MARYLAND
Part 3
Eighth Archbishop of Baltimore, the Most Reverend James Roosevelt Bayley (1872-1877); born August 23, 1814, Harlem, New York, the son of Guy Carleton Bayley and Grace Roosevelt Bayley. Baptized and raised in the Protestant Episcopal Church, Archbishop Bayley was descended from some of New York’s most prominent families and had a privileged upbringing. He attended Mount Pleasant Classical Institution, Amherst College, and Trinity College, receiving his B.A. degree in 1835. After studying medicine for one year, he withdrew from the program to begin preparing for the Episcopal priesthood with the noted Rev. Samuel Farmar Jarvis in Middletown, Connecticut. He was ordained in 1839 and returned to his family’s home parish of St. Andrew in Harlem for his first assignment. Bayley’s work with the poor in his community, many of who were Irish immigrants, and the friendships he formed with neighboring Catholic pastors, led to his being increasingly drawn to Catholicism. Over the next three years, he read and prayed his way into the Catholic Church, receiving instruction from the future Cardinal Archbishop of New York, Fr. John McCloskey. He also received counsel from his first cousins, the children of his father’s stepsister, St. Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton, foundress of the Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph, to whom he remained close throughout his life. In 1841, Bayley traveled to Rome, Italy, where he made the decision to convert and was formally received into the Catholic Church on April 28, 1842 at the Church of the Gesù. He entered the Sulpician Seminary at Paris soon after and completed his training at St. John’s in New York. He was ordained for the Diocese of New York on March 2, 1844 by Bishop John J. Hughes. His early assignments included serving on the faculty of St. John’s College (later Fordham) and as secretary to Archbishop Hughes. In 1852 he attended the First Plenary Council of Baltimore, where, at the request of the bishops in attendance, the city of Newark, New Jersey, was designated as the seat of a new diocese. Fr. Bayley was recommended for the see and on October 30, 1853 he was consecrated the first bishop of Newark. At that time, the boundaries for the diocese encompassed the entire state of New Jersey. There were an estimated 40,000 Catholics and thirty-three parishes in the diocese with nine women religious and thirty priests to serve them. Bayley immediately laid out an ambitious plan that would focus on the building of churches and schools. To carry out this work, he recruited religious orders, seminarians, and priests to serve with him. Within ten years the Sisters of Charity of St. Elizabeth had been established as a diocesan order, Seton Hall College, named for his aunt, St. Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton, and Immaculate Conception Seminary had been founded. As Bishop of Newark, he attended the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1866 and the First Vatican Council in Rome, 1869-1870. When he received news of his appointment to the Premier See in 1872, Bayley had been bishop of Newark for nineteen years. During that time, the Catholic population in New Jersey had increased more than four-fold with the number of parishes keeping pace. There were 170 priests and 18 religious orders present in the diocese with the infrastructure for a network of Catholic education, healthcare, and social service programs firmly in place.
Bayley was installed as the eighth Archbishop of Baltimore at the Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary on October 13, 1872. The Sacred Pallium was conferred on him the same day. Diagnosed with Bright’s disease, health problems prevented Archbishop Bayley from playing an active role in the affairs of his new see. He is credited with implementing administrative reforms that helped the Archdiocese run more efficiently, including the requirement that pastors submit annual parish reports, and for encouraging the founding of lay devotional, charitable, fraternal, and temperance societies, all of which flourished during these years. He led a capital campaign to retire the cathedral’s debt and on May 25, 1876, officiated over the consecration of the nation’s first Roman Catholic Cathedral. With his health continuing to fail, he requested in 1877 the appointment of a coadjutor bishop to assist him in his work. Baltimore-born Bishop James Gibbons was transferred from the Diocese of Richmond to Baltimore at this time and would succeed Bayley within the year. Realizing that the end of his life was near, Bayley returned to his beloved Newark, where he died on October 3, 1877. At his request, he was buried in Emmitsburg near his aunt, St. Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton.
Throughout his priestly ministry, Bayley was an active supporter of the temperance movement, a champion of Catholic schools, and an advocate for the poor and marginalized. He had a national reputation and was noted for his keen intellect, impeccable manners, and imposing presence. Possessing a strong sense of history, he collected historical data and organized the Episcopal archives for New York, Newark and Baltimore. He also authored two books: A Brief Sketch of the Early History of the Catholic Church on the Island of New York (1853) and the Memoirs of Simon Gabriel Brute, First Bishop of Vincennes (1855) and encouraged the work of others.
His Eminence Cardinal James Gibbons (1877-1921), ninth Archbishop of Baltimore, was born in Baltimore on July 23, 1834, the son of Thomas Gibbons, a clerk, and Bridget Walsh Gibbons. He was baptized in the cathedral from which he would be buried.
