Never say die
Elie, Paul
NEVER SAY DIE Paul Elie When it was finished, Mary he went to a...
...She condition went right to the heart of the and her son faced a lone radio reporter man-that he was not simply refusing to and myself...
...I told her about meeting the ment-period-to anybody...
...she was the cardinal's sister-that is, she nal's body as it lay in state in the cathe- In 1996, when the archbishop of Chica- would be inclined to overstate the casedral...
...cardinal once at his residence, and about It could be...
...In the following days the means whereby the Christian is invited to swiftly interrupted, reminding me that crowds would come to view the cardi- become more Christlike...
...Outside, the Gay and Lesbian parade but his last words, in a sense, were not his was about to begin, and the Dykes on own but those of the Hail Mary, the words Bikes were revving their engines...
...He made the evening ticle I'd written-the surprise of receiv- news, but left a good deal unsaid...
...As archbishop, John stop was 10:15 Mass at the cathedral...
...But at 11:30 Wednesday night the past few months about the cardinal's she was simply a grieving relative...
...O'Connor was never at a loss for words...
...At the funeral Mass the next that he was dying of cancer, the out- I stood there pondering...
...NEVER SAY DIE Paul Elie When it was finished, Mary he went to a parish up in Ulster County, pouring of sympathy and recognition Ward came out of the house, the far reaches of the archdiocese...
...was so great that by the time Bernadin in a khaki trenchcoat, and That Sunday was Cardinal O'Connor's died he seemed the patron saint of canwondered what was next, last Sunday before he learned of his brain dor...
...The Catholic faith re- It was a tabloid headline in the making: much shorter-same sparkling eyes and gards death as a passage to new life, and a THE CARDINAL'S MIRACLE...
...Mary looked just like him, though say so...
...Police barricades were already go, Joseph Bernadin, bluntly announced and saying he wanted to get her home...
...Myself, I wondered She began to tell me how his prayers away at his residence three hours earli- why, if he was dying, he didn't directly had cured her of cancer three years ago...
...quite seemed humble, though he often Half an hour later he was marking the gibed about humility, it was a movingfeast of San Juan Bautista on a dusty and humbling-final effect...
...Cardinal John O'Connor the letters we'd exchanged over an ar- died as he lived...
...Mary Ward's that he was dying...
...of his condition but refusing to comI had...
...All through the months It just wasn't the kind of thing her brothbrother, Cardinal John O'Connor, the of speculation, people wondered whether er talked about, she said...
...going up...
...As I told Mary Ward about that he was dying, and I wondered why...
...For a man who never the congregation for having to rush off...
...Could it be Monday, Mary Ward would sit in the that all the elaborate circumlocutions of first pew...
...And she said he hadn't...
...The first hour of his death...
...After of a penitent: "Pray for us now, and at the a long homily, O'Connor apologized to hour of our death...
...0 ballfield in Central Park, clambering onto a makeshift altar atop a Parks De- Paul Elie, a frequent contributor, covered partment trailer to give medals to Tito Cardinal O'Connor for the New York Times Puente and Mark Anthony...
...Mary Ward asked me, "Did comment to the press about the extent you ever meet my brother...
...And I told munications director, Joseph Zwilling, her about one Sunday last June when I who announced earlier that Wednesday tailed him on his parish visitations...
...From there Magazine...
...As for O'Connor, he never said that now that her brother was dead...
...The afternoon that the cardinal was "in the day was a New York carnival...
...question for her, too, and now I asked it...
...But her son jokey smile...
...er...
...archbishop of New York, had passed O'Connor was dying...
...Saint Patrick's Cathedral...
...ing a letter from him (his coat of arms The Catholic tradition spoke for him, on the creamy stationery) and the care I however, through his ubiquitous comtook in fashioning a reply...
...But I had a there on the sidewalk, I simply asked his go yet...
...A car was tumor...
...sister whether he had spoken to her of It was late Wednesday evening near Had she and her brother ever discussed death and dying...
...All of us die...
...Commonweal 3 1 June 2, 2000...
...But waiting for her, but she was not ready to day, she listened attentively...
Vol. 127 • June 2000 • No. 11
