TV movies about Pope John Paul II

[matrixrefugee]

The network stations seem to be pretending to be EWTN (that's the Eternal Word Television Network, a cable station out of Birmingham, Alabama, run by a feisty, charismatic Franciscan nun and her community): Thursday night, ABC ran a two-hour movie based on the life of the late, great Pope John Paul II (born Karol Wojtyla). It was a little choppy and too concise, but it was still watchable. Tonight and concluding Wednesday night, CBS is running their bigger-budget, better-scripted and better-filmed offering, featuring Cary Elwes as the young "Lolek" and John Voight as the future Pontiff. Personally, I'm liking CBS's version a *lot* better; it's inspired me to start reading George Weigel's biography of JPII, and I can definately see why "Papa Benny" (Pope Benedict XVI) gave it his two thumbs up when the film was screened at the Vatican about a month ago.

It's been a while since I posted any news about Holy Trinity (German) Catholic Church, our imperiled old parish, mostly because there hasn't been any news. The church is slated to be closed on the 15th of this month, and I've been offering an Advent novena to keep it open and so that the Latin and the German Mass communities can always worship there. It's not too late for some of you to join it with me, if you're so inclined:


Hail and blessed be the hour and the moment in which the Son of God was born of the most pure Virgin Mary at midnight in Bethlehem in piercing cold. In that hour, vouchsafe, O my God, to hear my prayer and grant my petition, through the merits of our Saviour Jesus Christ and of His Blessed Mother, that Holy Trinity German Catholic Church may be allowed to stay open and that the Latin and the German Mass communities may always be allowed to worship there. Amen

Comments

[matrixrefugee.livejournal.com]

Yes, it would be a terrible cultural and historical loss as well as a terrible loss of several hundred people's center of worship. It was the first Catholic church in the U.S. to have a Christmas tree (and one of the first places to publicly display one, in Boston, Massachusetts), back in the 1840s, and Ludwig Prang, a member of the parish, was the first artist to decorate and sell Christmas cards in the U.S. And it's also a beautiful old German Gothic structure, the kind of church they rarely build these days. I'll be posting a link to the parish website pretty soon; they've got several lovely photos of it.