Habemus Papam

And he's from Chicago!

We're in good company, Chicago is one of only four places on earth outside of Italy since 1523 that can claim the title "birthplace of a Pope". So we have every right to be stoked, which we are. Perhaps no one is more stoked than our Mayor, Brandon Johnson who proclaimed yesterday, May 8, 2025, the greatest day in Chicago history. Here are some thoughts:

Chicago Chicago

While the rest of the world contemplated the ramifications of the first Pope born in the United States, what impact Pope Leo XIV will have on the largest institution in the world, and what impact THAT will have on the world stage, we here in Chicago were focused on shall we say, more parochial issues. Celebrating my outright giddiness of the moment, shortly after the man formerly known as Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost stepped onto the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica and delivered his first words to the world as the new Pope, I made my first appearance in months on social media, asking the question it turned out was on the minds of most of my fellow Chicagoans:

Is he a Cubs or a White Sox fan?

Less than a minute after I hit "Post", someone responded with this: "Well he's from the South Side so..."

A moment later someone else responded: "ABC has just reported that he's a Cubs fan."

Hmmm I thought, a South Side Cubs fan. If that were true, then he's a contrarian like me, in my case, a North Side Sox fan. I commented that quality may serve him well in his new job. 

The silly banter went on in that vein for hours:

"South Side Cubs Fan. In other words, a heretic." wrote one friend.

"It might not bode well for his power of prayer if he's a Sox fan" wrote another.

It was delightful.

Another hot button topic on people's minds, just as silly, but equally understandable given the circumstances of being from the same place as the Pope is this:

Do I know anybody who knows him?

I learned the answer to that question before his papacy was announced, and it didn't even have a Chicago connection. After I received the call from my mother excitedly telling me: "There's white smoke coming out of the chimney of the Sistine Chapel!", I went to the front of the office to learn that my two colleagues there had not only heard the news, but were streaming live coverage on their computers. So I camped out behind one of them as I thought this historic event was an experience that should be shared. Boy was I right.

After what seemed an eternity waiting for the big reveal, my colleague told me that her mother knew one of the Cardinals who was considered a leading candidate for Pope. True to form, my response was measured and tactful: "Holy shit you're kidding me!"

The two of us however agreed that being from the United States, Cardinal Prevost didn't stand a chance.  

Then came the announcement. "Holy shit you're kidding me!" was her response.

She then proceeded to show me a picture of the new Pope taken by her mother when the two of them were classmates at Villanova outside of  Philadelphia. They were at a Halloween party and in the picture, a very young Rob Prevost was dressed up as (a very young) Groucho Marx. 

So I guess that means I have no more than two degrees of separation from Pope Leo XIV, in other words, I know somebody who knows somebody who knows the Pope. But wait a second, I've actually met the mother of my workmate so maybe I'm only one degree of separation. OK maybe that's pushing it a bit.

Later that day I learned of an even closer connection. My cousin has connections with a local priest, the chaplain at St. Rita High School in Chicago who is a fellow Augustinian and good friends with the new Pope.

If I dig a little deeper, I might find an even closer connection. In case you care and why wouldn't you, stay tuned.

Then there's this very pressing question:

But where is he really from?

This came up after I told another colleague that I had just found out that Robert Francis Prevost grew up in the suburb of Dolton. "Oh then he's really not from Chicago" she said. My mother had the same reaction. Well, I assured my colleague, Dolton shares a border with Chicago so it's certainly close enough. "Oh so you mean it's not like Joliet?" she said. I didn't bother to tell her that I know people from Joliet who certainly consider themselves part of greater Chicago.

This reminded me of an online list I commented on in this post which dealt with things people don't like about Chicago. One item on the list was "People who live in the suburbs but say they're from Chicago." 

Which made me wonder if all the folks who are bothered by suburbanites claiming themselves to be Chicagoans, will refuse to claim this Pope as one of their own. I'm guessing they'll make an exception in this case, special dispensation if you will. 

Then came the memes. My favorite ones were the comparisons to other unlikely, or "that'll happen when hell freezes over" types of events. My son pointed out this trope that was making the rounds of Chicago media yesterday:

The people who said that Chicago will have a Pope before the (Chicago) Bears will have a 4,000 yard passer, turned out to be right.

Indeed.

Obviously I don't know the man, but I imagine Pope Leo (or Pope Bob as we'll no doubt refer to him here) would get a chuckle out of all this silliness, or at least I hope he would. It turns out that Pope Leo XIV, may be from Chicago, but he is hardly provincial. He may be an American by birth, but he is truly a man of the world. As an example, he speaks five languages fluently and can read two more. 

In his first words as Pope to the tens of thousands gathered in St. Peter's Square to welcome him and to the hundreds of millions viewing on TV or streaming video, he took a moment to break from Italian to send a shout out in Spanish to the city of Chiclayo, Peru where he served as bishop from 2015 until 2023. His connection to Peru goes all the way back to 1985 where he worked as a missionary during a particularly challenging period in that country's history. Like us back home in Chicago, the people of Chiclayo and indeed much of Peru claim him as their own, as well as they should. 

He sent no similar shout out to Chicago nor spoke one word of English from that platform which made some ultra right-wing media folks lose their minds. *

All the more power to him I say. 

The comments on my trivial Facebook post were not all trivial, this one for example:

"It’s a shock. All the prognosticators were in agreement that an American was out of the question because of the current world political climate. Now I see that the world political climate may have been the very reason he was chosen."

There has been much speculation as to why in their infinite wisdom, the College of Cardinals selected an American to be the next Pope. Before the new Pope was elected, one TV priest-commentator stated that the Cardinals would only pick an American if they saw a serious degradation of this country's political system. 

Interesting.

Here's another:

"Simply glad that the American with the largest constituency is no longer our President, furthermore, one who possesses a moral compass."

That one particularly hit home.

Despite the euphoria in this country among people like me who don't believe being called "progressive" is an epithet, we have to be careful about our assumptions, especially trying to make this Pope in our own image. As I pointed out 12 years ago shortly after Pope Francis was elected: don't expect to see the Pope coming out in favor of reproductive rights, gay weddings at St. Peter's, or even many of the less contentious issues like the ordination of women or married priests in the Church anytime soon. Like a massive ship, it's difficult and takes a very long time for an institution with well over one billion members to change course, that is, without sinking the ship.

But like his predecessor, Pope Leo is on record stating unequivocally that he holds nothing sacred in national borders, that he prefers bringing people together rather than keeping them apart and prefers building bridges rather than walls. In my last post I linked to the encyclical written by Pope Francis last February to the US bishops, denouncing in no uncertain terms the notion put forward by the current US Vice President that Catholic teaching supports the mass deportation of refugees and other immigrants being carried out by the current administration.  

If anything, Pope Leo XIV was even more direct in his response than his predecessor as also in February, in an X account under then Cardinal Prevost's name came this tweet: 

“JD Vance is wrong, Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others.”

It should be noted that there is no confirmation that Cardinal Prevost actually wrote those words, but he has to date, not refuted them. 

There is sweet justice in the fact that Vance used the writings of St. Augustine to justify his reasoning. As we have all learned in the last two days, Leo is himself a member of the Augustinian order and was in fact for a while, the leader of that order. It remains to be seen whether Vance will choose to debate the new Pope on the issue which would be like me debating Albert Einstein on the issue of gravity.

