FALL RIVER DiOCeSAN NEWSPAPIR FOR SOUTHEASTMASSACHusms CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS VOL. 35, NO. 26
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Friday, June 28,1991
F ALL RIVER, MASS.
Southeastern Massachusetts' Largest Weekly
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511 Per Year
Family brings bone marrow donor search to Fall River By Marcie Hickey Like most four-year-olds, Andrew Cabral loves video games, "anything to do with Ninja Turtles," and his toy jeep. He went on his first airplane ride this week and loved it. And he seems typical "as far as wanting to keep up with the other children and getting into trouble!" says his mother, Lucia Cabral. But Andrew is not typical. Unlike other four-year-olds he spends much of his time in the hospital enduring intravenous chemotherapy treatments, a temporary measure to control his leukemia until a bone marrow transplant is possible. The search for a bone marrow donor for the Pawtucket, RI, boy began in March, and it will continue between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. on Sunday at Espirito Santo Church in Fall River. Mrs. Cabral said the parish was chosen because it is "well-known" by the..M&oic Portugese population in the city, where Andrew's grandparents formerly lived. A match for Andrew is more likely to be found among persons of Portuguese descent. The initial screening process is a simple one, Mrs. Cabral explained. Potential bone marrow donors between the ages of 18 and 55 who come to the church on Sunday will be asked to give two tablespoonfuls of bl90d for analysis. If a potential" match is discovered
through the preliminary screening, the blood donor will be recalled for a second, more precise, blood test. . Should a positive match then be identified, that person would be asked to donate bone marrow in a 45-minute procedure at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. The procedure, in which marrow is taken from the donor's pelvic bone, would require an overnight hospital stay and would result in some temporary residual soreness in the hip - all with the pos_sibility of saving Andrew's life. Once transplanted into the boy, the marrow hopefully would rejeuvenate, replacing Andrew's diseased marrow with healthy tissue. The sooner a donor is found, the better, Mrs. Cabral emphasized. Although Andrew's leukemia is .currently in remission, that is an unpredictable and temporary state. "He could slip out of it any time," said Mrs. Cabral. "You have to keep searching like you' don't have much time." Since their only child was diagnosed as having leukemia in February,life has been turned upsidedown for the Cabral family, who are communicants at St. Mary's' parish in Pawtucket. While father Joseph continues to work fuHtime at a Rhode Island printing company, Lucia Cabral was forced to take an indefinite leave of absence from her job as a sales associate.
"There really was no choice," she said. "Andrew requires around-the-clock care." The past few months have been "extremely difficult - as anyone who goes through cancer in their family can tell you, it totally disrupts everything. You go from having a healthy child one day to hospital stays, clinic visits, medications the next... "You can't avoid it - the leukemia is with you every waking moment. It's the first thing you think of when you wake up and it's the last thing you think of before you go to sleep at night." She added, "We try to carryon a normal life, but everything becomes second to the disease." It is particularly difficult when the victim is a small child who can't understand what is happening to him. "Of course you can't really explain it to a four-year-old, but he hears the term [leukemia) so frequently," said Mrs. Cabral. "I told him his blood wasn't working properly and that's why we have to go to the hospital so much." Andrew's treatments at Rhode Island Hospital in Providence involve three-day stays on alternate weeks, during which he receives IV chemotherapy on a 24hour basis. The treatments frequently make Andrew sick, his mother added. Turn to Page Seven
REV. MR. MATHIAS
. REV. MR. SOUSA
Two to be ordained
.tomorrow In ceremonies tomorrow at St. Mary's Cathedral, Bishop Daniel A. Cronin will ordain Rev. Mr. Gregory A. Mathias and Rev. Mr. Douglas H. Sousa to the priesthood for the diocese of Fall River. Rev. Mr. Mathias. Rev. Mr. Gregory Mathias, born Jan. 16, 1964, in Providence, RI, is the son of August and Maria (Machado) Mathias. He has a sis-' ter, Lynn M. Mathias. A member of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel parish, Seekonk, he attended George R. Martin School in Seekonk and graduated from Seekonk High School in 1982.
He earned a bachelor of science degree in marine transportation from Massachusetts Maritime Academy in 1986, then began studies for the priesthood at St. John's Seminary in Brighton. During his seminary years he taught CCD at St. Francis parish, Weymouth; ministered at Carney Hospital in Dorchester; was head counselor at St. Vincent's summer camp in Westport and served an internship as acolyte at St. Pius X parish, South Yarmouth. Ordained to the transitional diaconate Jan. 5 by Bishop Cronin at St. Mary~s Cathedral, he then Turn to Page II
Life issues top pope's agenda
ANDREW CABRAL
VAT1CAN CITY (CNS) Abortion, long a pivotal issue for U.S. Catholics, is being nailed to the top of the universal church's agenda by Pope John Paul II. From the beginning of his pontificate, the pope has condemned abortion as an attack on society's "weakest and most defenseless members." But this spring he seized upon the issue with new energy and a new sense of urgency. In April he called an unprecedented meeting of the world's cardinals to discuss "the struggle between the culture of death and the culture of life." Opening the session, a Vatican official estimated that 30-40 million abortions are performed each year. During the pope's June trip to his Polish homeland, abortion quickly became the most controversial issue. The pope compared abortions in Poland ~ estimated at half a million per year - to the genocide that took place in the Nazi death camps. The comparison drew criticism from several Jewish groups. Then in late June, the Vatican
released the text of a papal letter to each ofthe church's 4,000 bishops, calling for a vast mobilization against what the pope termed a
modern "slaughter of the innocents." The tone of the pope's letter was unusually pressing, and his instructions were specific: bishops were to speak out against abortion and other anti-life practices "at every opportunity," keep closer watch on what their seminaries are teaching and on what church-run hospitals are doing, and support pro-life legislation and political initiatives. All this is likely to be crowned in coming months with a major papal document on abortion and the sacredness of human life, Vatican sources said. The pope's concern is not limited to abortion. He often expresses apprehension that euthanasia may also be gaining acceptance in some countries. And when he lashes out at a "prevalent death mentality" in modern culture, he is thinking of the sick, lhe handicapped and, to some extent, the poor. But abortion is the main issue; and the most crucial moral battleground for the pope. Vatican sources said the pontiff was deeply Turn to Page II