Gibbons' parents had come to the United States about 1829 but returned to Ireland in 1837. There his father ran a grocery in Ballinrobe, County Mayo, until his death in 1847. The widow and children returned to the United States in 1853, establishing their residence in New Orleans. There James worked in a grocery store until inspired by a Redemptorist retreat to become a priest. In 1855 he entered St. Charles College, the minor seminary in Baltimore, and in 1857 St. Mary's, the major seminary. On June 30, 1861, he was ordained by Archbishop Francis Patrick Kenrick of Baltimore, who had accepted him for his archdiocese. For six weeks Gibbons was assistant at St. Patrick's parish, then appointed first pastor of St. Bridget's, originally a mission of St. Patrick's. There he served as a chaplain for Fort McHenry during the Civil War.
In 1865 Archbishop Martin John Spalding summoned Gibbons to be his secretary and help prepare for the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore. At the council the assembled fathers, at Spalding's prompting, recommended Gibbons for the vicariate apostolic of North Carolina, whose creation they also recommended. Named titular bishop of Adramyttium on March 3, 1868, Gibbons was raised to the episcopacy by Spalding on August 15, 1868, the youngest of more than a thousand bishops in the Catholic world.
The vicariate, the entire state of North Carolina, had fewer than seven hundred Catholics. Gibbons made a number of converts, but finding the apologetical works available inadequate for their needs, he determined to write his on; Faith of our Fathers would prove the most popular apologetical work written by an American Catholic. At Vatican Council I, where he was also the youngest bishop, he voted in favor of papal infallibility. In January 1872 Gibbons was named administrator of the Diocese of Richmond, one of Archbishop Spalding's last requests, and on July 30, bishop of Richmond, retaining his charge of North Carolina. In Richmond his principal task was providing teachers for his schools. At the wish of Archbishop James Roosevelt Bayley of Baltimore, he was named his coadjutor with right of succession on May 25, 1877. Upon Bayley's death on October 3, 1877, Gibbons became archbishop of the premier see.
In his first ten years as archbishop, Gibbons had neither large plans nor great ambitions. He believed his archdiocese well endowed in personnel and institutions, which, in fact, it was. Though he did not instigate, he put no brakes on the proliferation of parish societies that occurred throughout his administration, the knighthoods and young men's literary societies, especially in his first decade. The greatest problems with which he had to contend were those that arose from the influx of new immigrants: the Bohemians, Poles, Lithuanians, and Italians. Though his approach to most difficulties was a "masterly inactivity," he had on more than one occasion to intervene in the affairs of their troublesome parishes but was unable at one to prevent a Polish schism.
In 1884 the archbishop of Baltimore was chosen by the pope to preside over the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore, a gathering for which Gibbons initially showed little enthusiasm. The council, however, produced the most comprehensive body of legislation for the Catholic Church in America. On June 7, 1886, Gibbons was made a cardinal, the second American so honored. On March 17, 1887, he received the red hat in Rome, and a week later at his titular church, Santa Maria in Trastevere, delivered a stirring sermon in praise of his native land and its political principles.
In Rome Gibbons formed a close bond with three other Americans in their efforts to resolve a number of problems: Bishop (soon Archbishop) John Ireland of St. Paul; John Keane, rector designate for The Catholic University to be established in Washington, D.C.; and Denis O'Connell, rector of the North American College in Rome. Together they won Roman approval for The Catholic University despite the opposition of Archbishop Michael Corrigan of New York and the Jesuits. The four prevented a Roman condemnation of the Knights of Labor and the public condemnation of the works of Henry George demanded by Archbishop Corrigan. One of Corrigan's priests, Edward McGlynn, had, despite Corrigan's prohibition, espoused the cause of George, whom Corrigan considered socialistic. The four also successfully countered a petition of German Catholics in the United States for a greater degree of autonomy that was highly critical of Irish bishops. The defense of the Knights of Labor was signed by Gibbons alone and won for him a reputation as champion of the working class.
Gibbons, Ireland, Keane and O'Connell came to be recognized as the leaders of the "liberals" in the Catholic hierarchy; Corrigan and Bishop Bernard McQuaid of Rochester as spokesmen for the conservatives, who also included most of the German bishops. When German discontent surfaced again in what was called the "Cahensly affair," Gibbons delivered in 1891 a forceful sermon in the cathedral of Milwaukee denouncing those who would "sow tares of discord in the fair fields of the Church in America."
