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Death of Cardinal John Joseph Glennon

Cardinal John Joseph Glennon, prelate of the Roman Catholic Church, dies on March 9, 1946 in Dublin. He serves as Archbishop of St. Louis from 1903 until his death. He is elevated to the cardinalate in 1946.

Glennon is born on June 14, 1862 in Kinnegad, County Westmeath, to Matthew and Catherine (née Rafferty) Glennon. After graduating from St. Finian’s College, he enters All Hallows College near Dublin in 1878. He accepts an invitation from Bishop John Joseph Hogan in 1882 to join the newly erected Diocese of Kansas City in the United States. After arriving in Missouri in 1883, he is ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Hogan on December 20, 1884.

Glennon is then assigned to St. Patrick’s Church in Kansas City and, briefly returning to Europe, furthers his studies at the University of Bonn in Germany. Upon his return to Kansas City, he becomes rector of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. He is later made vicar general (1892) and apostolic administrator (1894) for the diocese.

On March 14, 1896, Glennon is appointed Coadjutor Bishop of Kansas City and Titular Bishop of Pinara by Pope Leo XIII. He receives his episcopal consecration on the following June 29 from Archbishop John Joseph Kain, with Bishops Maurice Francis Burke and John Joseph Hennessy serving as co-consecrators. At age 34, he becomes one of the youngest bishops in the world.

Glennon is named Coadjutor Archbishop of St. Louis on April 27, 1903. He succeeds Archbishop Kain as the fourth Archbishop of St. Louis upon the latter’s death on October 13 of that year. Realizing the Cathedral of St. Louis can no longer accommodate its growing congregation, he quickly begins raising funds for a new cathedral, the cornerstone of which is later laid on October 18, 1908.

Glennon opens the new Kenrick Seminary in 1915, followed by the minor seminary in Shrewsbury. He delivers the eulogy at the funeral of Cardinal James Gibbons, and is appointed an Assistant at the Pontifical Throne on June 28, 1921. He opposes British rule in Ireland, and supports the leaders of the Easter Rising. He is an outspoken opponent of divorce, condemns gambling games, and prohibits dancing and drinking at church-sponsored events. He sometimes throws the opening ball for the St. Louis Cardinals, but does not play any sports himself, once saying, “I once tried golf, but I so disfigured the scenery that I never played again, in fear of public indignation and reprisal.”[2]

Despite a rather popular tenure, as Archbishop of St. Louis Glennon opposes racial integration in the city’s Catholic schools, colleges, and universities. During the early 1940s, many local priests, especially Jesuits, challenge the segregationist policies at the city’s Catholic schools. The St. Louis chapter of the Midwest Clergy Conference on Negro Welfare, formed locally in 1938, pushes the all-female Webster College to integrate first. However, in 1943, Glennon blocks the enrollment of a young black woman at the college by speaking privately with the Kentucky-based superior of the Sisters of Loretto, which staffs the college. When approached directly by pro-integration priests, he calls the integration plan a “Jesuit ploy,” and quickly transfers one of the complaining priests away from his mission at an African American parish.

The Pittsburgh Courier, an African-American newspaper with national circulation, discovers Glennon’s intervention and runs a front-page feature on the Webster incident. In response, Father Claude Heithaus, professor of Classical Archaeology at the Catholic Saint Louis University, delivers an angry sermon accusing his own institution of immoral behavior in its segregation policies. Saint Louis University begins admitting African American students that summer when its president, Father Patrick Holloran, manages to secure approval from the reluctant Archbishop Glennon. Nevertheless, St. Louis maintains one of the largest numbers of African-American parishes and schools in the country.

On Christmas Eve 1945, it is announced that the 83-year-old Glennon will be elevated to the College of Cardinals. He originally thinks himself too old to make the journey to Rome, but eventually joins fellow Cardinals-elect Francis Spellman and Thomas Tien Ken-sin on their flight, during which time he contracts a cold from which he does not recover. Pope Pius XII creates him Cardinal Priest of San Clemente al Laterano in the consistory of February 18, 1946.

During the return trip to the United States, Glennon stops in his native Ireland, where he is received by President Seán T. O’Kelly and Taoiseach Éamon de Valera. While in Dublin, he is diagnosed with uremic poisoning and dies on March 9, 1946, ending a 42-year tenure as Archbishop. The Cardinal’s body is returned to St. Louis and then buried at the Cathedral.

Glennon is the namesake of the community of Glennonville, Missouri. The only diocesan hospital for children, Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital, affiliated with Saint Louis University Hospital, is created in his name.

(Pictured: Cardinal John J. Glennon, photo by the St. Louis Dispatch)


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Death of James McLoughlin, Bishop of Galway & Kilmacduagh

James McLoughlin, the Roman Catholic Bishop of Galway and Kilmacduagh and Apostolic Administrator of Kilfenora for twelve years from 1993 to 2005, dies on November 25, 2005.

McLoughlin is born in Cross Street in the centre of Galway on April 9, 1929. His parents run a small wholesale grocery business. He attends the Patrician Brothers primary school in Nuns’ Island and St. Mary’s College, Galway. He studies for the priesthood at Maynooth and is ordained on June 20, 1954.

After ordination McLoughlin is appointed to the teaching staff of St. Mary’s College, Galway where he develops interests in basketball and amateur dramatics. He is appointed diocesan secretary in September 1965, bringing to that role a reserved dedication to duty, meticulous planning and financial acumen. He leaves full-time teaching in 1983 and is appointed parish priest of Galway Cathedral.

On February 10, 1993, the year after the sensational resignation of Bishop Eamon Casey, McLoughlin is appointed by Pope John Paul II as Bishop of Galway and Kilmacduagh. His consecration takes place in Galway Cathedral on March 28, 1993. After his death one obituary notes that McLouglhin’s “quiet demeanour…intimate knowledge of Galway and his being a native son, made him the ideal man to assume responsibility for the diocese when Bishop Eamonn Casey resigned.”

McLoughlin serves as chairman of the finance and general planning committee of the Irish Catholic Bishops’ Conference. In 2003 he is one of the first Irish bishops to announce the clustering of parishes in recognition of the falling number of priests, his diocese having had very few vocations or ordinations in the decade up to 2003.

McLoughlin announces his retirement on May 23, 2005 and on July 3 is succeeded as bishop of Galway and Kilmacduagh by Martin Drennan. He lives in Claregalway during his retirement, and dies on November 25, 2005 in Galway Clinic. His funeral is held in Galway Cathedral, and he is interred in the crypt beneath the cathedral.

McLoughlin’s successor, Bishop Martin Drennan, says he is deeply saddened and shocked by the news of McLoughlin’s death and that the late bishop was deeply loved and admired by the people and priests of his native city and diocese.

Dr. Seán Brady, Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland, also pays tribute to the late bishop. He says Bishop McLoughlin was a gentle and humble man who radiated great joy, friendship and happiness to all whom he met.


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Creation of the Diocese of Galway

cathedral-of-our-lady-assumed-into-heaven-and-st-nicholasThe Diocese of Galway is created on April 23, 1831. The diocese has its origins in the ancient Kilmacduagh monastery and the Wardenship of Galway (1484–1831). Following the abolition of the Wardenship by the Holy See in 1831, the first Bishop of the new Diocese of Galway is appointed in the same year.

In 1866, Bishop John McEvilly of Galway is made Apostolic Administrator of the diocese of Kilmacduagh and Kilfenora. When he is appointed coadjutor bishop to the Archdiocese of Tuam in 1878, he retains Galway until he succeeds as archbishop in 1881. McEvilly continues to oversee Kilmacduagh and Kilfenora until 1883 when Pope Leo XIII unites the diocese with the neighbouring Diocese of Kilmacduagh. At the same time, the ordinary of the United Diocese of Galway and Kilmacduagh is appointed, in perpetuum, as the Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Kilfenora.

The bishopric of Kilmacduagh had been a separate title until 1750 when Pope Benedict XIV decrees that it is to be united with the bishopric of Kilfenora. Since Kilmacduagh is in the Ecclesiastical province of Tuam while Kilfenora is in the Province of Cashel, it is arranged that the ordinary of the united dioceses is to be alternately bishop of one diocese and apostolic administrator of the other. The first holder of this unusual arrangement is Peter Kilkelly, who had been Bishop of Kilmacduagh since 1744. He becomes Apostolic Administrator of Kilfenora in September 1750. Since that date, Kilfenora has been administered by that united diocese as an apostolic vicariate. Since the territory of an apostolic vicariate comes directly under the pope as “universal bishop”, the pope exercises his authority in Kilfenora through a “vicar.”

The geographic remit of the see includes the city of Galway, parts of County Galway and the northern coastal part of County Clare. Large population centres include Ennistymon, Oranmore and Oughterard. The cathedral church of the diocese is the Cathedral of Our Lady Assumed into Heaven and St. Nicholas. It is in the ecclesiastical province of Tuam and is subject to the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Tuam. The deanery of Kilfenora, previously a diocese in its own right, lies in the ecclesiastical province of Cashel. The Ordinary is Bishop Brendan Kelly who is appointed on December 11, 2017.

(Pictured: The Cathedral of Our Lady Assumed into Heaven and St. Nicholas


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Birth of John Hughes, 1st Archbishop of New York

john-joseph-hughesJohn Joseph Hughes,  prelate of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States and the fourth Bishop and first Archbishop of the Archdiocese of New York, is born in the hamlet of Annaloghan, near Aughnacloy, County Tyrone in Northern Ireland on June 24, 1797.

Hughes is the third of seven children of Patrick and Margaret (née McKenna) Hughes. He and his family suffer religious persecution in their native land. He is sent with his elder brothers to a day school in the nearby village of Augher, and afterwards attends a grammar school in Aughnacloy. The family emigrates to the United States in 1816 and settles in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. Hughes joins them there the following year.

After several unsuccessful applications to Mount St. Mary’s College in Emmitsburg, Maryland, he is eventually hired as a gardener at the college. During this time he befriends Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton, who is impressed by Hughes and persuades the Rector to reconsider his admission. Hughes is subsequently admitted as a regular student of Mount St. Mary’s in September 1820.

On October 15, 1826, Hughes is ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Henry Conwell at St. Joseph’s Church in Philadelphia. His first assignment is as a curate at St. Augustine’s Church in Philadelphia, where he assists its pastor by celebrating Mass, hearing confessions, preaching sermons, and other duties in the parish.

Hughes is chosen by Pope Gregory XVI as the coadjutor bishop of the Diocese of New York on August 7, 1837. He is consecrated bishop at St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral on January 7, 1838 with the title of the titular see of Basilinopolis, by the Bishop of New York, John Dubois, his former Rector.

Hughes campaigns actively on behalf of Irish immigrants and attempts to secure state support for parochial schools. Although this attempt fails, he founds an independent Catholic school system which becomes an integral part of the Catholic Church’s structure at the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore (1884), which mandates that all parishes have a school and that all Catholic children be sent to those schools. In 1841, Hughes founds St. John’s College in New York City which is now Fordham University.

Hughes is appointed Apostolic Administrator of the diocese due to Bishop Dubois’ failing health. As coadjutor, he automatically succeeds Dubois upon the bishop’s death on December 20, 1842, taking over a diocese which covers the entire state of New York and northern New Jersey. He is a staunch opponent of Abolitionism and the Free Soil movement, whose proponents often express anti-Catholic attitudes. Hughes also founds the Ultramontane newspaper New York Freeman to express his ideas.

Hughes becomes an archbishop on July 19, 1850, when the diocese is elevated to the status of archdiocese by Pope Pius IX. As archbishop, he becomes the metropolitan for the Catholic bishops serving all the dioceses established in the entire Northeastern United States. To the dismay of many in New York’s Protestant upper-class, Hughes foresees the uptown expansion of the city and begins construction of the current St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue between 50th and 51st Street, laying its cornerstone on August 15, 1858. At the request of President Abraham Lincoln, Hughes serves as semiofficial envoy to the Vatican and to France in late 1861 and early 1862. Lincoln also seeks Hughes’ advice on the appointment of hospital chaplains.

Hughes serves as archbishop until his death. He is originally buried in St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral, but his remains are exhumed in 1882 and re-interred in the crypt under the altar of the new cathedral he had begun.