The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio)

In his latest book: "The Jesuit Disruptor: a Personal Portrait of Pope Francis" Michael W. Higgins offers a nuanced look at a complex pope with a simple agenda: radically reforming the Catholic Church. He is the Basilian Distinguished Fellow of Contemporary Catholic Thought at the University of Toronto's St. Michael's College. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

With the overthrow of the Assad government in Syria, the story of a daring diplomatic mission undertaken more than a decade-and-a-half ago can now be told. Syria and Israel have been implacable foes for more than three-quarters of a century. But in 2007, a resident of Thornhill, Ontario met secretly with Assad for two-and-a-half hours in hopes of beginning a peace process with Israel. That man was Moshe Ronen, who has never previously publicly discussed his peace mission, and he joins Steve Paikin to talk about this experience and more. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Many Ontarians likely took lessons from the Royal Conservatory of Music as children. Alexander Brose is the new president and CEO of the Royal Conservatory, which has headquarters in Toronto. He joins us in studio to share his vision for Canada's most prominent music education institution. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How many 16-year-olds these days love Ella Fitzgerald? Young musician Ellie Maxwell sure does. After being adopted from South Africa, Ellie now lives with her family on Manitoulin Island. She joins us in studio to share her story and to sing an original song. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Coming off a five-week national tour, country rocker Devin Cuddy joins us in studio to talk about his inspirations, his upbringing, and how he lost his writing voice and found it again. He also performs an acoustic version of "Dear Jane," the title track from his latest album.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Howie Mooney does have a day job that has nothing to do with reporting on football and hockey, podcasting, or writing books. But the day job doesn't float this Ottawa native's boat like sports does. And so we thought we'd get him in here to tell us about a couple of his books: "Crazy Days & Wild Nights", and "The Consequences of Chance", where he indulges in his passion for all things sports. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How did Pan-African thought spread through North America in the twentieth century? The proliferation of Black liberation movements is explored in a new book called "Cross-Border Cosmopolitans: The Making of a Pan-African North America" written by McGill University historian Wendell Nii Laryea Adjetey (Nii Laryea Osabu I, Atrékor Wé Oblahii kè Oblayéé Mantsè).See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The longest-serving prime minister in the history of the British Empire and Commonwealth is Canada's very own, William Lyon Mackenzie King. This year, to celebrate 150 years of King and his legacy, The Agenda invites experts and historians to dive into his past.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Christmas is just around the corner. In preparation, The Agenda invites veteran Bayview Village Santa Claus, Ken Jones to discuss how parents all over the country can prepare for one of the biggest moments of the season - their annual family photo with mall Santa. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Over a period of 8 months, Ronnie Shuker set out to play hockey in every province and territory in Canada. The resulting book is called "The Country and The Game: 30,000 Miles of Hockey Stories". It's less a chronicle of his quest for ice time, and more of a journal about the characters he encountered at arenas, motels, bars and mancaves across Canada for whom hockey is no mere game. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There are a few reasons why the Canadian dollar is lower against its U.S. counterpart. One is a widening gap in interest rates. Another is economic performance – the U.S. is growing while Canada seems to be slowing. A lower dollar is bad news for consumers and for large parts of the economy, but some sectors do benefit from a weak Loonie. A look at what business are prospering amid a soft dollar, and how potential tariffs could drive it even lower.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

"The Master Plan" is a play about the failure to build a city of the future along Toronto's historic waterfront. This satire of the messy drama between Google's Sidewalk Labs and Waterfront Toronto is currently running at Soulpepper Theatre in Toronto's Distillery District.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Journalist John Lorinc's new memoir, "No Jews Live Here," is a documentation of four generations of his Hungarian Jewish family's journey through the Holocaust, the 1956 Revolution and ultimate settlement in Canada. Lorinc took a journalistic approach to find the facts behind the stories he heard growing up.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There are plenty of very vulnerable people living in Ontario, and tonight, we're going to look at some of the people who are possibly at the very bottom of the food chain. They are homeless, they are dying, and for the vast majority of them, they have nowhere to go. Which is why the Journey Home Hospice exists. It's a small home in downtown Toronto that tries to make the last days on earth for a handful of homeless people a little bit more civilized. SE Health helps run Journey Home and their chief operating officer Nancy Lefebre is here to tell us more.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Project Humanity started as a theatre company, and grew into an organization with a larger community purpose. Priscilla Williams and Melissa Bleecker met through the Project Humanity 1:1 program, which pairs professional working artists with youth on the margins. Together they have explored and expanded their metalwork practice and look forward to bright shiny futures.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

China's population is now shrinking. India's could follow within a generation. South Korea has the world's lowest birth rate. Italy has the fastest shrinking population in Europe and Canada's birth rate dropped from 1.6 children per woman to 1.26 in less than a decade. Almost everywhere you look, fertility rates are dropping. What does a world look like with a shrinking population? Can you grow an economy with fewer and fewer people? Can governments do anything to arrest the declining rates and incentivize their population to have more kids? And could those solutions become darker and darker and imperil women's rights? Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson, authors of Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline, discuss the looming threat of population collapse. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Should you have kids? It's a question most of us will ask ourselves at some point in our lives. Antinatalists have an easy and categories answer for you, regardless of your life circumstance: don't. In fact, it is immoral, they claim, to bring new life into this world. Lawrence Anton, editor of the Antinatalist Handbook, and Amanda Sukenick, host of The Exploring Antinatalism Podcast, join the program to make the case against having kids. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Canada-Mexico relations hit a rough patch earlier this year following the Canadian ambassador's criticism of Mexico's judicial reforms. Hopes for a rapprochement were raised following the election of Mexico's first female president Claudia Sheinbaum. Those hopes were dashed, however, when Donald Trump announced his intention to impose a 25% tariff on all products coming from Mexico and Canada, leading to strong reactions in both countries. Will Trump's threat strain 85 years of Canadian-Mexican relations? Host Steve Paikin asks: In Mexico City: José Luis Granados Ceja, Journalist and co-host of the Soberanía Mexican Politics podcast; Solange Márquez Espinoza, Geopolitical analyst and co-author of "Mexico & Canada: Two Nations in a North American Partnership" Laura MacDonald, the Chancellor's Professor of Political Science at Carleton University. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Once a year, Ontario's Auditor General takes a deep dive into several aspects of provincial spending. The highlight of this year's report: how the Ford government managed the situation on Toronto's waterfront. The verdict: not great. Shelley Spence, who last week issued her first ever report as the province's newest auditor general, joins Steve Paikin to discuss this and more. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

One of the longest relationships many Canadians will have isn't with friends, partners nor parents. Siblings are, generally, one of the lifelong companions you don't get to choose and, sometimes, conflict creeps in. Sibling rivalry is a tale as old as time, from biblical stories to more contemporary examples of sporting excellence. Why do sibling rivalries begin and will they ever really abate? We ask experts in various fields to discuss this and more. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.