An enigmatic soul

The Economist
March 11, 2015

http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2015/03/remembering-edward-cardinal-egan

SUNDAY services at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in New York featured a portrait at the altar of Edward Cardinal Egan, who died on March 5th. After the funeral today his body will be interred in a crypt at the cathedral. The ceremonies in tribute to his life and work have been fairly subdued. This is perhaps apt. Cardinal Egan, who presided over New York’s archdiocese from 2000 to 2009, may have had an imposing presence and a powerful baritone voice, but he kept a low profile. He was rarely in front of a camera. He hardly ever gave interviews. Indeed he was an enigmatic figure for many New Yorkers and a polarising leader among Catholics. He was not universally loved by his flock.

Cardinal Egan arrived in New York in 2000 with an impossible task: to fill the shoes of John Cardinal O’Connor, his beloved predecessor. New York’s cardinals tend to be a charismatic bunch, but Cardinal O’Connor was uniquely powerful. As the unofficial head of the Catholic Church in America, he was courted by presidents. He was not afraid to take on politicians, even well-known Catholics. He threatened to excommunicate Geraldine Ferraro, a vice-presidential nominee, and Mario Cuomo, a former governor, for their pro-choice stance in the abortion debate. Presidents attended his funeral and thousands of ordinary New Yorkers queued to view his remains. He was dubbed the patron saint of the working poor. But while witty and gregarious, Cardinal O’Connor was a poor administrator. He could not balance a budget to save his life.

So when Cardinal Egan assumed control of New York’s archdiocese, its finances were a mess. Spending was out of control and the operating debt exceeded $20m a year. The archdiocese could no longer afford to keep small and poorly attended churches open. Enrolment at Catholic schools was falling. Difficult decisions had to be made. Cardinal Egan was no stranger to downsizing. As bishop of Bridgeport in Connecticut, where he worked prior to coming to New York, he had closed a number of schools. He took this business savvy to New York, where he eventually closed (or “realigned”, as he liked to call it) 21 churches and nine parochial schools. But he did not go about this very well.

When the closure of Our Lady Queen of Angels in East Harlem was announced in 2007, it provoked embarrassing protests. Six demonstrating parishioners were arrested and the cathedral’s security got physical with other picketers. To avoid similar displays, Cardinal Egan tried a different tack when he decided to close Our Lady of Vilnius, a downtown church with mostly Lithuanian parishioners. The cardinal summoned the parish’s pastor to the cathedral for a meeting, during which time he had a security team change the church’s locks. Such subterfuge infuriated New York’s 2.5m Catholics. The city’s tabloids had a field day.  

Some priests had a hard time with him too. He publically fired seminary staff. In 2006 an anonymous group called the “Committee of Concerned Clergy” wrote a letter saying that the relationship between the priests and a New York archbishop had never "been so fractured and seemingly hopeless as it is now”. In response Cardinal Egan wrote a column in the archdiocesan paper calling the letter’s anonymous authors “a secret of cowards.”

His response to the sexual-abuse scandal in 2002 also won few fans among the clergy or the faithful. Connecticut newspapers, including the Hartford Courant, reported that when he was bishop of Bridgeport he knowingly transferred priests accused of paedophilia to different parishes and postings. He denied this, saying he actually sent accused priests to a well-respected psychiatric institution for evaluation. He claimed that priests were permitted to return to pastoral duty only when the institution recommended it—despite evidence of known offenders working within the church. He eventually said in a letter read from pulpits that “if in hindsight we also discover that mistakes may have been made as regards prompt removal of priests and assistance to victims, I am deeply sorry." For many in the church, and especially the victims of sexual abuse, this apology seemed insincere. To prevent another abuse scandal, the US Conference of Bishops in 2002 set up a review board of laypeople to serve as a watchdog for the church in America. The cardinal reportedly took issue with this body, however, as he did not believe lay people should have oversight over a bishop.

Cardinal Egan’s homilies bristled with wisdom, but his media-shy disposition meant most local Catholics did not know him very well. Many found his formal demeanour off-putting, and few New Yorkers know what to do with someone who prefers opera to baseball. The cardinal could have been a bridge between the church and the growing Latino community, particularly as he spoke Spanish fluently, but not many priests or parishioners ever warmed up to him.

He was very much Pope John Paul II’s man. He spent years in Rome studying and later revising cannon law. He served on the Roman Rota, a Vatican high-court. One theologian described him as “a Vatican dream man … he can talk to you for hours without disclosing what he really thinks about anything.” But few were unaware of his conservative views on theology and politics. He once scolded Rudolph Giuliani from the pulpit for receiving the Eucharist at mass; as a divorcee, the former New York mayor was not entitled to receive communion. The cardinal condemned same-sex marriage and once compared abortion to Nazism. Yet he appeared to be softening in old age. He seemed to suggest in one radio interview that allowing priests to marry was worth discussing.

He may not be remembered for his sentimentality, or indeed his mercy, Cardinal Egan consoled the city after it was attacked in September 2011. I was no fan of the Cardinal, but I found him a comfort in the days and weeks after the attacks. He went down to ground zero, anointing the dead and praying with those who searched for survivors. He presided over many funerals, sometimes three a day. He wished to be a shepherd, not a manager. Though he closed schools and churches, he spared many others. He helped quite a few people, but did so quietly. It wounded him that his love for and loyalty to the city was ever called into doubt. Indeed he called such scepticism “the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life.”