MONTREAL - The fire that ravaged a large part of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris offered an opportunity for French Catholics with Canadian connections to reflect on the impact the event can have on their faith.

Catholic parents fear the massive March 15 education cuts are just the opening salvo of a campaign to fold OntarioöÏÓãÊÓƵapp Catholic schools into a unified public system, while French Catholic trustees are warning of much deeper cuts to come.

PARIS - A day after Islamic extremists massacred 130 people in Paris last month, a Muslim-Catholic couple married in Lyon. It had to be a civil ceremony because the Muslim family refused to enter a church. Shocked by the attacks, some relatives even asked whether they should go ahead with the ceremony at all.

LAFONTAINE, Ont. - Four centuries ago, the first Mass west of Quebec was celebrated in the Huron-Wendat village of Carhagouha. On Aug. 15, Toronto's Cardinal Thomas Collins returned to that spot to mark the 400th anniversary of the event.

PARIS - Catholic churches in France have been placed under police protection and urged to take extra security measures against possible Islamist attacks before the Aug. 15 feast of the Assumption.

OXFORD, England - French and British Catholic bishops urged their governments to settle a growing refugee crisis around the port of Calais, where highways have been blocked and migrants from Africa and the Middle East have died attempting illegal crossings of the Channel Tunnel, or Chunnel.

VATICAN CITY - A French court has told authorities in Ploermel, France, to remove the small town's statue of St. John Paul II on claims the statue's placement in a public square violated the separation of church and state.

VATICAN CITY - Despite media reports that Pope Francis refused the candidate France proposed as its next ambassador to the Holy See — speculating that it is due to the fact Laurent Stefanini is homosexual — the French government has yet to receive an official response from the Vatican, said a spokesperson for the French government.

MONTREAL - Montreal's cardinal of the people, Archbishop Emeritus Jean-Claude Turcotte, is dead.

The popular cardinal, who served as Montreal's archbishop for 22 years, died April 8 in MontrealöÏÓãÊÓƵapp Marie-Clarac Hospital.

VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis has approved a miracle so that, for the first time, a married couple can be canonized together.