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{mosimage}Editor's note: The following speech was presented by Archbishop Thomas Collins to the Thomas More Lawyers' Guild of Toronto at their annual Red Mass dinner on Sept. 13. It describes how St. Thomas More is a worthy model for today of a Christian responding to God's call.

It������Ƶapp 93 years since the first apparition of the Virgin Mary to three peasant children, Jacinta, Lucia and Francisco, at Fatima, Portugal. Mary appeared six times entrusting to the youngsters three “secrets.” The first two, when revealed, urged the necessity of prayer and sacrifice so that Russia and the forces of atheism could be converted. At the last apparition, thousands witnessed the miracle promised to the three children: the sun, resembling a silver disc, could be gazed at without difficulty and, whirling on itself like a wheel of fire, seemed about to fall upon the Earth.

Since that time pilgrims, now up to seven million per year, have thronged to Fatima for prayers of petition and seeking miracles. Pope Benedict XVI will be one of them, making his first visit to Fatima May 13.

{mosimage}MONTREAL - What kind of society won’t admit religion? Apparently Canada.

Douglas Farrow believes Canada������Ƶapp grand experiment in multiculturalism is doomed. Or rather that it dooms its citizens to cultural relativism, a moral quagmire and the absence of true community.

TORONTO - It appears most Catholic school boards in Ontario are on board with the province's plans to vaccinate girls against the HPV virus. It's predicted the vaccine will reduce cervical cancer rates by 70 per cent.

{mosimage}Editor������Ƶapp note: The following is an excerpt from the article, “A Peace to Keep in Afghanistan,” by Ernie Regehr, a senior policy advisor for Project Ploughshares, an ecumenical advocacy group for peace and disarmament. It is a response to the Manley Report on the future of Canada������Ƶapp military involvement in Afghanistan. The entire article can be found on the organization������Ƶapp web site, .

The final report of the Independent Panel on Canada������Ƶapp Future Role in Afghanistan (Manley Panel, 2008) reinforced a prominent misperception in the current debate over the role of Canadian forces in Afghanistan, namely that “there is not yet a peace to keep in Afghanistan.” In large areas of the country, essentially the northern half, there is indeed a peace to keep. To be sure, it is a fragile peace, but if it is not protected, built upon and genuinely nurtured it will yet be lost.

{mosimage}TORONTO - When Michael Schmidt and Vanessa Nicholas got engaged they decided they wanted to symbolize their commitment ethically — with a socially and ecologically just ring.

TROMSO, Norway - Norway������Ƶapp Catholic parish of Var Frue Kirke (The Church of Our Lady) in Tromso may well be the most northerly Catholic church and most northerly Catholic cathedral in the world. It������Ƶapp located 400 kilometres inside the Arctic Circle, at a latitude of almost 70 degrees, similar to Siberia. (There������Ƶapp a Catholic mission house in the Canadian hamlet of Arctic Bay, Nunavut, at a latitude of over 73 degrees, but technically it������Ƶapp not a church).

{mosimage}TORONTO - The Catholic Church������Ƶapp historic mission to the native people of Canada is a big issue, and getting bigger. For the first time Statistics Canada reports there are more than one million Canadians who claim native ancestry. The aboriginal population grew 45 per cent between 1996 and 2006 — six times the growth in the Canadian population as a whole.

{mosimage}TORONTO - There������Ƶapp more to the modern practice of capitalism than squeezing costs to watch the bottom line grow, according to the company that sells some of the most expensive electricity in Canada.

Toronto-based has hundreds of business customers in Ontario and Alberta willing to spend three cents per kilowatt hour more for electricity than average rates. That������Ƶapp a 25- to 30-per-cent increase in their electricity bill.

{mosimage}If you pray for something for 100 years you might find the prayer refines itself in the light of new realities, and then perhaps the prayer itself deepens your understanding and broadens your horizon.