Arts and Culture

Hallelujah! Handel's Messiah still has special quality for choristers decades later

December 6, 2019

When Susan Worthington gets home from “Messiah” rehearsals with the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir she’s hungry and tired, but her brain is still full of music.

Seeking Jesus in people of the night

December 5, 2019

Award-winning columnist Deacon Robert Kinghorn has assembled a collection of his Catholic Register columns into a new book, The Church on the Street. In this excerpt, he explains his calling to minister to the forsaken on the streets of Toronto.

Book fails to cast new light on Nouwen

November 1, 2019

It’s not entirely clear that Michael Higgins and Kevin Burns are all that interested in Henri Nouwen as a writer or a priest. They’ve got bigger fish to fry — namely the Roman Catholic priesthood itself.

Rubens: The art of persuasion

October 18, 2019

Flowing from the brush of Sir Peter Paul Rubens, the art of persuasion is monumental, overwhelming, seductive and never quite as straightforward as it might at first appear.

Carnegie Hall artists help moms in need compose lullabies

September 13, 2019

NEW YORK -- Lullabies have been sung by parents to their children for time immemorial.

McLuhan and Trudeau: Penpals in new age

September 13, 2019

We live in the age of identity politics, where political and cultural battle lines are drawn around who and what we are. But this is not so new. Forty years ago, Canada’s most powerful politician and its most famous academic were thinking together about media, message, image and identity.

Author gives readers food for the soul

August 24, 2019

Theologian, therapist and author Mary Marrocco is not the sort who imposes pat formulas or rules of thumb to living her Catholic faith. But she does have one rule.

Group evolves from prayer group to music ministry named iv24

August 21, 2019

The music produced by the band iv24 for young Catholics at high school retreats, young adult events and evenings of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament is more a by-product than anything else. The seven-member praise and worship band from Mississauga, Ont., didn’t start off trying to achieve close harmonies, infectious beats or uplifting melodies.

It’s all hymns, all the time

August 10, 2019

WASHINGTON -- Catholics hear hymns in church, but hardly ever on the radio. Now they can augment their weekly diet of hymnody through a new audio web streaming service called Great Catholic Music.

Film highlights John Paul II alliance with Reagan

July 12, 2019

WASHINGTON -- Forty years after his first pilgrimage to Poland, a film and book has been released exploring St. John Paul II’s alliance with “deep spiritual bond” with U.S. President Ronald Reagan.