Mickey Conlon

Christmas was always special in the D’Cruz family — that tends to happen when there are 12 kids — but through the decades they have never let the secular overtake the religious in celebrating the season.

It’s amazing how far a small, one-off special creche exhibit has come over the past two decades at St. James Cathedral in downtown Toronto.

Despite what we’ve learned in the 30 years since the massacre of 14 women at a Montreal university, there still remains so much more that needs to be done, says the principal author of a declaration on violence against women in our society.

The failure to end child poverty in Canada, promised 30 years ago when parliamentarians pledged to stop the scourge by 2000, has seen a generation of children grow up without the supports they need, says Leila Sarangi.

Joy Smith is pleased that the Ontario government has stepped up with $20 million in annual funding to fight human trafficking, but these dollars and more need to be replicated by other provinces in combatting the problem.

Advent is a time of hope during a season of darkness. As a steadfast member of the Catholic Church and Leafs Nation, Dennis Patrick O’Hara can see parallels these days between his faith and favourite hockey team.

Forgive Blaise Alleyne if he doesn’t quite agree with the provincial government that Ontario universities and colleges are paragons of free speech. The pro-life advocate has the scars to prove they aren’t all that tolerant to some speech.

When Bishop Albert Thévenot says of his Missionaries of Africa order that “we work ourselves out of a job” in their ministry, it seems odd. After all, the order known as the White Fathers has lived on for 150 years and continues to make its mark in the world today.

There’s a simple reason that life-long Saskatchewan Roughriders’ fan Fr. John Weckend won’t equate sport with religion.

A new study echoes what several others have found since the implementation of the Canada Child Benefit: poverty is declining in Canada with a significant drop in food insecurity among low-income families.