How vividly I can still hear them — as though it were recently — the raucous cries resounding across university campuses in the 1960s and early ’70s: “Hey ho, hey ho, Western civ has got to go.” 

This Sunday in Rome there will be a papal Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica to give thanks for the “equivalent canonization” last April of two new Canadian saints: St. François de Laval and St. Marie de l’Incarnation. The process of “equivalent canonization” permits the Holy Father to declare a beatified person to be a saint, waiving any requirement for a miracle to be certified after the beatification, and to dispense with the canonization ceremony itself. 

They say all politics is local and that municipal politics is closer to our everyday lives than any level of government. It’s about water, sewage and garbage pickup. It’s about street-light repairs, safe pedestrian crosswalks and parks where our children can play. 

I was not about to miss seeing the pope on our Queen’s University campus. Perhaps not “the” pope — but a pope nonetheless, and surely the first ever papal visit to Kingston. 

In a widely reported statement Pope Francis recently told bishops to protect minors with “utmost care” and warned that anyone who failed would “be held accountable.” 

This month 673,000 students were registered to attend English and French Catholic schools in Ontario. Their registration is a choice made by parents who value and acknowledge the importance of Catholic education for their children. 

Not so long ago, it would have been considered the kiss of death for Canada’s Catholic bishops to launch a national campaign against medicalized killing.