One thing is crystal clear: Pope Leo's heart and soul lies in the devotion of service to the poor and disadvantaged of the world, to human dignity and to social justice. In that, he is a man who lives the Gospel both in word and deed, and I have little doubt that he will make not only we the people of Chicago and our brothers and sisters in Chiclayo who call him our own, proud, but people of good will everywhere, be they Christians or not.

And the cherry on top?

It turns out he's a White Sox fan after all, proving once and for all he knows a thing or two about suffering.

Saints be praised.  

* The ultra right-wing pundits would have really lost their minds if they had read this quote from Pope Leo XIV. It's a good thing it's in Spanish:

"Soy peruano. Porque uno no es de donde nace… sino de donde entrega el alma."

"I am Peruvian. Because one isn't from where he is born, but rather from where he delivers his soul."

Ordo Amoris and The Good Samaritan

We lost the Pope early this week, on Easter Monday. He was laid to rest this morning in the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore, hands down the most beautiful of the major churches in Rome, in my humble opinion.  After what would be his final act as Pontiff, blessing the multitudes gathered in St. Peter's Square to celebrate the most important holiday in Christendom, Pope Francis retired to his residence in the Vatican where he left this world at 7:15AM local time. 

May he rest in peace.

It's interesting that in one of his final meetings with a world leader, Francis met with the Vice President of the United States. The late Pontiff made no bones about his opposition to the current US administration, especially regarding its stance on immigration, refugees, and mass deportation.

One may be tempted to think the VP lectured the ailing Pope on Catholic teaching that he believes justifies mass deportation, just as he lectured Germans that they're being too hard on Nazis or to Volodmyr Zelenski that he wasn't sucking up enough to the current POTUS.. But it doesn't appear the Easter Sunday meeting between the two was anything more than an exchange of pleasantries and the all-important photo-op. 

The rift between the Pope and the VP began with a Fox interview in January where the VP addressed how his administration's policies on deportation and foreign aid, jibe with his Christian faith. He said this: 

You love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country. And then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.

He went on to claim that the "far left" inverts that hierarchy.

Then he attached a name to the hierarchy during a social media squabble:

Just google “ordo amoris.” ...the idea that there isn’t a hierarchy of obligations violates basic common sense. Does Rory (Stewart, a British commentator and former politician) really think his moral duties to his own children are the same as his duties to a stranger who lives thousands of miles away? Does anyone?

On a very basic level, the VP is right of course. Ordo amoris, first introduced to the Church by Saint Augustine in the early Sixth Century, makes clear that all forms of love are not equal. Scripture puts love of God and love of one's parents squarely at the forefront, as clearly stated in the Ten Commandments. From there the other kinds of love we share with others naturally follow. 

How absurd would it be if we for example, sent our entire paycheck to charity without leaving enough to feed our own family?

To the best of my knowledge not explicitly mentioned in scripture, love of oneself might also reside at the center of the hierarchy. More than anything, ordo amoris addresses the practical aspects of life in relation to the practice of faith. We are only human after all.

Much like the instructions we hear on every commercial flight when we are told that in the case of the loss of cabin pressure, we should place the oxygen mask over our face before helping others do the same, it is practical and logical to assume we are not in a good position to help others if we don't help ourselves first.

The same goes for love. 

But what about the idea that beyond our family and other loved ones, there is a hierarchy of categories of relationships, each one less worthy of our love and charity than the one proceeding it?

Was that what Jesus had in mind when he commanded his disciples to love one another as he had loved them? Did he have a hierarchy which determined how much he doled out his love and compassion to each of them?

With that logic, one could easily construct an infinite number of categories to separate people in the hierarchy chain. How about fellow members of a particular faith or political party? Or members of the same ethnicity or race? What about fans of the same football team? 

If I were to use that logic, woe be to the Trumplican, Muslim, Indonesian, Green Bay Packer fan who happens to cross my path during a crisis. 

The VP's interesting take on Catholic theology was not lost on Pope Francis who shortly before his final health crisis, wrote an encyclical to the bishops of the United States where he states that the universal dignity of every human being surpasses all other concerns. He wrote:

...Jesus Christ, loving everyone with a universal love, educates us in the permanent recognition of the dignity of every human being, without exception. In fact, when we speak of “infinite and transcendent dignity,” we wish to emphasize that the most decisive value possessed by the human person surpasses and sustains every other juridical consideration that can be made to regulate life in society. Thus, all the Christian faithful and people of good will are called upon to consider the legitimacy of norms and public policies in the light of the dignity of the person and his or her fundamental rights, not vice versa.

You can read the encyclical in its entirety here. 

On the true ordo amoris, Francis writes:

Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups. In other words: the human person is not a mere individual, relatively expansive, with some philanthropic feelings! The human person is a subject with dignity who, through the constitutive relationship with all, especially with the poorest, can gradually mature in his identity and vocation. The true ordo amoris that must be promoted is that which we discover by meditating constantly on the parable of the “Good Samaritan” (cf. Lk 10:25-37), that is, by meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all, without exception.

To current ears, the phrase "Good Samaritan" implies anyone who does a good deed, generally above and beyond the call of duty. But in the time the parable found in the Gospel of Luke was written, the Samaritans were a group of people who shared a common mistrust and emnity with the Jews (the original recipients of the Gospel). From the perspective of a contemporary dyed-in-the-wool believer, the term "good Samaritan" might have the same impact as calling someone a "good athiest", which is precisely why the story is so compelling and revolutionary.

Answering the question "who exactly is my neighbor?" Jesus proposed the story of a man, presumably a Jew, who is robbed and left for dead on the side of a road. Two upstanding members of the Jewish community, a priest and a Levite have neither the time not the inclination to help the man. Next comes a Samaritan who cares for the man's wounds then takes him to an inn where he asks the keeper to care for the man until his return where he will compensate the innkeeper for all his expenses.

Which of the three Jesus then asked, was doing God's will? Not even willing to let the word Samaritan cross his lips, the questioner responded: "He who showed mercy on him."

"Now go and do likewise" was Jesus' reply.

Our neighbor in other words, is all of humanity.

In his encyclical, Francis places the migrant fleeing terror, oppression, and all other sorts of indignities at home at the center of Scripture. He leads off his letter describing the Jews' Exodus from Egyptian slavery and the Holy Family's escape into Egypt, fleeing a jealous and "ungodly" king. (Could there be someone currently in our midst that the Pope had in mind?).

In the late Pope's words, The Holy Family:

are the model, the example and the consolation of emigrants and pilgrims of every age and country, of all refugees of every condition who, beset by persecution or necessity, are forced to leave their homeland, beloved family and dear friends for foreign lands.

The late Holy Father did not discount the practical concerns of society facing an influx of immigrants:

one must recognize the right of a nation to defend itself and keep communities safe from those who have committed violent or serious crimes while in the country or prior to arrival.

And yet:

the act of deporting people who in many cases have left their own land for reasons of extreme poverty, insecurity, exploitation, persecution or serious deterioration of the environment, damages the dignity of many men and women, and of entire families, and places them in a state of particular vulnerability and defenselessness.

Much has been made about the differences between Pope Francis and his immediate predecessors. But those differences were as much if not more about style rather than substance.

