photo and filled the church with Lebanese and Canadian flags to welcome home the latest fallen Canadian soldier, 22-year-old Marc Diab.

It wasn’t the homecoming that parishioners at Toronto’s Our Lady of Lebanon Maronite Catholic Church had hoped for.

Friends and family were counting down the days when they would see Diab return to Canada. But on March 8 he was killed by a roadside bomb north of Kandahar, Afghanistan, a month before his expected return. Diab was the 112th soldier killed since Canada’s mission in Afghanistan began in 2002.

{mosimage}TORONTO - The journey to possible sainthood for Sr. Carmelina Tarantino has begun.

A panel of theologians and historians, under the auspices of  the archdiocese of Toronto, has officially started an examination of the life of the Toronto nun to ascertain her candidacy for sainthood. The inquiry was to be opened at a Mass celebrated at St. Paschal Baylon Church March 16 by Archbishop Thomas Collins.

The archdiocese received approval to proceed — the nihil obstat — from the Vatican last September. An  examination of life is the first of four steps in the process to sainthood.

{mosimage}VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI said his trip to Africa would be a missionary journey highlighting the continent’s challenges, its enormous potential and its “profound religious soul.”

The Pope, speaking two days before his departure for Cameroon and Angola, said he was not bringing a political or social program to Africa, but simply the Gospel message of love that is “capable of transforming the world.”

{mosimage}TORONTO - Parishioners at St. Cecilia’s Catholic Church are enjoying a year-long celebration packed full of fund-raisers to commemorate the 100 years their church has been standing.

With more than 30 events planned events to keep the celebration alive, Fr. Joseph Pap Tran, who has been pastor for the past four years, said it’s an exciting and busy time.

“We have a Lenten retreat on March 29,” he said. “And the closing Mass in November will be presided over by Archbishop (Thomas) Collins.”

{mosimage}OTTAWA - The Canadian Religious Conference and the Catholic Women’s League are supporting MP Joy Smith’s anti-human trafficking private member’s bill.

Bill C-268 would change the Criminal Code so those convicted of trafficking children under 18 would receive a mandatory minimum sentence of five years.

 

{mosimage}A sharp policy turn away from Africa and away from the poorest countries has the development community wondering whether Canada is now using its foreign aid budget to promote trade and its security interests rather than help poor communities.

“We’re looking at this with a bit of a questioning eye to understand the rationale,” Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace executive director Michael Casey said.

{mosimage}TORONTO - Federal tough-on-crime legislation isn’t going to deter crime, won’t make communities safer and will divert millions of dollars away from crime prevention to build more jails and conduct more trials, said the Church Council on Justice and Corrections.

“It’s clear that you want to stop the gangs, that you want to make it safer for the community. Are these measures really going to make much difference?” asked Richard Haughian, who represents the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops on the board of the Church Council on Justice and Corrections .

{mosimage}VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict XVI has written a letter to the world’s bishops defending his decision to lift the excommunications of four traditionalist bishops and expressing regret that it gave rise to misunderstandings and polemics, according to Italian newspapers.

The Pope said the controversy over Bishop Richard Williamson’s statements denying the extent of the Holocaust was “a misadventure that was for me unforeseeable” and acknowledged that the Vatican should have paid more attention to information easily available on the Internet, the reports said.

{mosimage}TORONTO - Mass rape, forced abortions, hospital bombings and war crimes have been constant themes for the Tamil community as it has protested and prayed for international intervention in the civil war in Sri Lanka.

The most serious allegation against the Sri Lankan government found on signs at every Tamil rally is genocide. Tamil protesters have compared government attacks on Tamil civilians with the genocides in Darfur and Rwanda.

{mosimage}WASHINGTON - U.S. President Barack Obama's executive order reversing the ban on federal funding of embryonic stem-cell research represents "a sad victory of politics over science and ethics," Cardinal Justin Rigali said shortly after the March 9 signing of the order at the White House.

The chairman of the  U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities was among Catholic, pro-life and other leaders who criticized the reversal, which Obama had promised during his campaign.