Archbishop to celebrate Mass for Gibbons
Archbishop Edwin F. O’Brien (left) will celebrate a Mass on Thursday to honor the 175th birthday of Cardinal James Gibbons, the ninth archbishop of Baltimore. The longest-serving archbishop of the nation’s first diocese, Gibbons was described by President Theodore Roosevelt as “the most respected and venerated and useful citizen of our country.”
The Mass is scheduled for 12:10 p.m. at the Baltimore Basilica.
Ordained in Baltimore on June 30, 1861, Gibbons was a chaplain at Fort McHenry during the Civil War and pastor of St. Brigid Catholic Church in Canton.
He served as archbishop from 1877 to 1921, a tenure during which he was “the unchallenged spokesman of the Catholic Church in the United States,” according to Thomas W. Spaulding, author of The Premier See. He would establish more than 30 parishes, and in 1884 presided over the council that led to the establishment of the Catholic school system in the United States.
Gibbons died in 1921. His remains are interred in the crypt under the basilica.
Baltimore Sun file photo 2007
Comments
I wonder if he's inviting the students, parents and alums of Cardinall Gibbons School that he is closing to attend the mass ?
Posted by: wayne heddinger | April 6, 2010 11:22 PM
It will be O'Brien's first gesture of goodwill since the archdiocese announced the closing of 13 schools, including Cardinal Gibbons. O'Brien has had the decency to appear at the Cardinal Gibbons School even once.
In the event the Archbishop doesn't know the history of the Gibbons's campus with the Cardinal for whom he'll be saying mass, as archbishop of Baltimore from 1877 to his death in 1921, Cardinal Gibbons held the position of president of the school board of St. Mary's Industrial School for Boys of the City of Baltimore, Inc. It was only fitting that when, in 1962, the archdiocese reopened St. Mary's, they named it after a man who had given so much of himself to the campus. In every family, there is something that is simply beyond value. In the case of the Archdiocese of Baltimore and its historic place in Catholicism in America, this historic property is simply one of those items. The archdiocese has already announced they intend to entertain offers to sell or lease the property in September of this year.
Posted by: David Etheridge | April 6, 2010 11:33 PM
I sure wish he would come now to see the family that is being seperated because of the blue ribbon committee. They could pass around a basket for donations which would be filled with SAVE CARDINAL GIBBONS, SAVE ASCENSION! notes. I guess Elvis really has left the building.
Posted by: Thomas Kyle | April 7, 2010 1:10 AM