The old saw says nothing focuses the mind like the prospect of being hanged in the morning. I can personally attest that having a child living in a country of double beheadings runs a very close second.

Is there no middle ground to be found?

It’s been 42 years since I emigrated from Saskatchewan to Alberta, but I still have a place in my heart for the old country. Although I don’t have any stake in what happens there and can’t name the mayor of either Regina or Saskatoon, I did check in to see the Saskatchewan election results on Oct. 26.

Serious decline

I read with some concern your article of Oct. 24, “Regis, St. Mike’s alliance in works.” When, during my tenure as President of the University of St. Michael’s College (2015-18), I found that similar discussions had been launched, I argued against the initiative. Our faculty of theology was losing money and students and was, in my view, struggling academically. To the extent that it had an identity, it was largely indistinguishable from the sad, secular drift of the Toronto School of Theology.

There were more than 30,000 people gathered around the National War Memorial in Ottawa for Remembrance Day ceremonies last year. This Nov. 11 — with COVID-19 restrictions — there will be no more than 100.

Across the U.S., prominent, colourful and verbose lawn signs have been popping up. They all begin with “We Believe…” with slight variations in the body of the text. The text is basically a compendium of recent slogans on various hot-button issues. One of my Sisters commented to me as we drove by: “It’s like a secular Creed.” (Simply google “we believe lawn signs” for a sample.)

It’s been clear to me for nearing a decade that the vast majority of my fellow journalistic worker bees have drunk the Kool-Aid on MAiD.

The pandemic has led to a resurgence in the tradition of family board games, including one called Pandemic. My own family has favoured a word association game called Codenames. There is another game on our shelf though that I find myself thinking about these days — Monopoly. 

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.

Democrat posturing

Stan Swamy is an 83-year-old Jesuit priest and for the past 30 or more years has helped the poorest of the poor to exercise their human rights, for which he has now been accused of being a terrorist by Narendra Modi’s BJP government and is now languishing in jail.