TORONTO - Churches believe the moment has finally arrived when poverty is about to mix with politics in Canada, and the faith community wants an invitation to the party.

{mosimage}TORONTO - The Canadian Council of Christians and Jews has honoured multi-award winning performer and civil and human rights advocate Harry Belafonte with the International Diversity Award from its Canadian Centre for Diversity.

{mosimage}TORONTO - A pro-life advocate, Alex Schadenberg, has warned that one of the Catholic faith’s foremost goals, to preserve life, is under threat from the political and medical fronts in Canada.

{mosimage}OTTAWA - The collapse of Catholicism, not the demands of religious minorities, is responsible for Quebec’s profound anxiety over reasonable accommodation, according to Cardinal Marc Ouellet.

{mosimage}In less than a year the church in Prince Edward Island could cut two-thirds of its parishes. Demographic shifts, an overstretched and aging priesthood and financial pressures are driving the diocese of Charlottetown to consider reducing the number of parishes, missions and chapels it is committed to maintaining from 59 to 17.

{mosimage}With the latest calls to resurrect the “right to die,” a leading pro-life proponent reinforced his argument that life needs to be protected from conception until natural death.

{mosimage}TORONTO - There really is a new world order, and Canada has stumbled into a critical role in it, Sen. Romeo Dallaire told a gathering at the University of Toronto as he helped launch the anti-genocide Aegis Trust in Canada Nov. 3.

{mosimage}OTTAWA - A former Quebec justice minister has launched a petition aimed at bringing Pope Benedict XVI to Quebec City for the 2008 International Eucharistic Congress in June.

{mosimage}TORONTO - The Dalai Lama, whose name is Tenzin Gyatso, has a hard enough time convincing people he is a simple, 72-year-old monk and a refugee. That the spiritual leader who embodies both Tibetan culture and Tibetan Buddhism could convince 16,000 who came to see him at the Rogers Centre Halloween evening that he is a man of science and a champion of the secular borders on miraculous.

TORONTO - Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church just got a $1-million facelift. In just under one year art restorer Carlos Nunes and his team has restored the downtown Toronto parish to look as it did in 1908, except for a few new additions reflecting the culture of its Chinese congregation.