Though hitherto supportive of parochial schools, Gibbons rose to the defense of Archbishop Ireland in 1891 and his Faribault plan that would incorporate parish schools into the public school system, a measure strenuously opposed by Corrigan, McQuaid, the Germans, and the Jesuits. Rome declared that the plan could be tolerated, but in 1893 sent a permanent apostolic delegate to the United States, Francesco Satolli, to resolve this and other points of conflict. Satolli's initial sympathy for the liberals was indicated not only by his support of the Faribault plan but also by his lifting of the excommunication of Edward McGlynn imposed by Archbishop Corrigan. Uneasy, however, with the participation of Gibbons and Keane in the World's Parliament of Religions in 1893 and Gibbons' failure to enforce the Roman condemnation of certain secret societies in the United States in 1894, Satolli in 1895 shifted his support to the conservatives, especially in his approval of parish schools and the work of the Germans. The triumph of the conservatives was made obvious by the dismissal of O'Connell as rector of the North American College in 1895 and of Keane as rector of The Catholic University in 1896.
Despite this setback, Ireland, Keane, and O'Connell, with Gibbons' backing, promoted an agenda for the Americanization of the Catholic Church at home and abroad, especially the acceptance of such principles as the separation of Church and state and the adoption of democratic procedures. Alarmed, European conservatives, particularly in France, seized upon a biography of the founder of the American Paulists, Isaac Hecker, for which Ireland had written a glowing introduction, to have such American Aberrations condemned by the Holy See. In the papal letter, Testem benevolentiae (January 22, 1899) addressed to Gibbons, the heresy of "Americanism" was condemned, actually a medley of beliefs such as a reliance on the Holy Spirit rather than on external guidance, a promotion of the active over the passive or supernatural virtues, and a depreciation of religious vows.
Despite this fatal blow to the Americanizers as a whole, Gibbons continued to play the role of spokesman of the Catholic Church in America splendidly. His public utterances commanded increasing attention. His presence at important national events, usually to deliver the invocation, was given even greater coverage in the press. Gibbons developed a warm friendship with several presidents, especially Theodore Roosevelt. For the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood in 1911, business in the national capital came practically to a halt so that almost every politician of note could go to Baltimore to pay their respects.
A part of Gibbons' popularity derived from the works he authored. Faith of Our Fathers (1876) was published many times over. Also widely read were Our Christian Heritage (1889), Ambassador of Christ (1896), Discourse and Sermons (1908), and A Retrospect of Fifty Years (1916). He contributed a number of essays to such much-read journals as the North American Review and Putnams' Monthly. His style was simple but compelling. Protestant Americans looked most often to Gibbons for an explanation of the Catholic position on contentious issues.
Gibbons' views were not always consistent. At the time of the Spanish-American War he was a pacifist, denouncing militarism and the arms race as unchristian. At the outset of World War I he was a strong proponent of preparedness, and during its course urged Catholic men to go forth and be proud of their wounds. Initially an opponent of American imperialism, under the influence of Presidents Roosevelt and Taft he urged the American bishops to oppose the Jones Act designed to dismantle the American Empire. At the local level Gibbons supported such progressive measures as city planning, public health, consumer protection, and the regulation of sweatshops. At the national level he opposed the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Amendments. The list of his denunciations of the movement for women's suffrage was embarrassingly long.
Until the day he died Gibbons exercised considerable power in the American Church. As ranking prelate he presided over the annual meetings of the archbishops that began in 1890. He also presided over the transformation of the National Catholic War Council into the National Catholic Welfare Council in 1919. After his reception of the red hat, he came to enjoy the power he seemed to win effortlessly. In 1914 he raised strong objections to the rumors that the national capital would be detached from his archdiocese. He refused to have a coadjutor. He also enjoyed remarkable health until a few days before his death on March 24, 1921, at the age of eighty-seven years and eight months.
More than any other Catholic, not excepting John Carroll, James Gibbons was embraced by his country. He was personable, outgoing, and seldom without a smile. Concern for his reputation, according to some, made him conciliatory but overtly cautious. To a querulous few he was vain, devious, and timid. To most, however, he was assured, prudent, and gentle. With soothing words and disarming rhetoric he was able to retain the affection and esteem of those whose expectations he disappointed most. Quietly he worked to defuse the lay Catholic Congress movement while praising the layman's efforts. Though in print he continued to champion the cause of the working class, in practice his dealings with labor unions left much to be desired. While he fought a bill to disfranchise Maryland blacks, at a Catholic African American Congress he counseled "wisdom, forbearance, prudence, and discretion." While he complimented women for their virtue, industry, and piety, he made no effort to hide his disdain for feminists.
