From the editor's desk

Catholic New Times, Sept 12, 2004

As CNT moves into its 29th year fresh from our summer hiatus, we are happy to see that our homespun columnist with the razor mind and guitar, Cobalt's own Charlie Angus will now be representing Timmins-James Bag in Ottawa.

Charlie eked out a 500 vote victory in the federal election at the end of June. Now the NDP's Agricultural and Heritage critic, Charlie will bring his formidable, boundless energy and gift for eloquent song-writing to his new role. For of our readers who have never heard Charlie's check oat his work as the driving force behind the Grievous Angels (www.grievousangels.com). The Edmonton Journal describes Angus's music as "a national treasure whose songs one day will rank right-up there with Gordon Lightfoot, Ian Tyson and Stan Rogers."

Tom Harpur's book The Pagan Christ has been a runaway best seller in Canada. In July's CNT, our reviewer Scott Lewis S.J was decidedly unenthusiastic about it.. Harpur responds to Lewis in this ongoing debate. We sent the book to Europe and England and Scripture scholars them dismissed it out of hand. British scholar H.J. Richards is representative of the academy's response. Frequent CNT contributor, Barry Blackburn also gives a literate response to this controversial book. See our centre spread. Pages 10,11

Next issue will see the beginning of a new series which will run this publishing year. We're calling it, "How my thinking has changed." We're asking some serious Christians to write about their faith journey.

Staff writer Kevin Spurgaitis' long piece (page 5) on the plight of homeworkers helps us reflect on the meaning of Labour Day 2004. Dean Jalonen's cover beautifully sets this up.

Finally, we call attention to our modest fee increases on page 19.

--editor@catholicnewtimes.org