Europe is suffering from "dramatic sterility," Pope Francis has said, urging Christians to preserve their moral values and to "revitalize" a continent that is increasingly being distinguished by a plurality of cultures and religions.

"In our day, Christians are called to revitalize Europe and to revive its conscience, not by occupying spaces, but by generating processes capable of awakening new energies in society," Pope Francis said addressing European political and church leaders at the Vatican.

After two World Wars ripped through the continent, Europe deserves peace, the Pope said, expressing disappointment that "particular and national agendas risk thwarting the courageous dreams of the founders of Europe."

To preserve European values, the Argentinian-born leader of the Catholic Church urged his followers to rediscover their traditional identity, starting with the family, which, he said, "remains the most fundamental place for this process of discovery."
The Pope noted that Christians must pass on the values of past generations to their offsprings as Europe is suffering a period of "dramatic sterility" which began in the 1960s.

The two New York Police Department detectives who were accused of raping a handcuffed teenage girl in the back of their van have reportedly been indicted on first-degree rape charges.

According to a report from the New York Post, officers Eddie Martins and Richard Hall are facing a minimum of 3 years and a maximum of 25 years in prison if they are convicted, and they are expected "to turn themselves in early next week for arraignment in Brooklyn Supreme Court."

Martins and Hall were working as narcotics officers in south Brooklyn on Sept. 15 when they arrested an 18-year-old girl on the allegation that she was illegally possessing cannabis and an anti-anxiety drug. They drove her to a Coney Island Chipotle parking lot, "where Martins raped her and both of the officers forced her to perform oral sex, she has alleged through her lawyer," according to the report.

A father in Canada is accused of beating his daughter for refusing to wear a hijab, police said, calling the incident "honor-based" violence. The alleged victim claims she was abused for over a year.

The 35-year-old man was arrested in Gatineau city, Quebec on Wednesday, police said in a statement. He was later charged with "assault, assault with a weapon, and uttering death threats." According to police, the girl, described as "a teenager," claimed that she had been suffering from the abuse for more than a year.

A young woman was arrested in Long Island, New York after robbing a bank while her 6-year-old daughter was apparently waiting in a taxi, local police said.

Diana Marini, 28, entered Chase Bank in Islandia, Long Island and handed a note demanding cash on Saturday afternoon, Suffolk County Police said in a statement. "The teller complied" and the woman grabbed an undisclosed amount of cash.

An 83-year-old Russian woman has been shamelessly robbed in her own apartment by a policeman who came to her 'rescue' after fraudsters tried to swindle the victim out of a substantial sum of cash she was saving for a "rainy day."

Earlier this week, a pair of con artists rang the doorbell of the 83-year-old Moscow resident. Introducing themselves as friends of the would-be victim's sister, the scam artists told the grandmother that her sibling needed urgent and expensive surgery.

The swindlers then waited outside while the old lady hastily raked up all the cash she had in her house, which according to relatives, was "saved for a rainy day."


As the victim of the scam rushed to hand over the money to the fraudsters, the concierge of the building stopped her to inquire as to what was happening. After the woman explained that she's rushing to save her sister, the concierge suspected something amiss and called her relatives. They assured the old woman that her sister was alright and in good health.

A veteran American political journalist who faces accusations of sexual harassment from multiple women has apologized for the "pain and anguish" caused to his female co-workers.

"I apologize sincerely to the women that I mistreated," Mark Halperin wrote on Twitter, fully admitting his "aggressive and crude conduct."

A Free Speech Arizona symposium is still going ahead in Phoenix after "violent threats" forced organizers to drop its headline speaker, right wing commentator Milo Yiannopoulos.

The event, organized by United Liberty Coalition, is taking place in Glendale despite a week of "violent threats"and "security concerns," according to organizers.

The group said it was forced to drop the controversial former Breitbart editor because of security concerns.

"This decision was difficult for us to make but ultimately the safety of both our speakers and guests are of the utmost importance to us," the group said.

Annabella Sciorra, Daryl Hannah, and other women explain their struggles with going public.

In March, Annabella Sciorra, who received an Emmy nomination for her role in The Sopranos, agreed to talk with me for a story I was reporting about Harvey Weinstein. Speaking by phone, I explained that two sources had told me that she had a serious allegation regarding the producer. Sciorra, however, told me that Weinstein had never done anything inappropriate. Perhaps she just wasn't his type, she said, with an air of what seemed to be studied nonchalance. But, two weeks ago, after The New Yorker published the story, in which thirteen women accused Weinstein of sexual assault and harassment, Sciorra called me. The truth, she said, was that she had been struggling to speak about Weinstein for more than twenty years. She was still living in fear of him, and slept with a baseball bat by her bed. Weinstein, she told me, had violently raped her in the early nineteen-nineties, and, over the next several years, sexually harassed her repeatedly.

"I was so scared. I was looking out the window of my living room, and I faced the water of the East River," she said, recalling our initial conversation. "I really wanted to tell you. I was like, 'This is the moment you've been waiting for your whole life. . . .' " she said. "I really, really panicked," she added. "I was shaking. And I just wanted to get off the phone."

