The recent announcement (April 23) that Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski will be beatified in September brings to mind his dramatic final days in May 1981.

It's long since time to break with March Break.

Is it possible to entrust the cause of one saint to the intercession of another? Would it ever be necessary? If the former was the greater saint, would it be odd to entrust him to the lesser?

This is the 250th anniversary year of the death of St. Marguerite d’Youville, the founder of the Order of Sisters of Charity of Montreal. The first Canadian-born saint, she was canonized in 1990 by St. John Paul II.

It was, evident to everyone who knows anything about Vatican finances, a monstrous lie from the beginning. Or at least a monstrous mistake. But that it was believed by many is an indication that what a great number think they know about the Vatican is not true.

As 2020 closed, it was regrettable that the public observations of the 850th anniversary of the martyrdom (Dec. 29, 1170) of St. Thomas Becket did not take place due to pandemic restrictions.

The Boucher Report, released on Nov. 25 by the Archdiocese of Montreal, makes for distressing reading. The tale told therein also illustrates how failures in Canada may have contributed to the significant reforms made by Pope Francis last year aimed at changing the culture of episcopal governance.

Earlier this year I wrote an appreciation here of the late Fr. Jonathan Robinson, who established the Oratory of St. Philip Neri in Montreal in 1975 and transferred it to Toronto in 1979. Last month, I wrote about the 175th anniversary of the conversion of St. John Henry Newman on Oct. 9, 1845, which is now his feast day.

This autumn brings a trifecta of anniversaries for those of us devoted to St. John Henry Newman.

On Sept. 5, 1920, Laura Cardoso left the family home in which she had been born to marry Salustiano Roque de Freitas. Nearly 100 years later, I visited that home, now deserted, in her village in Goa, India.