U.S. President George Bush named University of Chicago ethicist Leon Kass the chairman of his President's Council on Bioethics in August. The events of Sept. 11 delayed the naming of the other 17 members, who were finally revealed in January. The list is controversial in some circles, because it is more conservative than previous presidential bioethics councils. The members include such nationally [...]
At a ceremony at United Nations headquarters April 11, the required instruments of ratification for the entry into force of the Rome Statute to establish the International Criminal Court were formally lodged by 10 nations. The deposited ratifications of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ireland, Jordan, Mongolia, Niger, Romania, and Slovakia brought the total number of ratifying [...]
Would you like to see "Timothy and the Terrorist" in your local public library? Written by John Robin Sharpe, the story deals with young white boys who are sold as sex slaves to an evil sultan, and includes graphic details of man-boy and boy-boy sex acts, beatings, and even a circumcision. Described by Sharpe himself in a letter as "sadomasochisticfaggotkiddie porn," such [...]
Pro-family advocates and traditional Catholics are worried that a student who is pushing the issue of bringing his same-sex partner to a school prom is being used by the homosexual lobby to advance their cause and weaken the distinctiveness of Catholic education in Ontario. Before Marc Hall set out to buy two tickets for the prom at Monsignor John Pereyma Catholic Secondary [...]
A U.S.-based front group, that claims to represent at least a small number of Catholics, angered orthodox and mainline members of the Catholic church recently when it arranged to have billboards hoisted at two locations in Toronto claiming that the church's stand condemning contraception has led to deaths from AIDS. The billboards, erected by Pattison Outdoor Advertising and located at Front Street [...]
An April 17 letter from Danco Labs, the New York company that manufactures and distributes the abortion pill Mifeprix (RU-486) sent to health care workers warned of severe complications associated with its abortifacient and admited that six women have developed serious illnesses and two have died after taking the drug to induce abortions. The letter also warned doctors that they must report [...]
Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of Atheism, By Paul C. Vitz, Ph.D., (Spence Publishing Co, $24.95 U.S., 174 pages) Should religious beliefs be subject to psychological analysis? Psychology should be irrelevant. Dr. Paul Vitz, a professor of psychology at New York University and at the Institute for Psychological Sciences in Virginia, bases the entire premise of Faith of the Fatherless, the [...]
The Clash of Orthodoxies: Law, Religion, and Morality in Crisis By Robert P. George. Forward by John J. DiIulio (ISI Books, $24.95 U.S., 387 pages) In a day and age when the upholders of traditional morality and people of faith are finding it increasingly difficult to gain a hearing in the public square where they are marginalized by the reigning liberal orthodoxy, [...]
On page 20, we highlight a nine-year-old story; namely The Interim's coverage of then attorney-general Marion Boyd's announcement that Ontario's NDP government would seek a court order restricting pro-life activity (such as the counselling of women or peacefully protesting against abortion) at certain locations in the province. The Ontario Court (General Division) issued a "temporary" injunction - and nine years later, it [...]
Recently, Statistics Canada presented the 2001 Census, in which it was reported that population growth in this country is at a record low and that what meagre growth there has been is only due to increased immigration. To sustain a population, a country must have a fertility rate (the number of children a woman will have in her lifetime) of 2.1; Canada's [...]