As the archdiocese he governed grew in prestige, it declined in proportion to the numerical and institutional indices that marked the growth of other archdioceses. Gibbons was not an institution builder because he was not a wall builder. He desired his immigrant charges to move into the mainstream as rapidly as possible. In this and in other ways he resembled the first archbishop of Baltimore. Like John Carroll, Gibbons evidenced a broad ecumenism in his association with the leaders of other denominations. In his involvement in civic affairs he also resembled Carroll. Like Carroll he was tireless in his praise of American virtues, institutions, and principles. And like Carroll he could interpret Roman directives broadly or ignore them altogether.
The Archdiocese of Baltimore, the apostolic delegate Giovanni Bonzano would report two months after Gibbons' death, was not in a flourishing condition. Gibbons had shunned acts of administration that involved responsibility or odium and had paid little attention to the decrees of the council over which he had presided. No future American bishop, Bonzano advised, must be allowed to wield the power Gibbons had.
Yet the apostolic delegate was prepared to admit that Gibbons had served the Church well in assuaging intolerance and bigotry. With consummate tact he had become the friend of people of every condition, race, and faith, so that at his death he was exalted as a patriot, a citizen, and a statesman, a man of great vision whose words on national questions were always peaceful and just. Five years before his death the Baltimore Sun had said the same. "The Catholic Church has given many distinguished prelates and priests to its work in this country, but none who has inspired the same general confidence and the same earnest esteem." Its explanation: "To all he seems to speak in their own tongues by some Pentecostal power, or by some subtle affinity that makes nothing human foreign to him."
The Most Reverend Michael Joseph Curley (1921-1947), tenth Archbishop of Baltimore, was born in Athlone, County Westmeath, Ireland, on October 12, 1879, the son of Michael Curley, a fairly prosperous farmer, and Maria Ward. He attended the Marist Brothers' school in Athlone until age sixteen, then went to Mungret College, Limerick, conducted by the Jesuits, to study for the priesthood. Though he originally dreamed of being a missionary to the Fiji Islands, the visit of a bishop of Florida to Mungret led him to volunteer his services for that under-developed part of the Catholic world. After receiving a bachelor's degree from the Royal University in Dublin, he entered the Urban College of the Propaganda in Rome in 1900 to prepare himself for the life of a missionary in the United States. He was ordained by Cardinal Pietro Respighi, vicar general of the pope, on March 19, 1904.
In Florida Curley was sent by the bishop of St. Augustine to a parish at DeLand that encompassed 7,200 square miles, greater by a thousand than the archdiocese he would later govern. He lived in a rented room above a store and took his meals in a diner where a five-dollar ticket bought him twenty-one meals. In 1914 he served nine months as chancellor and secretary to the bishop, then was himself named bishop of St. Augustine on April 3, 1914, and raised to the episcopacy on June 30 by the bishop of Savannah. In 1917 he attracted national attention by battling a convent inspection bill and later an act forbidding sisters to teach "colored" children. On August 10, 1921, he was named to succeed the venerable Cardinal James Gibbons as archbishop of Baltimore. He took possession of the premier see on November 21.
In his first years in Baltimore Curley devoted himself to the work of consolidation, centralization, and the implementation of Vatican directives, goals already achieved by the larger archdioceses. In 1922 he organized the Office of Education, in 1923 the Bureau of Catholic Charities, and in 1925 the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. The achievements of which he was proudest were in education; by 1926 he felt that he could boast, "I defy any system of grammar school education in the United States to prove itself superior to the system that is being maintained in the Archdiocese of Baltimore." He energized such societies as the Holy Name, Knights of Columbus, Catholic Daughters of America, and International Federation of Catholic Alumnae, charging them with such tasks as the support of Catholic schools, poor relief, and defense of the Church.
In time Curley won a reputation as a battler as well as that of a builder. He was the most outspoken and militant prelate in America in the interwar years. Among the crusades he launched were those against the anticlerical governments of Mexico and Spain, the salacious movies coming out of Hollywood, and the Catholic Foundation movement for the establishment of Catholic centers at secular universities, which Curley felt undermined Catholic schools. He was the first American bishop to speak out forcefully against Communism, persuading the bishops in 1936 to conduct a study of its influence in America. In Baltimore and Washington he established labor schools to disseminate papal teachings on social justice and to counter the activities of the Communist party in local unions. Curley was quick to demand apologies for what he considered slurs against the Catholic Church, waging a bitter campaign against the Baltimore Sun when one of its reporters compared Hitler to Ignatius Loyola.
