TORONTO - With elections looming next year both provincially and nationally, political parties are jockeying to position themselves on poverty.

At Queen’s Park politicians made time to talk to the Interfaith Social Assistance Reform Coalition Nov. 18 and trade blows over who really cares about the poor. In Ottawa, opposition politicians ganged up on the Conservatives Nov. 17 to issue a 300-page report calling for a national poverty reduction strategy to support the half-dozen provincial plans.

TORONTO - Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney is holding the gate open for Iraqi refugees another two years, and asking churches again for help.

By extending the program aimed at Iraqi refugees, Canada could welcome another 8,000 Iraqi refugees in 2012 and 2013. They would join approximately 12,000 Iraqis who will have come to Canada between 2009 and 2011.

Addressing the churches and other faith-based sponsorship agreement holders, Kenney told a Toronto news conference, “I’m asking you to get engaged. Do more. Raise more funds. Sponsor more refugees.”

In an open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canada’s bishops are calling for the the federal government to develop a national anti-poverty strategy.

“We invite Canadians today to join us in calling on our federal government to emulate the efforts of many provincial governments and develop a national anti-poverty strategy,” said the Oct. 15 letter from the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“Today, most new wealth is going to those who already have more than enough. Inequality is increasing in Canada. The growing rich-poor gap is threatening the economic and political power of our middle class and our treasured participatory democracy.”

TORONTO - Canadian Catholics have raised more than $3 million to help flood victims in Pakistan while the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace has been chosen to help deliver $2 million in extra emergency flood relief.

The $3 million raised for Development and Peace by Oct. 13 is eligible for matching funds from the federal government, transforming it into $6 million worth of aid.

Toronto parishes played a big part in the fund-raising drive, putting $463,000 in ShareLife’s emergency relief account in time for federal matching grants. Money has continued to trickle in after the Oct. 13 deadline, and ShareLife reported $466,113 in funds for Pakistan as of Oct. 18.

TORONTO - The Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace obtained a Federal Court injunction Sept. 12 to block an access to information request for the names and funding levels regarding its nearly 200 partner organizations in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa and Asia.

The request was made to the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) by LifeSiteNews, an online news organization that has published a series of articles over the past 18 months alleging links between Development and Peace-funded partners and pro-abortion lobbying in Mexico, Bolivia, South Africa and Nigeria. Development and Peace has denied those allegations and an investigation into five of its Mexican partners by the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops cleared the Catholic aid agency of wrongdoing while also warning it to be more prudent in selecting its partners. LifeSite called that investigation “deeply flawed.”

After the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace flooded Parliament Hill with more than 153,000 postcards last spring calling for Ottawa to hold Canadian mining companies accountable for damage they do to the environment and communities in poor countries, the mining industry is countering with a campaign of its own.

The Prospectors and Developers Association, dominated by junior mining and exploration companies, is urging its members to order up bundles of postcards that mining company employees can mail in opposing Bill C-300.

The new English translation of the Mass will be ready for Canadian parishes only when the bishops have Vatican approval for all of the texts and an opportunity to put in place a program to teach people about the changes.

With the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops announcing the new Mass texts will become standard south of the border beginning in Advent 2011, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops has received enquiries about the Canadian timetable.

TORONTO - ShareLife executive director Arthur Peters wants the fundraising arm of the archdiocese of Toronto more involved in efforts to encourage charitable giving with tax breaks on donations.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance has heard submissions from the charitable sector for years on ways to boost Canadian charitable giving. Peters would like to see lobbying by the charitable sector be more successful.

The Basilian Fathers are encouraging any possible victims of sexual abuse by Fr. Kenneth O’Keefe to come forward.

O’Keefe was charged Aug. 11 with one count of indecent assault stemming from his contact with a teenaged boy at St. Pius X High School in Ottawa in 1972. But if there are other victims or other unreported incidents to be dealt with, the Basilians want to hear about them and will work with police and the court system to see justice is done, said Basilian spokesman Fr. Tom Rosica.

The Basilian Fathers are encouraging any possible victims of sexual abuse by Fr. Kenneth O'Keefe to come forward.

O'Keefe was charged Aug. 11 with one count of indecent assault stemming from his contact with a teenaged boy at St. Pius X High School in Ottawa in 1972. But if there are other victims or other unreported incidents to be dealt with, the Basilians want to hear about them and will work with police and the court system to see justice is done, said Basilian spokesman Fr. Tom
Rosica.

"We are committed to making available financial support for restorative therapy for anyone who has been abused by Fr. O'Keefe or by any other Basilian," said a statement from the religious order.