t eanco VOL. 38, NO.5.
Friday, February 4,1994
FALL RIVER DIOCESAN NEWSPAPER FOR SOUTHEAST MASSACHUSETTS CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS
FALL RIVER, MASS.
Southeastern Massachusetts' Largest Weekly
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Pilot aid program at Connolly High expected to expand A pilot program aiding students with the expense of attending a Catholic high school is in place in the Fall River area of the diocese. If it proves successful. it will be extended to the areas serving the other diocesan secondary schools. Beginning last September, five students at Bishop Connolly High School, Fall River, had threequarters of the school's $3600 annual tuition paid throug~ an arrangement that saw the student's family, his or her parish, Bishop Connolly itself and Bishop Sean O'Malley each contributing $900 in cash (or services, in the case of the school). . By next September, said Rev. Richard W. Beaulieu, director of the Diocesan Department of Education, it is expected that each of the city's 23 parishes will similarly identify and aid a needy and academically promising student. The assistance will continue throughout the student's high school years. The scholarship plan was suggested by Rev. Edward J. Byington, pastor of Sacred Heart parish, Fall River, after Rev. John P. Murray, SJ, principal of Bishop Connolly, indicated the school's need for assistance.
A Dark Kinship
Viewe:rs also responsible for media, says prelate VATICAN CITY (CNS) Catholic viewers and readers share responsibility for the fare served up by the media and for improving the moral tone of daily life, Archbishop John P. Folc:y said. The U.S. archbislhop, president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, said the Catholic press can help the faithful meet their responsibilities. Archbishop Foley's statement for the 1994 observance of February as Catholic Pres!, Month, sponsored by the Catholic Press Association, was released by his Vatican office. Everyone who listens to the radio, watches television or reads a newspaper is responsible for what is offered, the archbishop said. "We are responsible for the declining moral tone: in the media because enough of us look at programs with explicit sexual and violent activity to give such telecasts high ratings," he said.
"Enough of us listen to abusive talk show hosts and disc jockeys to give their stations dominant market positions," he said. "Enough of us seek scandal in news reporting that the media seek circul'ittion and ratings through coverage of the sensational." The Catholic rress helps people responsibly use the media available to them by prQviding "intelligent, critical and moral evaluations of films and television programs" and by publicizing available religious programming, the archbishop said. Archbishop Foley, former editor of The Catholic Standard and Times in Philadelphia, said the Catholic press "provides complete and authentic newS reports of religious interest - not neglecting bad or even tragic news, but reporting it in the necessary context of all that the church does in the world Turn to Page 13
. The following editorial appeared in the Catholic Free Press, newspaper of the Worcester diocese. It is reminiscent ofa paperback thriller about the Cold War. Indeed, it is the farfetched stuff that B movies are made of. In this instance, however, it is truth and not fiction. From 1946 to 1956, numerous retarded children at the Fernald School in Waltham were given radioactive milk for breakfast or radioactive iron supplements. Thi's was done without the knowledge or consent of the chilo. dren or their parents. It was carried out by two of the country's most prestigious universities Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The subjects of the testing teen-agel's' with a mental age of about eight - were "rewarded" with an annual party at MIT. The experiments were part of a series of n.utrition studies. Researchers say they limited the children's exposure by rotating test subjects as much as possible. They Turn to Page 13
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DALLAS COWBOY Michael Irvin (left) walks with teammate Emmitt Smith before a Super Bowl practice. (eNS/ Reuters photo)
He supports Catholic schools 2 million percent
Dallas star Michael Irvin grateful to priest, school FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (CNS) - Dallas Cowboys all-pro wide receiver Michael Irvin started down a new path in life when he transferred to S1. Thomas Aquinas High School in Fort Lauderdale in 1982. And, by giving a $30,000 endowment to his alma mater in memory of his father, Irvin hopes to help others down a new path. "I will always be there for S1. Thomas because'S1. Thomas was always there for me," he said in a phone interview from Dallas prior to the Jan. 30 Super Bowl against the Buffalo Bills. "People need to support Catholic schools 2 million percent because they not only build a person up mentally and physicaliy, but spiritually." What young people need, he said, is a relationship with God and a chance to succeed.
"There's no better way to put it," Irvin told the Florida Catholic, newspaper of the archdiocese of Miami. "Many kids just don't get the opportunity to excel. A lot of kids don't have a connection with the man upstairs." Irvin, 27, had it rough at times. He was the 15th of 17 children and was suspended from a public high school after his sophomore year. His father, Walter Irvin, a roofer on weekdays and a traveling Baptist preacher on weekends, compared non public schools and chose S1.. Thomas Aquinas. Then the public school sued St. Thomas Aquinas to prevent the budding football star from playing sports in his first year at the Catholic school. Irvin recalled that during that rough first year, coach George Smith told him, "Look, we believe Turn to Page 13