It is late, dark and cold outside. Neve, our 97-pound dog, is standing in the middle of the road in front of our house. I think, silly dog, but just as quickly it occurs to me I am standing right beside her. As Neve and I look down Vincent Street I admire the Christmas lights which make our neighbourhood sparkle.

On a recent Saturday morning I revisited simpler times. After returning home from morning Mass the Bride and I were welcomed at our front door by Rose Anne, our eldest, and her two boys Jack and Beckett. Rose Anne had dropped by for a visit and had managed to rouse her sisters, Clare, Emma and Hope, from their beds. 

Is there no middle ground to be found?

Who is your favourite saint? Do you know something about the life of the saint? 

If the 20th century was the “age of anxiety” (W.H. Auden), the 21st century is shaping up to be the “age of rage.”

The timing of the photo op couldn’t have been better. A defiant, COVID- sick Donald Trump popping out of hospital to wave to his supporters from a vehicle, putting the driver and security detail in extreme danger, illustrated so perfectly one of Pope Francis’s key concepts in his latest encyclical, Fratelli Tutti , On Fraternity and Social Friendship.

They often say that one of the difficulties of discussing racism and prejudice in Canada is our reputation for being “nice.” Our supposed “niceness” acts as a veneer that covers up serious underlying issues.

The times they are a-changin’.

Writing in 1962 about anticipated dramatic changes to family, racial, social, political and sexual dynamics, singer-songwriter Bob Dylan warned the old guard that their existing road was rapidly aging and they’d better get out of the way if they couldn’t lend a hand to those driving world change.

Ladies, you’re being lied to. You can’t have it all. (And while we’re at it, all what?) No one can or does “have it all.”

It is 3 o’clock in the morning and my thoughts are too busy for sleep, so I pick up my pen.