Features

WASHINGTON - Paul Loong was determined to survive the POW camps where he was held by the Japanese for three years. While imprisoned, Loong kept a journal that had a chance of surviving him if he never made it out alive.

But Loong did. And he made his way to the United States, got married and had a daughter, Theresa, who accidentally stumbled upon her father's journal. She eventually picked up a video camera and started asking him questions about what he had written when he was in captivity.

The result is an hourlong documentary, "Every Day Is a Holiday," which airs in May and June on public television stations. (Check local listings for dates and times.)

WASHINGTON - In a country that has seen more than 50,000 deaths in six years, it took the finding of 49 headless bodies, some also missing arms or legs, to shock Mexican officials.

The discovery of the bodies, on a road about 120 miles from the United States, highlighted a problem addressed recently during a spring meeting at the World Bank headquarters in Washington.

Outgoing World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick warned that the violence doesn't solely threaten Latin American citizens. It also poses a security threat to the United States, he said.

"The U.S. (needs) to take it seriously as a nation," he said, addressing an audience gathered for a forum on "Reducing Murder Rates in Central America: Searching for Solutions."

LONDON, ONT. - As St. Peter’s Seminary in London gears up to celebrate its 100th anniversary with ceremonies and lectures and the publication of a lavishly illustrated history book, the overriding feeling being expressed is grateful amazement that the place is here at all.

There are only two other English-speaking seminaries in all of Canada — St. Augustine’s in Toronto, which was conceived at roughly the same time, and the newer St. Joseph’s situated three provinces to the west in Edmonton.

WASHINGTON - More than three dozen U.S. and British faith-based investment firms have banded together to get the Summer Olympics' major sponsors and tourist hotels to sign a pledge saying they will work to stop human trafficking around the Olympic Games.

So far, the campaign has had some success.

CHICAGO - With world leaders descending on Chicago for the May 20-21 NATO summit, some Catholic school teachers were incorporating lessons about the political-military alliance for their students.

And with thousands of people coming to the city to demonstrate and draw attention to focus on issues ranging from war to the environment to poverty, they included a lesson or two about the history of protests, too.

"Since the time of Christ, people have been protesting," said Mary Lee Calihan, principal of Old St. Mary's School. "What's a useful form of protest? What have people done? What has been effective?"

TORONTO - The majority of Ontarians are opposed to the public funding of the Catholic education system, according to a survey by Forum Research.

Of 1,072 randomly selected adults polled on May 14, a standard sample size for Ontario, 53 per cent disagreed with current economic support of Catholic schools. This is a four-per-cent jump since Forum Research last asked the question in January. Forty per cent of respondents favoured funding Catholic boards while six per cent were unsure.

TORONTO - The Catholic Civil Rights League of Canada has challenged the Liberal government's proposed Bill-13 over the anti-bullying legislation's focus on gender and sexual orientation.

Joanne McGarry, executive director of the league, along with league president Phil Horgan, addressed the Ontario government’s standing committee for social policy May 15. They expressed the league's opposition to Bill-13 because of its focus on gender, its infringement on denominational rights and its impact on curriculum.

TORONTO - St. Michael's College School is officially out of the Ontario Hockey League.

After reappearing in the major junior hockey ranks in 1997 after a three-decade hiatus, with the sale of the Mississauga St. Michael's Majors earlier this month, the midtown Toronto school has severed all links with the OHL team.

Three 16-year-old Nicaraguan students’ had their dreams shattered as an all-expenses-paid trip to Canada ended before it began when they were denied visas to enter Canada.

“The day I got the phone call here in my office I sat here and cried, literally sat here and cried,” said Brenda Holtkamp, chaplaincy leader at Robert F. Hall Catholic Secondary School in Caledon, Ont., which had sponsored the Nicaraguans. “Not only was I sad for myself and all the students here in the school that worked so hard for this reality, I was really very said for the young people in Nicaragua who have never had the opporunity to travel, who were so close to being here . . . and just because of bureaucracy they were turned down.”

OTTAWA - Pam Stenzel has made it her mission to make sure no teenager or young woman ends up with a sexually transmitted disease or unwanted pregnancy.

She told the more than 800 high school-age participants in the Youth Conference associated with the National March for Life that she did not want any of them leaving saying “Nobody told me” about the consequences of sex outside marriage.