Francis Spellman

49
Francis Spellman bigraphy, stories - American Catholic cardinal

Francis Spellman : biography

May 4, 1889 – December 2, 1967

Francis Joseph Spellman (May 4, 1889 – December 2, 1967) was an American archbishop of the Catholic Church. He was the sixth Archbishop of New York from 1939 to 1967, having previously served as an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Boston (1932–39). He was named a cardinal in 1946.

Early life and education

Francis Spellman was born in Whitman, Massachusetts, to William and Ellen (née Conway) Spellman. His father (1858–1957), whose own parents had immigrated to the United States from Clonmel and Leighlinbridge in Ireland, worked in shoemaking before becoming a grocer. The eldest of five children, Francis had two brothers, Martin and John, and two sisters, Marian and Helene. As a child, he served as an altar boy at Holy Ghost Church.TIME 1959 He had a difficult relationship with his strict father, but was very attached to his mother.

Spellman attended Whitman High School (now Whitman-Hanson Regional High School) because there was no local Catholic school. He enjoyed photography and baseball; he was a first baseman during his first year of high school until a hand injury forced him to stop playing, and later managed the team.Thornton Following his high school graduation, Spellman entered Fordham University in New York City in 1907. He graduated in 1911 and decided to study for the priesthood. He was then sent by Archbishop William Henry O’Connell to study at the Pontifical North American College in Rome.

During his years in Rome, Spellman befriended such figures as Gaetano Bisleti, Francesco Borgongini Duca and Domenico Tardini. He suffered from pneumonia, however, leaving his state of health so poor that the seminary administration wanted him to send him home. He nevertheless remained and managed to complete his theological studies.

Notes

Episcopal career

Auxiliary Bishop of Boston

On July 30, 1932, Spellman was appointed Auxiliary Bishop of Boston and Titular Bishop of Sila by Pope Pius XI.Catholic Hierarchy (unofficial Website) He had originally been considered for the Dioceses of Portland, Maine, and Manchester, New Hampshire. He received his consecration on the following September 8 from Pacelli (whose old vestments Spellman himself wore), with Archbishops Giuseppe Pizzardo and Francesco Borgongini Duca serving as co-consecrators, at St. Peter’s Basilica. His was the first consecration of an American bishop ever held at St. Peter’s.TIME September 19, 1932

Entitled as a bishop to a coat of arms, Spellman designed a different depiction of Christopher Columbus’s vessels: the Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria. He had them depicted from behind, departing The Old World, versus the typical front view of their arrival in The New World. When a draft of these arms were unveiled to Pope Pius XI, he shouted to Spellman in excitement Sequere Deum, meaning "Follow God". Moved by this emotional display, Spellman adopted that papal exclamation as his episcopal motto.

After his return to the United States, Spellman resided at St. John’s Seminary in Brighton, Massachusetts. He was later made pastor of in Newton Centre; there he erased the church’s $43,000 debt through different fundraising activities and the help of his many rich connections. When his mother died in 1935, her funeral was attended by Governor James Curley, Lieutenant Governor Joseph Hurley, and many members of the clergy, with the exception of O’Connell.

As late as June 1936, polls gave President Roosevelt at best a 50 percent chance of reelection, due largely to the nightly, national radio attacks by Father Charles Coughlin of Detroit. Spellman arranged with Joseph P. Kennedy to finance a visit by Pacelli, who sailed from Italy with a large entourage. Soon after arrival, Pacelli silenced Coughlin. Then, using a Douglas DC3 airliner hired by Kennedy, Spellman and Pacelli visited each major Catholic population center. The "landslide vote" for Roosevelt in November 1936 was, in major part, due to the effect of Pacelli. Americans understood that he was almost the guaranteed successor to Pope Pius XI. At the Roosevelt estate in Hyde Park, New York, on the day following electoral victory, Rose Kennedy bluntly asked Roosevelt to appoint her husband ambassador to England’s Court of St. James. Pacelli requested appointment of a credentialed American ambassador to the Vatican. He was quietly outraged when Roosevelt said that the best he could do was appoint a "personal envoy". This affair had the small and hidden consequence for Spellman of gaining some political dominance over the man who in 1917 prevented him from becoming a U.S. Navy chaplain.