All Times Eastern

SUNDAY, 8 p.m.

Nature: Silence of the Bees

PBS This documentary investigates “colony collapse disorder” — why many bee colonies in the United States and elsewhere have been dying out. We need bees because their function as pollinators keeps about a third of our fibers, fruits, seeds and vegetables going. We hear from scientists, farmers and beekeepers in China, France, Spain and our homeland. A re-air from 2007.

SUNDAY, 10 p.m.

Holy Roman Spies: The Vatican’s Secret Agents

EWTN The Catholic priesthood is a place for heroes, and this 2006 documentary introduces us to some: the zealous priests who answered the Holy See’s call to risk martyrdom by entering the Soviet Union to bring the sacraments to Catholics oppressed by the cruel, atheistic communist regime. Re-airs 2 p.m. Tuesday, 4 a.m. Friday.

MONDAY-WEDNESDAY, 6 a.m.

Ralph McInerney’s What Went Wrong with Vatican II

EWTN In this three-part series, author McInerney identifies misinterpretations and misapplications of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). In Part 3 he analyzes Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae (1968) and its courageous teaching against contraception.

TUESDAY, 8 p.m.

The Universe: Space Travel

HISTORY Could technology ever speed up space travel enough to make it feasible? Scientists are working on laser beams, anti-matter and other ideas. Advisory: TV-PG.

WEDNESDAY, 10 p.m.

Some Assembly Required

DISCOVERY In this series, hosts Brian Unger and Lou Bloomfield visit factories across America and join workers in manufacturing the products about which we wonder “How do they do that?” — from acoustic guitars to Zamboni machines and even cat’s-eye marbles.

THURSDAY, 8 p.m., live

Life on the Rock

EWTN Tonight’s guests are from Crossroads, the pro-life group that recruits college-agers each summer to “Walk the Talk” across the country on northern, central and southern routes, as well as across Canada and, this year, Ireland, to save babies by changing hearts. “Crossroads reminds me of Calvary,” says 2007 walker Annette Corbett.

FRIDAY, 10:30 a.m.

Homes Across America

HOME & GARDEN TV Tour a renovated 18th-century former tavern in Massachusetts, a redone tiny cottage in Maryland and an early 20th-century country estate in Virginia.

SATURDAY, 10:30 p.m.

Adventures of Tartu

FAMILYLAND TV Harold Bucquet directed this British-made 1943 World War II spy thriller in which a British secret agent infiltrates a German poison-gas factory in Czechoslovakia and plots to blow it up with the help of heroic anti-Nazi underground fighters.

Dan Engler writes from
Santa Barbara, California.