TORONTO - Bishop Samuel Ruiz made the Vatican nervous, he made the government of Mexico nervous and he made indigenous people around the world proud. Ruiz was bishop of the diocese of San Cristobal de las Casas in the southern Mexican province for more than 40 years. He was memorialized in an ecumenical prayer service in Toronto Feb. 23 by veteran human rights campaigners and Church activists.

“His legacy is alive and well and is needed in Mexico today,” Jesuit Father José Avilés told about 100 people who gathered for the prayer service and a conference that followed.

The Iraqi family sponsored by Cardinal Thomas Collins is in the final stretch of its long road to refuge. The Iraqi Christian refugees should be in Canada before the end of April thanks to an offer of sponsorship by Collins.

Members of the archdiocese of Toronto administrative staff have raised the money, drawn up a 15-page settlement plan and gathered together a hope chest to make sure the family will find a warm welcome in Toronto.

The office workers have come together to take full responsibility for the refugees, said Martin Mark, executive director of the archdiocese of Toronto’s Office for Refugees.

TORONTO - In his Grade 9 art class at Fr. John Redmond Catholic Secondary School in west end Toronto, Roman Makuch is drawing beavers, turtles and geese, trying to see through aboriginal eyes and express himself with First Nations’ symbols. The semester dedicated to studying aboriginal art is not easy, Makuch tells a visitor. But he believes it’s valuable.

“We’re all Canadian,” he said. “We’re all proud of being Canadian and part of our past is aboriginal.”

Grade 12 student Radiyah Chowthury spent last year reading aboriginal authors in her Grade 11 University Enriched Natives Studies English class at Blessed Mother Teresa Catholic Secondary School in Toronto’s Malvern community. She can’t imagine not studying aboriginal authors. As an immigrant kid, she’s unwilling to settle for a history of Canada that begins and ends with European sailors bumping into a big, cold land mass on their way to India.

Churches need to define how they're going to help repair the damage residential schools did to aboriginal culture in Canada and the federal government must cough up the millions of documents that future historians will need to tell the story of Canada's effort to assimilate First Nations' people, says the interim report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada.

The report marks the halfway point of the five-year mandate of the commission. It warns that government reluctance to provide full and meaningful access to Library and Archives Canada records threatens the mandate of the commission. The TRC intends to go to court to force greater government co-operation.

TORONTO - Fr. Tom Rosica knows he’s going to get letters. You don’t wade into the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis expecting bouquets of roses.

Controversy has never been a hallmark of Salt + Light TV. Since its launch in the wake of World Youth Day 2002, Rosica has consciously shaped the digital broadcaster as a voice of hope — clear, Catholic evangelism without the rancor, resentments or fear that so often mar religious television.

Despite efforts at balanced, just-the-facts reporting, Salt + Light’s next big documentary will elicit partisan passion for and against Israel, for and against the Palestinian leadership, when it airs later this year.

TORONTO - Students at Marshall McLuhan Catholic Secondary School in Toronto began Lent with a purpose. The 1,000-plus students at the midtown school are raising money to combat child sexual slavery.

Jesuit Father Len Altilia told the students Lent should make us want to reach out to the helpless, particularly the women and children who suffer most from violence and sexual exploitation.

"It's not just an act of charity," said Altilia. "It is an act of faith and an act of justice."

TORONTO - Cardinal Thomas Collins was big news over the two weeks leading up to his elevation to the College of Cardinals.

Every major news organization in Canada covered the event in Rome with news reports, analysis, feature interviews, photos, videos and live blogging. Canada’s largest newspaper kicked its coverage off with a two-part profile of Collins that ate up pages of precious newsprint.

“It was acres, wasn’t it?” said Toronto Star associate editor Alison Uncles. “It was thousands of words.”

TORONTO - Full-day kindergarten may be off limits to the Drummond chainsaw, but Ontario’s Catholic schools are still bracing for a lean season.

The Drummond Commission On the Reform of Ontario’s Public Services was commissioned by Premier Dalton McGuinty and released Feb. 15. In it, TD Bank chief economist Don Drummond recommends dozens of cuts to education funding. That’s never good news for Catholic schools, said Paul Whitehead, Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association senior policy advisor for finance. Less money means less flexibility for school boards.

TORONTO - As she takes over as executive director of KAIROS, Jennifer Henry’s priority is keeping the ecumenical social justice organization close to its roots in Canada’s churches.

“My commitment is to preserve the ecumenical character of this organization and I think that’s also the commitment of people around the board table,” Henry told The Catholic Register.

TORONTO - When Fr. Roger Brennan was living and working in a dirt-poor town 700 kms southwest of Manila in the Philippines, he didn’t think he would have to answer questions about whether it was OK to eat chicken during Lent. As far as he could see, his parishioners in Hinunangan were too poor to pass up any opportunity for a little extra protein, no matter what time of year it happens to be.

“Let’s face it, they fasted 12 months of the year,” Brennan, a Scarboro Missions priest, said.