Knights’ founder now called ‘blessed’
NEW HAVEN — The priest who founded the Knights of Columbus is one step away from sainthood.
The Rev. Michael McGivney, who became an assistant priest at St. Mary Roman Catholic Church in
1877, founded the Knights in
1882 in order to promote faith, charity and civic virtue among the Catholic men in New Haven. Pope Francis announced Wednesday that he recognized a 2015 miracle attributed to McGivney’s intercession, beatifying him. A second miracle is required to elevate McGivney to sainthood.
“It’s been a great day that we’ve been praying for for many, many years” and one that brings “great joy,” said Supreme Knight Carl Anderson, CEO of the K of C. “It’s obviously a great day for the Knights of Columbus and also I think it’s a great day for America.”
That’s because McGivney’s example of charity and unity within the fraternal order are what the nation needs now, Anderson said. “He was known during his lifetime as a good Samaritan devoting his life to charity,” he said. “We need more charity and we need more unity.”
It may be a coincidence but, while his beatification comes during the coronavirus pandemic, McGivney died of pneumonia during the Russian flu pandemic of
1889-90, at 38 years old. Anderson said it’s been a relatively short period that he and other Catholics have prayed for McGivney, who was declared a venerable servant of God by Pope Benedict XVI during a 2008 visit to St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York.
The miracle attributed to McGivney was the healing of a fetus that had “a condition totally incompatible with life,” Anderson said. “The child was born and the condition was no longer there.”
He said the Vatican’s definition of a miracle is to ask, “can it be explained by scientific or medical reasons … and if the conclusion is no, then it is judged to be an act of God, a miracle.”
“That’s wonderful news and a great inspiration and a great boost to think of one of our own priests of the Archdiocese of Hartford has been judged worthy to be honored at the altar,” said Archbishop Leonard Blair.
“I was looking at the biography that had been written,” Blair said. “There were two aspects of his inner life that never wavered and the first was his abiding faith and the second was his abiding empathy,” marked by a spirit of kindness.
“We have always worked very closely with the Knights of Columbus … to present the case to the Holy See in Rome.” He said the beatification ceremony may be attended by the family whose child was healed.
“With the coronavirus, there’s a question of where it will happen and when it will happen,” Blair said. “We’ll consider how we can do this in the near future given the constraints that we’re under.”
With beatification, McGivney is called “blessed” and he may be celebrated locally with a date on the church calendar. “It would be designated in Rome. It usually happens on the day of a person’s death,” which is Aug.
14, Blair said. However it could be another day if his death date is celebrated as another saint’s day.
Because McGivney is the founder of the Knights, an international organization, his day may be celebrated more widely, Blair said.
“Today is a day of just great joy,” said the Rev. John Paul Walker, pastor of St. Mary Church. McGivney founded the Knights in the church basement. “This is something that so many of us, not only in New Haven but beyond, have had in our hearts … reaffirming something we’ve felt for a long time.”
McGivney’s tomb is in the rear of St. Mary, which is undergoing renovation and is closed now because of the pandemic. “Whenever we have Mass in that church we always say at the end a prayer for his canonization,” Walker said.
“From the day I arrived here I can say I’ve felt his presence,” he said. “I have the responsibility of continuing that legacy that Father McGivney set so long ago.” He said McGivney was “a pastor who cared deeply for his flock but also someone who taught others to lead … recognizing there were problems and challenged the men of his church to step forward and do something about it.”
Walker said McGivney empowered the men to take care of their community, made up of Irish immigrants who were subject to discrimination. “The biggest problem that his people faced was that as very poor immigrant families they were at the lowest end of the economic spectrum in the New Haven area.”
It was a time when people often died before age 40, as McGivney did. “Back then, if the breadwinner died, there would be some kind of a court hearing,” which could break up the family.
“They would band together and kind of make a pledge to each other that, if one of us dies, the other is going to chip in and help,” Walker said. “It was basically an early form of life insurance when that wasn’t prominent.”
Today, the Knights of Columbus is an insurance company, using premiums for charitable causes, as well as a worldwide fraternity of
1.9 million members.