Though he avoided involvement in local politics, Curley was outspoken in his criticism of the foreign policy of the Roosevelt administration. On this and other matters his public statements proved often a source of embarrassment to the administrative committee of the National Catholic Welfare Conference, with whom he was often at odds. In 1936 Curley submitted his resignation to the conference when ordered to dissolve a corporation he had created for Mexican relief. Curley was also frustrated in his efforts to make a true university of The Catholic University in Washington, of which he was, as archbishop of Baltimore, the chancellor. The dismissal of the rector whom he supported Curley also took as a rebuke.
Curley had, in fact, no close friends among the American bishops and was the first archbishop of Baltimore not to be recognized as leader of the Catholic Church in the United States. On July 22, 1939, however, he was named also archbishop of the newly created Archdiocese of Washington, but he continued to govern the two archdioceses as a unit. Unaware of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Curley responded to a reporter in a flippant manner concerning the catastrophe. The interview was used by those who wished to silence him to have the apostolic delegate deliver an admonition. Pained by the reproof, Curley made no pronouncements on political affairs for the rest of his life.
Perhaps the majority of his spiritual children in the two archdioceses he governed came to admire this bluff and blunt Irishman so unlike his irenic predecessor, in whose shadow Curley lived throughout his years in Baltimore. In his disdain for the values of mainstream America, Michael Curley, in fact, put himself at odds with the Maryland tradition begun by Carroll and revived by Gibbons. His contribution to the Catholic militancy of the interwar years was, perhaps, unequalled. As a builder he also had few equals, doubling the institutions and personnel in his twenty-five years in Baltimore.
Much of this was accomplished from a hospital bed. Curley suffered from a number of ailments, among them sinusitis, shingles, and high blood pressure. He suffered a number of strokes that induced partial paralysis, blindness, and on May 16, 1947, death. Archbishop John McNicholas of Cincinnati, a former antagonist, summed up the many assessments of his episcopacy. In Curley's death, he declared, "the Church loses a warrior prelate for its unchangeable teachings... a champion of Christian education of our youth, a friend of the missions, and almoner of the poor." Curley was, perhaps, the most honest and forthright of American bishops. Even his critics admired his directness and candor as they deplored his lack of tact. Even more did those who really knew him admire his simplicity of life and love of the poor. He tried, in fact, to live as poorly as the poor he never patronized.
The Most Reverend Francis Patrick Keough (1947-1961), eleventh Archbishop of Baltimore. Born in New Britain, CT, Dec. 30, 1889. The second son of Irish immigrants, Patrick and Margaret (Ryan) Keough, he attended parochial school in his native city and began his studies for the priesthood at St. Thomas Seminary, Hartford, Connecticut. In 1911 he was sent to the Sulpician Seminary at Issy, France, but he returned after the outbreak of World War I and continued his theological studies at St. Bernard's in Rochester, New York. He was ordained for the Hartford diocese on June 10, 1916. For three years he did parochial work; thereafter, until his appointment to Providence (Feb. 10, 1934), he was engaged in special diocesan assignments as institutional chaplain, director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, assistant chancellor, and secretary to the bishop. Keough was consecrated in his see city on May 22, 1934, by the newly appointed Apostolic Delegate, Archbishop Amleto Cicognani, later cardinal and Vatican secretary of state. During his 13 years as ordinary of a heavily Catholic state, Keough founded a minor seminary, used his knowledge of French to soften differences that had risen between the French-speaking and English-speaking members of his flock, and employed his financial talents to overcome entirely the heavy debts burdening the diocese at his arrival. Despite his reluctance to leave his native New England, he was appointed to the nation's premier see Nov. 29, 1947, and was installed in Baltimore's basilica-cathedral by Archbishop Cicognani on Feb. 24, 1948.
Keough's new position of prestige led to numerous major appointments to the National Catholic Welfare Conference, where he had already served in many secondary posts. He played a decisive role in the issuance of the historic 1958 statement of the American Catholic hierarchy against racial discrimination. Always concerned about the needy, he built a residence for the elderly (Stella Maris) and a consolidated home for deprived school-age children (Villa Maria); he also took the initial steps for constructing a new St. Vincent's Infant Home and an adjacent maternity care residence (Villa St. Louise). His major building project was the construction (1954-1959) of an $8 million cathedral from funds bequeathed by a Baltimore merchant, Thomas O'Neill. This Cathedral of Mary Our Queen became the metropolitan center on Sept. 21, 1959. Two years later the archbishop was buried beneath its main altar.
As a retiring man of childlike piety and conservative temperament, Keough preferred a gradual and quiet approach to solving the practical problems that completely absorbed his energies. Declining health, which began with a major illness in 1954, and the preoccupations of overseeing the construction of the new cathedral considerably restricted the general productivity of his later years.
