On May 1, 2002, Larry Henderson retired as Managing Editor of the Canadian Catholic monthly Challenge. He was born in Westmount, P.Q., in 1917, into an Anglican family. He studied music at McGill University in Montreal and then went to the London School of Economics in England and the School of Graduate Studies in Geneva. This was followed by three years in repertory theatre in England, where he starred in Christopher Marlowe's classic Doctor Faustus and, at the age of 22, played Mercutio to young Alec Guinness's Romeo. During the Second World War, he was a signals officer in the Canadian Army, on duty in Italy. In 1944 the Canadians were among the troops gradually pushing the Germans northwards. Larry told me how, one night near Christmas of that year, he slept by Dante's tomb in Ravenna, hidden by partisans from the Germans:

"At that time we often straightened our line in Italy in order that it should occupy as small a target as possible at the front. In order to do that, we had to fall back in some instances. We fell back before the city of Ravenna because it was a large city and entering it was likely to involve a lot of house-to-house fighting. We didn't wish to get involved in all that. So we straightened the line; we hung back; we did not take the city of Ravenna. But we had lost a whole company of men (about 30 of them) who had taken refuge in the bell tower of a church in Ravenna. They were beyond reach of our microphones. So we couldn't tell them, or order them, to come back. So they thought they were fulfilling their orders by occupying the bell tower while at the same time we wanted them to return to our front line.

"When I arrived at the spot I was told to go and get those men and bring them out. Of course I had no idea where I would find the Germans, or what to do when I found them. But I decided that I had to act. So I went with six men to the city of Ravenna. It was night time and foggy. I encountered a long line of men who were stretched out and many of whom were bandaged. I knew that they could not be German soldiers. But, on the other hand, I didn't know who they were. They said they were partisans. I had to believe them.

"They took me to a cemetery, not a nice place to be taken to. There were large tombs in the cemetery, above ground. Some of them dated back to the early days of the Church. I didn't know what to do. But they told me, 'You are going to sleep on the bones of Dante.' I didn't know what that meant. But they repeated it several times. I had to assume that these were in fact the bones of Dante although I had refused to get into the tomb. Later I was taken to the bell tower where our Canadians were said to be holed up, and I found them there. The Germans must have known that they were there but must not have wanted to fight because they too were very light on the ground, and they were pulling out. That being the case, I decided to move the men out immediately anyway, and I took them back to our lines.

"Later, about 40 years later, I was leading a pilgrimage to Ravenna and decided that I would revisit the cemetery. Of course I didn't have troops with me then, but some of the pilgrims came with me. They searched for the tomb and found it. They found not only the tomb but a sign on it which read: 'Here the bones of Dante rested for six months while he was hidden from the Germans.' So I knew that the story was true."

In 1945 Larry returned to Montreal, still wanting to be an actor. When he applied at the CBC studios for an acting job, he was given a position as a radio announcer in Toronto.

In 1949 he married Joan Annand; two sons were born to them. In 1954 he moved to TV and became CBC's first high-profile anchorman. His nightly newscast made him familiar to millions of viewers. In ferreting out the news he also visited Korea, Vietnam, Algeria, Lebanon, Cyprus, Israel, and the Soviet Union. On leaving the CBC in 1959, he became a reporter and anchorman for the CTV network.

In 1964, as part of his reporting, he asked a number of church leaders whether they believed that Jesus is God and is both divine and human. Only a Catholic priest, Msgr. Raymond Limoges, vicar-general of Ottawa archdiocese, gave a resounding yes. Though formerly an Anglican, Larry had become a materialist but realized from its fruits that materialism could not be true. He then learned about Catholicism from the Monsignor, using a basic catechism. With encouragement also from the renowned Thomist philosopher Jacques Maritain, and from a convert from Judaism, Father Jean Roger, a Franciscan archeologist in the Holy Land, he became a Catholic on Dec. 8, 1966.

On leaving CTV he worked for the Canadian International Development Agency, helping to set up and supervise broadcasting projects in East Africa. In 1973 he was asked to write for the Catholic Register in Toronto, and, the next year, to be its editor. He held this post until 1986. He revitalized the newspaper, put the Pope's messages in the limelight, recruited distinguished contributors, increased subscriptions from 30,000 to 60,000, achieved awards for the Register from press associations, and put the paper in the black for the first time in its history. When he retired as editor he received a papal reward, Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice, and the first copy of The Hot Seat, an anthology of his articles. What drew the greatest praise from those at his farewell luncheon was the statement that he was steadfast in his loyalty to the Holy Father and the Magisterium.

There had been lots of Catholic causes to defend. The Manitoba cabinet minister who was a great leader in the pro-life cause, Joseph Borowski, wrote: "Larry Henderson and the Catholic Register ignited the fight for a baby's life in Canada more than any paper I know. Without Larry, without the Register, I would never have had the support I did in my fight for the unborn against Canada's abortion laws and Morgentaler."1

Larry next accepted the task of putting out Challenge, which he has carried out until handing it over to new hands this past spring. At the age of 85 he can look back with pride on several occupations and especially on distinguished service in journalism and news reporting.

What is distinctive of his writing in Catholic newspapers and journals is the fruit of his conversion. When on one occasion, death threatened him in Vietnam, he prayed to God to give his life a second chance. His prayer was answered and, though the Church he had entered in 1966 was in turmoil, his conversion convinced him that all that matters is finding and following the truth. That was the only second chance he needed.

He has spoken of the turmoil in the Church: "I well remember what it was like when I first discovered the beauty of the Catholic system of belief, and then encountered priests who told me how happy they were to be able to 'think for themselves,' and how they 'did not have to jump' whenever the Pope told them to . . . . When Pope Paul VI wrote his encyclical against contraception, the local chancery office did not want to be rung up by every newspaper in town and asked how they could justify such a retrograde statement. So they distanced themselves from it. When rescuers attempted to close abortion clinics and had their bones broken by police in the process, the Catholic press disowned them."2

A personal tribute to him appeared in the Register when he retired from it: "In every issue of the paper, and in everything he wrote and said, he encouraged loyalty to the Holy Father and to the teaching authority of the Church. When I first met him, I think I was somewhat overawed by the man. After all, he was the CBC's National newscaster for so long that he had become a larger-than-life figure, a celebrity across the nation. And I did not even know about so many of his other, earlier achievements, as a scholar, an actor, a foreign correspondent, and a soldier. Yet when I was introduced to him, I was struck by his humility."3

1. Catholic Register, May 10, 1986, p. 14.

2. Challenge, Nov., 1993, p. 21.

3. John Melady, Catholic Register, Ju ne 21, 1986, p. 14.

Father Kennedy was president of Assumption University, Windsor, and of St. Thomas More College, Univ. Of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon.