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As we celebrate Canada Day we may not have a team in the exciting World Cup soccer tournament this month, but events surrounding it remind us that we’re so fortunate to live here. One news story really drove this point home: people in soccer-mad Africa are being killed by Islamist extremists for watching the games on television. 

Msgr. Foy knew what was at stake

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Last week I wrote about ordination of a friend for the Archdiocese of Kingston. Priestly ordinations are joyful occasions. They are not as common as they should be, but they are not rare. This coming Saturday something truly rare will be celebrated when Msgr. Vincent Foy will celebrate the 75th anniversary of his priestly ordination, which took place on June 3, 1939. 

Les glorieux Catholic

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A colleague and good friend of mine is an intractable Leafs fan, meaning he is generally unaware that NHL hockey exists after the palest first quarter moon of April.

No place for state in personal beliefs of nation

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Just before Christmas, 1967, then-justice minister Pierre Trudeau famously said: “There’s no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation.”

Who is this man?

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Palm Sunday this year began with the fundamental question being asked in Matthew 21: “And when He entered Jerusalem the whole city was shaken and asked, ‘Who is this?’ ”

Gauging the rights of religious institutes

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Religious and conscientious freedom is at the heart of several ongoing news stories. Some of the stories involve institutions and others individuals, but they all raise the troubling spectre that these rights may exist more in theory than in practice.

PQ’s star candidate a Harper ally?

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A friend in Montreal — I’ll call her Sassy Knoll for her love of conspiracy theories — thinks Pierre-Karl Peladeau and Prime Minister Stephen Harper are in league to torpedo the Parti Quebecois’ chances in the crucial April 7 Quebec election.

Pope’s ministers of mercy

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I was a little nervous about Pope Francis’ meeting with the clergy of Rome last week. As a seminarian and a new priest, I always looked forward to Blessed John Paul’s annual Holy Thursday letter to priests. To my disappointment, Pope Benedict XVI did not continue that tradition, but replaced it with an annual encounter with the clergy of Rome in the first days of Lent. Pope Francis opted this year to continue Benedict’s practice, and so met with the parish priests of Rome last week.

G.K. and the God debate

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God was abundant at the Toronto archdiocese’s recent inaugural Chesterton Debate. Dear old G.K., unfortunately, was in notably shorter supply.

Rolling Stone and the Pope: what a shame

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It is official: Pope Francis is a rock star. Or, at least that is what Rolling Stone magazine is announcing to the world by putting the Pontiff on its current cover.

Israel’s outlook must be seen through a biblical lens

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JERUSALEM - I have been to Israel more than a dozen times — as a pilgrim, leading pilgrimages, with my family, on a private retreat, for Christmas, for Holy Week, for board meetings, for the papal visit of 2009 — but never for something quite like this. I was invited to be part of the official delegation accompanying Prime Minister Stephen Harper on his visit this week to Israel and the Palestinian Authority (West Bank).