His Eminence Cardinal Lawrence Joseph Shehan (1961-1984), twelfth Archbishop of Baltimore, was born on December 18, 1898 in Baltimore and studied at St. Charles College, Catonsville, Maryland, St. Mary's Seminary, Baltimore, and at the Pontifical North American College, Rome, where he was ordained a priest on December 23, 1922. He completed his doctoral studies in theology the following year at the Urbaniana University in Rome, and returned as curate in St. Patrick Church, Washington, D.C. Shehan was involved in pastoral work from 1923-47. He also served as assistant director of Catholic Charities fro 1929-36, and director from 1936-45. He was appointed auxiliary bishop to the archbishop of Baltimore and Washington in 1945 and, in 1947, auxiliary to the archbishop of Baltimore, and served as vicar general from 1948 until his translation to the newly erected Diocese of Bridgeport, Connecticut, in 1953.
During his nine years in Bridgeport, Shehan devoted himself to ensuring the adequate organization and functioning of the diocesan offices, approved the construction of twenty-four new churches and the establishment of eighteen new parishes, as well as numerous parish schools, and the founding of three diocesan high schools, in Bridgeport (1957), Stamford (1958), and Norwalk (1959).
Shehan also organized youth ministry in the diocese, improved vocation work for priestly and religious vocations, began parish ministry for the growing numbers of Hispanic, Portuguese, and Brazilian immigrants, and founded St. Joseph Manor in Trumbull for the care of the elderly, introducing the Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm to staff the facility in 1958. In order to complete the initial organization of the diocese and establish a uniform code of practice and discipline for the clergy, Shehan celebrated the first synod of Bridgeport in October 1960.
In July 1961 Shehan was promoted to the titular archiepiscopal see of Nicopolis ad Nestum, and appointed coadjutor to the archbishop of Baltimore, Francis Keough. He succeeded to the see in December of that year, following the death of Keough and received the pallium March 29, 1962.
In 1962, as the twelfth archbishop of Baltimore, Shehan began his official work in the field of ecumenism, with his nomination as a member of the Congregation for the Union of Christians. In November 1964 he was chosen by the bishops as the head of the Episcopal Commission for Ecumenism, which was to inform the American hierarchy on the practical application of the decrees of Vatican II on dialogue with other Christians. During the Second Vatican Council, Shehan served as a member of the Conciliar Commission for the Discipline of the Clergy and of the Faithful, and was named a member of the Council of Presidency of Vatican Council II in July 1965. During the council he made a number of interventions concerning ecumenism and religious liberty. In 1965 Pope Paul VI named Shehan his representative at meetings with the Orthodox, which resulted in the lifting of the mutual excommunications by Constantinople and Rome.
Concerned about racism in America, and in his archdiocese, Shehan participated in the 1963 March on Washington with Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. In March 1963 Shehan issued a strong pastoral letter on racial justice, stating that "discrimination has no place in the Church." He made a study of racism in the Catholic institutions within the archdiocese, and formally requested the Catholic hospitals to approve and support a rule of nondiscrimination.
Shehan was not a supporter of the war in Vietnam, which he called "uncontrolled violence and senseless wholesale destruction of human life and moral values". In the early 1970s Shehan supplied the bail for the Harrisburg Seven, which included Fr. Philip Berrigan, following one of their protests. Shehan visited them in jail and assigned an archdiocesan attorney to defend them in court. Throughout his years in Baltimore, Shehan supported nonviolent efforts for peace, social justice, and fair housing.
Pope Paul VI created him a cardinal on February 22, 1965, the second of Baltimore's archbishops to receive the red hat. In 1973 he served as the papal legate to the Fortieth Eucharistic Congress in Melbourne, Australia, and retired in 1974.
The Most Reverend William Donald Borders (1974-1989), thirteenth Archbishop of Baltimore, born in Washington, Indiana, the son of Thomas Martin and Zelpha Ann (Queen) Borders, he attended Catholic elementary and high school before enrolling in St. Meinrad’s College and Seminary. Although he intended to be ordained for the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, he responded to an appeal from Archbishop Joseph F. Rummel of New Orleans for priests and seminarians in 1936. He transferred to the Archdiocese of New Orleans and completed his studies at Notre Dame Seminary, New Orleans. He was ordained a priest on May 18, 1940.
His first assignment was to Sacred Heart Parish in Baton Rouge, where he became acquainted with a number of young adults who would soon be leaving to serve in the armed forces during the Second World War. These relationships influenced his decision to enlist in the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps in 1943, where he served as a battalion chaplain with the 362nd Infantry Regiment of the 91st Infantry Division in North Africa and Italy. He held the rank of major and was awarded the Bronze Star for Valor for carrying a wounded soldier to safety while under fire.
