Readers Speak Out: August 30, 2020

Hate crimes

It’s sad that we have come to a time when churches and statues of saints are being defaced and vandalized.   

These are not mere crimes of mischief, but should be seen for what they truly are: serious hate crimes. The evidence is pretty clear. Christian suffering and persecution have increased all over the world. Canada and the United Sates are no exception. And looking for government help to provide more security is not necessarily the answer. We need to speak up against this violence and vandalism. When those responsible are caught, they must he held accountable.

Where is the voice of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops strongly condemning these vile acts? We have heard nothing about these attacks against the Church in Canada in my parish.

Silence is not an option.

Lou Iacobelli,

Toronto 

Lack of debate

Thank you for publishing Michael Swan’s articles about the Toronto City Hall Peace Garden and Setsuko Thurlow’s appeal to Prime Minister Trudeau to acknowledge Canada’s crucial role in the creation of the first atom bombs.

City Council approved building the Peace Garden in 1983 (at a cost of  $1,100,000 in 2020 dollars) for Toronto’s 150th anniversary. Its official aim was to create “a lasting physical expression of our highest aspirations in our most public place. … In symbolizing peace and a love for mankind, it will represent our continuing struggle to avoid the devastation of war.”

Yet as Swan points out, creating a culture of peace requires more than monuments and eternal flames that are extinguished whenever it is convenient. Peace building needs ongoing public education, discussion and the persistent involvement of our politicians.

The lack of debate on issues of war and peace — particularly the horrors of nuclear warfare — by city governments and in Parliament has us walking into a future too horrendous to imagine.

Anton Wagner,

Hiroshima Nagasaki Day Coalition,

Toronto

Extra-Ordinary

Re: Syro-Malabar calendar (Aug. 2-9):

Fr. Raymond de Souza does the Church a favour by highlighting the vibrant liturgical life of one of our sister churches and as a Latin-rite pastor who has repeatedly tried to let the faithful know there are many ways to be Catholic, I thank him for his informative article.

That being said, he has missed the boat when it comes to our own liturgical calendar. The gift of Ordinary Time — or the rediscovery of Sunday as the original feast day, as the Vatican II documents have it — is something we can all better appreciate during our interminable COVID-19 observance.

His take on Ordinary Time (“an uninspired translation”) ignores the reality of all time being ordered: We come from God and we go to God. A bishop’s greatest title bestowed by the law of the Church is surely “the Ordinary” of a diocese (i.e., what the bishop does is normative for the local Church). Shouldn’t the universal Church be consumed in its teaching and action with ordinary life?

Fr. Matthew George,

Zurich, Ont.