Published in The Catholic Register, May 21, 2020) By Glen Argan In Alberta, the province where I live, those hardest hit by the covid-19 pandemic are workers in meat processing plants. At High River’s Cargill plant, Canada’s largest meat-processing facility, 936 cases of covid-19 had been reported as of May 4 with hundreds more among people in the community who
Read more(Published in The Catholic Register, May 8, 2020) By Glen Argan One could almost hear the collective sigh of relief as governments across Canada announced the lifting of some restrictions imposed during Covid-19 pandemic. By the time you read this, Albertans will again be able to get their hair cut or styled and go shopping as retail stores open for
Read moreBy Glen Argan The question on many minds is, “When will life return to normal?” That implies another question: What is normal? For many, the answer would be something like, normal is when I return to my daily activities such as visiting family and friends, earning a living wage and the kids returning to school. For others, normal includes increased
Read moreHuman life is sacred; it is also a form of captivity. Most people get the first part, not so many the second. But if we don’t understand, or better yet feel, the captivity of our current existence, we will not know the meaning of hope. Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, we need hope. And hope is quite different than optimism. The
Read moreDistractions and busy-ness. These times of isolation are an opportunity to free ourselves from such superficial aspects of our lives. Now that we are not so busy, we can become more contemplative. That’s true, but I am also grateful for those distractions that take my mind away from the mounting global COVID-19 death toll, from all those news articles that
Read moreBy Glen Argan With widespread orders from bishops across North America and Europe to cancel public Masses including the Sunday Eucharist, some naysayers were bound to arise. Me, I agree with the bishops who have temporarily halted public Masses, first, because I believe in the sacredness of human life and, second, because this pause in Masses provides an opportunity for
Read moreSnow is gently falling this Saturday morning in Edmonton. It is near silent outside. I live a block away from 75th Street, one of the main arteries in this city which refuses to stop growing. But the last 10 days, two weeks, traffic on 75th has slowed to a trickle. The temperature is -10C, far too cold for the 28th
Read moreMy meditation today was on the pitiless injustice which Roman soldiers heaped upon Jesus prior to his execution. Jesus was mocked, flogged, spat upon, stripped, crowned with thorns and struck on the head with a reed. Jesus was an innocent victim in a bloodthirsty time. Are we any better today? The means of persecution may not be so violent –
Read moreShould the Catholic Church cancel all public Masses during the COVID-19 pandemic? While dioceses across North America and in many parts of Europe are doing just that, some prominent Catholics are saying the public celebration of the Eucharist must continue even if it costs some people their lives. The Eucharist is that essential to our spiritual lives, they say. I
Read moreNearly two weeks ago, I realized I was suffering from low-level anxiety, probably the result of reading too much about the spread of the coronavirus. I had been reading news articles about the epidemic in the Wuhan region religiously since early to mid-January and began to wonder about what the impending pandemic would mean, not so much for me or
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On the Threshold 