About a week after Ontario’s new minimum wage kicked in, I grabbed a sandwich at a well-known coffee shop.

VATICAN – In his ministry as archbishop of Manila and in his travels for Caritas Internationalis, Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle said he is reminded of the true meaning of hope by people living in situations the world would see as hopeless.

There are few, if any, parishes in Toronto that had three shooting deaths in the first month of the year and followed them up with two more in the next few months. Add to this an epidemic of drug overdoses and a picture of lawlessness could emerge.

UNITED NATIONS – Conditions in many parts of the world force women and girls to bear the burden of carrying out everyday chores for their families and communities, keeping many of them from getting even a basic education, the Vatican's U.N. nuncio said Oct. 6.

We’re all guilty to some degree, aren’t we? I mean, guilty of taking things for granted.

VATICAN CITY – With millions of people fleeing violence, persecution and poverty around the globe, individual nations must expand options that make it possible for migrants and refugees to cross their borders safely and legally, Pope Francis said.

VATICAN CITY – Saturday, Pope Francis and German Chancellor Angela Merkel met at the Vatican, agreeing on the need to dedicate special attention to the responsibility of the international community in addressing issues of poverty and hunger.

John of the Cross teaches that within spirituality and morality there are no exempt areas. Simply put, you cannot be a saint or a highly moral person if you allow yourself a moral exemption or two.

Given the chance to tell politicians from Ottawa about poverty, Sr. Sue Mosteller didn’t want to argue about economics.

VATICAN CITY – People cannot sit back and be indifferent or unresponsive to growing poverty in the world as a privileged minority accumulates "ostentatious wealth," Pope Francis said.

ABUJA, Nigeria – At a recent meeting, the Catholic Bishops of Nigeria gave a bleak summary of the state of their country, lamenting humanitarian crises including violence at the hands of Boko Haram and other extremist groups, poverty, government corruption, and a lack of respect for human rights or dignity.

The concept of a guaranteed basic income for the poor has been around at least since St. Thomas More pondered the topic 500 years ago in the court of Henry VIII. Napoleon apparently liked the idea. U.S. founding father Thomas Paine was an active proponent after the American Revolution. Even disgraced president Richard Nixon floated its potential as a means to tackle poverty.

UNITED NATIONS – Saying poverty is the greatest challenge facing humanity, the Vatican's permanent observer to the United Nations called on nations to seek solutions to poverty not only based on economics but to also address personal, social and environmental factors that contribute to it.

If the economy leaves 1.3 million Canadian children living in poverty, is the economy really working?

Every armchair economist in the country wonders how a country so rich can have so many people who are poor.