WINDSOR, ONT. – Windsor Regional Hospital could be the first hospital in Ontario, perhaps Canada, to successfully apply for a 150-metre restriction on anti-abortion protests or vigils.

When Harley travels the halls at Providence Healthcare, he gets the rock star treatment.

MANCHESTER, England – Britain's highest court has ruled that doctors can withdraw food and fluid from patients who are in a vegetative state or minimally conscious without seeking permission from judges.

MANCHESTER, England – An English bishop warned Catholics to be alert to the possible deliberate killings of seriously ill patients in state-funded hospitals.

SAN GIOVANNI ROTONDO, Italy – Many people admire St. Padre Pio, but too few imitate him, especially in his care for the weak, the sick and those who modern culture treats as disposable, Pope Francis said during Mass at Padre Pio's shrine.

MAPLE RIDGE, B.C. – Lorraine Shelstad was a prairie girl on her first trip to the big city, starting what was supposed to be a year of Bible study in Toronto.

VATICAN CITY – Corrupt business practices that seek to profit from the sick and the dying are a cancer to hospitals entrusted with the care of the most vulnerable, especially children, Pope Francis said.

VATICAN CITY – The Catholic Church is not a fancy medical clinic for the rich, but a "field hospital" that – often literally – provides the only medical care some people will ever receive, Pope Francis said.

If there is an issue that unites most politicians, health workers, social agencies and religious leaders, it is the urgent need for a bold strategy and major investment in palliative and hospice care.

The Man Who Learned to Walk Three Times by Peter Kavanagh (Knopf Canada, hard cover, 257 pages, $29.95).

In a poem by the English poet Ted Hughes, a hawk contemplates its physical form: “It took the whole of creation to produce my foot, my each feather; now I hold creation in my foot.”

HAVANA - Sitting outside the church where she was baptized, 65-year-old Clementina Torres recalls the time when anyone who publicly admitted being a Catholic in Cuba faced a host of problems. It could mean not getting into the "right" university or program, being taunted by classmates or isolated by neighbours, or it resulted in being fired, demoted or not allowed to advance professionally.

JERUSALEM - Since the death of his wife in an Israeli missile attack on their house in the Gaza Strip in late July, George Ayyad, 75, has been keeping vigil over his son Jeries, 31.

BETHLEHEM - Hospitals are mostly in the habit of receiving patients. In Bethlehem, Holy Family Hospital also receives pilgrims.

A Kenyan hospital specializing in maternal care that was co-founded by a Canadian doctor is being credited as the first health care facility in the world to be named after St. John Paul II.