All told, more than fifty women have now levelled accusations against Weinstein, in accounts published by the New York Times, The New Yorker, and other outlets. But many other victims have continued to be reluctant to talk to me about their experiences, declining interview requests or initially agreeing to talk and then wavering. As more women have come forward, the costs of doing so have certainly shifted. But many still say that they face overwhelming pressures to stay silent, ranging from the spectre of career damage to fears about the life-altering consequences of being marked as sexual-assault victims. "Now when I go to a restaurant or to an event, people are going to know that this happened to me," Sciorra said. "They're gonna look at me and they're gonna know. I'm an intensely private person, and this is the most unprivate thing you can do."

Editor's note: This just breaks our heart and we are thinking of the family and loevd ones of the Carver's.

They couldn't live without each other.

When Dennis Carver realized the loud cracks weren't fireworks but instead rapid gunfire, he jumped on top of his wife, Lorraine Carver, to shield her from the bullets.

"That's just the kind of love they had for each other," Brooke Carver, the couple's oldest daughter, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. "Their love was selfless."

Minutes earlier, the couple had been line dancing and singing along to country performer Jason Aldean at the Route 91 Harvest music festival on Oct. 1.

It was during the third or fourth lull in gunfire when the two got up, hand in hand, and started running. They ran for their lives and didn't stop until they got out uninjured, their daughter said.

Two days after the shooting attack, the couple, who lived in Henderson part time and owned a plumbing company, returned to their Riverside County home in California.

They would go on to spend the next two weeks more in love than ever with each other and with life.

"After the shooting, they heard from all of the people they cared about most. They were so happy," said Brooke, 20. "The last two weeks of their lives were really just spent living in the moment."

But on the night of Oct. 16, the couple's younger daughter, 16-year-old Madison Carver, heard a loud bang outside her window. When she ran down the street and rounded the corner, a familiar vehicle engulfed in flames came into view. Dennis, 52, and Lorraine, 53, had died together less than half a mile from their home.

According to the Riverside County Fire Department, their vehicle crashed into a metal gate outside their community at 10:50 p.m. on the 20000 block of Avenida De Arboles. It took firefighters nearly an hour to completely put out the fire, the department said in a statement.

'Little pieces of them'

Where others see a tragedy, the couple's daughters see a show of love (which confuses us - the editor a tiny bit).

If they had to lose both their parents at the same time, they said they're thankful it happened so close to the time of the Las Vegas massacre.

"We were so relieved when they got out of the shooting alive," Brooke said. "But I also think we've been given little pieces of them that we would've never gotten if the shooting hadn't happened right before they died."

Their father was strong and independent and always put the people he loved first. Their mother was humble and generous and appreciated the simple things in life - like a hearty laugh or a colorful flower arrangement.

Three days after the shooting, Brooke said she was on the phone with her father. They asked about each other's days and their plans for the weekend.

"Hey, you think I should get roses or different flowers for your mom?" her dad asked her.

There was no special occasion - no birthday, no anniversary.

"He just wanted to give my mom a reason to smile after the shooting," she said. "I swear they were more in love those two weeks than the last 20 years."

Nearly a month later, she said, not a single petal had fallen from the dried-up roses.

"It's almost as if they're frozen in time," her sister added. "We're so lucky we have those flowers to remind us of them."

A week after the fatal crash, another item carrying memories of their 52-year-old father showed up on their doorstep. During the confusion of the shooting, he had lost his phone, but a Las Vegas FBI agent promised to ship the phone to him.

"When we turned it on, all his photos and messages were still there," Brooke said. "This is how we know they're looking down and watching over us."

'Just the four of us'

The couple had been together for 22 years but waited until their daughters were older to get married. They wanted to share the special day with their girls.

On Aug. 9, 2010, they tied the knot at the Little White Chapel on the north end of the Strip. Their two daughters were the only witnesses.

"It's always been just the four of us," Brooke said. "But it never felt lonely because they loved us so much. They were always so happy and full of life."

Now they're down to two, but the daughters say they plan to honor their parents' memory by living by their family motto: We do as we do and we be happy.

"We've found some peace in knowing that our parents just loved each other so much that they had to go at the same time," Madison said. "They couldn't live without each other."

SOURCE (only their little local Henderson county paper and the Epoch Times were the sources we could find to cover this!)

While some progress has been made combating human trafficking in Canada more needs to be done, especially in educating the public, says former MP Joy Smith.

"There is human trafficking in Canada and it happens a block away from where you are sitting," Smith told more than 150 people attending the screening of a feature-length documentary Human Trafficking: Canada's Secret Shame produced by the Joy Smith Foundation. Smith hopes to get the documentary shown in schools and at police departments nationwide.

Most human trafficking in Canada involves Canadian women and girls, and the problem disproportionately affects Indigenous communities, panelists said following the Oct. 18 presentation. In addition to luring girls at schools, shopping centres and venues where they hang out, traffickers are increasingly using social media.