NEWS

TORONTO - Exorcisms have always piqued the Hollywood imagination and provided a steady source of material for filmmakers in the horror genre. And with a new movie set for release Jan. 28, plus a reality-TV series on exorcists, Hollywood is once again entering the battleground of good versus evil.

The Rite, a horror film featuring Anthony Hopkins, is based on a book by journalist Matt Baglio about the accounts of an American exorcist. Meanwhile, the Discovery Channel is working on a reality show called The Exorcist Files.

Fr. John Horgan, a scholar on exorcisms and pastor at Vancouver’s Sts. Peter and Paul parish, was a consultant to the 2005 movie The Exorcism of Emily Rose, a movie loosely based on an actual case in Germany.

He cautions that Hollywood versions of exorcism usually provide a “liberal” interpretation of the actual rite. Scenes of “being chained and tied up has nothing to do with the Catholic rite of exorcism,” he said.

VATICAN CITY - Religious freedom and religious diversity are not threats to society and should not be a source of conflict, Pope Benedict XVI told diplomats from around the world.

The Pope asked the representatives of 178 countries, as well as of the Palestine Liberation Organization, the European Community and the Knights of Malta, to examine how well their own countries respect the right of individuals to believe, to act in accordance with their conscience, to gather with other believers for worship and to carry out the educational and social projects their faith inspires.

Pope Benedict met Jan. 10 with diplomats accredited to the Holy See and continued his Christmas-season focus on the connection between religious liberty and peace, and on threats to full religious freedom in Western democracies as well as in countries notorious for violating human rights.

Once again he denounced recent attacks on Christians in Iraq, Egypt and Nigeria and expressed concern about the recent renewal of Chinese government restrictions on Catholics there. Condemning the murder Jan. 4 of Salman Taseer, the governor of Punjab in Pakistan, the Pope said the country must overturn its blasphemy law, which makes insulting the Prophet Mohammed or the Quran punishable by death.

Taseer supported the move to abrogate the law, which the Pope said often “serves as a pretext of acts of injustice and violence against religious minorities.”

TORONTO - Toronto Archbishop Thomas Collins will meet with abuse victims and lead a penitential service in the course of a two-week visit to the archdiocese of Cashel and Emly in Ireland.

Collins’ apostolic visit to Ireland, which began Jan. 13, was mandated by Pope Benedict XVI’s March 19, 2010 pastoral letter to the Catholics of Ireland. Along with Collins’ visit to Cashel and Emly, Ottawa Archbishop Terrence Prendergast, S.J., has visited the archdiocese of Tuam, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, archbishop emeritus of Westminster, England, will visit Armagh and Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley is visiting Dublin. The program of apostolic visitation to Ireland also includes a trip by New York’s Archbishop Timothy Dolan to Ireland’s seminaries, and a delegation of religious visiting the religious orders.

Collins will lead a penitential service in the Cathedral of the Assumption in Thurles on Jan. 16 at 3 p.m. Thurles is about an hour-and-a-half drive west of Dublin.
 
All of the apostolic visitors to Ireland will meet with victims, with a particular emphasis on meeting individuals and families.

TORONTO

Mining and banking helped end 2010 on a positive note for investors who care about the environment, labour and community standards and transparent corporate governance. But over-all, ethical investors lost ground relative to conventional stock indices.

The Jantzi Social Index grew 11.95 per cent in 2010. That trailed the 13.84-per-cent growth in the S&P/TSX 60 and 17.61 per cent in the S&P/TSX Composite.

CATHOLIC REGISTER STAFF

The right of gay couples to be married free from discrimination trumps the freedom of religion and conscience rights of Saskatchewan’s marriage commissioners, the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal has ruled.

A unanimous decision released by the court Jan. 10 said any scheme that would allow marriage commissioners to refuse service to gay couples “would perpetuate disadvantage and involve stereotypes about the worthiness of same-sex unions.”

BOULDER, Colo.- From his office in Boulder, scientist Carl Drews can pinpoint the spot where his research theorizes the biblical miracle of the parting of the Red Sea took place.

