Cardinal Egan compares abortion to crimes of Hitler, Stalin
Oct 28, 2008
‘It is high time to stop pretending that we do not know what this nation of ours is allowing-- and approving-- with the killing each year of more than 1,600,000 innocent human beings within their mothers,’ Cardinal Edward Egan of New York wrote in an Oct. 23 archdiocesan newspaper column defending the humanity of the unborn child. ‘One day, please God, when the stranglehold on public opinion in the United States has been released by the extremists for whom abortion is the center of their political and moral life, our nation will, in my judgment, look back on what we have been doing to innocent human beings within their mothers as a crime no less heinous than what was approved by the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott Case in the 19th century, and no less heinous than what was perpetrated by Hitler and Stalin in the 20th.’
Abortion support equal to Nazism
Oct 28, 2008
New York, Oct 28, 2008 / 09:37 am (CNA).- In a strongly worded article published next to a moving photo of an unborn baby in the womb, Cardinal Edward Egan, Archbishop of New York, compared tolerating abortions to the reasoning used by Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin to commit mass murders.
The cardinal begins his column for the latest edition of the archdiocesan newspaper “Catholic New York” by explaining that “the picture on this page is an untouched photograph of a being that has been within its mother for 20 weeks. Please do me the favor of looking at it carefully.”
“Have you any doubt that it is a human being?” Cardinal Egan asks.
“If your answer to this last query is negative, that is, if you have no doubt that the authorities in a civilized society would be duty-bound to protect this innocent human being if someone were to wish to kill it, I would suggest—even insist—that there is not a lot more to be said about the issue of abortion in our society. It is wrong, and it cannot—must not—be tolerated.”
The Archbishop of New York continues by asking: “Why do I not get into defining ‘human being,’ defining ‘person,’ defining ‘living,’ and the rest?”
“Because, I respond, I am sound of mind and endowed with a fine set of eyes, into which I do not believe it is well to cast sand. I looked at the photograph, and I have no doubt about what I saw and what are the duties of a civilized society if what I saw is in danger of being killed by someone who wishes to kill it or, if you prefer, someone who ‘chooses’ to kill it.”
After describing a recent video depicting the humanity of babies in their mothers’ wombs, the Archbishop of New York says that “if you can convince yourself that these beings are something other than living and innocent human beings, something, for example, such as ‘mere clusters of tissues,’ you have a problem far more basic than merely not appreciating the wrongness of abortion. And that problem is—forgive me—self-deceit in a most extreme form.”
Cardinal Egan continues: “Adolf Hitler convinced himself and his subjects that Jews and homosexuals were other than human beings. Joseph Stalin did the same as regards Cossacks and Russian aristocrats. And this despite the fact that Hitler and his subjects had seen both Jews and homosexuals with their own eyes, and Stalin and his subjects had seen both Cossacks and Russian aristocrats with theirs.”
“It is high time to stop pretending that we do not know what this nation of ours is allowing—and approving—with the killing each year of more than 1,600,000 innocent human beings within their mothers. We know full well that to kill what is clearly seen to be an innocent human being or what cannot be proved to be other than an innocent human being is as wrong as wrong gets,” he adds.
“Do me a favor,” Cardinal Egan writes, “Look at the photograph again. Look and decide with honesty and decency what the Lord expects of you and me as the horror of ‘legalized’ abortion continues to erode the honor of our nation. Look, and do not absolve yourself if you refuse to act.”
Do as I say...Not as I do?
Oct 27, 2008
If New York's Cardinal Edward Egan wasn't in Rocco's list of 50 bishops who have effectively (or explicitly) said Catholic can't vote for Obama, then he is now. Via Gary Stern's "Blogging Religiously" site (Gary is the religion writer nonpareil at the Journal News in Westchester County) comes Cardinal Egan's latest column in "Catholic New York," titled "Just Look," with a photo of a 20-week-old fetus and a dare for anyone to support legalized abortion. He also takes the Hitler/Stalin path, and cites Dred Scott, and concludes:
"Do me a favor. Look at the photograph again. Look and decide with honesty and decency what the Lord expects of you and me as the horror of "legalized" abortion continues to erode the honor of our nation. Look, and do not absolve yourself if you refuse to act."
Cardinal Egan earlier backed up his words with actions, scolding Fordham University for honoring Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer this Wednesday (Oct. 29) with the annual Fordham-Stein Ethics Prize, despite Breyer's clear abortion rights record. Again, Gary Stern has the details about Egan's anger that a Catholic institution would honor an abortion-rights supporter.
On the other hand, as Gary points out elsewhere, it was Egan who honored Barack Obama at the Al Smith Dinner (along with embryonic stem cell champion John McCain). And that has him on the receiving end of some of the same criticism he is dishing out, most notably from Deal Hudson.
And so it goes.
Mad About Music
Sept 08, 2008
His Eminence Edward Cardinal Egan was born on April 2, 1932, in Oak Park, Illinois, the son of Thomas J. and Genevieve Costello Egan.
(wnyc.org, September 07, 2008) Having earned a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy from Saint Mary of the Lake Seminary in Mundelein, Illinois, he was sent to Rome to complete his seminary studies at the Pontifical North American College in Vatican City where he was ordained on December 15, 1957. In 1958, he received a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University. After ordination, he returned to the United States in 1958, where he served briefly as a curate at Holy Name Cathedral Parish and later as assistant chancellor of the Archdiocese of Chicago and secretary to His Eminence, Albert Cardinal Meyer.
In 1960 Cardinal Egan was named assistant vice-rector and repetitor of Moral Theology and Canon Law at the Pontifical North American College in Vatican City. In 1964, he earned a doctorate in Canon Law “Summa Cum Laude” from the Pontifical Gregorian University and thereafter returned to Chicago, where he served first as secretary to His Eminence, John Cardinal Cody, and later as the co-chancellor of the Archdiocese of Chicago. During this period, he was also the secretary of the Archdiocesan Commissions on Ecumenism and Human Relations and was a member of several interfaith and ecumenical boards and commissions of social concerns throughout the greater Chicago area. Among these might be mentioned the Chicago Conference on Religion and Race, the Leadership Council for Metropolitan Open Communities, and the Interreligious Committee for Urban Affairs. During this period, he likewise participated in numerous ecumenical undertakings, among them the Anglican-Roman Catholic Dialogue of the United States Catholic Conference and Protestant Episcopal Church of America, the North American Academy of Ecumenists, and the Chicago Ecumenical Dialogue.
In 1971 Cardinal Egan returned to Rome as a judge of the Tribunal of the Sacred Roman Rota, a position he held until his episcopal consecration in May of 1985. While in Rome, he was as well a professor of Canon Law at the Pontifical Gregorian University; a professor of Civil and Criminal Procedure at the Studium Rotale, the law school of the Rota; a commissioner of the Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship; a consultor of the Congregation for the Clergy; and in 1982 one of six canonists who reviewed the new Code of Canon Law with His Holiness, Pope John Paul II, before its promulgation in 1983.
Cardinal Egan was consecrated a bishop on May 22, 1985, in the Basilica of Saints John and Paul in Rome by His Eminence, Bernardin Cardinal Gantin, Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for Bishops, with His Eminence, John Cardinal O’Connor, Archbishop of New York and His Excellency, the Most Reverend John R. Keating, Bishop of Arlington, as co-consecrators.
Cardinal Egan served as Auxiliary Bishop and Vicar for Education of the Archdiocese of New York from 1985 – 1988.
On November 8, 1988, Pope John Paul II appointed Cardinal Egan to be the Third Bishop of the Diocese of Bridgeport. He was installed on December 14, 1988.
Felix Mendelssohn Piano Concerto in G minor, Op. 25. Third movement [excerpt]. Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. Herbert Blomstedt. Jean-Yves Thibaudet, piano. Decca 289-468600-2.
César Franck Panis Angelicus, [excerpt]. Vienna Symphony Orchestra. Uwe Christian Harrer. José Carreras, tenor. Philips 442 296-2.
Franz Schubert Piano Trio No. 1 in B flat, Op. 99. Second movement [excerpt]. Isaac Stern, violin, Leonard Rose, cello, Eugene Istomin, piano. Sony Classical SK 92740
Ludwig van Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 8 in C-minor, Op. 13 "Pathétique". First movement [excerpt]. Artur Schnabel, piano. Documents LC 12281.
John Kander and Fred Ebb “New York, New York”. Frank Sinatra. Reprise 26501-2.
Johannes Brahms Intermezzo, No. 2, Op. 117. Arthur Rubinstein, piano. BMG Classics 09026 63010-2
Richard Strauss Der Rosenkavalier. Final trio from Act III. Philharmonia Orchestra. Herbert von Karajan. Teresa Stich-Randall, Christa Ludwig, Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. EMI Classics 5 67609 2.
GILBERT KAPLAN: Welcome back as we open our new season with my guest, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan.
[Theme music]
For the last eight years he has served as the Archbishop of New York -- a period filled with enormous challenges and difficult decisions. Throughout it all he has never wavered from what he regards as his most important contribution --- leading people in prayer. And along the way music has always been his companion. He is an accomplished pianist and often turns to music both at difficult times and for consolation. Cardinal Edward Egan, welcome to “Mad About Music”.
CARDINAL EDWARD EGAN: Well thank you for having me, Gil. I’m delighted to be here.
KAPLAN: Now in my introduction I mentioned you are an accomplished pianist. -- As I understand so is the Pope. Now when he was in New York, with all the masses and all the ceremonies, did you have a chance to speak with him at all about music?
