December 21, 2022 at 1:19 pm
I won’t even pretend to have been aware of the 60th anniversary of the opening of the Vatican II council (1962-1965) in April of this year. Pope (now Saint) John XXIII called Vatican II almost 100 years after the previous such council, to the surprise (and often shock) of CatholicsRead More
June 15, 2022 at 12:31 pm
Back in the March 30th issue of The Cape Breton Spectator, I wrote about the two-year process leading to the 2023 Synod of Bishops, called by Pope Francis in 2021, which asked Catholics across the world to join in “discerning and listening together to the voice of The Holy Spirit”Read More
March 30, 2022 at 12:44 pm
The Catholic Church’s Synod on Synodality (from the Greek “syn” meaning “a way of living and working together”) hasn’t received much media attention, but it is a first for the Church – a two-year synod that began in October 2021 and will run until 2023. Synods have been held fairlyRead More
December 15, 2021 at 11:47 am
A recent celebrant on CTV’s local Mass for Shut-ins began his homily with this line: If you go out into the garage and stay there all day, it doesn’t make you a car. Similarly if you go to church every Sunday, it doesn’t make you a Christian. That statement threwRead More
October 13, 2021 at 11:49 am
Although the Residential Schools have come under attack over the years, the discovery of the graves of children in and around the former schools in May of 2021 resulted in a new and urgent call for apologies from the various churches involved in them. Almost immediately after the graves wereRead More
March 24, 2021 at 11:52 am
In 1963, when Nate Nathanson, owner of CJCB radio and television, approached Rev. Frank Abbass with a plan to broadcast Mass for those unable to attend in person, I doubt either of them imagined the program would become the longest-running TV production in the country. Certainly, neither could have envisionedRead More
October 28, 2020 at 12:19 pm
Reporters and religious writers who cover the Vatican are already going to great lengths to make sure that Catholics, especially LGBTQ Catholics, realize that Pope Francis’ statement re “civil unions” changes nothing as far as the Catholic Church’s stand on homosexuality and its definition of “marriage” is concerned. (The latterRead More
September 30, 2020 at 12:26 pm
“It’s God will” is a statement so often heard that when one personally decides s/he no longer accepts it as reasonable, practical, or — let’s face it — believable, a statement from a high-ranking clergyman in the Catholic Church endorsing such a view, especially with regard to COVID-19, has toRead More