Lenten warmth

Just a couple of things I feel are noteworthy for they have warmed my heart in these past Lenten weeks. 

With 60 “yea” votes in the Senate, Bill C-7 took its final step before becoming law on March 17, widening the expressway of death that Canada has been travelling since 2016.

This is the most profound story I have ever heard about prayer:

May 1 will mark the 30th anniversary of the publication of Pope John Paul II’s landmark encyclical Centesimus Annus. The document’s name suggests that it was written to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the publication of Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical Rerum Novarum, the first papal encyclical which addressed social issues of work, labour unions and economic justice. To an extent, that is true. However, the greater inspiration for the content of the document was the fall of Eastern European communism in 1989.

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?

Mess is not a new way of living for our family, but moving has a way of making figurative messes real. Our house is full of boxes, waiting for certainty that we will not need to move again soon.

Justice denied

The jailing of Fr. Stan Swamy for defending the human rights of an impoverished group against their overlords supported by a bigoted Hindhu fundamentalist political party makes a complete mockery of India’s boast of being the largest democracy in the world.

There’s been a lot of moral/ethical debate about whether Catholics should avoid being injected with COVID-19 vaccines that were produced using cell lines derived from an abortion.

“Feminism” is not a dirty word. At its most basic level, I define feminism as “the protection and promotion of women.” “Radical feminism” denies any significant differences between men and women beyond a few reproductive body parts, which, of course, is patently false, unscientific and demeaning. I was a radical feminist for a good portion of my life until I discovered John Paul II’s Theology of the Body.

For a decade of his 31 years with the Calgary Police Service, Sean Lynn worked with at-risk youth.