Re: “The Star of the North retires” (WCR, April 9).

Federal government funding cuts to CCODP are a cause for rejoicing in the Catholic community. After all, the irony is that this is probably about the only time that any North American government has done anything at all, however indirect, about reducing or restricting abortion in the world, in a very long time.

M.A. Caskey of Edmonton does not know whether to laugh or cry at comments made by Dianne Willman at the UN Commission on the Status of Women (WCR letters, March 26).

One of the biggest disgraces in the Catholic Church in Canada happened in post-Vatican II times when the Canadian Catholic bishops dissented on Pope Paul VI's encyclical Humanae Vitae. Up to the present, this stance has not been revoked. The Canadian bishops left the use of contraception up to the consciences of couples.

The quote from the 17th century English poet John Dryden "Better shun the bait than struggle in the snare" that appeared in Joe Gunn's article, "Overseas aid battered by storms of cutbacks" (WCR, Feb. 13), was prophetic in terms of what is currently happening with CIDA funding for Development and Peace.

Re: "Homeschoolers fear intrusion on parental rights from School Act" (WCR, March 12).

I refer to the editorial, "Besieged Church need not withdraw into circle of muskox" (WCR, March 19).

Re: "U.S. contraception debate won't happen here" (WCR, March 5).

Re: "Women need influence, Vatican tells UN" (WCR, March 12).

Kudos to Living Water College for their offering of a summer program in sacred polyphony (WCR, March 19).