Free Republic

NEW YORK (CNS) -- Cardinal John J. O'Connor, who as archbishop of New York cultivated and cherished his strong ties with the Jewish community, was born of a mother who was born Jewish. It is not known whether he knew that his mother, Dorothy Gumple O'Connor, was born Jewish. She converted to Catholicism before she met and married Thomas O'Connor, the late cardinal's father. Mary O'Connor Ward, the cardinal's sister, told Catholic New York, newspaper of the New York Archdiocese, that her mother never spoke about having belonged to another faith. The fact that Dorothy O'Connor was Jewish by birth...

NEW YORK, February 26, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Following a period of relative silence since his installation last year, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan eagerly took an opportunity to set forth Church teaching on controversial points, including the forbidding of public honors for pro-abortion politicians, in a recent interview with NY1.  The bishop also asserted that his outspokenness on such issues was simply part of his job as shepherd and teacher of the faith.When NY1 News reporter Roma Torre asked whether a pro-abortion Catholic should be invited to a "Catholic event" such as the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner, Dolan's...

Obama pick faces questions over bombers' clemencyBy PETE YOST Associated Press Writer Originally published Wednesday, January 14, 2009 at 2:05 PM WASHINGTON — New York police detective Anthony S. Senft's life changed forever when a bomb set by Puerto Rican separatists exploded, blowing him 15 feet in the air and blinding him in one eye. Now, he's angry that Eric Holder, who played a key role in awarding clemency to the bombers, is in line to be attorney general. Holder, as President Bill Clinton's deputy attorney general, worked closely with the Justice Department's pardon attorney to raise the possibility of...

Hard to believe how the time's flown, but six years ago tonight, John Cardinal O'Connor passed from our midst much too soon. How quickly we forget. In his final years, as he wound down his ministry as archbishop of New York, I was immeasurably blessed to know the cardinal, to meet up with him every so often, and to have received a good bit of his wisdom, humor and the lessons he had picked up along the way. His kindness to a young upstart was a gift which remains alive with me constantly. At sunset on 3 May 2000,...

Pastoral Reflections on the Holy Sacrifice of the MassBy CARDINAL JOHN J. O'CONNORIII. Do This in Memory of Me [Lk. 22:19]Had the celebration of the Mass in English begun in the United States in, let us say, the 1930s or '40s, or been simply a translation of the "Tridentine" Mass that Church-going Catholics were accustomed to, the transition might not have aroused a great deal of emotion. The 1960s and '70s, however, were turbulent years. As we have noted before, the "establishment" became suspect, as did hierarchical leadership. Authority in general became discredited. Young people, especially, looked horizontally for...