| Written by Deborah Gyapong, Canadian Catholic News,
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 OTTAWA - Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Academy, a small private Catholic liberal arts college in Barry’s Bay, Ont., is mourning the loss of two students who died after a minivan plunged through the ice of a nearby lake.
“The immediate reaction was a sense of shock and profound sadness,” said the school's president David Warner.
Four students had decided to drive across Lake Kamaniskeg Feb. 2 on their way to Combermere to the lay apostolate Madonna House. They used a public ramp used by ice fishers to drive to their huts.
The ice gave way at the southern end of the lake. The driver and another male passenger in the front seat managed to swim to safety. Two days later, Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) divers found the bodies of Paul Sanders, 24, of Mitchell, Ont., and Janine Lieu, 22, of Vancouver, in the submerged vehicle. They had been riding in the back seat.
Warner declined to reveal the names of the surviving students.
“They are taking it so hard,” he said. “The two boys barely escaped with their lives.
“They immediately started screaming for help. The van sank quickly. They could not even see it,” Warner said.
Soaked and freezing, they realized they could lose their own lives if they did not find shelter. They ran towards some winterized cottages on shore and broke into several, trying to find a phone to call 911. They finally found one with a woodstove, where they spent the night.
“In my opinion, they were suffering some degree of hypothermia,” Warner said. The boys were able to alert police the next morning.
“People drive on the lake all the time,” Warner said. “There are trucks on the lake right now. They plow the snow on the ice. The boys made the wrong judgment that they could go further south on the lake than they could.”
The school had been on a three-day study break at the time of the accident. Warner notified the small community of about 60 full-time and 20 part-time students on Feb. 4.
“I gathered the students at the front steps of the Sunday morning Mass and gave them the basics,” he said, choking up. “We prayed for God’s mercy on those steps, turned right around, went right back in and prayed the divine mercy chaplet led by a deacon here who is also a trained psychologist.”
Sanders had been discerning a priestly vocation, Warner said. Lieu had been on her way for an appointment with a Madonna House priest for spiritual direction. Two days prior to their deaths, he said, students had spotted them going into side-by-side confessionals.
Our Lady Seat of Wisdom, which combines a classical three-year liberal arts program with a deeply committed Catholic faith community, has been participating in two Masses a day, eucharistic adoration and many spontaneous prayer gatherings.
“I haven’t observed any deep crises of faith,” Warner said. “Some are experiencing the grief at a deeper emotional level than others. We don’t know the long-term grieving and processing of this in each individual’s life.
“There has been a mixture of profound sadness, mixed with abiding hope with the God who loves us and has an abiding plan for our life. Even if we don’t understand it right now,” he said, noting how grateful he is for how the Catholic faith helps prepare them for the “mysteries and paradoxes” of life here and “for the life hereafter.”
Warner was also thankful for the overwhelming support from the local community, about 170 kilometres from Ottawa. The school has received an outpouring of prayers, flowers, cards and finances from around the world. Details for memorial funds will appear on the college’s web site at www.seatofwisdom.org.
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