We arrived in the Eternal City with the dawn. On the in-flight screen, as we flew through the darkness, I could see the sun racing towards us. It reached Rome the same time as we did.

Add one more item to the list of COVID-19’s destructive impacts: the concept of private health care may be becoming more palatable to a majority of Canadians, a claim that a national survey made early last month.

In last week’s column I recalled Pope John Paul II’s call for “a patient and fraternal dialogue” among Christian leaders and theologians on possible reform of papal primacy. The day after I sent that column to TheRegister for publication, I received my copy of the British Catholic magazine TheTablet in which Rowan Williams, the former archbishop of Canterbury, discussed the same topic.

When I give Media Literacy workshops to folks, I often ask: What’s the first thing you think of when you think of “the media”? The overwhelming majority think: the news.

We are living in a time of deep mistrust. It’s not the first time in history that has happened but it’s happening now, so we must deal with it or at least try to understand it. It is especially rampant under the cloud of COVID and the issues surrounding the vaccine.

From Jan. 18 to 25 each year, the Christian church celebrates the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. The week, really an octave, is a time when Christians of various denominations hold joint services in each other’s churches to pray for full visible unity of the communion of believers.

It is a January deep freeze in Saskatchewan and my three-year-old buries himself in his blanket in the morning and says, “It’s cold and I’m tired. I’m not getting out of bed.” He just says what the rest of us are feeling.

I was recently interviewed by a secular news outlet about a new fictional film featuring nuns. I almost didn’t do the interview. Why not? Because I know better.

Growing numbers of commentators are warning of “a grave danger” to American democracy — the possibility of a civil war or other anti-democratic actions by right-wing extremists aimed at overthrowing the United States government.

It was one of these soft evenings when a gentle snowfall enveloped the drabness of the streets, and with no breeze to speak of, the chill had been taken from the air. As I walked the downtown streets the ancient hymn came to my mind, “See Amid the Winter’s Snow.”