Canadian News

Without grassroots Catholics, Indigenous-Church relations won’t move forward

To meet the anticipated needs of the expected influx of refugee children fleeing Ukraine, the Toronto Catholic District School Board’s Angel Foundation, Loretto Fund plans to increase its annual budget from $5,000 to $50,000.

Talking about racism can be uncomfortable for some but a new resource aims to help churches navigate those difficult discussions.

Montreal’s Irish community will be on its feet again next week with resumption of its St. Patrick’s Day parade — two years after the Great Green blowout was unceremoniously cancelled by COVID-19.

In a multicultural society like Canada, the lack of diversity among dieticians has been a major problem, one Esraa Aly Naguib Hassan is working to change.

Ivanka Galadza is not the sort of person who ever expected to go to war, nor would any of her Ottawa neighbours pick the slight young woman out as a warrior. But with a pen and a sheet of paper, Galadza can concentrate the strength she inherited from priests and poets who resisted the Soviet empire.

Two weeks into the war in Ukraine, Lily Hordienko, principal at St. Demetrius Catholic School in Etobicoke, received a phone call from a parent letting her know that their son would not be in school that day. The family, the mother told Hordienko, hadn’t slept a wink all night. Her father was taking the train from Kiev to their family home in the western part of the nation. The train was under bombardment by Russian forces, The anxiety and uncertainty of the journey in midst of the crisis prevented parent and children from getting any rest.

The substantial loosening of public health protocols at places of worship around Canada — except, for now, B.C. — has made it possible to manifest the Catholic Mass that existed before COVID-19. But senior clergy know it will take time to restore parishes to pre-pandemic vibrancy. 

An investigation is underway of an incident where police were called on a four-year-old student at John Sweeney Catholic Elementary School in Kitchener, Ont.

As an ordinary Ukrainian far from home, Maria Ivaniv has struggled with all the emotions the outbreak of war was bound to fuel — fear, anger, despair and confusion. As a theologian, she looks to the Church for hope.