As legal gambling becomes widespread, dangerous addictions grow Gambling has become a widespread practice in Canadian life. It may be found in the form of state-managed lotteries, casinos and even charity raffles. Every province in Canada holds a near-monopoly over the gaming industry. Lotteries, horse racing, charitable gaming, casinos, slot machines, video lottery terminals and internet gambling are all somewhere in Canada, [...]
“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, and though the mountains tremble at its swelling” (Psalm 46:1-3) On Jan. 12, an earthquake measuring 7.0 on the Richter scale rocked Haiti, [...]
15 years after Cairo, abortion controversy rages In October, the UN General Assembly held a high-level meeting for the 15th anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development. While some have used the anniversary to try and assess progress towards realizing the ICPD program of action, the UN Fund for Population Activities and pro-abortion non-governmental organizations have sought to use the [...]
Fearful Symmetry: The Fall and Rise of Canada’s Founding Values by Brian Lee Crowley (Key Porter, $34.95, 360 pages) In an important new book, Fearful Symmetry: The Fall and Rise of Canada’s Founding Values, Brian Lee Crowley persuasively argues that the future prosperity of Canada depends on a revival of marriage and the family. For Crowley, this is a new understanding. Until [...]
Canada’s anti-prostitution laws are being challenged by a prostitute, a former prostitute and a dominatrix, who argue that decriminalizing bawdy houses and scrapping the law prohibiting living off the avails of prostitution will make the sex trade safer for women. Countering the sex trade activists, the Ontario and federal governments have been joined by REAL Women of Canada, the Christian Legal Fellowship [...]
41.6 million abortions annually, yet report frets about access The Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion think tank, has released a study which says surgical abortions decreased in 2003 from 1995 levels, but decried that abortion was not universally legal and that many women have “unsafe” abortions due to the fact the procedure is illegal or restricted in much of the developing world. In [...]
Titus Brandsma was a small, gentle, bespectacled man. He spent years working with the Dutch underground movement to smuggle Jewish people out of the Netherlands and away from the threat of the Nazi murderers. As a monk, he rejected violence and so would not, could not, pick up a gun to use against the oppressors of goodness and all he [...]
The sign outside the fire hall in Malton, just near Toronto’s Pearson airport, read “Remember 9-11.” It was just a couple of days since the 8th anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, but I was pleased – and somewhat surprised – that someone was still making the effort. I was in my late thirties on the [...]
Agronomist who helped double agricultural production dies at 95 Norman Borlaug, one of the most important people of the 20th century, has died at the age of 95. Borlaug is often referred to as the “father of the green revolution” – the new processes and techniques in agriculture that brought food to hundreds of millions of starving people and helped lower the [...]
In an attempt to address concerns about expanding abortion coverage that might result from changes to the U.S. health care system, Senator Max Baucus (D, Montana), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, amended his proposed bill to say that abortion cannot be mandated by the Department of Health and Human Services. The change echoes an amendment proposed by Rep. Lois [...]
In September, the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children held its national conference in conjunction with the annual meeting of the International Right to Life Federation. Conference participants were thus treated to international experts from all corners of the globe who spoke about the challenges to defend human life at all stages. SPUC, which describes itself as the world’s first pro-life [...]
A new study released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control on August 19 found that vaccines for the human papillomavirus (HPV) have caused 12,424 adverse reactions after more than 23 million doses have been administered in the United States since 2006. Most were classified as “non-serious” – fainting, headaches, rashes – but 772 were serious including anaphylaxis (life-threatening allergic reactions), blood [...]
Some of America’s leading billionaires met secretly recently to consider how their wealth could be used to “slow the growth of the world’s population.” Attending on the initiative of Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, they discussed joining forces to overcome political and religious obstacles to change. Other participants included David Rockefeller Jr., the patriarch of America’s wealthiest dynasty, Warren Buffett and George [...]
At a time when the affronts to life at every stage are enough to leave one’s head spinning, a group of summer interns at Campaign Life Coalition, the political arm of the Canadian pro-life movement, has decided to put its energies into hosting an uplifting charity event for all ages: a fashion show celebrating the dignity of each human life. [...]
It’s helpful to learn, in these difficult financial times, the problems we share with the very wealthy, who have to experience getting along on considerably less income. Ruth Madoff is one of those persons, the celebrity wife of an epic swindler, Bernard Madoff, a financial adviser who was found guilty of purloining $170 billion in a gigantic Ponzi scheme. Her husband’s estimated [...]