Conservative pundits in the US and perhaps elsewhere, couldn't hide their giddiness at this Pope's passing. To them he was an unapologetic progressive, even a heretic who was bent on destroying the Church and its traditions. Liberals on the other hand lamented that Francis did not do enough to reform the Church, changing all the things about it they didn't like. I guess the fact that the bitterly divided Church still remains intact, at this writing anyway, means that Pope Francis did a pretty good job. 

Shortly after he became Pope, in 2013, I wrote this piece about how the dean of American blowhard ultra-conservative talking heads, the late Rush Limbaugh, was particularly unhappy with Francis, particularly with his views on capitalism. I pointed out in the piece that while Limbaugh couldn't say enough good things about Francis' two predecessors, Popes Benedict XVI and John Paul II, he either didn't know or ignored that those two were also very critical of systems that place the making of money ahead of basic human dignity. In fact their views on the subject were hardly different at all from Francis's.

Naturally right now there is a spirited debate about who will be chosen to carry on as Pope. Conservatives have made a list of candidates they feel will best represent their interests and liberals have done the same. But the story of the Good Samaritan is so central to the faith that whoever ends up wearing the "shoes of the fisherman" in a few weeks' time, will be loathe to go against it, J.D. Vance's opinion notwithstanding.

I closed that post with this thought:

We may claim the Almighty for ourselves but God is neither liberal nor conservative, Democrat nor Republican. He is neither a Communist nor a Capitalist. His message doesn't belong exclusively to the Right nor to the Left, to the Jew or the Gentile, or to you or me. It belongs to all of us.

Somehow we're just all going to have to accept that.

Our Lady of Paris

"The Virgin of Paris" Early 14th Century,
a masterpiece of late Gothic art,
in the transcept of Notre-Dame de Paris

Ever since the day I first walked from Manhattan to Brooklyn across its pedestrian walkway in 1979, I've had a love affair with the Brooklyn Bridge. A work of tremendous beauty, that magnificent 19th century structure is the perfect blending of structural engineering, architecture, and history, especially the heartrending  story of the contibutions of the thousands of individuals who built it, not a few of whom who gave their lives (including its chief designer John Roebling), during its construction. That, combined with ts loaction in the heart of New York City makes the walk across it over the East River between the two boroughs in my opinion, the single greatest example of the urban experience.

One day about twenty five years ago, I found myself on the Brooklyn side of the bridge. It was a difficult time in my life, filled with loss and the confusion that follows. As I gazed upon that magnificent creation, I took comfort in the thought that despite the painful loss I was going through at the time, the Brooklyn Bridge, and all it had meant to me over the years, would always be there.

Some years later, the unthinkable happened. Two hijacked commercial jets, one coming from the north, the other from the south, deliberately slammed into the two towers of the World Trade Center, just a stone's throw from the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge. Back in Chicago, 780 miles away, I watched on TV in horror with my wife and infant son as the South Tower then the North Tower collapsed taking with them the lives of nearly 3,000 innocent people.

Weeks after the initial shock and mourning for the lives lost that day, for their families and for the City of New York, I recalled that moment at the bridge and realized how foolish I had been. Perhaps it was because I had lived a sheltered life in a world that for a good part of my existance had been relatively peaceful, at least on my side of the globe. Violence and destruction of that magnitude in a place I loved and was intimately connected to was inconceivable. If the mighty Twin Towers could flatten like pancakes thanks to the diabolical efforts of a handful of men, nothing, not even that beloved bridge was safe. After 9/11, my new mantra became, "take nothing for granted."

The cathedral as seen from the Left Bank in January, 2005.
This week's fire destroyed the entire roofline and
the 19th Century spire at the transcept.

Here at the outset,  I must I point out there is absolutely no parallel between the September 11 attacks and what happened last week in Paris. The fire that destroyed much of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in that city was an accident, of that I am certain. Not one life was lost (at least as far as we know at this moment) and there were few serious injuries, none of them life threatening. For that we should be eternally grateful. 

The comparison is a personal and purely superficial one. Once again I was caught off-guard. You see, if there is any work of human hands in the world that means as much to me as the Brooklyn Bridge, it would be the Cathedral of Paris. Long before I set foot inside, an obsession with Medieval Gothic architecture drove me to study Notre-Dame de Paris inside and out from front to back, every nook and crannie of it. For many years to me it was without question the greatest building on earth, the perfect combination of heart breaking beauty, magnificent craftsmanship, brilliant structural engineerng, the moving story of the fierce devotion of the community of believers who built it, its role as the symbolic heart and soul of the nation of France and its people, and of course by any standard, a great work of art. Words cannot describe how I felt as I learned the news on Monday that the cathedral was in flames. In denial, I assumed when I saw the early images of the fire on my computer at work, just as I did when I first saw smoke coming out of the hole in the World Trade Center punctured by a plane, that the emergency responders on the scene would soon have everything under control.

Then I saw a photograph of the great 19th Century spire above the transcept consumed in flames. At that moment a colleague at work, himself from France and well aware of the situation, came back from lunch and told me the spire had already collapsed into the church. I was broken hearted. Something I dearly loved, a place that gave me great joy during my formative years, a sense of peace in troubled times, (I visited it for the first time the same year as my Brooklyn Bridge epiphany), and a place I visited so often that it became a dear friend, would soon be no more...

The West facade of  of Notre-Dame  de Paris

...or so I thought.

The fire worked its way to the north tower (the one on the left in the photograph above) where firefighters worked valiently to halt its spread. Had they failed and the tower's structure become sufficiently weakened, the massive bells in the tower's bellfry would have broken free and collapsed to the ground. With them, all hope for saving the building would have been lost.

Catastrophic as the damge to the building was, thanks to the quick thinking and hard work of the firefighters, the tower and its bells remained intact.. Expecting the worst when I woke up Tuesday morning, the news was encouraging. Allthough the spire and timber roof where the fire began were destroyed, the stone vaulting directly underneath the roof survived nearly intact. Early morning photographs showed the interior covered with debris, a little worse for the wear, but still intact. The most remakable news of all was that most of the stained glass including the two magnificent rose windows pictured below, one on either side of the transcept also survived.

The North Transept Rose Window

The South Transept Rose Window

The fire brought out the most remarkable display in people, a veritable rainbow of hues, luminances, and saturations of human nature, in all its glory and well, not so much. The night of the fire, thousands of Parisians lined the quais on the Left Bank of the Seine to watch in disbelief as their cathedral burned, mournfully singing hymns as the flames illuminated the towers of the church and the surrounding neighborhood in an eerily beautiful light. 

The following day, President Emmanuel Marcon declared the church would be completely restored, practically good as new in five years, presumably in time for 2024 when Paris is to host the Summer Olympic Games. Even before the French president opened his mouth, tens of millions of Euros were already pledged by weathly individuals and corporations to rebuild Notre-Dame. By Thursday morning, two days after the fire was officially declared extinguished, over one billion Euros had been pledged, yes indeedy some of it believe it or not, coming with strings attached, mostly in the form of demands for extreme tax breaks in return for the contributions. 

St. Joan of Arc, 19th Century sculpture
by Charles Desvergnes

That display of spontaneous philanthropy turned heads and triggered significant consternation from all corners, ranging from historical preservation groups who questioned the irony of why raising funds for the necessary restoration of the cathedral before the building was nearly lost was almost as difficult as trying to draw blood from a stone, to advocates for practically every charity on the face of the earth who threw up their hands in disgust at the record amount of money raised in the blink of an eye for an effort they deemed so much less worthy than their own. 