EGAN: When he was here, we were in the Pope-mobile, as they say, coming away from St. Patrick’s Cathedral, after the mass, and he said to me, “What are you playing?” And I said, “Well, Your Holiness, I’m a little ashamed to say that I don’t play Haydn and Mozart and things of that sort anymore.” I said, “I actually play things like Debussy and Ravel.” And he said, “Well, that’s OK, too.” So I have permission for that, you know.”
KAPLAN: I read somewhere that the Pope, from time to time, plays duets with his former housekeeper, who was a music teacher at one point. Have you ever played together, as a duet, for fun or anything?
EGAN: No, I’ve never done that. I would be happy to try, but, no. I’d never heard that story, too. Is that right?
KAPLAN: Yes. I suppose I ought to ask you, I mean, who is the more accomplished pianist, you or the Pope?
EGAN: Oh, I have to answer, the Pope.
KAPLAN: Even if he wasn’t?
EGAN: Actually, I’ve never heard him play, to tell you the truth, and he’s never heard me play.
KAPLAN: All right, we’ll talk further about the Pope and music, but first give me a sense of the role music plays in your life. Is it something you just enjoy or are you one of those who just can’t live without it?
EGAN: I’m definitely in the “I can’t live without it” group. I’ve been in love with music all of my life, and frankly, I pretty much learned music on my own. I was a boy that went to a library and brought home the 40th Symphony of Mozart, and I remember putting it on the electric phonograph and saying, “My heavens! Where have I been? What is this?” So then I went back to the library, and it was in Oak Park, Illinois, and I brought home the Brahms Fourth Symphony and the Beethoven Fourth Piano Concerto, and after that, if I could use this expression, I was hooked and I’ve been hooked ever since.
KAPLAN: Well, that’s fascinating. Now, I understand you’re an accomplished pianist, and almost all of your selections, all but one today, are piano music, so tell me how you first got to that.
EGAN: I had an aunt who played on WCFL in Chicago, that was the Chicago Federation of Labor, many, many years ago, in the thirties. And she was a pianist, and very fine. And Aunt Dorothy decided that she was going to make a pianist out of me, and so very early in the game, I learned to play all the popular songs from my aunt, and then I decided after I had heard Mozart and Brahms and Beethoven and the rest of them, that I was going to move in a different direction. So I did have the great advantage of a very fine piano teacher. She died, and then I got another one, and I would say that from then, I really learned to love music.
KAPLAN: Well that’s fascinating. And then, let’s use that as a natural transition into your first selection today, which is piano music, and this case Mendelssohn.
EGAN: Yes, I’ll tell you why I chose this. This was the first piano concerto I ever learned to play, and I actually played it in a recital in Oak Park many, many years ago.
KAPLAN: How old were you?
EGAN: Oh, I was twelve or thirteen. And I worked so hard to get the third movement of this up to tempo, and I had it memorized. As we used to say, I had it “aced”. And it’s a concerto that you never hear. It’s very seldomly performed; it’s really often I think seen as one of his less important works. But it’s melodic and lovely, and it was the kind of thing that a twelve or thirteen year old boy could handle, and I was very proud to be playing a piano concerto, and that was my first. I think it’s very, very beautiful, and I’ve always loved Mendelssohn; it’s full of melody, and I hope that your listeners, when they hear it, will like it as well.
[Music]
KAPLAN: An excerpt from the third movement of Mendelssohn’s first piano concerto, the Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig under the baton of Herbert Blomstedt with soloist Jean-Yves Thibaudet. A work played by my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan, when he was only about 12 years old. Now we were talking before about you and the Pope both playing the piano. I understand he plays a half hour a day -- almost every day. How about you?
EGAN: I wish I could do the same, and I ought to take his example, but I don’t play that much at all.
KAPLAN: Well, you know, you mentioned that the Pope’s favorites are somewhat different from yours, at least what you’re playing, and growing up with Mozart, the Pope said, that his music “thoroughly penetrated his soul”. Is there any one composer about which you could say the same thing, that his music thoroughly penetrated your soul?
EGAN: Well, I’m a little embarrassed to give the answer, but I’m going to give it anyway. I would say that the composer who moves me and has moved me all my life, more than perhaps anyone else, is no less than Frédéric Chopin.
KAPLAN: Why should one be embarrassed about that? He may be the greatest composer of piano music.
EGAN: I think one of the great, great composers of all time, quite apart from just the piano music, I think the art of his composition is magnificent. Now, I know his orchestrations were not great, but a lot of people, it seems to me, think of Chopin as something less than Beethoven and Brahms and Mozart and so forth. But I believe if you listen to it, this master of melody, this master of unexpected harmonies, this master, it seems to me, of a whole national understanding of music, and I’m from Chicago, you know, so I have a lot of Polish connections. I believe that he is the one who has gone deepest into my own heart.
KAPLAN: And yet today, I see you have no Chopin on your list, but I understand you’ve selected music around which it impacted on your life. But I’m surprised to see, and I was surprised to see, when your list came in, that there is no sacred music on your list. No Bach B minor Mass, no Verdi Requiem, no Mozart Requiem, Brahms.
EGAN: Well, I’ll tell you, for me, all great music is sacred. And I would not have chosen the ones that you mentioned because I would think of this program as not a program about religious music, and when the Pope was here, I worked for hours and hours on the choice of what we would be singing. And sacred music means a whole lot to me, but the music I chose, I tried to make kind of the music that’s sacred for everyone.
KAPLAN: Well, while we’re talking about church music, I wonder, do you have a favorite hymn?
EGAN: Actually, I do. I would say its César Franck’s Panis Angelicus. It’s a masterpiece I think in every way, it’s marvelously prayerful, it’s one of the most familiar hymns by choirs that are able to do great music, and I had it for the funerals of both my mother and my father. And the Holy Father started out his visit in the United States in Washington. And they sang the Panis Angelicus in Washington, and I knew they were going to sing it, and so they took it away from us, we weren’t able to repeat it, you know. But I would say that the Panis Angelicus of César Franck is a masterpiece and a marvelous prayer and I would list it as number one.
[Music]
KAPLAN: An excerpt of César Franck’s Panis Angelicus, sung by José Carreras with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra led by Uwe Christian Harrer. The favorite hymn of my guest today on “Mad About Music” the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. You know I understand there was a secret weapon behind the choir preparing so diligently at St. Joseph’s for the Pope, and I suppose at St. Patrick’s, also. I read that you had sent a big box of chocolates to the choir at St. Patrick’s when they were rehearsing. Was this a reward or a bribe?
EGAN: Well, I sent more than one. And I believe that the choir should know that the local bishop esteems their work and admires them and loves them. And so I sent more than one box of chocolate, and it was just kind of my way of saying, “hang in there, you’re doing a great job”.
KAPLAN: All right, well you’re doing a great job so far, so then, let’s return to your music list, and our next selection on that list is Schubert.
EGAN: Right. You were mentioning that my list is largely piano music. However, when I was in high school, we had a wonderful orchestra. And there were many who played the piano, and we didn’t need another pianist. And so I was assigned to learn the cello, believe it or not. So, I learned to play the cello very poorly. And so I played the cello in high school and in college and I loved the music of Schubert in a very special way. And one time, I discovered the Piano Trio in B flat, and someone asked me, if you only could take one piece of music with you to the desert island, what would it be? And I answered the second movement of this absolutely exquisite creation of Schubert.
[Music]
KAPLAN: An excerpt from the second movement of Schubert’s Trio No. 1 with Isaac Stern on the violin, Leonard Rose – cello, and Eugene Istomin, on the piano. A selection of my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. When we return we’ll discuss how the music program at St. Patrick’s Cathedral stacks up against the competition, what other churches are doing in the city.
[Station Break]
This is Gilbert Kaplan with my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. Let’s now turn to the music program of St. Patrick’s Cathedral. How do you feel the program stacks up against what the other churches in the city are doing?
EGAN: Well, I think it’s improving. You may know that now we have a rather impressive concert series, and we can do much more, it seems to me, and I know that a lot of the people in New York who are friendly with me would like to see that music program for the general public improved, because we do, I think, eight major concerts a year. And they’re free concerts, and they sometimes would be completely filling the Cathedral; at other times, maybe a half or two thirds, and I think it’s a great contribution to the community, because going to a concert these days is a very expensive enterprise. And so I would say, stay tuned, I hope we begin to do even more.
KAPLAN: I think in general, there is an impression that, of surprise that, given your passion for music, that the financial resources that are used for music at St. Patrick’s are probably not as much as many people think they ought to be. Now, I have no idea what they are, but what do you say about that?
EGAN: Well, I’ve never heard it said, to tell you the truth, the financial resources for the Cathedral music are pretty much determined by the rector of the Cathedral. And I’ve not known that they’ve felt that they were, you know, not having enough money available. I’ll look into that but you know, you never can really do all that you’d like to do. I believe that we’ve tried to do a good job, and I didn’t know that people felt that the financial resources were inadequate; I’ll have to talk to Monsignor Ritchie and see what the financial resources are.
KAPLAN: OK. Well, in an interview, you were asked what your biggest accomplishment in New York has been during your tenure here, and you said, “Leading people in Prayer.”
EGAN: Right.
KAPLAN: What would you regard as your most significant accomplishment in shaping the music program at the Cathedral?
EGAN: I think that I have chosen a very excellent director, and I think that together we have decided that we would see to it that we kept the total tradition of sacred music, of church music, not just what we might call the last thirty or so years. There was getting to be, it seemed to me, too much of the more recent hymns, and then, too much of the music that goes back to the classical polyphony of the 1500’s. I have tried to see to it that we cover the waterfront; and if we do that, that would be, forgive this – my greatest contribution.