He returned to Louisiana after the war and in 1946 was sent to the University of Notre Dame to pursue a graduate degree. He received a M.S. in Education the next year and has held an unflagging commitment to Catholic education throughout his life. Upon completing his studies, he resumed parish ministry. In 1961 when the Diocese of Baton Rouge was created out of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, he became a priest of the new diocese. Two years later was named a domestic prelate with the title of Monsignor and in 1964 was appointed rector of St. Joseph Cathedral. During this period, he served as a diocesan consultor, director of seminarians, and as moderator for the diocesan councils of Catholic Men and Women. He is also recognized as one of the founders of St. Joseph Catholic Preparatory School, a minor seminary.
He was appointed by Pope Paul VI bishop of the newly erected Diocese of Orlando on May 2, 1968, and was consecrated on June 14, 1968. He devoted tremendous energy to implementing the directives of the Second Vatican Council in Orlando, with particular emphasis on collegiality and shared responsibility. Under his guidance, diocesan and parish councils, boards of education, and similar commissions were established. He also created a Social Services Board to correlate the work of already existing agencies. He developed a comprehensive educational program aimed at coordinating efforts in Catholics schools, campus ministry, and religious education. Social outreach centers were set up throughout the diocese to meet the needs of migrant workers and the poor.
He was appointed Archbishop of the Metropolitan See of Baltimore on April 2, 1974, succeeding Card. Lawrence J. Shehan (1898-1984), and was installed at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen on June 26, 1974. He received the Sacred Pallium on March 24, 1975. He led the Archdiocese for the next 15 years, where he oversaw the division of the Archdiocese into vicariates, reorganized Archdiocesan Central Services, and clarified and strengthened the role of the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council and the Priests’ Council. On the national level he chaired the Bishops’ Committee on Education and served on the Bishops’ Committee on Human Values, the Administrative Board of the U.S. Catholic Conference, and the Administrative Committee of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. He also chaired the Ad Hoc Committee for the Bicentennial of the U.S. Hierarchy. He retired on April 10, 1989.
His Eminence Cardinal William Henry Keeler (1989-2007), fourteenth Archbishop of Baltimore, was born March 4, 1931 in San Antonio, Texas, the son of Thomas L. Keeler and Margaret T. (Conway) Keeler. He was raised in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, where he attended St. Mary School and Lebanon Catholic High School. He received a B.A. from St. Charles Seminary, Overbrook, Philadelphia, in 1952 and a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome in 1956.
Ordained a priest on July 17, 1955 in the Church of the Holy Apostles, Rome by Archbishop (and future Cardinal) Luigi Traglia, the young cleric became assistant pastor at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church, Marysville, and secretary of the diocesan Tribunal (1956-1958). He was then assigned to study Canon Law at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. In 1961, he received his doctorate in Canon Law and was reappointed by Bishop George L. Leech as assistant pastor of Our Lady of Good Counsel Church. At the same time he was named Defender of the Bond of the diocesan Tribunal. In 1964, he was appointed pastor of the Marysville parish.
As secretary to Bishop Leech during the Second Vatican Council meetings in Rome (1962-1965), he was appointed peritus or "special advisor" to the Council by Pope John XXIII. During the Council, he also served on the staff of the Council Digest, a daily communication service sponsored by the United States Bishops.
In 1965, he was appointed to serve as Vice Chancellor of the Harrisburg Diocese and, in time, Chancellor (1969) and later Vicar General. He held the latter position when he was named Auxiliary Bishop of Harrisburg by Pope John Paul II on July 24, 1979. His episcopal ordination occurred on September 21, 1979, at St Patrick Cathedral, Harrisburg.
On September 3, 1983, he was elected Administrator of the Diocese of Harrisburg by the College of Consultors following the death of Bishop Joseph T. Daley. Pope John Paul II appointed him Bishop of Harrisburg on November 10, 1983, and he was installed as Bishop on January 4, 1984, by His Eminence John Cardinal Krol, Archbishop of Philadelphia.
He was appointed Archbishop of Baltimore by Pope John Paul II on April 11, 1989, and was formally installed as 14th Ordinary of the nation's oldest See on May 23 in ceremonies at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen.
Cardinal Keeler was appointed to the College of Cardinals by Pope John Paul II on November 28, 1994. The Consistory ceremony took place in the Pope Paul VI Audience Hall, Vatican City State. The Cardinal currently serves on the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and the Congregation for the Oriental Churches.
An influential participant in a wide range of national and international issues, Cardinal Keeler was elected President of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops (NCCB) and the United States Catholic Conference in November 1992. He had been elected as the organizations' Vice President in November of 1989, when he hosted Baltimore's bicentennial celebration of the founding of America's first Roman Catholic diocese.