It didn't take long for conspiracy theorists to come up with the idea that the cathedral was torched, conceiving of plots to destroy the church carried out by folks whom those theorists do not like, more often than not, Muslim extermists. And people of faith got into the act by proclaiming it was nothing less than an act of God which spared the church  from total destruction. Unfortuantely for those fine theories, facts, physics and common logic explain how the fire started unintentionally, and how despite the serious nature of the blaze, most of the church managed to survive intact, even without the direct intervention of the almighty.   

Portal of the Virgin, West Front of the Cathedral.
Originally installed between 1210 and 1220,
many of these stone figures were behaded during the
French Revolution and retored during the mid-19th Century.  

All evidence points to the source of the fire as being the result of restoration work carried out in the transcept of the cathedral. Ironic as they are, devastating fires such as these, resulting from the heat producing tools necessary for restoration work, in close proximity to the highly inflammable materials the buildings are constructed of, are painfully common. Off the top of my head, I can think of at least three such fires here in Chicago in recent years, two of which left only the walls of historic churches standing, and the third in our own Roman Catholic cathedral which was saved only through a little luck (that the fire was caught in time), and the remarkable efforts of firefighters.

That Notre-Dame didn't suffer more damage is due to the fact that the firefighters there managed to contain the blaze to the wooden roof which can be considered a separate structure from the main body of the building. Beneath that roof as I mentioned earlier, is the stone vaulting which one sees from inside the church, the majority of which withstood the flames and the heat of the fire. The great weight of that vault is transferred to the enormous flying buttresses, one of the building's most distinct features, which flank the outside of the cathedral. Had the vault been severely compromised, the delicate balance between the downward force of the vault counterbalancing the lateral force of the flying buttresses might have dramatically shifted, causing the buttresses to crush the outer walls of the cathedral. That this did not happen is a testament to the brilliance of the Medieval builders of Notre-Dame, and to the wise approach that was taken to combat the fire.

However there is one thing about this event than cannot be explained away so easily: its timing. The April 15, 2019 Notre-Dame de Paris fire took place during the midst of the biggest existential crisis in the history of the Roman Catholic Church, in one of that institution's most recognizable symbols (perhaps second only to St. Peter's Bascilica in Rome), AND during Holy Week no less, the single most important week of the year in the calendar of the Church.

The nave of the Cathedral
In this photograph you can see part of the
stone vaulting and the magnificent organ
which itself dates from the 19th Century
but contains components which date
back much earler.

A non-believer can easily dismiss all this as pure coincidence. But to someone who takes his or her faith seriously, especially a Catholic for whom symbols mean a great deal, the timing of this devastating fire certainly has to give one pause to think.

As a Catholic myself, it pains me to say that the institution I love is rotten to the core, at least the administration of it. If there is a God who takes a personal interest in the goings on of this planet, He, She (or They if you prefer), must be supremely pissed at the Church who claims to be His, Her, or Their representative on earth. For even naive Catholics who once assumed that the sexual abuse of children at the hands of priests, dreadful as it is, was only a rare and isolated occurrance, it has now become terribly obvious that the scourge is pandemic in the Church. Much as I like and respect the current Pope Francis, he has done very little to instill the faith in his flock that the Church will unequivocally do everything in its power to end that unspeakable and despicable crime, as well as many other abuses of power in the Church. Culpability, knowledge and most damning, the failure to act upon this cancer in the Church goes all the way to the top to the point where it is impossible to give anyone in any position of power in the Roman Catholic Church a pass.

Clearly the Church needs a radical reboot in order to survive and what better time for this message to come to us than the week before Easter?

The Gospels describe an event that took place in Jerusalem the week before Jesus's crucifixion, where he turned over the tables of the profaners of the Temple, evicting them from the sacred place and telling the perplexed authorities: "destroy this Temple and I will raise it again three days." Can anyone honestly say that at this point in its history, the Roman Catholic Church doesn't need God to come down and do the same thing?  You might think I'm crazy to say this (and I'd be the first to agree with you), but maybe, just maybe that is exactly what happened last Monday.

Christians recognize the Friday before Easter as the holy day when we commemorate the day Jesus died, yet we call it "Good Friday", Those who are perplexeed by that name, forget the fact that without Jesus's death, there could be no Resurrection hence, without Good Friday, there would be no Easter, the central tenet of the faith.

Shrine devoted to Our Lade of Guadalupe from 1949,
the only such shirne in Eurpoe 

Believers or not. I think we can all agree that good things have come out of the horrible fire at Notre-Dame de Paris last week. Because of it, people have come out of their slumber about our sites of cultural heritage, those places around the world that define who we are as a people and as a civilization. The point has been hit home that once they're gone, they can never be replaced. Perhaps we'll all learn not to take any of them for granted.

For an ever so brief a moment, in fact it's probably over by now, the fire brought much of the world together, Catholic or not, in universal sorrow for the potential loss of such a treasure. Not that I ever want to test this out, but one could only hope that were such a catastrophe to befall a cultural heritage site that is not a Christian church, for example the mosque known as the The Dome on the Rock in Jeruslaem, the Hindu/Budhist Temple Angkor Wat in Cambodia, or the Taj Mahal in India, that we of the Christian faith will respond in kind.

Perhaps the most appropriate and heart warming thing that happened last week was that three modest but historic African American churches in Louisiana that were torched by a white supremacist young man in the past month, all reported significant spikes in contributions to their own re-building programs, presumably in response to the fire in Paris.

Clearly, the fire at Notre-Dame de Paris was catastrophic, but it was in no sense at all tragic. All the good that has and will certainly come as a result of it without the loss of a single life is truly a miracle. Despite President Macron's overly optimistic timeline, the cathedral will be restored, that is for certain. As far as I'm concerrned,  I may never set foot inside my old friend again, and that is perfectly OK with me. As long as my children and God-willing their children, and theirs and hopefully the dozens of generations of children to follow will have the opportunity to set foot inside the magnificent cathedral that truly belongs to the enitre world, something which at this moment looks very likely, wherever I am, I will be pleased.

Our Lady of Paris is very much alive.
Joyeuses Pâques, Happy Easter!

POST SCRIPT: I'm very happy to report that unless otherwise noted, everything shown in the photographs in this post has survived the fire.

St. Boniface, the Saga Continues...

I first wrote about the sorry saga of the former St. Boniface Roman Catholic Church back in 2009, right as the ninety day waiting period expired after a demolition permit had been issued, clearing the way for the church building to be turned to dust. More than eight years later and several plans to re-purpose the building falling through, the still beautiful structure remains, standing across from the northwest corner of Eckhart Park at the intersection of Noble and Chestnut Streets on Chicago's near north side.

And now a new plan has arisen. In the cheeky words of this Chicago Architecture blog article, the church is about to be "transubstantiated into condos." as part of a square block development.

Again, we'll wait and see if this new plan has any legs. The church, the work of Chicago's pre-eminent ecclesiastical architect Henry Schlacks, has been closed for 27 years, what's another few months?

Cardinal George

This month, Chicago lost its archbishop emeritus, Francis Cardinal George. Cardinal George served at the helm of the third largest American Roman Catholic archdiocese for seventeen years before stepping down last November due to his declining health.

