Michael Joseph Curley | |
|---|---|
| Archbishop of Baltimore-Washington | |
 | |
| See | Baltimore-Washington |
| Appointed | August 10, 1921 |
| Installed | November 30, 1921 |
| Term ended | May 16, 1947 |
| Predecessor | James Gibbons |
| Successor | Francis Patrick Keough (Baltimore) Patrick O'Boyle (Washington) |
| Previous post(s) | Bishop of St. Augustine (1914–1921) |
| Orders | |
| Ordination | March 19, 1904 by Pietro Respighi |
| Consecration | June 10, 1931 by Benjamin Joseph Keiley |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1879-10-12)October 12, 1879 |
| Died | May 16, 1947(1947-05-16) (aged 67) Baltimore, Maryland, US |
| Denomination | Roman Catholic Church |
| Motto | Quis ut Deus? (Who is like unto God) |
| Styles of Michael Curley | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Reference style | |
| Spoken style | Your Excellency |
| Religious style | Archbishop |
Michael Joseph Curley (October 12, 1879 – May 16, 1947) was anIrish-bornAmerican Catholic prelate who served as the firstArchbishop of Washington from 1939 to 1947. He previously served asArchbishop of Baltimore (1921–1947) and asBishop of St. Augustine (1914–1921).
Curley was known for his militancy in protecting the rights of Catholics and of his dioceses against perceived and real attacks from outside forces. As Bishop of St. Augustine, he fought anti-Catholic efforts by theState of Florida and theJesuits to claim what he felt was his rightful authority.
As Archbishop of Baltimore and later Washington, he denounced the oppression of Catholic clergy in Mexico and Spain and of Jews in Germany. Curley is also known for his strong program of school construction in the Archdiocese of Baltimore.
One of eleven children, Michael Curley was born on October 12, 1879, inAthlone,County Westmeath, Ireland to Michael and Maria (née Ward) Curley.[1][2] He attended a primary school in Athlone that was run by theMarist Brothers.[3] At age 16, Curley enteredMungret College in Limerick, Ireland. While at Mungret, Curley wanted to eventually become a missionary to theFiji Islands. However, after speaking with BishopJohn Moore during a school visit, Curley decided instead to go to the Diocese of St. Augustine in the United States after he finished his education.[2][4]
After graduating from Mungret, Curley entered theRoyal University of Ireland, earning aBachelor of Arts in 1900. He then travelled to Rome to study at theUrban College of the Propaganda, receiving aLicentiate of Sacred Theology in 1903.[2] His ordination was postponed until 1904 due to stress.[4]
On March 19, 1904, Curley wasordained to the priesthood for the Diocese of Saint Augustine by CardinalPietro Respighi in theBasilica of St. John Lateran in Rome.[5] He arrived inFlorida in 1904, and was namedpastor of St. Peter's Parish inDeLand, Florida. He lived in a rented room above a store and ate in a localdiner.[2][6]In 1914, BishopWilliam Kenny appointed Curley aschancellor of the diocese and as his personal secretary.[1]
On April 3, 1914,Pope Pius X appointed Curley as the fourth bishop of St. Augustine.[5] He received hisepiscopalconsecration at theCathedral of Saint Augustine on June 30, 1914, from BishopBenjamin Keiley, with BishopsPatrick Donahue andOwen Corrigan serving asco-consecrators.[5] At age 34, Curley was the youngest bishop in the country.[3] He spent eight months out of every year on journeys throughout the diocese.[1]
In 1913, theFlorida Legislature passed legislation prohibiting white women from teaching African-American children in schools. At that time, the diocese had white nuns teaching in four schools for African-Americans in St. Augustine,Fernandina, Jacksonville, andYbor City. Considering the law unconstitutional, the bishop at the time,William Kenny, told the sisters to ignore it.[7] In a 1915 letter to the parishes in the diocese, Curley wrote:
We Catholics of the United States are victims of organized vilification and the government itself [through the mails] takes a hand by the distribution of lewd and lascivious anti-Catholic filth. It is high time for the sixteen million Catholics of the United States to assert their rights and claim that protection which their citizenship and demonstrated loyalty should guarantee them.”[7]
On April 24, 1916, Florida GovernorPark Trammell ordered the arrest of threeSisters of St. Joseph for violating the law. When one of the sisters refused to post bond, she was put under house arrest at herconvent. Curley vigorously attacked the sisters' arrests, portraying them as a state-sponsored campaign against Catholic schools in Florida. He gained strong support from other Catholic prelates in the United States.[7][6] Curley attracted national attention in 1917 by battling a bill in theFlorida Legislature mandating state inspections of convents.[2][1] Curley refused to comply with it.[6] He led a successful legal campaign to have the law declared unconstitutional.[1] He also sought to educate Floridians about Catholicism and demonstrate the bigotry of theKu Klux Klan.[6]
DuringWorld War I, Curley was a strong supporter of the American war effort. In 1917, he established the diocesan Catholic War Council, a group that gave spiritual guidance to Florida's Catholic soldiers.[6] He spoke atLiberty Bond rallies. At the end of the war, Curley celebrated a large memorialmass for soldiers who died in the war atBattery Park inNew York City.[6] By the end of his tenure as bishop of St. Augustine, the Catholic population in the diocese had grown from 39,000 to 41,000, with 40 new churches built.[1]
In 1919, Curley appealed to BishopGiovanni Bonzano, apostolic delegate to the United States, to end an agreement between the diocese and theSociety of Jesus. In 1889, BishopJohn Moore had asked the Jesuits to build Catholic missions and churches in Southwest Florida fromTampa Bay toKey West. Curley wanted them to surrender control of the area, along with Jesuit property, to the diocese. In 1921, the Vatican approved an agreement that gave the diocese jurisdiction over the region, but allowed the Jesuits to keep their property.[4]
