QUEBEC CITY - Last week the National Assembly here was the scene of a rather unlovely protest, with topless women of a feminist bent protesting the presence of the crucifix over the Speaker’s chair in the chamber. Stripping off in the presence of the province’s first female premier, the protesters had written their slogans on their naked torsos, loosely translated as “heritage belongs in a museum.” The reference was to the Parti Québécois position that the crucifix will remain in the National Assembly, even while “conspicuous” religious symbols are banned from the public sector under the proposed “Charter of Quebec Values.” The crucifix is not a religious symbol, the government maintains, but a manifestation of Quebec’s “cultural heritage.”

A YouTube video issued by the family of the late Dr. Donald Low, in which the doctor argued passionately for a law that would allow assisted suicide in Canada for the terminally ill, has re-ignited the public debate about euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Pope Francis has been in the news following a three-part interview in which he commented on moral issues that have always generated much heat — homosexual relationships, abortion and contraception.

I found myself unwittingly joining in a fun new Catholic game last week. Ever since Pope Francis’ interview with La Civilta Cattolica was published in Jesuit journals around the world, there has been both within and without the Church great huzzahs that under the new Holy Father everything will be, well, new, new, new! So here and there more knowledgeable Catholics than one would find at, say The New York Times, or for that matter, at some of those same Jesuit publications, have highlighted this or that revolutionary quotation from the interview, only to reveal that it in fact was said five years ago by Pope Benedict XVI.

Francis of Assisi is one of the saints in the Catholic calendar honoured by different religions around the world. And with the election of our new Pope, people everywhere are hearing the name Francis now more than ever.

Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, is flying high at the moment, chairman of the “elite eight” cardinals going to Rome next week to advise the Holy Father on necessary reforms. He was invited to address the plenary meeting of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops this week.

Reading through Pope Francis’ fascinating 12,000-word interview in the Jesuit journal America Magazine, many thoughts and sentences leapt out, especially this one.

The Kenyan city of Mombasa is an ancient metropolis that bears the marks of its long history as a melting pot of civilizations, religions, cultures, races and nationalities. It is the gateway to East Africa and the coastal city of choice for many tourists from Asia, Europe and North America.

It’s something you never want to hear. You’ve believed and clung to something your entire life, something you stake your very existence on. Then someone suggests it’s all bunk, irrelevant, meaningless.

Readers will indulge me, I trust, if I write again about Msgr. Thomas Joseph Raby, whose funeral was held last week in Kingston. It does not seem excessive to spend another week on his memory.