KAPLAN: Well, however broad or narrow the field is there is never a controversy over whether to include Beethoven, right? And I see he is the next composer on your list today.
EGAN: Yes, no controversy at all. A giant of giants. I lived in Rome twenty-three years, and in the middle time that I lived in Rome, I was a professor at a seminary, the North American College in Rome. And one day, I met a pianist by the name of Leonard Pennario. And Leonard had a marvelous personality, an ebullient, smiling, happy, enthusiastic personality. And we started talking, and in the course of the conversation, I mentioned that I occasionally played the piano. So he said, “What are you playing?” I said, “Well, you know, I’m kind of playing the Pathétique of Beethoven”. So, he said, “Well, play it for me.” So, I played the first two movements. I didn’t try the third. And I received a master class from him. He pulled up the chair, told me what I was doing wrong, especially in the second movement, keeping the melody absolutely in control and watching out that I was changing the rhythms in the second movement, and so forth and even corrected some of my notes in the first movement, and so forth, and I felt that that was my one and only master class. And I would say that I knew few people that loved to perform as this man did. So, he’s my one master class, and that’s why I mentioned the lovely Pathétique.
[Music]
KAPLAN: An excerpt from the First Movement of Beethoven’s Pathétique Sonata performed by the legendary Artur Schnabel -- both the music and the performer chosen by my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. You know, before we were discussing music at St. Patrick’s and now I’d like to ask you about another aspect of church music which is a genuine fight that seems to be brewing concerning electric guitars during the mass. I understand that in Italy they often use electric guitars and in Spain, Flamenco music has even shown up. But the Pope has demanded an end to this, saying guitars are inconsistent with what music in the church ought to be. Now one Cardinal has gone public to disagree. I wrote down what he said: “better to have guitars on the altar than empty churches.” Where do you come out on this?
EGAN: Oh, I would have no problem with that either. We just simply have not had at the Cathedral any tradition of that kind. But we have many, many parishes, here in the Archdiocese of New York, that have guitars, and music that would be very much music of the people of the particular area. So, while St. Patrick’s Cathedral is something quite apart, let me assure you that next Sunday, I believe, I’ll be in a parish, Sacred Heart Parish here in Manhattan, and I understand I am to do the first mass in English and the second mass in Spanish. Now, I am sure, that during that second mass, you’re going to have guitars and all of this and that, and it’s wonderful. And it will be in Spanish and so forth. I don’t know that the Holy Father has said that we are not to have guitars in church and so forth, because we have them, and no one has ever told me not to.
KAPLAN: Well, I think if I can believe what I read in the newspapers, he did give a talk on this and was totally against it. And I wondered: what authority does the Pope have on a matter like that within the church? Can he only give advice and hope people follow him? Or, can he actually make it an edict that there will not be, say, electric guitars in churches?
EGAN: Well I suppose he could make it an edict, but I’m sure that that’s not the kind of thing that he’d be making edicts about. The parishes that have these kinds of things are expressing something that’s truly theirs, it’s something that’s truly holy, and I would be there delighted and I am, Sunday after Sunday, when I am away from the Cathedral.
KAPLAN: Well, this discussion of what is appropriate music in the church leads nicely to the next section of our show which we call the “wildcard” where you have a chance to pick music that is not classical or opera, sacred music, it can be anything - as wild as you like by the way. So what did you bring us today?
EGAN: My selection is “New York, New York”, not the one written by Leonard Bernstein for “On the Town,” but rather the one that John Kander and Fred Ebb wrote for Liza Minnelli in the film that made her so very famous, and of course the song that Frank Sinatra gave to the world in many ways. I am not a New Yorker, as you know; I came here first as an auxiliary bishop to Cardinal O’Connor in 1985, and then I left in 1989, but came back in 2000, so I have tried to become a real New Yorker. I, you know tell you, with striking my breast, I was a Cubs fan, you know, all my life. And of course, I’ve turned my back on that. I’m completely a Yankees fan now. But, this to me sums up New York in a very special way for someone who has become a New Yorker, and hopes to live the rest of his life right here in New York. I think it’s a great song, and I know that in the Olympics in 1984, it was played; and at Yankee Stadium, as you know there was a bit of controversy about it, whether they would play the Liza Minnelli performance, or the Frank Sinatra performance. And it’s a great song, all you have to hear is that little beginning, that is the background, before you know the whole world’s going to start singing, and so, being a New Yorker of recent vintage, I think this sort of sums up my understanding of this wonderful, wonderful town.
[Music]
KAPLAN: “New York, New York” sung by Frank Sinatra, the “wildcard” choice of my guest on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. Now as you know your “wildcard” is one of your only selections not for the piano. So what about performing piano music? Who are your favorite pianists?
EGAN: I would have to say that for Chopin, whom I mentioned, I don’t think anyone touches Rubinstein. I think that he simply knocked the ball out of the park. And I could mention this, too, that I actually heard Rubinstein play both of the Chopin concerti at Orchestra Hall, many, many years ago. And he was up in years, and it wasn’t the same Rubinstein that had done the recordings many years before, but the feeling in Orchestra Hall in Chicago was a feeling like no other that you ever could imagine. You felt as though the melodies were flowing out right from that piano right into your heart and back, and I’ll never forget that he came out and did two encores. And I didn’t see it, but somebody said to me that at a certain point, he turned to a lady in the audience and winked at her before he started the Nocturne in E flat, you know? And I think it made it all the more wonderful. I hope it was true. But certainly Rubinstein for Chopin. When you talk about Beethoven, I believe that my hero of heroes always was and always will be Artur Schnabel. Now, that really dates me, I know; but Schnabel’s recording of the thirty-two sonatas is available now, you can buy it, and I really think it’s the criterion.
KAPLAN: Well then, I think then let’s continue on with another piano work. This one by Brahms.
EGAN: The beauty of this piece is that it’s, I think, the quintessential expression of subtlety. There’s nothing that’s pushed in this. This is a subtle, beautiful development by Brahms, and I would say that this intermezzo, the second in the Opus 117, is particularly beloved for me because when I studied it, the teacher I had had been studying it in Nantucket with Leonard Shure. Leonard Shure was a well-known pianist, who was the assistant to Artur Schnabel. So, when I studied this intermezzo, in fact all three of them of the opus, I always felt that Schnabel was teaching me through Leonard Shure, and of course through my teacher. So, whenever I listen to this lovely, subtle piece of music, I think of myself as sort of inheriting some of the wonder that Leonard Shure put into his Brahms. And of course that Schnabel taught him.
[Music]
KAPLAN: Brahms’ Intermezzo No. 2 performed by pianist Arthur Rubinstein, music chosen by my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. When we return I’ll be asking Cardinal Egan whether music can have the same power as prayer.
[Station Break]
This is Gilbert Kaplan with my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. As we get deeper into the show today it becomes increasingly clear, I think, that for you music is something highly personal. So, I'd like to know a bit more about the power of music—that is the power of music in your own life. The Pope has said that music is – and this is a direct quote: “an authentic art, just like prayer.” So, along with prayer, do you ever turn to music at difficult moments for consolation, or when you just have to make a difficult decision?
EGAN: Absolutely. And I would have to say that I do see music as a prayer. I believe that our principal duty here in this world is to give adoration to our God. And I believe when we admire what is good and true and beautiful, we are admiring a reflection, we are seeing in what is good, true and beautiful, some kind of a reflection of the Divinity. So I see music as a prayer as well.
KAPLAN: Do you have any moments you can reflect on, when you faced making a difficult decision, when you thought, maybe I’ll put a little bit of this or that on, and what might it have been that you would put on?
EGAN: Well, I can’t say anything like that, but I’ll say something near it. When I was deciding whether or not I would go to a seminary, I remember making the decision in Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago, listening to what we call the “Tenebre,” written by da Victoria, and the choir at that time was at the level that I hope our choir here in New York will be with the great classical polyphonist, one day, and at this “Tenebre”, and the way we used to have it during Holy Week, the lights were all turned off, and the candles were extinguished, one by one, the apostles leaving the Lord. And I remember being swept up in the beauty of that magnificent 16th century masterpiece as a boy. And this had a big effect upon my decision.
KAPLAN: How emotional is your response to music? For example, do you find yourself at times in tears when you’re listening to music?
EGAN: I can’t say I’d be in tears, no. I wish I could give you a case of music that had done it to me. I think music really more buoys me up than anything else.
KAPLAN: Well, my next question is then, I guess, not really about buoying you up, because as someone who regularly officiates at funerals and who loves music so much, I wonder if you’ve decided at all what music you would like played at your own funeral?
EGAN: I didn’t expect that question, and let me tell you what I would do if I had the opportunity. And, I would say that if it ever were possible for me to choose what it would be, it would be the Perosi Requiem. I don’t know what’ll happen, but if they did have the Perosi Requiem, it would be wonderful.
KAPLAN: That’s a wonderful answer. I hope there are a few other questions that surprised you, but we’ll go on. Now, if there’s any music, we’ve been talking about emotional music, if there is any music that can surely touch your emotions, it’s your final selection, the extraordinary concluding trio from Strauss’ Rosenkavalier.
EGAN: Well, it’s a triumph and it’s I think as beautiful as anything you’d ever want to hear. Let me tell you how I came to love Der Rosenkavalier. When I was a seminarian, back in the 1950’s, one of my classmates was the now Cardinal Francis Stafford, who is a Cardinal in Rome. And Frank was not terribly informed about music, but he put up with my enthusiasms, and we actually managed to get tickets in Rome for Das Rheingold in Bayreuth. And so the two of us went to hear Das Rheingold. And when it was over, Frank turned to me and said, “I have no idea what you could possibly have heard or seen in that. I don’t like it at all.” Well, Das Rheingold is a kind of a heavy start for one’s operatic experience, but in any event, we continued down toward Rome. We went to Munich, and in Munich, I actually had two tickets for Der Rosenkavalier, with von Karajan and Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. So we went in and heard that, and after that, as we walked out, Cardinal Stafford became an opera fan. And I’ve kidded him many times that I really am the one that brought him forward in the musical world. So, having heard that incredible performance with no less than Schwarzkopf and von Karajan, and I believe it was in the Prinzregenten Theater in Munich. I’m 99% sure. I have never forgotten that, and I love it now, and there is a magnificent recording, of course, with Schwarzkopf and von Karajan, and when you get to that ending with that trio, you never think it’s going to stop going up and finally it achieves whatever it is that we all want to achieve, that marvelous resolution, and so I have such a fine memory of having taught opera to Cardinal Stafford through Schwarzkopf and von Karajan, and I thought that’s what I would choose.
[Music]
KAPLAN: The final trio from Richard Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier sung by Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Christa Ludwig and Teresa Stich-Randall with the Philharmonia Orchestra, all under the baton of Herbert von Karajan, the final selection of my guest today on “Mad About Music”, the Archbishop of New York, Cardinal Edward Egan. Powerful music that trio. And music you used to seduce another Cardinal into appreciating opera. And I say seduced purposely because another guest on “Mad About Music” also selected that trio from Rosenkavalier. That guest, the well-known Hollywood and Broadway director, Mike Nichols, he picked it for a different reason. He used it earlier in his life, he said, for seduction of the more traditional type, as I’d like you now to hear it in his own words:
NICHOLS: The Trio from the Rosenkavalier was just out and out, a way of getting girls, you know. It was simply saying, “have I got something to play for you”, and sitting them down and playing them the trio, which it has to be said, almost always worked.
KAPLAN: So that’s Mike Nichols about the seductive power of Rosenkavalier. What do you think about that?
EGAN: Well, I think that Richard Strauss seduces us all. And not just in Der Rosenkavalier. I think that Ariadne auf Naxos and especially the wonderful section that they give to the young Italian girl that sings music almost as marvelous as that trio. So, I would have to say to Mr. Nichols that he ought to broaden his spectrum and take a look and see if Ariadne might do the job too.
KAPLAN: All right well, beyond seduction, you know there’s a lot of fantasy in Rosenkavalier and we have a fantasy portion of our program which I call “Fantasyland”, where every guest, and that includes you, has to reveal their fantasies, their musical fantasies. And in your case, having studied the piano so much, I’d like to rule that out as a fantasy. And I’d like you to tell us that if you could be a big star, an opera singer, a composer, a musician playing the violin, a conductor, what would it be?
EGAN: Well, you’ll have to forgive me, but I often wondered what would have happened if I had pursued music and had had an opportunity to become a choir director, believe it or not. I would say that if you handed me the baton, and I had this choir in front of me, my fantasy would be to direct a great choir as part of a mass, as part of a liturgical service, as part of a worship. I wouldn’t be interested in doing it necessarily in a concert hall. But, St. Patrick’s Cathedral would be wonderful, but they’ve given me another job and so I put that into the hands of someone else with far greater talent.
KAPLAN: Well, we’re talking about fantasies, of course, and you certainly could do it sometime, why not? Cardinal Edward Egan, you’ve been a superb, wonderful guest, and provide a powerful example of the power music can provide in all our lives. This is Gilbert Kaplan, for “Mad About Music.”
New York Cardinal - Pelosi Not Worthy of "Providing Leadership in a Civilized Democracy"
Sept 05, 2008
Edward Cardinal Egan, Archbishop of New York, has unified his voice with fellow clergymen and Catholic congressmen, condemning House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's comments made on an August 24 episode of NBC's Meet the Press.
NEW YORK, August 26, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In short, Pelosi told moderator Tom Brokaw that as an "ardent" and "practicing" Catholic and well-learned individual on the Catholic Church's teaching on human life, no one knows "when life begins." She falsely claimed that the issue of human life has been a topic of "controversy" for the Catholic Church in order to support her advocacy of abortion and contraception.
Watch the full interview here: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwUSt7dfj5I)
Cardinal Egan explained how Pelosi has failed to defend the inherent right to life of all and said that her belief that confusion among Church theologians warrants abortion is erroneous.
"What the Speaker had to say about theologians and their positions regarding abortion was not only misinformed; it was also, and especially, utterly incredible in this day and age," stated a "shocked" Cardinal Egan.
Pointing to the fact that modern technology allows one to view a human baby in the womb, he continued by saying, "In simplest terms, they are human beings with an inalienable right to live, a right that the Speaker of the House of Representatives is bound to defend at all costs for the most basic of ethical reasons."
The Cardinal went on to strongly denounce Pelosi's pro-abortion position: "No one with the slightest measure of integrity or honor could fail to know what these marvelous beings manifestly, clearly, and obviously are, as they smile and wave into the world outside the womb."
"Anyone who dares to defend that they may be legitimately killed because another human being 'chooses' to do so or for any other equally ridiculous reason should not be providing leadership in a civilized democracy worthy of the name," concluded Cardinal Egan.
USA/ Visita Papa, Cardinale Egan: Giuliani non doveva fare comunione
Apr 29, 2008
Egan: non doveva farla perché sostiene diritto aborto.
New York, 28 apr. (Ap) - Il sindaco di New York Rudy Giuliani non avrebbe dovuto prendere la comunione durante la visita di Papa Benedetto XVI a causa del suo sostegno al diritto all'aborto. Parola del cardinale della città Edward Egan.
Il cardinale non ha nascosto il proprio disappunto, soprattutto perché Giuliani avrebbe mancato di attenersi "all'intesa", come l'ha definita Egan, sul fatto che l'ex sindaco ed ex candidato alla nomination repubblicana non avrebbe ricevuto l'Eucaristia.
Secondo i precetti della Chiesa cattolica "l'aborto è una grave offesa verso la volontà di Dio", motivo per cui ora Egan dovrebbe chiedere un incontro con Giuliani "per insistere sul fatto che ha mancato alla parola data". Una risposta ufficiale dell'ex sindaco, come hanno reso noto i suoi portavoce, dovrebbe arrivare oggi.
Cardinal Egan's Greeting at Papal Mass
Apr 21, 2008
We "Feel Especially Blessed By Your Coming Among Us".
NEW YORK, APRIL 20, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Here is the greeting Cardinal Edward Egan, archbishop of New York, gave to Benedict XVI before the Pontiff celebrated Mass today at Yankee's Stadium.
* * *
Most Holy Father, welcome to New York!
Your pastoral visit is for all of us gathered here this afternoon an immense blessing for which we are truly and deeply grateful.
Two hundred years ago this month, your wise and heroic predecessor of happy memory, Pope Pius VII, elevated the Diocese of Baltimore, the only Diocese in the nation at the time, to the dignity of an Archdiocese and created within its Metropolitan Province four Suffragan Sees. They were Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Bardstown, which is now Louisville. All four have since become Archdioceses and, along with Baltimore, are engaged in Bicentennial Celebrations which, in the providence of God, culminate most fittingly with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass offered by the Vicar of Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, here in our midst. For your visit and your leading us in this Eucharist, Most Holy Father, we express our humble and heartfelt gratitude.
With us on this splendid and grace-filled occasion are cardinals, archbishops, bishops, priests, deacons, religious, and faithful from all 195 dioceses and archdioceses of the United States of America. They represent an extraordinary variety of races and ethnic backgrounds, all united in the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church of which you are the Supreme Shepherd. They are joined by clergy and laity of many faiths and communions, political leaders, and men, women, and children from every corner of this land. It is an extraordinary privilege to be allowed to tell you on their behalf what a splendid and deeply appreciated grace your presence is for all of us.
Most Holy Father, we have read with pleasure and gratitude your most recent Encyclical Letter, “Saved by Hope.” It sets the theme for this Eucharist, “Christ, Our Easter Hope,” and points out most tellingly the path we need to follow with unlimited trust and confidence in the Lord over the years that lie ahead. Thank you most sincerely for that Encyclical and for all that you have said, written, and done over the past three years as Successor of Saint Peter to deepen our faith and strengthen our commitment to live as the Lord has taught us to live.
Finally, Most Holy Father, allow me to add that we in New York feel especially blessed by your coming among us in our Cathedral, at our seminary, in one of our parish churches, before the world community at the United Nations, and in Lower Manhattan at what we have come to call “Ground Zero,” a place of tragedy hallowed by your concern and prayer.
Please know that your visit inspires and heightens in the hearts of all of us that “life-changing and life-sustaining hope” about which you wrote in your Encyclical Letter with such depth and learning. We pray for the Bishop of Rome, the Supreme Pontiff, and the Vicar of Christ; and we promise to continue that prayer throughout the years that lie ahead with ever-greater love and hope.
Most Holy Father, welcome!
Edward Cardinal Egan Reflects On Years As Archdiocese Leader
Feb 20, 2008
In celebration of the New York Archdiocese's 200th anniversary this year, NY1's Roma Torre sat down with Edward Cardinal Egan to talk about his tenure at the helm.
(ny1.com, February 20, 2008) The archdiocese serves two and a half million Catholics in Manhattan, the Bronx, Staten Island and seven upstate counties.
Egan spoke about his eight years as the archdiocese leader and plans for the pope's upcoming visit.
During his tenure here, the cardinal has worked hard to balance the books on the archdiocese, which had been saddled with multi-million dollar deficits for years. The deficit is gone but the cost-cutting measures have taken a toll. Parishes had to be closed and church members protested loudly.
In the end, four parishes in New York City were shut down and ten were merged. The cardinal says he had no choice.
"We've been remarkably free of closures," he said. "There are some things you have to close. We've had one church here in New York that had 46 people coming on a Sunday. Well nobody is going to keep a building open and pay the heating and insurance and so forth for 46 people."
Programming Note: To see Part I of Torre's interview with Cardinal Egan, tune into NY1's News at Eleven tonight.
In Part II, which debuts tomorrow night, Cardinal Egan discusses plans for Pope Benedict's three-day visit to the city in April.
Egan's retirement would be a first
Dec 11, 2007
The 2.5 million Catholics of the Archdiocese of New York may soon witness something that their parents, grandparents and immigrant great-grandparents never did: the retirement of an archbishop.
(thejournalnews.com, December 8, 2007) The archdiocese will turn 200 in April, but all 11 of its previous leaders - bishops and later archbishops - have died in office (even if the first never actually touched American soil).
Cardinal Edward Egan does not appear likely to join them.
Egan turned 75 in April and submitted his formal retirement papers to the Vatican, leaving his future in the hands of Pope Benedict XVI.
Observers within and without the archdiocese believe Benedict will accept Egan's retirement and appoint a new archbishop at some point in the next year, possibly in early 2008 or after the bicentennial and the pope's visit to New York in April.
"We don't know when it will be," said Egan's spokesman, Joseph Zwilling. "Whatever the Holy Father wants is what Cardinal Egan wants. He will do whatever the Holy Father asks of him."
Egan is not likely to go far, whenever retirement comes, Zwilling said.
"He expects he will stay somewhere in New York," he said. "He will be the first to admit that he's a city boy."
Benedict and his advisers in the Vatican may be in the process of trying to answer two related questions in regard to the future of the Archdiocese of New York: When should Egan retire? And who should replace him as archbishop?
Or the questions may already be answered.
Bishops and archbishops who lead dioceses - known as ordinaries - rarely retired before Vatican II. Archbishop of Melbourne Daniel Mannix, for instance, died in 1963 at 99 after serving for 46 years.
But canon law was amended in 1966 to set 75 as the age when bishops submit retirement papers.
As far as Egan's retirement date, the pope may consider many factors, including Egan's desires, the needs of the archdiocese and the availability of his top choice for successor, said Monsignor Ronny Jenkins, a canon lawyer and associate general secretary of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Detroit's Cardinal Adam Maida is still serving even though he turned 75 in March 2005.
"It's basically up to the pope," Jenkins said.
Although there are several possible scenarios, most observers believe a successor will be named when Egan's retirement is announced.
"I would be willing to put money down that's how it will happen in New York," said the Rev. Thomas Reese, author of "Inside the Vatican."
The process for choosing a successor is more or less managed by the apostolic nuncio to the U.S., Archbishop Pietro Sambi. It is his job to consult with the movers and shakers in the American Catholic hierarchy and to submit three names, ranked by preference, to the Vatican's Congregation for Bishops.
The congregation vets the names and makes a recommendation to the pope.
At this moment, few people know where the process stands.
"The whole thing is done very secretively," Reese said. "If there is a consensus among the American cardinals, the nuncio and the Congregation for Bishops, it can go very smoothly and rapidly. If there's disagreement, it can go slowly."
Once the decisions are made and an announcement comes, the transfer of power is a simple affair. A papal document, a bull, naming the new archbishop will be presented to the archdiocese's consultors, a group of priests who have certain administrative responsibilities.
"When they acknowledge the authenticity of the bull, the power is transferred with that act," said Monsignor Robert Trisco, professor emeritus of theology and religious studies at Catholic University in Washington, D.C.
Egan will become archbishop emeritus and temporary administrator of the archdiocese, while his successor will become archbishop designate.
A Mass will be scheduled at St. Patrick's Cathedral, where the new archbishop will be officially installed. At that time, Sambi will read aloud the papal bull, walk the new archbishop to the cathedra, or bishop's seat, and hand him his crozier, the bishop's staff.
A new era will begin for the Archdiocese of New York.
And Egan, a cardinal for life, will have no defined role whatsoever in the archdiocese. Then what?
"When a bishop retires, he is free to pursue whatever interests he would like to pursue," said Susan Gibbs, spokeswoman for the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C.
She would know. Washington has seen several retired archbishops come and go in recent years.
Today, as Archbishop Donald Wuerl runs things, Archbishop Emeritus Cardinal Theodore McCarrick uses Washington as his home base as he travels the world to promote religious freedom. Another former archbishop, Cardinal William Baum, who left in 1990 to serve in the Vatican, also spends part of his retirement in Washington.
The role of former archbishops often depends on their relationship with the current archbishop.
Reese noted that Wuerl and McCarrick have an excellent relationship, which was on display at a recent dinner for which McCarrick was master of ceremonies.
"It takes a very humble man like Wuerl, who was in the audience, to allow his predecessor to kind of upstage him," Reese said. "But he doesn't have a big ego."
In Baltimore, where Archbishop Edwin O'Brien was installed Oct. 1, newly retired Cardinal William Keeler has said he plans to continue working on Catholic relations with other religious communities, a longtime passion.
Egan will retain numerous responsibilities to Vatican institutions. He is a member of one of the Vatican's top courts, the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, as well as the Pontifical Council for the Family, the Prefecture for the Economic Affairs of the Holy See, the Council of Cardinals for the Study of the Organizational and Economic Concerns of the Holy See, and other bodies.
As far as New York goes, Egan has no clear plans, Zwilling said.
"He is looking forward to confirmations, visiting parishes and giving some of those talks he's always asked to give, but declines because he doesn't like leaving the archdiocese," he said.
"If he was given the opportunity to teach somewhere, I think he would love it."
Other New York bishops came close to retiring.
Bishop John Dubois, who led the diocese during the early 1800s, was very ill for the last three years of his life and pretty much turned over control to Bishop John Hughes, who would ultimately replace him.
"Technically, Dubois wasn't retired - just incapacitated," said Monsignor Thomas Shelley of Fordham University, the author of a forthcoming history of the archdiocese.
Cardinal John O'Connor was all but ready to retire when he became ill in his late 70s. A spacious office for his retirement was all set on the grounds of St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers.
But he died as archbishop in 2000.
Had O'Connor not gotten sick, he may well have cast a large shadow in New York during his retirement.
"I think it would have been very difficult to follow John O'Connor if John O'Connor was alive and well," said Christopher Bellitto, a church historian at Kean University in Union, N.J.
Even if Egan does become the first archbishop of New York to retire, he figures to join his predecessors at some point. Each of the eight late archbishops, six of them cardinals, are entombed in a crypt beneath the altar of St. Patrick's Cathedral.
Cardinal Egan Tells Media to "Grow Up"
Sept 25, 2007
Cardinal Egan, the archbishop of the New York Archdiocese, had no patience of protesters or reporters covering the protests outside a Midtown church yesterday.
(gothamist.com, September 24, 2007) Some people have been upset their local churches have been closed by the Catholic Church, most notably parishioners Our Lady Queen of Angels in East Harlem, who have been protesting the February closing every weekend since February. And yesterday, outside of St. John the Baptist on West 31st Street, Our Lady Queen of Angels parishioners-turned-protesters gathered to ask Egan, "Why have you abandoned us?"
The Daily News reported this exchange between Egan and the media:
"You just have to ignore all this and grow up," Egan said when asked about the Catholics gathered outside in protest of the closure of their beloved church, Our Lady Queen of Angels.
When pressed, Egan, who had just finished celebrating Mass at St. John the Baptist on W. 31st St., said, "Oh, for heaven's sake."
Egan left the church through a back door, avoiding the 30 protesters.
Before stepping into a waiting van, Egan again refused to discuss the protest.
"Madam, get serious," he said. "This is important. Go in and look at reality."
The New York Archdiocese closing of churches has been driven by immigration and other demographic changes. The News points out that there are three churches within walking distance of Our Lady Queen of Angels, but many parishioners feel very strongly about their church, even holding a funeral for a fellow parishioner outside the closed church. And in one of the other parish closings, a Lithuanian Church downtown was shut in a sneaky fashion: The priest was called to a meeting with Cardinal Egan, and while he was gone, the church was locked!
Earlier this year, New York magazine examined Egan's career and how other priests can't wait to get rid of him (he's expected to retire soon).
A Sunday in June
Jun 12, 2007
In the Holiness of Truth - June 7, 2007.
In 1904, Reverend Raymond Walsh, O.F.M., a Franciscan friar, celebrated the first Mass in the City of Yulan in Sullivan County. The liturgy took place in the home of Mr. and Mrs. John Kinnelly who, shortly thereafter, gave the Archbishop of New York land in Yulan for a future parish church.
Father Walsh and his growing Catholic community began immediately to raise funds for the church, assisted in their efforts by such famous entertainers of the day as Eddie Cantor and Irving Berlin, who during the summer appeared in various vacation hotels in the area. Thus, on July 14, 1907, St. Anthony of Padua Parish Church was dedicated by the Most Reverend Thomas F. Cusack, an Auxiliary Bishop to the Archbishop of New York, John Cardinal Farley.
In the 1930s, the church burned to the ground. In spite of the heavy burdens of an economic depression that was raging in every corner of the nation, the church was rebuilt and stands today as a remarkable tribute to the faith, generosity and—one might add—excellent taste of all who were involved. It is a simple structure, but handsome and marvelously devotional.
Last Sunday, June 3, I left Manhattan shortly before 8 a.m. to make my way up to Yulan for the 100th anniversary of the parish and church of St. Anthony of Padua. The rain fell throughout our journey, at some points so heavily that we could hardly see out of the car windows. Nonetheless, once all the celebrants had vested in the rectory and were ready to move over to the church, the rain stopped, the sky cleared and the sun appeared. The pastor, Reverend Anthony Moore, O.F.M., explained why. Early in the morning he had had a conversation with St. Anthony, and everything worked out exactly according to plan.
The Mass was inspiring, attended, as it was, by the Provincial of the Holy Name Province of the Friars Minor, Very Reverend John F. O'Connor, O.F.M., and clergy and religious from surrounding parishes. At the conclusion, Father O'Connor gave St. Francis medals to Mr. Carl Hentschel, the oldest member of the parish who will be celebrating his 100th birthday this year; to Mr. and Mrs. Chet Oset, both of whom have lived in the parish for more than 80 years; and to 20 other members of the parish community who have over the years been deeply involved in parish undertakings.
From the church we went to a hotel a few miles away for a splendid luncheon. I raised a toast to the parish, the pastor and the Holy Father and then explained to the packed dining room that I had to get back to St. Patrick's Cathedral for a Mass with the Puerto Rican community. All seemed to understand, as we got into the car for a speedy return to New York City.
In the Cathedral an immense crowd was praying the Mass with the Most Reverend Félix Lázaro Martínez, Bishop of Ponce in Puerto Rico, as principal celebrant. Some months before I had invited him to be with us for this Mass, and he had graciously accepted. After the final blessing, I spoke to the congregation about the countless blessings that the Puerto Rican people had brought to the City and Archdiocese of New York and encouraged all to be active in their parishes, as examples of dedicated followers of the Lord.
Then, to complete a beautiful celebration, I blessed over 100 "Hijas de Maria" (Daughters of Mary) who, in white veils, brought flowers to be placed before an image of the Virgin. My predecessor, John Cardinal O'Connor, had asked the Holy See to recognize the Association of the "Hijas de Maria" canonically, and it was my privilege to implement the affirmative decision from Rome. It is an outstanding organization of girls and young women who commit themselves to lives in imitation of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and do immense good throughout the Archdiocese—in parishes, schools, hospitals, nursing homes and all kinds of neighborhood institutions of education and charity. As I sprinkled them with holy water, I begged the Mother of God to assist us in making their numbers increase greatly over the years to come.
The liturgy in Yulan and the liturgy in the Cathedral would have been more than enough to make my Sunday in June truly memorable. But there was something else as well.
With me during our five-hour drive to and from Yulan was a publication titled The Dunwoodie Review that I had received in the mail a few days earlier. It is issued by our major seminary, St. Joseph's in Yonkers, and contains articles by professors, students and alumni. And it is first class in every sense.
The articles by professors are four in number. The first is by Sister Sara Butler, M.S.B.T., S.T.D., Professor of Dogma at the Seminary and a member of the Pontifical Theological Commission. It concerns the ordination of women. The second is by Reverend Joseph T. Lienhard, S.J., S.T.D., Professor of Dogma at the Seminary and also at Fordham University. It concerns the reactions of the Fathers of the Church to the Arian heresy of the fourth century. The third is by Reverend Monsignor Kevin P. O'Brien, Ph.D., Spiritual Director at the Seminary. It concerns prayer in the life of a priest. The fourth is by Reverend Monsignor Hugh F. McManus, Ph.D., Professor of Homiletics at the Seminary and Pastor of Our Lady of Fatima Parish in Scarsdale. It concerns the manner in which homilies are to be delivered. All are incredibly interesting and powerfully written.
The articles by seminarians of St. Joseph's Seminary are two in number. The first is by Mr. Christopher Argano, who will be ordained in 2009. It concerns the theology of creation. The second is by Mr. Vincent Druding, who will be ordained also in 2009. It concerns purgatory. Both are very timely and very well written too.
The three longest articles are by alumni, and I found them all not only interesting and well-researched, but also extraordinarily thought-provoking. The first is by Reverend William Cleary of the Ordination Class of 2004 who is a parochial vicar at St. Frances de Chantal parish in the Bronx. It concerns the dwelling of the Holy Spirit in each of us. The second is by Reverend James Collins of the Ordination Class of 2004 who is a parochial vicar at St. Teresa of the Infant Jesus parish on Staten Island. It concerns the sacrificial character of the Mass. The third is by Reverend Brian Taylor of the Ordination Class of 2006 who is a parochial vicar at St. Joseph's parish in Bronxville. It concerns human dignity as understood by the French theologian Henri du Lubac. From all three I learned much, and I look forward to reading them again.
There is a column in a New York newspaper that frequently ends with the exclamation: "Where but in New York!" As I finished the day on June 3, this was the question that came to mind. Where but in the Archdiocese of New York could one rejoice with the members of a country parish as it celebrates its centennial, pray with a Cathedral filled with devout faithful from Puerto Rico, and be amazed and instructed by the remarkable learning of professors, alumni and students of the local seminary. We have so much for which to be thankful, and I am especially grateful that in preparation for our Bicentennial celebration we have a whole year to explore the wonders of the Archdiocese, and to discover new ones as well. The Lord has blessed us mightily. May His name ever be praised.
Copies of The Dunwoodie Review can be obtained from St. Joseph's Seminary, 201 Seminary Ave., Yonkers, N.Y. 10704. Cost is $25 and checks should be made payable to The Dunwoodie Review; donations are accepted.,
With prayerful best wishes, may I remain
Very truly yours in Christ,
Edward Cardinal Egan
Archbishop of New York
Retirement watch begins as Egan hits 75
May 05, 2007
When Pope Paul VI amended Canon Law in 1966 to require that bishops submit retirement papers at the age of 75, Cardinal Francis Spellman was already 77. But New York's long-ruling archbishop died in office the following year, showing early on how fickle the pope can be about accepting those papers.
(THE JOURNAL NEWS, April 2, 2007) Never mind. Whenever a big-name bishop nears the three-quarter century mark, speculation swirls about whether he will be asked by the pope to lean his staff in a corner for special occasions.
This will be especially true today, when Cardinal Edward Egan turns 75.
From the day Egan came to New York in 2000, becoming the region's 12th Catholic boss, it's been widely believed that he would be the first to leave office alive. He was a Roman at heart, the conventional wisdom held, who would close parishes and schools and balance the budget before being rewarded with a plum spot in the Vatican bureaucracy.
Then came the national sex-abuse crisis and widespread dissatisfaction with how Egan handled several high-profile cases.
Priests began to complain about a lack of leadership and pastoral touch, criticisms that were echoed in an anonymous letter in the fall that provoked tremendous discussion about Egan's future.
In December, Egan talked openly in a TV interview about the possibility of retirement: "I think that if I retired I would, maybe, take a little trip and have a little relaxation, but ultimately, sure, I would want to be back in New York."
So what does it all mean? Only Pope Benedict XVI knows.
"There's a lot of buzz, but it's possible that nothing will change for a long time," said Rocco Palmo, overseer of the closely watched Catholic insider blog, Whispers in the Loggia. "Unless Egan indicates that he wishes to go earlier, and I don't see that happening, he's a good bet to stick around at least through the year, if not longer. New York is still the most visible post in American Catholicism, and when it does come down, it will be Benedict's most significant appointment to a diocese to date."
Egan has two significant milestones coming up, which Palmo and others believe Egan will celebrate as archbishop of New York.
On April 15, he will preside over a special Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral to kick off a year of events commemorating the bicentennial of the Archdiocese of New York, which will fall on April 8, 2008.
And on Dec. 15 of this year, Egan will celebrate his 50th anniversary as a priest.
"John Paul was very sympathetic to the argument that if a bishop has an anniversary coming up, he should stay," said the Rev. Thomas Reese, author of "Inside the Vatican." "It's hard to say what Benedict will do."
So everyone is left to try to read the Roman tea leaves.
On the one hand, Benedict accepted the retirement of former Dallas Bishop Charles Grahmann last month, only eight months after Grahmann turned 75.
On the other hand, Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit is 77 and Cardinal William Keeler of Baltimore is 76 - and both are still serving.
George Weigel, an influential Catholic theologian with close ties to the Vatican, wrote in an e-mail about Benedict's initial bishop appointments: "The long-term tale will now be told, however, with appointments to such major sees as Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Louisville, Detroit, Seattle, Portland and New York, all of which are likely to happen in the next two years or sooner."
But then Weigel denied he has inside information about Egan's future.
"I have no idea," he said. "Neither does anyone else."
The question many are asking is whether the increasingly open criticism of Egan from priests will affect his future.
Terrence Tilley, a theology professor at Fordham University and a longtime follower of the comings and goings of bishops, said public grumbling from priests might have the opposite effect from what's intended.
"I would expect a Roman response to be increased support for Egan," he said. "By that I mean I would not expect his mandatory retirement to be accepted. I think he'll stay awhile. They tend to support those who face difficulties."
Who might have a say in Egan's future? The new papal nuncio to the United States, Archbishop Pietro Sambi, who arrived last year, is a decorated Vatican diplomat. He is said to pay close attention to the media and his opinion on bishops - whatever it might be - weighs heavily in Rome.