The last quarter century has been a time of great struggle for the Church. The ongoing problem of declining membership and respect for the institution along with the inevitable church closings that followed were merely the tip of the iceberg of problems Cardinal George faced when he took over the job from his predecessor, the late Joseph Cardinal Bernadin in 1997.

The issue that has hung like a dark cloud over the Church for several decades now, is the sexual abuse crisis that rocked American Catholicism to its core. It was bad enough that there were priests who abused children, and worse that those acts were covered up by officials in charge. But by far the worst violation of trust was the fact that many known perpetrators were simply transferred by their superiors to other parishes where they could continue their pattern of abuse, rather than being taken out of commission, not to mention prosecuted and punished.

The indignation and outrage that followed every story of a fallen priest and criminally irresponsible bishop was justified. Yet as these things go, righteous, moral indignation has a way of taking on a life of its own. The outcry that followed the Church's sexual abuse crisis is no exception. Once the story was made public, retribution was swift and fierce; all priests, the good and the small handful of bad ones, were lumped together by an all-knowing, cynical body politic. Tragically it came to the point where many priests refused to wear in public the collar, once a symbol of honor, and pride, lest they be mistaken for sexual predators.

Even the widely respected and beloved Cardinal Bernadin fell victim to the general public's assumption of a priest's guilt until proof of innocence, as he was wrongly accused of sexually molesting a young man. When his accuser recanted his story, the Cardinal was magnanimous in forgiveness, but the damage to his reputation was done. This was the climate in the Archdiocese of Chicago when Cardinal George took over its reigns after Bernadin's death.

Cardinal George was himself never implicated with impropriety, but early on in his tenure, he was seen as not acting quickly enough in the pursuit of accused priests. He also made the "mistake" of insisting that even wayward priests were deserving of compassion and forgiveness. As a result, he was lumped together will all the other bishops who were enablers of the criminal behavior of their charges. Ultimately, George who became president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in 2007, spearheaded the zero tolerance policy, which barred men who had credibly been accused of sexual abuse, from serving in the ministry.

A native of Chicago, Cardinal George's personality contrasted with the genial warmth of Cardinal Bernadin. An intensely private man, the new archbishop was reticent to reveal an "inner self", preferring to stick to the business at hand. In his writing and homilies to the faithful, George displayed a brilliant, analytical mind, one deeply influenced by years of the study of literature, theology, and philosophy. Yet many found his style to be lacking a personal touch, leading some to mistakenly assume him to be cold and impersonal.

Cardinal George's unequivocal stance on issues such as gay marriage and birth control, made him a polarizing figure in the Church. Many in the Church's left saw the Cardinal's views as outdated and out of touch with those of his flock. However the Cardinal was no mouthpiece for the conservative right as he was equally adamant in his support of social justice, especially the rights of the poor, of immigrants, and outcasts from society. On holidays such as Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving, the Cardinal could be found ministering to inmates at Cook County Jail.  It was the greater good spelled out in the "truth found in the Gospel" that Cardinal George insisted he followed, rather than current fashion, public opinion, or political ideology.

Despite his devotion to the tenets of his faith, there was a pragmatism in Cardinal George's leadership style, as he was not rigidly bound to a particular cause, if the pursuit of it proved to be impractical or untenable. A good example is his dealings with the Reverend Michael Pflager, the controversial priest who is pastor of St. Sabina Parish on the city's south side. Church rules place a time limit on the tenure of a pastor at a particular parish. Father Pflager's tenure at St. Sabina has nearly tripled that limit and a few years ago, Cardinal George felt it was time for a change. The community at the predominantly African American parish disagreed and in no uncertain terms threatened to leave the Catholic Church if Pfleger was relieved from his duties. Despite a war of words, suspensions and loads of media coverage, Cardinal George agreed to compromise, a victory for Pfleger and his parish, At this writing, Father Pfleger remains in place in his thirty fourth year as pastor at St. Sabina.

Francis Cardinal George was particularly well suited to the call of service and personal sacrifice required of the life of a priest and archbishop. If you never saw him in person, you may not have realized that he walked with a distinct limp. That limp was the result of having being stricken with polio at the age of 13. The disease and its aftermath had a profound impact upon his life.

Francis George lived in constant physical pain. One leg, rendered virtually useless, was strapped to a painful brace which he wore throughout his life. Denied his dream of entering the seminary of the Archdiocese of Chicago because of his affliction, George became a member of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, a congregation founded in France just after the Revolution, whose primary mission was working with the poor of the world.

From a Catholic point of view, the pain that Francis Gorge endured along with his service to the poor, paved the way for a lifetime of devotion, compassion and empathy for the suffering, as he indeed was one of them. The bladder cancer that would eventually claim his life was diagnosed in 2006, and would introduce him to an entirely new form of pain.  Despite the cancer, he continued his strenuous work schedule barely missing a beat, until he voluntarily stepped down a few months ago, but not before he presided over the seamless transition of the episcopate of Chicago's new archbishop, Blase Cupich.

I last saw the Cardinal in October just before he left his position. He was presiding at a function honoring a friend of mine who received the Catholic Lawyer of the year award, At the function, the Cardinal, describing one of the pitfalls of his job, quipped that there was no group of people whom he both sought the advice, and ran away from as quickly as possible as lawyers. Clearly he would have preferred a life of ministering to the downtrodden, rather than dealing with the quagmire  of running an enormous institution fraught with a myriad of problems. Yet as always, this man of tremendous strength and faith, left it in God's hands.

They say that God works in mysterious ways. If you believe that everything happens for a reason as I do, the pain, suffering, and heartache that Cardinal George endured, led him on the path to accomplish some very important things. We may not all agree with everything the man stood for, but no one can honestly question his integrity or the sincerity in which he pursued those ideals.

He guided the Church through very troubling waters with little regard for his own comfort, security, and most of all popularity. Francis George may not have been the most popular or beloved archbishop of Chicago, but I firmly believe that in the end, God chose the right man for a very difficult job.

His earthly pain and suffering now over, Francis George is perhaps no longer is in need of our prayers. We on the other hand, are desperately in need of his.

Don't Mess with Mr. In-between

One e-mail message line on my inbox screamed this:

Obama's illegal alien uncle to appear at new immigration hearing.

And another:

Oklahoma City will not cancel pornographic play mocking the Bible.

From a site devoted to the leanings of the other side comes this:

Libertarian Writings that Read like Comic Books. 

And this: 

Truth, No Strings Attached. 

And again: 

Some Filthy Facts About the Rich.

I've been on the mailing lists of these and similar web sites for some time now. If strangers were to casually glance at my inbox, they would draw the conclusion that my political views are schizophrenic to say the least. Other than their wildly divergent points of view however, there is very little difference between the sites. I never asked to subscribe to them, the organizations responsible for the publications are spamming me, they got my address from other sites that I do subscribe to. I could simply unsubscribe but frankly I'm entertained by headlines such as these, much like those of the tabloids at the checkout line. The difference between these messages and the ones at the supermarket is that the e-mail headlines are lead-ins to articles that are meant to be taken seriously.

I also don't unsubscribe to these sites because unlike most Americans it seems, I'm interested in what people who don't necessarily share my point of view have to say. Good heavens, I might even learn something.

More than anything, what these web sites have in common is the tone of their discourse. There is seldom an attempt to lend any credence to the other side of the argument as if to say people who don't believe as they do are simply a bunch of irritating, misguided fools. On both sides of the ideological divide, the websites, periodicals, and TV networks devoted exclusively to one point of view or another are essentially saying this: "We're right, and everybody else is wrong."