On August 10, 1921,Pope Benedict XV named Curley as the tenth archbishop of Baltimore.[5] His installation took place on November 30, 1921.[5] His arrival in his new city was described as "one of the greatest welcomes ever tendered a new citizen of Baltimore."[8] During his tenure in Baltimore, Curley spent $30 million building 66 schools in 18 years, placing the importance of constructing schools over churches.[1][4] In 1926, he declared,
"I defy any system of grammar school education in the United States to prove itself superior to the system that is being maintained in the Archdiocese of Baltimore."[2]
Curley also established archdiocesan offices forCatholic Charities (1923) and for theSociety for the Propagation of the Faith (1925).[2] In 1922, in an article in theGaelic American during theIrish Civil War, Curley criticized the Irish politicianÉamon de Valera for causing violence in Ireland, comparing him to the Mexican revolutionaryPancho Villa.[9] In March 1926, Curley criticized the expropriation of Catholic Church property by the Mexican Government and the expulsion of foreign priests and nuns from Mexico:[10]
In order to preach the doctrine of Jesus Christ in Mexico, one must be a Mexican by birth. If the Savior of the world came back to Mexico, he would be exiled forthwith...because he is not a born Mexican.[10]
In the mid-1920s, many clergy became concerned about the spiritual well-being of the large number of Catholic students attending non-Catholic colleges. This prompted the establishment of theNewman Club movement, Catholic centers at these institutions. However, Curley denounced the movement, believing that Catholic youth belonged in Catholic universities only.[11] He made these remarks in 1925:
The men backing the so-called Catholic Foundation Plan are waging a secret hypocritical warfare against the best interests of the Church in America. They are honest. They remind us of the Modernists who were bent on destroying the Church from within. The latter attacked the Church's teachings. The Foundationists attack the Church's right to educate. In fact, they pose as friends of the Church when they tell her to throw her millions of children into an atmosphere of destructive secularism in order that they may be educated.[11]
In 1931,Pope Pius XI appointed Curley as anassistant to the papal throne; he was later named a member of the College of Patriarchs and Bishops. Curley celebrated the mass at the end of the1932 Eucharistic Congress in Dublin.[12] Combative by nature, Curley exemplified the militancy of many American bishops and archbishops during the 1920s and 1930s:
In 1934, an article inThe Baltimore Sun compared the ruthlessness ofAdolf Hitler to the Catholic theologianIgnatius of Loyola. After receiving complaints from several Jesuit priests, theSun printed an apology. Unhappy over what he perceived as slights by theSun, Curley demanded a fuller apology and threatened a subscriber boycott. While Curley was visiting Ireland, theSun worked out a quiet settlement with the archdiocese.[4]
On July 22, 1939,Pope Pius XII separatedWashington, D.C., from the Archdiocese of Baltimore to form the new Archdiocese of Washington.[2][15] While allowing Curley to retain his position as archbishop of Baltimore, the pope appointed him as the first archbishop of Washington. He governed the two archdioceses as a single unit.[2][15]
In March 1941, Curley suedLoyola College in Baltimore and its president, ReverendEdward Bunn, over abequest in a will. In 1937, Frances Stuart, a Catholic philanthropist, had written a will naming the archdiocese as a beneficiary. When Bunn arrived in Baltimore in 1938, he became a spiritual counselor to Stuart. In January 1940, in declining health, she revised her will, using a lawyer suggested by Bunn. In the new will, Stuart added Loyola College as a beneficiary and dropped the archdiocese. She died a few days later.[4] In early 1940, Bunn tried to negotiate a lawsuit settlement with Curley, but he refused it. In February 1941, Curley demanded Bunn's firing as part of a settlement. In May 1941, a jury ruled that Stuart's second will was valid.[4]
In December 1941, Curley made an inappropriate remark to a reporter about the Japaneseattack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th. His opponents in the Catholic hierarchy persuaded theapostolic delegate to the United States, BishopAmleto Giovanni Cicognani, to reprimand him. From then on, Curley avoided any political comments.[2]Although his predecessor in Baltimore, ArchbishopJames Gibbons, was appointedcardinal, Curley never received the same distinction.
By 1943, after an operation for adetached retina, Curley had given up his public appearances. Curley suffered fromsinusitis,shingles, and high blood pressure. A series ofstrokes caused him to have partial paralysis and blindness.[12]
Curley died atBon Secours Hospital in Baltimore from a stroke on May 16, 1947, at age 67.[12] He is interred in theBasilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Baltimore.[1] After Curley's death, Pius XII appointed separate archbishops for Baltimore (BishopFrancis Keough) and Washington (BishopPatrick O'Boyle).[5]
Archbishop Curley High School in Baltimore, founded in 1960, was named after Curley.[16]
Media related toMichael Joseph Curley at Wikimedia Commons| Catholic Church titles | ||
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| Preceded by | Bishop of St. Augustine 1914–1921 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Archbishop of Baltimore 1921–1947 | Succeeded by |
| New title | Archbishop of Washington 1939–1947 | Succeeded by |
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