Weekly TV Picks

All times Eastern

SUNDAYS IN AUGUST

EWTN Catholic Classics

EWTN, 8 p.m.

Join Mother Angelica in celebrating EWTN's 20th anniversary. These 90-minute shows feature EWTN series, specials and other highlights of the past two decades. To be rebroadcast Thursdays at 1 p.m. and Fridays at 3 a.m. and 10 p.m.

MON.-SAT., AUG. 6-11

Summer Pledge Period Specials

PBS; check listings for time

Here are some of the specials that local PBS stations will choose from for their pledge drives this week. (Each station will air only some shows.) Cooking for Gold follows the U.S. Culinary Olympics team for 12 months as they practice for the four-day international cooking competition held every four years. Frank Patterson's World of Music reminisces about the late Irish tenor and airs his “Ave Maria” (Gounod), “Farewell, My Derry Love” and other treasures. Great American Rail Journeys ushers us aboard historic trains for spectacular trips around every section of our beautiful land. Three Mo’ Tenors in Concert is a tour de force in opera, Broadway, jazz, blues, soul, gospel and spirituals by Victor Trent Cook, Rodrick Dixon and Thomas Young.

MONDAY, AUG. 6

Blind Man's Bluff

History Channel, 9 p.m.

In this gripping two-hour premiere, ex-crewmen of U.S. nuclear subs tell of top-secret U.S.-Soviet submarine espionage encounters from the early postwar period into the ‘90s. A Towers Productions special based on the non-fiction bestseller by Sherry Sontag and Christopher Drew.

TUESDAY, AUG. 7

Sherman Tanks

History Channel, 10 p.m.

This “Modern Marvels” show tells of the heroism and heavy losses of the crews of U.S. Sherman tanks in World War II. Their superior tactics and greater numbers overcame the German Panzers’ thicker armor and deadlier guns.

THURSDAY, AUG. 9

Martyrs: They Died for Christ

EWTN, 6:30 a.m. and 6:30 p.m.

This episode movingly describes the life of St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein) on her feast day. A brilliant philosopher whose mentor was Edmund Husserl, Stein converted from Judaism on Jan. 1, 1922, and became a Carmelite sister in 1933. She and her sister Rosa were murdered in Auschwitz in 1942.

FRIDAY, AUG. 10

Third Annual Family Television Awards

CBS, 8 p.m.

We can agree or disagree with them, but here are the picks for 2001 from the Family Friendly Programming Forum, an initiative of 47 major advertisers. The nine awards include an interesting category, “Inspiring Stories/Pride in Our Heritage.”

SATURDAY, AUG. 11

Feast of St. Clare Specials

EWTN

At 5:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m., Bob and Penny Lord's Saints and Other Powerful Women salutes St. Clare of Assisi (1194-1253), founder of the Poor Clares. At 8 p.m., the documentary St. Clare of Assisi describes her life. At 9 p.m., Francis and Clare of Assisi tours sites loved by Assisi's two great Franciscan pioneers.

Dan Engler writes from Santa Barbara, California.

Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki of Cologne attends a German Synodal Way assembly on March 9, 2023.

Four German Bishops Resist Push to Install Permanent ‘Synodal Council’

Given the Vatican’s repeated interventions against the German process, the bishops said they would instead look to the Synod of Bishops in Rome. Meanwhile, on Monday, German diocesan bishops approved the statutes for a synodal committee; and there are reports that the synodal committee will meet again in June.

Palestinian Christians celebrate Easter Sunday Mass at Holy Family Church in Gaza City on March 31, amid the ongoing battles Israel and the Hamas militant group.

People Explain ‘Why I Go to Mass’

‘Why go to Mass on Sundays? It is not enough to answer that it is a precept of the Church. … We Christians need to participate in Sunday Mass because only with the grace of Jesus, with his living presence in us and among us, can we put into practice his commandment, and thus be his credible witnesses.’ —Pope Francis