NEW YORK – Joy has to be rooted in the fullness of reality, the suffering of the Cross, the glory of the Resurrection and the providence of God, not in a gooey meringue of sweetness.

It is wonderful the theology we learn in coffee shops.

A new, three-year pastoral plan will drive Toronto’s 195 Catholic schools and 91,000 Catholic students to a deeper sense of who they are and what they are meant to be, even as campaigning Ontario politicians promise to tinker with school curricula to gain votes.

For Mark Neugebauer, his journey to the permanent diaconate is something he says he just “fell into.” A look at his story would beg to differ.

“You are servants of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. That’s who we are. That’s who the people expect their priests to be,” Cardinal Thomas Collins told his two new priests in his homily.

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The warm, generous, loving and happy young woman who was the first among the 10 Toronto van attack victims to be revealed to the public was laid to rest May 2 in her family’s parish with 900 friends and supporters crowding St. Clare’s Roman Catholic Church.

An image of sadness, grief and defiance has been imprinted on the heart of Toronto over this past week as an informal memorial sprung up along Yonge Street and then at least 25,000 citizens walked the empty street and gathered at Mel Lastman Square for prayers, songs and words of hope on the evening of April 29.

We were all lined up at our desks, blank forms at the ready an plenty of pens for St. Michael’s parishioners to use. 

If there’s one thing Deacon Peter Doyle always loved to do, it was put a smile on your face. And the earlier in the day the better.

Of course Mario Biscardi was given prior notice that he was to receive the highest honour the Vatican bestows on any layperson. 

Once a missionary, always a missionary. It didn’t matter whether bedridden with illness or looking off into retirement, Msgr. Philip J. Kennedy kept Canada’s mission territories close to his heart.

Many of us were fortunate enough to hear Cardinal Robert Sarah speak at St. Michael’s Cathedral Basilica last month. He is truly a holy man and strong voice in a world of banalities. How many people do you know whose cause is silence?

Sixteen-year-old Mary-Margaret Asoata wasn’t expecting much from Service Week. 

For almost half a century nothing has defined the historic parish of St. Francis of Assisi in Toronto’s Little Italy as much as the annual Good Friday procession which attracts 70,000 people every year.

An Ontario campaign to pressure politicians over the protection of health care conscience rights is “democracy in action,” said an organizer.