NEWS

A Presbyterian prayer around the turn of the 20th century rather summed up the position of Toronto’s Irish Catholics before the First World War.

CAIRO - Egypt’s new interim government is doing nothing to prevent hate speech, which is inciting violence, said a prominent Egyptian Catholic leader.

TORONTO - The Syriac Orthodox parish of St. Barsaumo has rallied around Sammy Yatim’s mother and sister in the aftermath of the youth’s July 27 shooting at the hands of Toronto police.

WARSAW, POLAND - Calls for an Olympic boycott because of a Russian law banning “propaganda of non-traditional sexual relations” have become “highly politicized” and will not draw a response from the Russian Church, said an official of the Russian bishops’ conference.

VATICAN CITY - Dialogue and negotiations are "the only option for putting an end to the conflict and violence" in Syria, said Pope Francis and Jordan's King Abdullah II.

QUEBEC CITY - The archdiocese of Quebec has begun construction on a holy door for its Basilica-Cathedral Notre Dame de Quebec, the first Catholic parish in French-speaking North America.

BEIRUIT - Syrian-born Melkite Catholic Patriarch Gregoire III Laham warned against armed intervention in his country, saying, "It has brought us to the tragedy we are now living in Syria."

WASHINGTON - U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry were consulting with other world leaders about how to respond to Syria's apparent chemical weapons attack on civilians.

VATICAN CITY - As international leaders increasingly discussed the possibility of some form of armed intervention in Syria, the Vatican announced Pope Francis would interrupt the last week of his summer break in order to meet Aug. 29 with Jordan's King Abdullah II.

OTTAWA - Religious freedom experts say the proposed Charter of Quebec Values that would ban religious dress and symbols from public institutions is unlikely to survive a Supreme Court challenge.