hand and heart

The recent post office troubles have impacted our regular fundraising efforts. Please consider supporting the Register and Catholic journalism by using one of the methods below:

  • Donate online
  • Donate by e-transfer to accounting@catholicregister.org
  • Donate by telephone: 416-934-3410 ext. 406 or toll-free 1-855-441-4077 ext. 406

An imperfect people on a spiritual journey to God

Fifth Sunday of Easter (Year C) April 24 (Acts 14:21b-27; Psalm 145; Revelation 21:1-5a; John 13:1, 31-33a, 34-35)

What sort of word did Paul and Barnabas proclaim to the communities they founded? We can expect that the death and resurrection of Jesus was first on the list — details about His life came later. Most importantly, their proclamation included the warning that Jesus had been appointed judge of the living and the dead.

We are stewards, not owners, of creation

MONTREAL – Mankind was created to take care of creation, not to own it, the archbishop of Manila told a Montreal audience April 6.

The power of prayer, ritual inside our helplessness

In the movie based upon Jane Austen’s classic novel Sense and Sensibility, there’s a very poignant scene where one of her young heroines, suffering from acute pneumonia, is lying in bed hovering between life and death. A young man, very much in love with her, is pacing back and forth, highly agitated, frustrated by his helplessness to do anything of use, and literally jumping out of his skin. Unable to contain his agitation any longer, he goes to the girl’s mother and asks what he might do to be helpful. She replies that there’s nothing he can do, the situation is beyond them. Unable to live with that response he says to her: “Give me some task to do, or I shall go mad!”

Scott McCaig dared to be a priest

OTTAWA – Bishop-elect Scott McCaig traces the beginning of his priestly vocation to a chance glimpse of a sign on the side of the road.

'VatiLeaks' trial: Author says he had duty to publish private documents

An Italian journalist said he was given private documents by a Vatican official detailing problems with financial reforms and that he had a duty to publish them.

"Amoris Laetitia" lets us know sex is not something to be looked down upon

Sex is not something the Church fears or is trying to control. Sex is not the opposite of prayer and spirituality, it’s not something we grudgingly concede to the young. Sex is not merely the mechanism of reproduction, although there’s no such thing as a full and true understanding of sex that can’t live with our human capacity to make babies.

Moving Vatican II forward

Pope Francis’ long meditation on love in the family does more than sum up two meetings of the world’s bishops in Rome in 2014 and 2015. Francis is bringing a new spark to an old fire.

Collins’ misgivings allayed by final Synod document

TORONTO – In six months Cardinal Thomas Collins’ misgivings about the 2015 Synod on the Family have been banished by a deeply scriptural Synod summation from Pope Francis.

For Catholic astronauts, flying to space doesn't mean giving up the faith

WASHINGTON - On the International Space Station there's a place, while filled with robotic equipment, where astronauts like to hang out. Called the Cupola, the small module has seven large bay windows that give crew members a panoramic view of Earth.

50 years ago, Time asked if God was dead? Millions today would say no

WASHINGTON - It hit like the proverbial ton of bricks: the Time magazine cover story of April 8, 1966 — Good Friday that year — asking, “Is God Dead?”

Canadian bishops point to "Amoris Laetitia" in fight against euthanasia

OTTAWA — Canada’s Catholic bishops are glad to count Pope Francis as an ally in their fight against euthanasia. The bishops were anxious to point out how strong the Pope rejects euthanasia in his post-synodal exhortation Amoris Laetita: On Love in the Family, Apr. 8, noting in its teachings its rejection of euthanasia.