LEXINGTON, Mo. (CNS) — The lowering August sun glimmered on old red brick and gleamed on weathered faces as dozens of Hispanic migrant workers gathered behind Dibbons Hall of Immaculate Conception Church in Lexington to seek services from the Migrant Farmworkers Project. With hugs and handshakes, migrant workers greeted the project staff and volunteers before lining up to register for food, commodities and social or legal services. The Migrant Farmworkers Project, a program of Legal Aid of Western Missouri, offers social and legal services to migrant workers who come to the region during the fall fruit harvesting season. Suzanne Gladney, an immigration attorney for Legal Aid, started the project about 21 years ago. It began as a food distribution program and grew into a service that puts migrant workers in touch with organizations providing medical, dental and legal services, and church agencies in the Missouri Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph offering help to migrants.

DAYTON, Ohio (CNS) — The feature films "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" and "Secondhand Lions" and the documentary "Bonhoeffer" about German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer were among the winners of Gabriel Awards, presented each year by the Catholic Academy of Communication Arts Professionals. The "Lord of the Rings" trilogy was given a special achievement award. This year’s Gabriels will be awarded in Los Angeles Oct. 22, at which time the winner of a personal achievement award will be named. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation won six Gabriels or certificates of merit in the awards’ radio competition. KNOM-AM of Nome, Alaska, repeated as the Gabriels’ radio station of the year, marking its seventh win in all, while New England Cable News in Newton, Mass., also repeated in winning television station of the year honors.

NEW YORK (CNS) — "Rise, Let Us Be on Our Way," the English edition of Pope John Paul II’s latest book, is due in U.S. bookstores at the end of September. Published in the United States by Warner Books, the book is an autobiographical reflection on the pope’s 20 years as a bishop in communist Poland, from 1958 to 1978. The book, published in hardcover for $22.95, goes on sale Sept. 28.

PITTSBURGH (CNS) — Everything in television goes in cycles, and that includes the depiction of religion and the religious lives of TV characters, said Rob Owen, TV editor of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "Sometimes we can find it in the most unlikely of places," said Owen of religious content on series. "For instance, that episode of ‘The West Wing’ that I think ended the second season, entitled ‘Two Cathedrals,’ where President (Josiah) Bartlet is cursing at God inside the National Cathedral in Latin. A powerful scene. "It dealt with religion in a way that real people deal with it," Owen added in an interview with the Pittsburgh Catholic, diocesan newspaper. "Real people get angry at God. Real people have doubts about God. But too often on television you don’t see that depicted. Instead, you see the saccharine ‘Touched by an Angel’ quasi-spiritual element of purported relationships with God," he said.

HARPERS FERRY, Iowa (CNS) — When it comes to planning his vacations, the pastor of a three-parish cluster along the Mississippi River never thinks in terms of relaxing in the comfort of a tropical resort during the heart of a Midwestern winter. Instead, Father Louis Trzil prefers to take the proverbial roads less traveled — those leading to the Native American reservations in southern South Dakota. His idea of an enjoyable, productive vacation involves hauling secondhand items into impoverished areas. Father Trzil, 78, has a long tradition of delivering used kitchen stoves, refrigerators, freezers, washing machines, bicycles and other items to reservations along U.S. Highway 18.

WASHINGTON (CNS) — The steady rise in the number of poor people in the United States and those without health insurance challenges the nation to a nonpartisan reassessment of its priorities, said a Catholic expert in health care issues. "These are chronic ills that have plagued our society for decades — through both Democratic and Republican administrations," said Father Michael D. Place, president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association. Father Place was commenting on the Aug. 26 release by the U.S. Census Bureau of its annual report on income, poverty and health insurance coverage. The report, for the year 2003, said the number of people below the U.S. poverty line increased by 1.3 million with more than 60 percent of the increase among children under 18 years of age. In terms of percentage, the number of poor increased by 0.4 percent to 12.5 percent of the U.S. population. The Census Bureau also reported a 1.4 million rise in the number of people lacking health insurance and said household income was stagnant, except for Hispanic households which saw their income drop by 2.6 percent.

BOSTON (CNS) — Retired Auxiliary Bishop John J. Glynn of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, awarded a Bronze Star for valor while a Navy chaplain in the Vietnam War, died at age 78 in Milton, just outside Boston. A funeral Mass was held Aug. 27 at his boyhood parish, St. Gregory’s Church in the Boston suburb of Dorchester. He died of colon cancer Aug. 23 at Milton Hospital. Bishop Glynn was named an auxiliary bishop for the military archdiocese in 1991 and retired in 2002. While a member of the U.S. bishops’ international policy committee in 1999, Bishop Glynn participated with other religious leaders and famous personalities in campaigns supporting a comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty and measures to reduce the foreign debt of poor countries.