There are also several Americans on the Vatican's Congregation for Bishops, which oversees the selection of bishops and other matters. Among them is Cardinal William Levada, former archbishop of San Francisco and Benedict's successor as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Cardinal Bernard Law, the ousted archbishop of Boston, also serves on the congregation.
"Everyone and their mother wants their voice heard on New York," Palmo said.
Joseph Zwilling, Egan's spokesman, said that the digital era is perfect for the spread of rumors and handicapping, but that Egan is unconcerned.
"I know people like to speculate, and 10 years ago we didn't have all these blogs, which fuel the fires for those interested in guessing games," Zwilling said. "The cardinal has been going around telling the priests, 'Don't worry, I'll be here for another 150 years.' This is not something he's focused on at all."
In the end, it's all up to Benedict. Canon 401 requests that a bishop offer his papers upon turning 75 to the pope, "who will make provision after he has examined all the circumstances."
"The pope considers how things are going in a diocese, any other factors, and makes his decision," said Monsignor Joseph Giandurco, a canon lawyer and pastor of Sacred Heart Church in Suffern. "It can range from immediate acceptance of a bishop's resignation to allowing him to stay indefinitely. This Holy Father has done both."
Giandurco noted that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger submitted his resignation at 75 to Pope John Paul II.
"It was not accepted," he said. "At age 78, he was elected pope. One never knows what the Lord has in store."
As the Rev. Michael T. Martine, professor of canon law at St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers, put it, "It's whatever the Holy Father wants."
One thing the pope can't control is the inevitable conjecture over who may replace Egan, whether next year or in five years. It's a popular guessing game among priests, active laypeople and church analysts, even though there appears to be no real favorite this time around.
During the final period of Cardinal John O'Connor's tenure, the popular choices were Archbishop Edwin O'Brien and Bishop Henry Mansell, both former auxiliary bishops in New York. But another former New York auxiliary bishop who was right up Interstate 95 in Bridgeport, Conn., was John Paul's choice.
"The way I read Pope Benedict, he seems to be appointing people who are pastoral and teaching bishops rather than confrontational bishops," Reese said. "John Paul liked bishops like Cardinal O'Connor, who would tell it like it is and fit right in in New York. Benedict has been appointing people who are more soft-spoken, I would say. But again, who knows?"
O'Brien and Mansell are still considered contenders, and have lingered for more than a decade at the top of many lists. O'Brien remains head of the military archdiocese and Mansell now leads the Archdiocese of Hartford.
Archbishop Timothy Dolan of Milwaukee is the fast riser.
Some say they feel that two current New York auxiliaries, Dennis Sullivan and Gerald Walsh, are in the running.
The name of Archbishop Roberto González Nieves of San Juan started coming up during O'Connor's tenure. Could he be New York's first Hispanic cardinal?
But it's all guesswork. And Egan may not need a successor for some time.
O'Connor reached his 75th birthday in 1995. But he died in 2000 at the age of 80 - as archbishop of New York.
Who's who
Possible contenders for future archbishop of New York
- Archbishop Timothy Dolan of Milwaukee, 57. The St. Louis priest is a former rector of the prestigious North American College in Rome. Took over in Milwaukee in 2002 under difficult circumstances. Young and personable.
- Archbishop Edwin O'Brien, turns 68 on Sunday. One of the best-known Catholic figures in New York and a "leading contender" for many years. Was an auxiliary bishop in New York and twice the rector of St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers. Head of the military archdiocese, which includes Catholics in the U.S. military around the world. Still a regular visitor to New York. Some say his time has passed.
- Archbishop Henry Mansell, 69. The New York priest served at St. John & St. Paul in Larchmont early on. Was an auxiliary bishop under O'Connor before leaving for Buffalo in 1995. Became archbishop of Hartford in 2003. Would be a short-timer at this point in his career. A transitional cardinal?
- Archbishop Roberto González Nieves, 56. Young, charismatic and Puerto Rican. Born in New Jersey but grew up in Puerto Rico. Served in the Bronx as a young priest. Has served as archbishop of San Juan since 1999. Has friends and supporters across the country. An obvious choice to appeal to New York's growing Latino community. But may be too young.
- Bishop Dennis Sullivan, 62. A parish priest for his whole career before being tabbed an auxiliary bishop in 2004. Was pastor at the time of St. John & St. Paul in Larchmont. Spent 21 years at St. Teresa's in Manhattan. As co-vicar general of the archdiocese, he has led planning for the realignment of parishes. Down to earth and generally popular.
Other names mentioned:
- Bishop Gerald Walsh, 64, auxiliary bishop of New York and vicar of development.
- Bishop Timothy McDonnell, 69, of Springfield, Mass., a former auxiliary of New York.
- Archbishop John Myers of Newark, 65, formerly bishop of Peoria, Ill.
- Bishop Arthur Serratelli, 62, of Paterson, N.J.
At 75, a Battle-Tested but Unwavering Cardinal
Apr 25, 2007
He has shuttered half-empty churches, faced down disgruntled parishioners and retired an unsightly $20 million deficit, all in the name of putting the Archdiocese of New York on sturdy fiscal legs.
(New York Times, April 23, 2007) So the question for Cardinal Edward M. Egan arises: Will this white-haired prince of the Roman Catholic Church follow the lead of other large dioceses and release the archdiocese’s financial reports to the public?
Cardinal Egan considers the idea for a second or two, and offers a smile more suggestive of steel than humor. Wall Street titans sit on his finance council and study his ledgers. The cardinal sees no point in public inspection.
“I am transparent to the best possible people,” he said in a rare interview in his 20th floor office on First Avenue in Manhattan. “So when you say, ‘We don’t know,’ well, my ‘we’ knows.”
In the dusk of his half-century-long career, Cardinal Egan remains something of a riddle. He turned 75 this month and thus, in accordance with church law, he has submitted his resignation as archbishop to the Vatican. As Pope Benedict XVI weighs the cardinal’s future — he can ask him to stay on or to step down — the challenges facing the second-largest archdiocese in the nation extend well beyond uncertain finances.
The core of the New York archdiocese’s 2.5 million Catholics is slowly shifting to the northern suburbs, resulting in the closing of some churches in the city and the building of new ones in the suburbs. A majority of the students in the inner-city parochial schools are non-Catholic; 98 percent of the students graduate from high school, but the church subsidizes much of the cost.
And the ranks of priests continue to dwindle, as fewer and fewer young men appear willing to take vows of celibacy. (The archdiocese inducted about half a dozen new priests last year, and the average priest in the United States is older than 60.)
Appointed archbishop seven years ago, Cardinal Egan reasoned that his greatest immediate challenge was to straighten out the financial problems that afflicted the archdiocese. He tended quickly to his listing ship, paring budgets, closing parishes, installing nine finance directors to oversee the archdiocese’s 10 counties, and working with wealthy laity to raise the many millions of dollars needed to keep this vast machine of churches, schools and charities running.
But to this day, it is difficult to draw the precise measure of his accomplishments. Before Cardinal Egan arrived, the archdiocese had run an annual $20 million operating deficit, which it was financing partly by borrowing internally. Church officials declined to give details on the nature of this borrowing, other than to acknowledge that it created a new mountain of debt, totaling more than $40 million.
Cardinal Egan says — without offering a look at any ledger sheets — that he wiped out the operating deficit within two years. As for the $40 million worth of internal debt, last week church officials said they were paying it off at a rate of $3 million per year.
But on Friday, a spokesman for the archdiocese, Joseph Zwilling, said the archdiocese would retire that internal debt by midsummer. He offered few details about this sudden turn.
“Money we had has been put aside and invested and is now sufficient to pay off the debt,” Mr. Zwilling said. “We had some surpluses and fund-raising, although I don’t have a breakdown.”
An accomplished fund-raiser, the Cardinal also declines to talk about his work in that realm, save to describe himself a “a beggar” at the doorstep of wealthy benefactors. And he has refused to release even a bare-boned accounting of the archdiocese’s finances, although four of the five largest dioceses in the nation — Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston and Brooklyn — have done so.
He raises a forefinger in caution. He’s quite clear about his mistrust of the press.
“Do we want to leave ourselves open?” Cardinal Egan asked, referring to public disclosure of church finances. He rolled his eyes. “Oh, what fun people could have!”
A number of prominent Catholics, however, have embraced openness as a crucial step toward regaining the trust of parishioners disenchanted by financial malfeasance and sexual abuse in dioceses around the country.
The Archdiocese of Boston, which covered up hundreds of cases of sexual abuse by priests and suffered the loss of tens of millions of dollars in lawsuits as a result, now releases voluminous financial statements, listing debts and its five highest-paid contractors.
Kerry A. Robinson, executive director of the National Leadership Roundtable on Church Management, which draws 180 executives from the secular and religious worlds, argues strongly that holding everyone publicly accountable, from parish councils to bishops, makes moral and practical sense.
“Catholics have risen in affluence and influence, and they give a lot more when they know how the money is used, invested and reported,” said Ms. Robinson, who stressed that she had not examined the New York archdiocese. “If a diocese is run in an authentic and transparent way, it becomes worthy of generosity.”
To supporters and critics alike, Cardinal Egan’s resistance to public inspection and to calls for reform follow the pattern of his tradition-bound church career. He is a man of Rome — a Romanist in the argot of church insiders — learned in canon law and philosophy, and a confidant of the late Pope John Paul II. Early in his career he served as a top assistant to Cardinal John Patrick Cody of Chicago, a man with a reputation for brooking little dissent and disliking outside scrutiny.