Small wonder why our current government is so dysfunctional, the rhetoric of these internet articles, and the comments that follow them, seem to be a beacon for our politicians as well.

There is a war going on in this country and the weapon of choice by the combatants is hyperbole.

I distinctly remember a time during the late sixties and early seventies when this country was bitterly divided over the war in Vietnam. While we have our own serious problems today, I can't see an issue in our time, no not even Obamacare, that comes close to the divisiveness that Vietnam produced. Yet today I'd say we as a nation are as divided if not more so, than during that difficult time.

What accounts for the lack of tolerance, subtlety, and common sense in our current political discourse is anybody's guess. Perhaps it's because we don't have a common enemy bringing us together as we did during the Great Depression, World War II and the days after September 11, 2001. Maybe it's the proliferation of cable TV outlets, the internet, and social media which provides a platform for every political ideology no matter how extreme or goofy, and promotes the segregation of those with like minds. Or maybe its just the old ennui, I have no idea.

What worries me is that the voices that scream the loudest on both sides are the ones that get the attention, leaving the subtle, unbiased, and measured views behind.

No ideological group holds the monopoly on overblown rhetoric and hyperbole; both sides spew it as freely as a drunken sailor spends money on a twelve hour shore leave. But if I had to crown a king of bluster, a crown prince of bombast, and a champion of the art of summing up all the world's problems into one sentence, usually wrapped around an infantile temper tantrum, that title would have to go to Rush Limbaugh.

Limbaugh's political views are well documented, as they say he's a little to the right of Attila the Hun. That alone for me is not a problem, far from it. In fact sometimes, rarely, but sometimes I agree with him. It's not his message I find objectionable, but the way he delivers it. Limbaugh is as subtle as a twenty pound sledge hammer, blasting his targets, that is to say anyone who doesn't subscribe to his world view, with insults and diatribes that would not be out of place in a professional wrestling ring. He seems to reserve the bulk of his wrath for women supporting women's issues. Recently Limbaugh labeled a women who publicly supported medical insurance paying for birth control pills a "slut." Of course it's all an act, no one in their right mind should take Limbaugh any more seriously than the circus known as the Jerry Springer Show.

But unfortunately, many people do.

Limbaugh's latest target has been none other than the Pope. When Cardinal Bergoglio of Buenos Aires stepped into the shoes of St. Peter in the Vatican this past March becoming Pope Francis, it quickly became clear that he would be a quite different pontiff than his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI. Benedict, now officially Pope Emeritus, is a brilliant theologian who was instrumental in the creation and implementation of the reforms of Vatican II which brought radical change to the Catholic Church. But the former Cardinal Ratzinger would later change some of his views on the sweeping changes that took place since the Second Vatican Council met in the early sixties and became very well known, even before his pontificate, as a strong voice for conservatism in the church.

Unlike Benedict, Francis, the first pope from Latin America, has rejected many of the trappings of the royal Vatican lifestyle, going out of his way to show that his pontificate will be devoted to the basics, that is to say, ministering to the poor and the helpless, and concentrating on the most fundamental tenets of Christianity, namely the gospel of love and forgiveness.

In recent months Pope Francis has made strong statements about some of the failings of capitalism, specifically the culture of greed that unrestricted capitalism left unchecked, can create.

This is where old Rush, huffing and puffing as usual, comes in. Though not a Catholic himself, he tells us he very much admires the institution. Specifically, Rush strongly approves of the Church's stand against abortion and gay marriage. He brags about being wined and dined aboard a yacht by the former Cardinal O'Connor of New York during a "Pro-Life" cruise. He claims to have visited the Vatican on numerous occasions and correctly points out there would not be a Vatican, and all its treasures, were it not for the vast amount of money that capitalism provides. And he writes admiringly about Pope John Paul II's strong opposition to communism and the late pope's claim that Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan (two of Limbaugh's personal heroes) were important figures in the downfall of Communism in central and eastern Europe. Rush is right about that too.

But in the Gospel according to Rush:

...juxtaposed against the actions of Pope John Paul II this pope (Francis) and the things that he released yesterday or recently are really striking. 

There has been a long-standing tension between the Catholic Church and communism. It's been around for quite a while. That's what makes this, to me, really remarkable...

...I'm not Catholic, but I know enough to know that this would have been unthinkable for a pope to believe or say just a few years ago. But this passage, "The culture of prosperity deadens us. We are thrilled if the market offers us something new to buy. In the meantime, all those lives stunted for lack of opportunity seem a mere spectacle." I have to tell you, folks, I am totally bewildered by this. 

Here Rush shows that he's way out of his league. Fair enough, the non-Catholic Limbaugh couldn't possibly (or could he?) know that both Popes Benedict XVI and John Paul II, while being harsh critics of communism, also had stern warnings about "unfettered capitalism." According to Rush's great hero J.P.II in 1987:

The tension between East and West is an opposition... between two concepts of the development of individuals and peoples, both concepts being imperfect and in need of radical correction... This is one of the reasons why the Church’s social doctrine adopts a critical attitude towards both liberal (unfettered) capitalism and Marxist collectivism.

Then in 1991 after the fall of communism in Europe, in the encyclical letter Centesimus Annus, John Paul II wrote this:

...can it perhaps be said that, after the failure of Communism, capitalism is the victorious social system and that capitalism should be the goal of the countries now making efforts to rebuild their economy and society? Is this the model which ought to be proposed to the countries of the Third World which are searching for the path to true economic and civil progress?

The answer is obviously complex. If by ‘capitalism’ is meant an economic system which recognizes the fundamental and positive role of business, the market, private property and the resulting responsibility for the means of production, as well as free human creativity in the economic sector, then the answer is certainly in the affirmative... But if by "capitalism" is meant a system in which freedom in the economic sector is not circumscribed within a strong juridical framework which places it at the service of human freedom in its totality (in other words, unfettered capitalism), and which sees it as a particular aspect of that freedom, the core of which is ethical and religious, then the reply is certainly negative. (Emphasis and comments are mine)

Pope Benedict XVI would later go on to write much the same on the subject. In that vein, Pope Francis
has added little or nothing to the Church's doctrine on capitalism. What he has done, which has come as a breath of fresh air to many, and a thorn in the side to folks like Limbaugh, is place less emphasis on hot button topics, social issues such as abortion and gay marriage, in favor of living and preaching the Gospel. In other words, the focus of his ministry as stated above, is directed toward the hungry, the poor, the dispossessed, the sinners, (groups Limbaugh doesn't have much time for), as well as the so called righteous. As a result, Pope Francis has brought the Vatican in step with what goes on daily in the lives of Catholic parishes around the world. Contrary to the general (non-Catholic) public's perception, as any practicing Catholic can tell you, the Church's heart resides within the hearts and souls of its people, not within the mysterious halls of the Vatican.

Judging from his words, Rush Limbaugh clearly knows little about Catholicism or the Catholic Church. What he knows or understands about Christianity is also somewhat suspect. If Limbaugh were looking for some truly radical theology he could chomp is pointy incisors into, he should read this:

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

That said, it is important to point out that despite Pope Francis's ingratiating words for those on the Left to believers and non-believers alike, the Church's doctrine regarding the controversial issues of our time is not about to change. Don't expect to see the Pope coming out in favor of abortion, or gay weddings inside St. Peter's any time soon. This is as it should be I believe. It's one thing for individuals, government and statutory law to be swayed by changing times, public opinion, and ideology, but I believe that the Church is the one institution in our lives that must remain steadfastly true to its mission, namely the Gospel.

