San Antonio Catholic TV

From Vatican II to John Paul II, the Church has urged Catholics to make use of modern technology.

The Diocese of San Antonio has answered that call in the television medium for 18 years, but, as reported in the Express-News there May 13, that could end July 1. Archbishop Patrick Flores has announced that the cable company that carries the Church-supported Catholic Television San Antonio (CTSA) has forced him to halt its broadcasting.

He announced that he had delivered a letter to Paragon Cable warning them that their decision to move the station to a new channel “will eliminate a significant number of viewers from access to CTSA.” The cable company's plan was to move CTSA from Channel 22, which is accessible to everyone receiving the basic cable service, to channel 61, which is only available to those who pay more than twice the basic cost to obtain more channels.

Archbishop Flores has asked viewers to contact the company and register their disapproval.

“I've heard [Paragon] say this station isn't really that important to the people of San Antonio, but that's not what we're hearing,” Flores is quoted saying.

He also said that Paragon has a moral responsibility to people who rely on CTSA's ministry.

Locals seem to agree. The Rev. Kenneth Thompson, an official of the San Antonio Community of Churches said that Protestant and Jewish leaders intend to write to Paragon expressing their disapproval.

One local parishioner said she was “very disturbed” at the decision. “When I was a minister to the sick, whenever I'd go to their homes, they were watching the Mass on CTSA; this will be devastating to them.”

Sinatra Reconciled With Church

There has been much written about Frank Sinatra on the occasion of his death and funeral, but the articles, covering his several marriages, his reputation for past carousing and his Mafia ties, left one burning question in many Catholics’ minds: what was his status with the Church?

The Philadelphia News answered the question May 19: he had been eligible to receive the sacraments since 1977.

He married his first wife, Nancy Barbato in the Catholic Church in 1939, said the article. However, subsequent marriages to Ava Gardner, Mia Farrow, and finally to Barbara Marx were not Church weddings, and were not valid in the Church's eyes, since the first marriage was still recognized.

When Sinatra's mother, Dolly, died in 1977 — a year after his fourth wedding — the singer sought reconciliation with the Church. He sought and obtained an annulment for his first marriage, which was the only one in question, and then remarried Barbara Marx in a Church ceremony.

The annulment was kept secret until 1979, when Sinatra was photographed receiving communion in St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York.

In his final years, Sinatra was a parishioner at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills. He actively lived his faith: he arranged to have a priest live in his Palm Springs estate to instruct Barbara and prepare her to enter the Catholic Church. When his friend Princess Grace of Monaco was killed, he organized and led a prayer service for her at his parish.