While Archbishop of Baltimore, Cardinal Keeler established as one of his priorities as leader of the oldest Catholic See in the United States, the strengthening of the Catholic school system. In 1996, he helped to start “Partners in Excellence,” a program designed to help needy families and at-risk youth afford the cost of Catholic education through the help of corporate partnerships. To date, over 16,500 scholarships have been awarded. He also has been a vigilant leader of the pro-life movement and an outspoken advocate for expanded evangelization throughout the parish community. In 1992 the Cardinal initiated the Lenten Appeal (now known as the Archbishop’s Annual Appeal), a giving campaign that to date has raised over $70 million in support of area Catholic schools, the needs of the less fortunate, and a variety of spiritual development efforts.
The Most Reverend Edwin Frederick O’Brien (2007-present), fifteenth and current Archbishop of Baltimore, was born April 8, 1939 in the Bronx, New York, son of Edwin Frederick O’Brien, Sr. and Mary Winifred O’Brien. He was one of three children, including brothers Ken and Tom (now both deceased). He attended St. Joseph’s Seminary, Dunwoodie, where he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1961, a Master of Divinity in 1964, and a Master of Arts degree in 1965. He was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of New York on May 29, 1965 by Francis Cardinal Spellman.
His first assignment was as a civilian chaplain at the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. He would later be commissioned to become a military chaplain and in 1970, he officially became an Army Chaplain with the rank of Captain, serving with the 82nd Airborne Division. From 1971 to 1972, he served a tour of duty in Vietnam with the 173rd Airborne Brigade and 1st Cavalry Brigade. From a base of operations in the middle of a jungle, he and a Protestant minister flew by helicopter to defensive outposts where they would provide for the spiritual needs of the soldiers.
In 1973, he left the military and began his doctoral studies at Rome’s Angelicum University. While preparing for his doctorate in sacred theology, Archbishop O’Brien was a graduate student at the Pontifical North American College. He studied moral theology and completed his doctoral dissertation, entitled The Origin and Development of Moral Principles in the Writings of Paul Ramsey, in 1976.
He returned to continue his service to the Archdiocese of New York, serving as vice-chancellor for the Archdiocese and associate pastor at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. In 1979 he coordinated Pope John Paul II’s visit to New York and for two years served as communications director for the Archdiocese. In 1986, he was elevated to Monsignor and served two terms as rector of St. Joseph’s Seminary from 1985-1989 and 1994-1997. From 1990-1994, he served as rector of the Pontifical North American College in Rome.
On February 6, 1996, he was named Auxiliary Bishop of New York and bishop of the titular see of Thizica. He was consecrated by Cardinal John O’Connor at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on March 25, 1996. On April 7 of the following year, he was named co-adjutor bishop for the Archdiocese for the Military Services and on August 12, 1997, he succeeded as archbishop. The Archdiocese for the Military Services serves 1.5 million Catholics including all U.S. Armed Forces and their families as well as 170 Veterans Administration hospitals and U.S. Government employees overseas.
From September 2005 to June 2006, he served as the Holy See’s coordinator for the Papal Visitation of Seminaries and Houses of Priestly Formation and this spring was appointed a member of the Congregation for Catholic Education and Seminaries.
On July 12, 2007, his appointment as Archbishop of Baltimore by Pope Benedict XVI was announced.
O Estado de Maryland (Old Line State) é uma das treze colônias que, após a Revolução de 1776, formaram os Estados Unidos da América. Seu processo de colonização é sui generis, uma vez que foi entregue pelo rei protestante inglês como propriedade a um nobre convertido ao catolicismo, o segundo Lorde Baltimore.
A única jurisdição eclesiástica do estado é a Arquidiocese de Baltimore, Sé Primacial, criada logo após a independência dos Estados Unidos. A Arquidiocese de Baltimore abrange a quase totalidade dos condados de Maryland, com exceção dos condados de Montgomery, Prince George, St. Mary's, Calvert e Charles que pertencem à Arquidiocese de Washington, D.C. Os Católicos do estado chegam a 23% da população, quando incluídos todos os condados.
OBLATVS agradece aos leitores de Annapolis (capital), Baltimore (cidade mais importante), Bethesda, Bowie, Columbia, Ellicott City, Emmitsburg, Lanham, Lutherville Timonium, Parkville, Rockville e Upper Malboro.
ESTATÍSTICAS
Arquidiocese de Baltimore
População: 3.055.407; Católicos: 517.679 (16,9%); Sacerdotes: 545; Paróquias: 151
Fonte: Catholic Encyclopedia; Archdiocese of Baltimore; Catholic Hierarchy;