Popes come and go, some of them such as Francis and John XXIII are claimed by the Left, while others like John Paul II and Benedict XVI are claimed by the Right. However I suspect that none of those pontiffs would have appreciated being labeled as a poster child for any particular ideology.

The nutty political discourse we're now experiencing maybe OK for the secular, temporal world in which we live. However when all is said and done, we will all be judged (by a greater power if you believe in such things, and most certainly by those who survive us), by the way we treated others. The fundamental message of Christianity and other religions is so simple and profound that we lose sight of it among the all the busy details of our lives. That message is this:

Love and forgive one another.

That's all.

In the words of the great Rabbi Hillel, spoken 2000 years ago:

 the rest (of scripture) is commentary.

We may claim the Almighty for ourselves but God is neither liberal nor conservative, Democrat nor Republican. He is neither a Communist nor a Capitalist. His message doesn't belong exclusively to the Right or to the Left, to the Jew or the Gentile, or to you or me. It belongs to all of us.

In the end, that message is the only one that matters.

St. James

St. James Roman Catholic Church, July 2, 2013

As someone interested in preservation and keeping this city's architectural legacy intact, I'm deeply saddened by the demolition of one of Chicago's oldest churches, St. James, a neo-Gothic house of worship on the south side at 2942 S. Wabash, just north of the campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology. The building is the work of Patrick Keely, one of this country's most prolific ecclesiastical architects. Keely was adept at many architectural styles; examples of his work in Chicago include the neo-Romanesque Nativity of Our Lord Church in the neighborhood of Bridgeport, about one mile away, and the neo-Baroque St. Stanislaus Kostka Church on the north side. Gothic however was his bread and butter and Keely is responsible for over 600 churches in the United States, most of them Gothic in style and Roman Catholic in denomination.

Keely designed what would become the most important Catholic church in Chicago, Holy Name Cathedral, which was built in 1874 to replace its predecessor which was destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire. From its soaring tower and Joliet limestone cladding, to its plan and interior details, St. James, built one year later, is essentially the cathedral in miniature. The big difference is that St. James strikes a more dramatic profile than its larger cousin as it dominates the vista of its near south side community. St. James has a proud history, the church was built by well heeled, "lace curtain" Irish Catholics in 1855. Despite building a lavish church with rich appointments, the parish was in the black by 1895. St. James spawned several mission churches and was at one time considered the mother church of all south side Catholic parishes.

The community of Douglas in which St. James resides, once the domain of Victorian era mansions, was named after Senator Stephen A. Douglas who owned a large tract of land along the lake shore. The community's 19th century prosperity was bolstered by nearby meat packing and other industries, excellent transportation, and the establishment of institutions such as Michael Reese Hospital and the Armour Institute which later became IIT. Things began to change during the 1890s, when apartment buildings began to appear. In 1892, the South Side Elevated, Chicago's first such line was constructed above the alley directly behind St. James. From that point on, priests at St. James had to pause during mass while noisy trains rumbled by just feet away from the altar. Gradually, light industry began popping up around the church further altering the residential character of the neighborhood. Along the New York Central tracks a couple of blocks to the west, an Italian working class neighborhood became the Federal Street slum, mentioned in a previous post. During the period of the Great Migration of African Americans from the southern states to the north in the first decades of the 20th century, Douglas became the heart of Bronzeville, the center of Chicago's black community, with the nearby intersection of 35th and State Streets its heart. Important African American institutions developed in the community such as the Douglas National Bank, the Chicago Defender newspaper, and the Mount Olivet and Pilgrim Baptist churches.

The church rectory on the left is a good example of the style
of architecture common to the community of Douglas at the time
St. James was built in 1875

During the Great Depression, most of the single family homes around St. James were converted to multiple family units and the economic climate of the community declined. After World War II, St. James was directly in the center of a transformation that can only be described as breathtaking. Roughly 700 acres of densely populated city land were cleared for massive urban renewal projects that took on many forms. The neighborhood directly to the south of St. James was cleared and taken over by the expanding Illinois Institute of Technology. Further south, the Federal Street slum was cleared to make way for the Stateway Gardens and Robert Taylor housing projects. To the north were the Dearborn and Harold Ickes Homes. To the east, Prairie Shores and South Commons, two middle income high rises were built. And the area to the west of the NYCRR tracks, formerly part of the neighborhood of Armour Square, was cleared to make way for the Dan Ryan Expressway.


Somehow through all that St. James survived. It even survived a devastating fire in December of 1972. The fire burned for hours in the basement but eventually worked its way up into the sanctuary. Firemen gained access into the church by breaking through the Tiffany stained glass windows that had graced the church for almost 100 years. The marble altar crumbled in the heat of the fire but amazingly the rest of the interior including the walnut and white oak pews survived.

Signs of change: In 1892, less than twenty years after the building of St. James, the South Side Elevated
was constructed and ran directly behind the church. From that moment on, nothing would ever be the same.
The Dearborn Homes public housing project which opened in 1950, can be seen behind the green fence.

Immediately, parishioners raised funds to restore the church. Just as its cousin the cathedral downtown, conforming to the new liturgical decrees of Vatican II, the interior of St. James was stripped of most of its ornament and a simple table replaced the old marble altar in the sanctuary. The number of pews was reduced and a large, informal greeting area with a baptismal font was created in the back of the church. Some of the treasures of the pre-fire St. James made it back into the newly created church including a scaled down replica of Michelangelo's Pieta, the Roosevelt tracker-pneumatic organ which won first prize at the Columbian Exhibition of 1893, and a twenty bell carillon housed inside the tower.

The small parish community of about one hundred members continued to worship in old St. James until about four years ago. At that time, an assessment of the structural integrity of the building was conducted after a fire at Holy Name revealed dangerous flaws in the cathedral. The assessment determined that St. James had similar problems and was unsafe. The structural problems were cleared up at the financially secure cathedral, but the costs to repair St, James were more than the congregation could bare and the old church has been closed to the public ever since.

The community has since been worshipping in the parish hall, the auditorium of the parish's long closed school. In August of last year, the Archdiocese of Chicago purchased land to build a new, smaller church and announced the old building would be demolished.

Ancient symbols of the Christian faith and the
saint for whom the church was named,
contrast with more banal, contemporary symbols.

This got the attention of Preservation Chicago and other preservation groups who have since waged a campaign to save the church.

I won't go into the details of the ensuing struggle to save St. James, much of which have been detailed in Lynn Becker's blog, on the site of Preservation Chicago, and elsewhere.

I have great respect for Preservation Chicago and their work, and am devastated by the apparent fate of this beautiful, historic building. But there is another side to the story. Here I'm going to let an articulate response to one of Becker's posts from an anonymous member of Chicago's preservation community on the subject speak for itself:

I am very, very sympathetic to the cause of saving this building. It truly is a beautiful piece of architecture that represents the collective identity of the neighborhood and Chicago Catholicism.

However, this building is also home to a real community of real people. A very small, poor community that tries to minister effectively to those in the area.

I recently read this "inside story" from a parishioner of St. James with great dismay.