Although Drews has never been there, the Google Earth Pro imaging on his computer can zoom in on the place in Egypt where Moses and the Israelites escaped death when the waters parted, according to the Book of Exodus. His virtual "pushpin" comes back with images of what is now predominately agricultural land, with orchards, irrigation canals and grape fields indicating vineyards.

It is in the Eastern Nile Delta, between Pelusium and Qantara, and 120 km north of the most popular theorized place in Egypt, which has been the Suez Canal. And it's reachable on foot.

"One of the places right in the middle of the crossing shows what looks like a hotel and some type of building," said Drews, a member of Epiphany Anglican Fellowship in Boulder, a congregation under the umbrella of the Anglican Mission of the Americas out of Rwanda. "It would be fun to knock on their door and to say in Arabic, 'Do you know that Moses walked right by here.' It would probably elicit a form of disbelief. But perhaps people would say, 'Well, maybe...' ”

WASHINGTON (CNS) — Frustration and aggravation are simmering across Haiti a year after a terrifying earthquake ripped apart the country's most densely populated region and as a persistent cholera epidemic endangers the health of people throughout the impoverished nation.

Life in a tattered tent in a crowded makeshift camp with no alternative on the horizon, threats to personal safety and the need to scramble for food and clean water are fueling the growing anger, said Archbishop Louis Kebreau of Cap-Haitien, president of the Haitian bishops' conference.

"The people of Haiti are tired of misery," Archbishop Kebreau said during a visit to the Washington headquarters of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. "They are tired of living in their tents. The people are saying they are not happy. They're frustrated and angry. That provokes violence."

More than 1 million people continue to live in hundreds of settlements that sprouted after the 35-second magnitude 7 earthquake. At least 230,000 people were killed.

AJAX, Ont.- A crisis response team is helping students at Ajax’s St. Francis de Sales Elementary School cope with the news that one of their teachers has been accused of trying to kill his wife while on a pre-Christmas Jamaican vacation.

Tracy Barrill, superintendent of education for the Durham Catholic District School Board, visited the school Jan. 3, the first day of classes for students returning from the Christmas break, along with the board’s crisis response team led by the board’s chief psychologist, Dr. Ian Brown.

“This is a type of situation that no one can anticipate. We certainly are shocked and saddened by what has occurred and are praying for them, praying for everybody who has been affected,” Barrill said.

TORONTO - Toronto’s Catholic Copts are just as worried as their Orthodox brethren about Internet threats of an Al Qaeda operation in North America.

The much larger Coptic Orthodox community has initiated meetings with police to discuss security in the wake of a New Year’s Eve bombing in Alexandria, Egypt, that killed 21 and wounded about 100. Fr. Bishoy Y Anis of Toronto’s Holy Family Coptic Catholic Church, however, is just as worried about the safety of the 250 to 300 families in his Catholic parish.

“Now I don’t think there is empty talk,” Bishoy told The Catholic Register. “They talked before in Alexandria and they did it. They talked in Iraq and they did it. They talked in Nigeria and they did it.”

Though the archdiocese of Toronto has yet to receive a request for additional security from the Coptic parish (without a bishop of its own, Toronto’s Catholic Copts fall under the authority of the Roman rite archbishop), it plans to provide Holy Family with whatever security may be necessary.

TORONTO - Spiritual leaders, agency directors, government officials, community leaders, educators and corporations will be some of the groups gathering together for the Jan. 12 launch of the Canadian Augustinian Centre for Social Justice.

Spearheaded by the theology and spirituality of St. Augustine and sponsored by the Order of St. Augustine, the goal of the centre is to open up dialogue between community groups and leaders to make social justice a reality, said Brian Dwyer, director of the centre and a parishioner at St. Brigid’s parish in Toronto.

“We believe that through partnerships and collaboration between groups in the community and the decision makers that a dialogue and agreement (on social justice issues) could occur,” said Dwyer.

The launch is an effort to get the dialogue started and establish partnerships with community leaders. In addition, the centre wants to get community groups that are interested in similar social justice issues working together to approach decision makers.