February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
The news surprised few Americans, for by 1946 Spellman had become the most prominent figure in the American Catholic Church. His high-profile work during World War II on behalf of U.S. armed forces helped solidify a growing impression of the Catholic Church as a bulwark of patriotism and morality. Spellman’s power and prestige would only grow stronger in the succeeding two decades, so much so that many took to calling him the “American Pope.”
Francis J. Spellman was born in 1889 in Whitman, Mass., a small town near Boston. He was the eldest of five children born to William and Ellen (Conway) Spellman, both first generation Irish Americans. His father was the prosperous owner of a grocery story who provided the Spellman’s with a comfortable middle-class home and lifestyle. Like so many of their fellow Irish Americans who had scratched their way into the middle class, the Spellmans sent their children to college. Francis attended Fordham and following graduation entered the seminary at the North American College in Rome. This choice reflected Spellman’s ambition to be more than a mere parish priest, for study in Rome allowed one to make the vital contacts in the Vatican power structure needed to rise in the ranks of the American hierarchy.
Ordained in Rome in May, 1916, Spellman returned to Boston where for two years he served as a parish priest. Then came what appeared to be his first big step up the ladder to higher office. Cardinal William O’Connell named him vice-chancellor of the Boston archdiocese — a major promotion for a priest not yet 30 years old. But any joy Spellman derived from his new position soon evaporated. He has a falling out with O’Connell (over what neither ever divulged) and soon found himself relegated to a series of demeaning jobs, including managing the archdiocese’s archives and copy editing its weekly newspaper. Rather than buckle under such vindictiveness, Spellman worked hard and bided his time, confident that a new opportunity would arise.
It came in 1925 when Spellman traveled with a group of Bostonians on pilgrimage to Rome. The trip allowed him to rekindle his friendships with key figures in the Vatican, including Eugenio Pacelli, who would one day become Pope Pius XII. When the Boston pilgrims departed for home, Spellman stayed behind, having secured a job with the Vatican Secretariat. He stayed on for seven years, all the while ingratiating himself with key figures in the Vatican like Pacelli, who in 1929 became Vatican secretary of state.
Spellman’s sojourn in Rome ended in 1932 when he secured an appointment as auxiliary bishop of Boston. Although it brought him back under the heel of his nemesis Cardinal O’Connell, the position was a welcome one and marked the resumption of his quest for high office. Recognizing the value of having powerful patrons in the secular world, Spellman cultivated friendships with Gov. James Michael Curley and millionaire Joseph P. Kennedy.
The latter provided him with a unique opportunity in 1936 when his longtime friend Eugenio Pacelli (now a cardinal) informed him that he planned to visit the United States. Ostensibly he was coming at the invitation of a wealthy Catholic family, but the real reason was that he hoped to meet with President Franklin Roosevelt to discuss diplomatic concerns in light of a looming war in Europe. At the time the U.S. had no formal diplomatic relations with the Vatican. Could Spellman, his friend inquired, arrange such a meeting? Spellman turned to Joseph Kennedy, then head of the Securities and Exchange Commission and soon to be named ambassador to Britain, to make the arrangements. Several weeks later a beaming Bishop Spellman personally escorted Pacelli into a meeting with FDR at his family home in Hyde Park. He followed this coup by accompanying Pacelli on a tour of the U.S.
Two years later, Cardinal Patrick Hayes of New York died. It seemed certain to those with knowledge of Vatican politics that Archbishop John T. McNicholas of Cincinnati would be selected as his successor. But then fate intervened. Pope Pius XI died before confirming the appointment and so the decision was put off until the selection of a new pope. At the ensuing conclave, Eugenio Pacelli, Spellman’s patron and friend, was elected Pope Pius XII.
Weeks later the American hierarchy was stunned by the announcement that the new pope had named Spellman as the new archbishop of New York. It was not so much his relatively young age (not yet 50) but his obscurity that surprised his fellow clergy. A mere auxiliary bishop of Boston was now placed in the most powerful office in the American church, head of the vast archdiocese of New York.
While many of his fellow bishops would come to fear and resent Spellman’s outspokenness and obvious love of the limelight, none contested his reputation as an excellent administrator and fundraiser. In his first few years in office Spellman successfully implemented major reforms in the archdiocese and improved its finances. He also drew upon his friendship with FDR to convince the president in 1940 to name a personal representative to Pope Pius XII, a move that allowed for unofficial diplomatic relations during the war.
When the U.S. entered the war in late 1941, Spellman seized the opportunity to boost his own profile and that of his church. Named military vicar of the armed forces in the U.S. by Pius XII in 1941, he quickly emerged as a vigorous champion of FDR’s preparedness campaign and, after war was declared, mobilization for war. At times, the role tested Spellman’s skill as the spokesman for his church, as when the Vatican approved the establishment of a Japanese mission to the Holy See only months after Pearl Harbor.
In 1943 Spellman made an extended tour of American forces in Europe and North Africa, making calls along the way on Franco in Spain, Churchill in England, and the pope in Rome. He took a second tour of the troops in 1944. These highly publicized excursions, in addition to countless patriotic speeches, sermons and interviews in the states, earned Spellman and the American Catholic Church a reputation for fierce patriotism. This was no small achievement, given the legacy of anti-Catholicism in American history, the foundation of which was the belief that Catholics, because of their loyalty to the pope, could never make good Americans.
Victory in the war for the U.S. and its allies in 1945, however, did not result in a diminished public profile for the Archbishop of New York. Quite the contrary, in fact, because almost as soon as the euphoria of VE Day and VJ Day wore off, America found itself engaged in another protracted conflict against international communism. The Cold War, as it would soon be dubbed, would provide Spellman with an even greater stage from which to boost his own reputation and that of his Church. As if in anticipation of this new role, the Vatican announced in February 1946 that Spellman was to be elevated to the rank of cardinal.
HIBERNIAN HISTORY WEEK
Feb. 20, 1942: Lt. Edward “Butch” O’Hare shoots down five Japanese bombers in a single fire fight and becomes the first U.S. Navy ace in World War II.
Feb. 24, 1984: Writer Anthony Kennedy wins the Pulitzer Prize for his novel “Ironweed.”
HIBERNIAN BIRTHDATES
Feb. 22, 1932: Sen. Edward M. Kennedy is born in Brookline, Mass.
Feb. 22, 1918: Major League Baseball franchise owner (Kansas City and Oakland) Charles Finley is born in Ensley, Ala.