This past summer, the French high court ruled in favour of a family of a severely disabled French teen in a lawsuit against medical authorities that in effect says the child ought never have been born. The decision in this "wrongful birth" lawsuit implicitly accepts that Nicholas Perruche, who has heart problems and is deaf, dumb, partly blind, and mentally disabled, should [...]
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), at a major crossroad in his life in 1896, wrote a letter to a friend expressing his desire to become a philosopher: "As a young man I longed for nothing else than philosophical knowledge, and I am now on the way to satisfy that longing by passing from medicine to psychology." In one sense, his philosophy was simple and [...]
A conversation between U.S. Christian leaders Pat Robertson and Rev. Jerry Falwell on the 700 Club Sept.14 provoked strong media reaction. Both Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition, and Falwell, a Baptist minister and chancellor of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., said that God had lifted his hand of protection from the country and that Americans must repent. Robertson listed insults to [...]
During the Sept. 14 National Day of Mourning, Prime Minister Jean Chretien said, "Words fail us." Especially one word - God. It was a word that was not uttered during the official ceremonies on Parliament Hill. Many Canadians of faith were appalled by government services that failed to mention anything greater than or outside ourselves, reminiscent of other public ceremonies that expunged [...]
A World Made New: Eleanor Roosevelt and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by Mary Ann Glendon (Random House, $38.95, 333 pages) Mary Ann Glendon, a professor of law at Harvard, leader of the Holy See's delegation to the Beijing Women's Conference and usually one of the clearest thinkers on the issue of human rights, has penned a fascinating but ultimately disappointing [...]
One of the best people I know turned 65 years old recently and was given an enormous party at his workplace. Not only did friends and family celebrate the event, but also the fact that this man had recently undergone major heart bypass surgery. He was back at work, looking as fit as ever. His name is David Mainse, founder of the [...]
All newspapers have a "slant." It doesn't necessarily mean they get the facts wrong - it's just how they choose to interpret or misinterpret those facts for their readers. The pro-life movement is the biggest victim of news blackouts and censorship. Who do you think would get front page coverage - 3,000 pro-lifers in the annual March For Life in Ottawa, or [...]
It was 1870 and the Franco-Prussian War had just begun. A 25-year-old philologist, on his way to the front, observed a cavalry battalion exhibiting impressive clatter and pomp as it passed through the town of Frankfort. Taken by the spectacle, the young scholar had a vision, out of which was to grow his entire philosophy: "I felt for the first time that [...]
The author of legislation that legalized abortion in Canada will be the chair of the annual Toronto Cardinal's Dinner on Oct. 18. Former Prime Minister John Turner, as Pierre Trudeau's Justice Minister, wrote and guided through the House of Commons the Omnibus Bill that led to the legalization of abortion and homosexuality in 1969. Catholic pro-lifers are scandalized that for the second [...]
The Educated Child: A Parent's Guide from Preschool Through Eighth Grade by William J. Bennett, Chester E. Finn Jr., and John T.E. Cribb Jr. (Free Press, $44.50 hc, pb, 666 pages)The Educated Child, written by a former US Education Secretary (Bill Bennett), a professor of education (Chester Finn) and a former education department bureaucrat (John Cribb), was published two years ago but [...]
The Earl of Longford died earlier this month, a fact that in Britain provoked a response from almost every adult citizen. In Canada, he is less - perhaps little - known. Even so, he merited half-page obituaries in some newspapers and several radio and television discussions. I write about him because Lord Longford, or Frank Pakenham, was my godfather. He was 95 [...]
Philosophy was born the moment it was discovered that there is a critical difference between appearance and reality. The way things really are is not simply the way they appear to us. The surface of a table appears solid and static to us. Yet, according to physics, it is highly porous and charged with electrical particles. It has been said that philosophy [...]
Whenever a politician delivers an address, his audience simply assumes that his message is going to be political. So deeply entrenched is this assumption that it prevails even on the relatively rare occasion when a politician delivers an address that is essentially ethical. It is like assuming that your lottery number is never going to be a winner and not noticing, on [...]
I hate to say I told you so. But my goodness, I told you so. Not just me, of course. Everyone who believes in family, marriage and unchanging morality. All those people, in fact, who have been routinely chastised by the trendy powers that be and their fellow travellers. I refer to a report from Statistics Canada that concludes that people who [...]
Subjectivists prefer to avoid facing the possibility they may be complicit in wrongdoing Conscience, like most important concepts in the contemporary world, is widely misunderstood. In fact, its more popular usage is the perfect antithesis of what it really means. The world, being skeptical and not believing that one can know what is true, has disconnected conscience from the realm of the [...]