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t eanc 0 VOL. 38, NO. 18
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Friday, May 6, 1994
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FALL RIVER DIO«:ESAN NEWSPAPER FOR SOUTHEAST MASSACHUSETTS CAPE COD & THE ISLANDS
F ALL RIVER, MASS.
Southeastern Massachusetts' Largest Weekly
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511 Per Year
Pope John Paul prognosis good
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WORKING WITH CHAIRMAN John P. Urban and Bishop Sean P. O'Malley (center) for a successful Catholic Charities Appeal in the New Bedford area are (from left) Father Daniel W. Lacroix, Helena Tavares, Robert Rebello and Father Maurice O. Gauvin. (Hick(:y photo)
Appeal stands at $383,696 Reports from parish and special gifts collections have brought the current Catholic Charities Appeal collection to 5383,696.28. Collectors for both parishes and special gifts are asked to complete their calls as soon as possible and bring their reports to their respective headquarters or parishes. The parish phase of the Appeal closes on Wednesday, May 25, but the Appeal books will re'main open until 10 a.m" Wednesday, June 8
and reports received by that time will be credited to the 1994 Appeal. To assure such credit, from May 30 on reports should be brought in person to Appeal Headquarters at 344 Highland Avenue, Fall River, Rev. Da.niel L. Freitas, diocesan director of the Appeal said, "We are anticipating that each of our 112 parishes will report substantially increased donations to meet escalating needs and that our final total will surpass last year's figure of $2,226,973.22."
ROME (CNS) - Doctors say Pope John Paul II is recovering well from a thigh bone fracture and reconstructive surgery, but will need several weeks of recuperation before fully resuming his duties. "The pope is in good general condition, and I found him in great humor," Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls said April 30, the day aft~r the pontiffs twohour operation. On Ma.y 2, the spokesman said the pope continued to improve and was beginning muscle-toning exercises in bed. In a tape-recorded Sunday blessing May I, the pope said he was sorry the accident forced him to postpone a planned trip to Sicily and miss the rest of the African synod. "The designs of divine providence are truly mysterious'" he said, his voice somewhat weaker than normal. In the days following the surgery, the pope met regularly in his hospital room wit A top aides toreview a revised scheduleJor the coming months. He was expected to remain in Rome's Gemelli hospital for 2-3 weeks. .The pontiff, who will be 74 May 18, fell getting out of his bathtub late April 28, breaking his right thigh bone close to the hip. DocTurn to Page Two
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LITURGICAL DANCERS bring candles to altar at Dominican Academy Mass opening school's centennial year. (Gaudette photo)
Dominican Academy looks towards second century By Pat McGowan In an era that has seen the closing of all too many Catholic schools, it is a joy to know of one that is proudly celebrating its first 100 years, emphasizing that first in a way that leaves no doubt that it expects to be around for centuries to come. On April 24, blue ribbons tied to the wrought-iron entrance stair-
way of Dominican Academy on Fall River's Park Street signaled the beginning of a yearlong celebration that will climax in June 1995 with graduation of the academy's centennial class of eighth graders. Between now and then special events at the only Catholic all-girl grade school in Southeastern MasTurn to Page II
Forgiveness is only thing th:at makes sense, says Father Jenco By Marcie Hickey "In order to be pilgrims of peace we must make incarnate in our lives the love and forgiveness of Jesus-love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you," said Father Lawrence Martin Jenco, the Servite priest held hostage by Shiite Moslems in Lebanon Jan. 8.1985, to July 26.1986. "I try to make incarnate in my life the Sermon on the Mount," he said: "Blessed are the peacemakers." Father Jenco was keynote speaker for a peace and justice workshop by that title at LaSalette Shrine, Attleboro, April 30. Eight years after his release, now stationed at a seminary in Berkeley, Calif., and writing a book about the hostage ordeal, the priest is still searching for the meaning of the 19 months he was "chained to a wall," allowed "10 minutes a day to use the bathroom," and cut off from the outside world. For six months he was in soli-
tary confinement, then he was moved to other locations that he shared with several American hostages kidnapped by Islamic Jihad, which was demanding release of 17 terrorists held in Kuwait. Among those held with Father Jenco were William Buckley, a former CIA officer who died in captivity, and journalist Terry Anderson, in 1991 the last of the hostages to be freed. Father Jenco described the hostage experience as one of struggling to retain his dignity and identity while not giving in to anger and hatred toward his captors. He sometimes asks himself, he said, "Haven't I a right to my anger?" but ultimately, "we are called to forgive, we need to seek forgiveness ourselves. and the church must be a forgiving community." In fact, he expressed not bitterness but compassion for his guards, "pious followers of Islam" whose formal education ended by age 10. Hostages and guards faced almost
insurmountable cultural and religious differences, but the guards were not abusive and on occasion exhibited a seemingly incongruous affection for the priest they called "abuna," dear father. Father Jenco worries about their future and the prospects for peace in their part of the world if they cannot take the first step needed for reconciliation: "to understand what they've done and the hurt it caused." After his release Father Jenco
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met William Buckley's widow in Paris and she had just one question for him: "Why?" "I didn't have the answers then, and I still don't, said Father Jenco.
Flashbacks The situation in Beirut, torn by factional fighting between Moslem and Christian forces, deteriorated seriously between July 1984, when Father Jenco was asked to head Catholic Relief Services in the Lebanese capital, and his arrival there that October. "I had never lived in a world like that," he said of the daily barrage of violence. Before his kidnapping, he spent many nights on the floor in the center of his house, hoping the walls would hold against "the violence outside." "I wrote on the wall in black calligraphy: Dear God, I want to live." It was a prayer he would offer again and again in the long months of captivity that followed.
He recounted his kidnapping from a car in traffic in a congested area of Moslem West Beirut: "A tremendous violence came down the street; men rushed up to the car, automatic weapons blasting in the air. I said to [the driver), I am going to be kidnapped." Taken by the kidnappers to an isolated area and thrown into the trunk of a car, "my first thought was, I am going to die now." After an interrogation in which he learned that his kidnappers had mistaken him for his CRS predecessor, Joseph Curtain, Father Jenco was "taped up like a mummy-I thought they were wrapping me for burial." Instead he was lodged underneath a truck and transported to the first of his prisons. There is a Jewish proverb, he said, "that at times like this you cry, you sing, and then you remain silent." At the beginning of his Turn to Page II