NEWS

TORONTO - Citizens for Public Justice is celebrating half a century of advocating Christian values to Parliament on issues of national importance.

OTTAWA - Montreal Archbishop Christian Lépine has warned against the Parti Quebecois’ plans to enshrine Quebec values in a charter.

CHARLOTTETOWN, PEI - Some Prince Edward Island Catholics are confident that their very first bishop, Angus Bernard MacEachern, will one day be recognized as a saint. A committee has started the process it hopes will lead to his canonization.

Throughout our lifetime there are many wonderful people who cross our paths and influence us in many ways. Msgr. Thomas J. Raby was one of these people.

OTTAWA - Caritas, or charity, both at home and abroad, will be the theme of this year’s annual plenary of Canada’s Catholic bishops Sept. 23-27 in Sainte-Adele, Que., says Msgr. Patrick Powers.

OTTAWA - The Jesuit Centre for Justice and Faith (Centre justice et foi) in Montreal stressed the importance of tolerant social climate to prevent a descent into xenophobia and demagogic excess as the Parti Quebecois government announced details of the proposed Charter of Quebec Values.

KILIS, TURKEY - While diplomats shuffle between Geneva, Moscow and Washington, their plans to place Syria’s chemical weapons under international control are having no impact on the war of attrition Syrians are fighting with rifles, rocket propelled grenades, tanks and bombing raids. As the violence that’s killed more than 100,000 Syrians wears on, Turkey is seeing more and more of the human toll in the form of refugees and wounded fighters.

MEXICO CITY - The archdiocese of Acapulco has suspended church services and instructed priests to turn their parishes into support centres after torrential rains on one of the busiest weekends of the year left the city cut off from other parts of Mexico.

MANCHESTER, England - The bishop of Northampton, England, has appointed a priest to investigate the possibility of opening the cause for sainthood of G.K. Chesterton, a British journalist and author of the early 20th century.

JERUSALEM - Christians in Syria are continuing to be targeted by outside fundamentalist groups who have joined the country's long civil war, said the head of the Syriac Catholic Church in Jerusalem.