Last fall Cardinal Egan repelled two small rebellions, one by priests who accused him of being arrogant and of failing to attend to the spiritual needs of the faithful, and another by parishioners who challenged his closing of churches. He replied to his priestly critics by writing an angry letter accusing them of a “vicious attack” intended to smear him. These unhappy few, he argued, were upset only because he had cracked down on child-abusing priests. (He also expressed his displeasure to the 42-member Presbyteral Council, a consultative priests’ “senate,” which then passed a resolution of support for him.)
He also let the police go into an East Harlem church to arrest some protesters.
“He’s brought to the table some amazing organizational strengths, but also some real weaknesses,” said Wallace A. Harris, chairman of the Presbyteral Council and pastor of the Church of St. Charles Borromeo in Harlem. “He wants to hear your opinion, but only if it’s absolutely necessary. You don’t like to say it’s a weakness, but he may not have the ability to listen well.”
Cardinal Egan shakes his head at mention of such complaints. He counsels no worry.
“When I came here, I told everyone what I would do, and quite frankly, I did it,” Cardinal Egan said. “I had to deal with the sex scandal, and I did. I had to realign, and I did. I wanted peace in my diocese, and it’s peaceful.”
His smile is broad. “It’s all been a colossal success,” he said.
But Thomas Hyland, a managing partner at a large law firm and an influential layman in Westchester, worries about the future. “These Cardinals are C.E.O.’s of vast and troubled organizations,” he said. “The financial situation is overwhelming.”
Powerful Pulpit, and Friends
There are few better perches in American Catholicism than the pulpit at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Cardinal Francis Spellman stood there in the 1960s and inveighed against “Godless Communism,” and in the 1980s, Cardinal John J. O’Connor spoke against abortion and for the rights of striking workers.
Cardinal Egan visits many parishes, writes a monthly column in the newspaper Catholic New York and delivers an affecting homily. He even pokes fun at his stentorian voice, which his nieces say calls to mind Darth Vader.
He has spoken out against the war in Iraq, and against abortion. But while other bishops walk picket lines, or threaten to deny communion to politicians who favor abortion rights, he as often stays his tongue or favors a muted tone.
“I’ve done everything I can to stay out of conflict that was not immediately part of the Catholic faith,” the Cardinal says. “I’ve handled it right, quite frankly.”
Cardinal Egan is not without influential friends.
Stephen Sweeny, president of New Rochelle College, a Catholic institution, lavishes praise on the cardinal’s dedication to education. The Rev. Joseph P. LaMorte, a pastor in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and a member of the Presbyteral Council, notes that the cardinal found the money to build a pleasant retirement home for priests. And Denis P. Kelleher, chairman of Wall Street Access, a money management firm, recalls warm evenings at the cardinal’s residence, with wealthy givers in couches and chairs and His Eminence on his beloved grand piano.
“He’s a most gracious host, most charming,” said Mr. Kelleher.
But the Cardinal keeps a distance from the larger city. Current and retired politicians, business union leaders and other prominent New Yorkers, Catholic and non-Catholic, as often shrug at the mention of his name.
“I’ve never met him, and our absence of a relationship is intriguing,” says Kathryn S. Wylde, president of the Partnership for New York City, a nonprofit group representing the city’s leading corporations. She served on public policy committees with Cardinal O’Connor. “I’m sure Egan is a leader inside the church, but not outside.”
Born to an upper-middle class family in a Chicago suburb, Cardinal Egan suffered polio as a child; a powerfully built man, he moves with a halting step to this day. As a young priest, he passed less than a year in a parish before departing for Rome for years of training and work as a canon lawyer and judge. He became private secretary to Cardinal Cody in 1965.
A cultural storm was washing over the American Catholic Church.
The F.B.I. told Cardinal Cody that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a communist and sexual deviant, and Cardinal Cody’s enthusiasm cooled for Dr. King. He discouraged support of him, even as the cardinal’s parish priests stripped off their collars and marched with Dr. King.
An association of Chicago priests voted no confidence in Cardinal Cody. (Faced with his own rebellion last fall, Cardinal Egan angrily invoked his long-ago loyalty to Cardinal Cody as a model).
Young Egan kept an eye on the unruly priests for Cardinal Cody
“Priests were getting arrested and speaking out, and Ed Egan was this button-down Romanist trying to rein things in,” said John T. McGreevy, a professor of history at the University of Notre Dame and author of “Parish Boundaries: The Catholic Encounter with Race in the Twentieth-Century Urban North.”
“You could argue he’s consistent,” Mr. McGreevy said. “Egan wasn’t interested in changing the world in 1968, and he’s not interested in that in 2007.”
Cardinal Egan later served a term as auxiliary bishop under Cardinal John J. O’Connor. Theirs was a far frostier relationship. The gregarious Cardinal O’Connor wrote a letter to his priests noting that Bishop Egan was not his choice as auxiliary.
In 1988, Auxiliary Bishop Egan became bishop of Bridgeport. There he shored up Catholic schools and installed financial controls. He also declined to divulge cases of abuse by clergy members, and allowed priests who underwent counseling to continue working long after allegations surfaced.
In videotaped testimony in 1997, he argued that the diocese held no legal sway over priests. “Every priest is self-employed,” Bishop Egan said. “He pays his taxes four times a year.”
Five years later, Cardinal Egan offered a conditional apology: “If in hindsight we discover that mistakes may have been made as regards prompt removal of priests and assistance to victims, I am deeply sorry.” The Bridgeport diocese has so far legally forestalled the release of its records.
Battling a Deficit
Cardinal Egan arrived in New York in 2000, where he faced the task of cleaning the fiscal stables. The late Cardinal O’Connor was no financial manager; he had run a $20 million annual operating deficit and declined to close near-vacant parishes. As former Mayor Edward I. Koch said of his late friend: “Cardinal O’Connor was a great man, but he was like the Pentagon. He was incapable of saving money.”
Cardinal Egan laid out a painstaking course for closing parishes. Each parish prepared reports. Diocesan officials visited, studying maps and demographics, and agreed to close fewer parishes than first planned.
But when the archdiocese released the final list of 21 parish closings and a furor arose, Cardinal Egan viewed discussion as closed. (He opened his press conference by talking of finances restored and parishes saved, saying: “I’m delighted to be able to share with you a lot of good news.”) When parishioners loudly protested at Our Lady of Vilnius, a Lithuanian national parish in Manhattan, the cardinal invited the administrator to his office. He had the church doors padlocked while they talked.
“We sent people to attend Mass there: Not a word of Lithuanian,” Cardinal Egan said, explaining why he closed the church. “The pastor speaks not a word, can’t read it, can’t write it. They average around six people at the early Mass.”
He slapped the arm of his chair. “Is there any person in the world who has sanity who would keep open deserted churches?” he said. “I made a good move.”
Perhaps, though, even some traditional support for New York’s cardinals has drained away of late. At a Friendly Sons of St. Patrick dinner in Rye, N.Y., last month, Catholic donors gave a loud ovation to a priest who had publicly challenged Cardinal Egan.
The cardinal’s problem, said Terrence W. Tilley, a professor of theology at Fordham University, is that he understands management but misses the subtle chemistry that binds a parish.
“This realignment symbolized his technocratic management style,” Mr. Tilley says. “People have buried parents, baptized babies and celebrated weddings in these places. The best parishes are sacred places, and a leader acknowledges that heartbreak.”
Such talk exasperates Cardinal Egan. To reduce his career to a knack for numbers strikes him as demeaning; he is not, he insists, some priestly accountant who dryly recites numbers and awaits his flock’s approval.
“I don’t expect a secular newspaper to capture this, but this question of whether I can eliminate debts: That’s not why I’m here,” he said. “That’s not who I am.” He shifts his eyes towards the ceiling. “I often wonder: What must John Paul think of this? He didn’t send me here for ‘fiscal reasons.’ ”
Now he leans forward, his eyes searching.
“I could have done something else in my life,” he said. “But I decided to do this. I wanted to preach a God-given means of salvation. So much of what we’ve been talking about, these anonymous letters and complaints and questions about ‘transparency’? It’s peripheral. All of this passes.”
Correction: April 24, 2007
Because of an editing error, a front-page article yesterday about the challenges facing Cardinal Edward M. Egan, the Roman Catholic archbishop of New York who turned 75 this month, referred incorrectly to the resignation he has submitted to the Vatican, in accordance with church law. He offered to resign as archbishop — not cardinal, a lifetime position. The article also misspelled the given name and surname of the president of the College of New Rochelle, who praised the cardinal’s dedication to education. He is Stephen Sweeny, not Steven Sweeney.
Approaching 75th Birthday, Feels 'Indebted' to the Lord
Apr 06, 2007
On April 2, Cardinal Egan will celebrate his 75th birthday, a special occasion in its own right but also the day that he is required by Church law to submit his resignation to Pope Benedict XVI.
(cny.org, March 29, 2007) The cardinal recently reflected on his tenure as Archbishop of New York, including his plans for the future, and addressed a number of other issues during an interview in his office at the New York Catholic Center. The interview was conducted by John Woods, Editor in Chief of Catholic New York.
What is on your mind as you approach this milestone in your life?
I look back on 50 wonderful years. The Lord blessed me with two devoted parents who were in Rome with me when I was ordained to the priesthood and in spirit with me throughout my years of service in Chicago and my early years in the Roman Curia. Both have gone to the Lord, and I will never cease to be indebted—deeply indebted—to them.
The years were wonderful also because they gave me the opportunity to be what I wanted to be from my high school days forward—a priest at the service of the Lord and the Lord's People. In the se
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