It makes me very sad to hear of the division and infighting that this issue has caused. 

It's instances like this that make those of us in the historic preservation community look bad. If we really want to save historic church buildings like this, we need to come alongside the folks that worship and minister there. We need to truly help them - not lead protests and write scathing editorials. 

It's clear that no one in the parish really wants to demolish the church, but at the same time they don't have the resources to maintain it either. They see the Archdiocese's sponsorship of a new church building as their only alternative to straight-up closure. And they're right.

Why weren't we in the preservation community there back in August when this was first announced? Or really, why weren't we there four years ago when the church was condemned in the first place? Just think of how this situation could have been different if we had stepped forward to HELP right away. What if we would have said something like: "We know you don't want to see your church demolished, and neither do we. Maybe with our contacts, resources, and expertise we can work with you to help restore this building and make it more suitable to your needs." We could have helped St. James Parish re-imagine their built environment to better serve the entire neighborhood. But we weren't there. We didn't decide to show up until the wrecking ball was looming on the horizon. 

The real work of historic preservation means far more than simply saving a building from demolition and then walking away. We have to let those involved in these decisions know that we have their best interests at hear. That means walking with other people on their own journeys and seeing the situation through their eyes.

Four years ago, if we could have only had the eyes to see St. James as a small, poor congregation that needed help, we wouldn't be in this situation today.

This very well stated response references a blog post from Jerry Galipeau, a member of the St. James community who articulates what he feels is the untenable position of preserving old St. James. It is well worth reading and in case you missed it above, here is another link.

In a nutshell, Mr. Galipeau claims that despite its history and beauty, not even considering the expense to bring the old building up to code, the parish community would be better served by a much smaller building built in a place "where people actually live." While it's true that there are parishioners who support saving the old church, Galipeau questions their sincerity and conviction, saying those folks never spoke their minds four years ago, back at a time when their opinions could have had an impact on the building's fate. They only came to the forefront after the preservationists got into the act and started to make some noise.

This is precisely what makes architectural preservation a such difficult issue.  Buildings do not exist as works of art in a museum, they are a living part of the fabric of a city. Churches pose an especially difficult problem when it comes to preservation. We can't landmark them, the first amendment to our constitution which mandates the separation of church and state explicitly prohibits that, as well as government money earmarked toward their rehabilitation. Then there are the ethical and practical issues. Simply put, the mission of the Church is saving people, not buildings. It is certainly true that church buildings themselves, especially in the Catholic faith, play a very important role in the liturgy; to the faithful they are considered houses of God. Beyond that, a church building represents the continuity of a neighborhood to both believers and non-believers. I can think of few more gut wrenching sights than the demolition of a church.

In the many articles concerning St. James, the current archbishop of Chicago, Francis Cardinal George and the Archdiocese of Chicago are singled out as the prime antagonists in the story. Cardinal George and the organization he leads are painted as little more than a bureaucrat and a faceless institution concerned not with the feelings and needs of those most closely affiliated with the church, but interested only in the bottom line. Amazingly George is even compared unfavorably to his predecessor, Joseph Cardinal Bernadin, who presided over the greatest number of church closings and parish consolidations in the history of the city. During Bernadin's tenure, many churches, some more architecturally significant that St. James were demolished.  One particularly jingoistic comment I keep hearing is this: "If St. James were on the north side, you can bet it would be saved." Well, St. Boniface is on the north side and although it has yet to be demolished, it has stood vacant, allowed to face the elements and deteriorate for almost thirty years. I think in many ways, quick demolition is a much kinder fate for a beloved building than a slow, painful death.

Workers begin the somber task of dismantling St. James.

A "church", at least as described in the Catholic faith, is defined as the community of people gathered together in the Lord's name, not a building. In a transient city like Chicago, parishes and church buildings come and go as a community's ethnic and religious makeup changes. As we saw with St. Boniface, a neighborhood once saturated with immigrants belonging to the Catholic faith built far more churches than could reasonably be sustained after those new arrivals moved on to bigger and better things. The situation with St. James in Douglas is only slightly different as the community that built and supported that church vanished decades ago and was replaced with a community belonging for the most part to different faith traditions.

It has been proposed that the community of Douglas has the potential of another great wave of change. They say that demolishing old St. James is shortsighted, that one day it may be at the center of a newly vibrant community as happened to Old St. Pat's, Holy Family Church, and St. Mary of the Angels, three old churches once slated for closure and demolition that are now thriving. The problem in Lynn Becker's words is this:

For the Chicago archdiocese, gazing into eternity - no problem. Looking a few decades down the road, not so much.

Perhaps. But the Roman Catholic Church is not in the speculative real estate business. If it were, it would be an unmitigated failure and would have been forced out of business years ago. While I am at odds on a number of issues with Cardinal George, on this particular issue I have a great deal of sympathy with the position he is forced into. I have no doubt that the last thing he wants is to drive people out of the church in which they have worshipped, were baptized, received their sacraments, married, and buried their loved ones. Yet even an institution that specializes in the eternity has to exist in the real world, and the here and now must be taken into account. The faith community must ultimately be the one to determine the fate of its house of worship.

As a city is not just about buildings, those of us who are concerned with preservation, must endeavor to preserve communities as well as buildings. Personally I hope against hope that an eleventh hour compromise satisfactory to all parties can be drawn up to save St. James from the wrecker's ball, even as at the time of this writing, crews have already poked a hole through the building's roof.*  Frankly it's looking quite bleak.

The loss of Patrick Keely's St. James will be sad and felt within the sound of its bells and the sight of its magnificent tower. But the community of St. James parish is still very much alive, if not particularly well at the moment, and they are the ones we should concern ourselves with.

One block away, the message on the sign of a church built in a much different time says it all: "God Bless St. James Parish."

If it is within you, please keep them in your prayers. If it is not but you care about them just the same, feel free to send them your well wishes and better still, a check.


*The photographs above were made after this post was written and as you can see, the demolition crew is well on its way to sealing the fate of this beautiful church.

The end is near...

A demolition permit has been issued by the City of Chicago for old Prentice Hospital, the Bertrand Goldberg building that has been the front burner issue for Chicago's architectural preservation community. The battle it seems is all but lost as the legal means attempting to stop the demolition and to question the motives of the Landmarks Commission have been exhausted. If you recall, last fall the Commission went out of its way to heap praise upon the building, saying by all means it was significant and very worthy of designation as a landmark, and then declared it a landmark. Then in the next breath they went on to say that the needs of Northwestern Hospital who owns the building and land it sits upon, trumps its architectural significance, then rescinded the declaration they had made only minutes earlier.

In one unfortunate ruling, the Commission essentially declared itself and its work irrelevant, a far greater concern than losing one wonderful building. It seems the fox is in the henhouse of the Landmarks Commission; as of that ruling, no building in Chicago is safe from the wrecker's ball.

Other preservation concerns are quickly moving to the forefront as the wrecker's shroud is about to be placed over Prentice. Lynn Becker has this wonderful elegy to many of the churches that have been lost or are very likely to be lost in the near future including St. Boniface on the near northwest side, whose fate is again uncertain as the funds to convert it into a home for the elderly have not come through.

Here is Robert Powers' testament to St. James Church in Bronzeville whose date with destiny is close at hand.

These are troubling times indeed for our historical and architectural legacy.

Out of the darkness, a great light

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.