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Mess is a theme in my life, and therefore also in my barefoot preaching. I think I return to the theme because mess challenges me so deeply. While I grew, I found relief in order, comfort in control, rest in simplicity. And I wandered into a world with a tendency toward disorder, a resistance to control and more complexity than I could have imagined. I tried and failed to eliminate the mess, and I crawled out of rock bottom (more than once) to make peace with the reality of mess.

The Pope������Ƶapp visit to Canada and apology to Indigenous peoples was a profound occasion for our country. His visit also raises important questions about the proper relationship between political and religious institutions. 

On my way to becoming a Catholic I kept hitting speed bumps. There were certain things the Church taught that I could not get my head around.

I have never had an easy devotion to Mother Mary. For most of my life it has felt rather contrived. There are a few possible reasons. Growing up in a bookish household meant that spiritual and intellectual pursuits were closely intertwined and many of the expressions of Marian piety were viewed as populist pablum. My mother is a convert and is naturally suspicious of anything smacking of folk religion. My father kept a Rosary in the drawer of his bedside table, but the placement was strategic. He once explained to me that the counting of the beads was a useful sleep aid.

At a recent convocation ceremony, I closed my commencement address with a reference to one of my favourite stories: that of the famed astronomer Harlow Shapley and his discovery that Argon atoms, which make up one per cent of our atmosphere, never fade. They recirculate indefinitely.

Lead on, Milloy

Kudos to John Milloy for his July 10-17 column “Building a consistent culture of life.”

Whether Pope Francis proves correct that the Indian residential school system constituted “genocide,” he erred three times during the concluding media conference for his otherwise near-flawless penitential pilgrimage across Canada.

Pope Francis will lead a consistory to install new cardinals on Aug. 27. The 16 new cardinal electors, eligible to vote in the next election of a pope, come from surprising places, and many are involved with people on society������Ƶapp margins. As observers note, the men this Pope has named princes of the Church often have no pretensions to royalty. They are God������Ƶapp servants in the vineyard of life.

I don’t need to tell you that gender confusion is rampant among our youth today. Only 10 years ago, when I would ask an audience of adults or youth, everyone knew someone who was same-sex attracted, but no one knew someone who was experiencing gender dysphoria or identified as “trans.” Now everyone knows some young person fairly close to them in that situation: a son, daughter, nephew, niece, grandchild. Why?

The muting of approval following Pope Francis’ wholesale, emotional, and historic apology on Canadian soil for the “evil” done to Indigenous people has come in two forms.