WCR This Week

While retired Pope Benedict XVI said organization and governance are not his strong suits, he also said, "I am unable to see myself as a failure." In a book-length interview with the German author Peter Seewald, Pope Benedict said that when he resigned, he had the "peace of someone who had overcome difficulty" and "could tranquilly pass the helm to the one who came next." The new book, Last Testament, will be released in English by Bloomsbury in November.

EDMONTON – Toronto’s newest auxiliary bishop was called to be a servant leader, “a man for others,” in his episcopal ordination Mass Sept. 12 at St. Joseph’s Basilica. Cardinal Thomas Collins, in his homily, told Bishop Robert Kasun that a priest must reject the narcissism in which the leader’s personal agenda directs his actions.

Kathleen Murphy motioned with her outstretched arm, saying "Look at that grass! What a waste!" The grass she was alluding to was the lawn surrounding Assumption Church. But not all of the church grounds are grass. Tucked in a corner is a vegetable and herb garden with a few flowers to add colour among the flourishing vegetables. This green thumb venture is the result of Murphy's desire to turn her fellow parishioners on to the joys and rewards of gardening.

The music ministry for Edmonton Catholic Schools' opening Masses does not happen its own. However, it springs to life with much greater ease than one might expect. In June, Corey Nahayowski, Sandra Talarico and Beth Pecson sat down to choose the hymns based on the Scripture readings for the Aug. 30 Masses held at St. Charles and Corpus Christi churches.

STOCKHOLM - Allowing people to drink unsafe water or to have no access to dependable, clean sources of water is shameful, Cardinal Peter Turkson told religious leaders. "It is a continuing shame," too, that people's needs "are secondary to industries which take too much and that pollute what remains," said the president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.

EDMONTON - Catholic educators are called to teach not only with words, but with the witness of their lives, Archbishop Richard Smith told the staff of Edmonton Catholic Schools Aug. 30. The archbishop reflected on his experiences with his Grade 4 teacher, Mrs. Bradbury, during his homily at the district's annual Mass launching the school year.

Living out the call to justice is central, not only to Christian discipleship, but also to parish life, Bob McKeon said at a Aug. 27 retreat for the Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (CCODP). The speaker for the day-long retreat, McKeon, former coordinator of social justice for the Edmonton Archdiocese, said much depends on the size of the parish, its ethnic makeup and the priest.

'Don't let anyone tell you there are no hills in Saskatchewan," said Bishop Robert Hardwicke, the Anglican bishop of Qu'Appelle. "I've climbed 119 of them so far." "When I came to Canada (he is originally from England), they told me Saskatchewan was flat. Don't you believe it." The bishop, along with nine other bikers, had just rolled into the parking lot of All Saints Anglican Church in south Regina, completing more than three-quarters of his Pedalling Pilgrimage of Prayer bicycle tour of the southern portion of his south Saskatchewan diocese.

VATICAN CITY - With a large tapestry bearing the portrait of the woman known as the "Saint of the Gutters" suspended above him, Pope Francis proclaimed the sainthood of Mother Teresa of Kolkata, hailing her courage and love for the poor. Despite the formality of the occasion though, "her sanctity is so close to us, so tender and fruitful, that spontaneously we will continue to call her 'Mother Teresa,'" Pope Francis said to applause at the canonization Mass Sept. 4.

One inmate was baptized and confirmed while another was confirmed during Archbishop Emeritus Sylvain Lavoie's recent visit to the Bowden Institution. Thomas Grabon received the sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation while Jonathan Leduc was baptized during Lavoie's June 18 visit to the prison at Innisfail. The institution's two Catholic chaplains, Thelma Pelletier and Brent Walker, prepared the two inmates for the sacraments of initiation.