Canadian priest fails to win election to Parliament

Published: 2004-06-29

OTTAWA (CNS) -- Several prominent Catholics failed to win Canadian federal elections June 28, with the Liberal Party winning its fourth consecutive election. Father Des McGrath, 69, a retired parish priest who co-chaired a multimillion dollar fund-raising campaign for St. Paul University in Ottawa and helped found the Fishermen, Food and Allied Workers Union in Newfoundland, ran a distant second to Liberal Bill Matthews in the Newfoundland constituency of Random-Burin-St. George's. Father McGrath ran for office as a New Democratic Party candidate even though the Vatican has banned priests from seeking political office. The New Democratic Party supports same-sex marriage and legal abortion. "You people on the mainland seem to be more interested in that (abortion) than any other issue in Canada -- and we got more serious issues right now," Father McGrath recently told The Globe and Mail daily newspaper. Also defeated in the federal election was Toronto-based Liberal Member of Parliament Dennis Mills, the federal government's point man for World Youth Day 2002.

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