Newspaper Page Text
Thursday, October 12, 2000
N©ws
The Southern Cross, Page 3
Archbishop Gerald P. O’Hara, D.D., J.U.D. :
Bishop of Savannah and consummate diplomat
Rita H.
DeLorme
r hen Bishop Gerald P.
O’Hara came to the Diocese
of Savannah in the 1930s, there
was a real need for heroes. The
I Great Depression had left the
U.S. reeling economically.
Adolf Hitler was moving on
with his planned takeover of
Europe. Discrimination and prej
udice abounded everywhere, partic
ularly in the South.
Appointed Bishop of
Savannah in late 1935, the
dynamic O’Hara arrived in the diocese, fresh from
six years’ service as auxiliary bishop and vicar
general of the Archiocese of Philadelphia.
Bom in Green Ridge, Pennsylvania, on May 4,
1895, to Dr. and Mrs. J. P. O’Hara, Gerald Patrick
O’Hara attended Our Mother of Sorrows Parochial
School and Saint Joseph’s High School in
Philadelphia. O’Hara progressed to seven years of
study at Saint Charles Borromeo Seminary. Sent to
Rome to finish his education for the priesthood,
O’Hara was ordained by Cardinal Pompilli on
April 3, 1920, in the Church of Saint John Lateran.
He continued his studies in Rome until 1924,
receiving the Doctor of Divinity degree and the
degree of J.U.D., doctor of both civil and canon
law.
Following his return from Europe, the young
priest became secretary to Dennis Cardinal Dou
gherty, Archbishop of Philadelphia. In 1929,
Father O’Hara was consecrated Titular Bishop of
Heliopolis and Auxiliary Bishop of Philadelphia in
1929; he was one of the youngest men ever to hold
the office of bishop in the Catholic Church.
He became Bishop of Savannah on January 15,
1936, succeeding Michael J. Keyes, who had re
signed. Groomed for greatness, Bishop O’Hara
came to the Diocese of Savannah full of energy
and ideas. Summer camps of religion took off as
the new bishop sought to provide religious instruc
tion for children in the far reaches of his diocese.
He encouraged the work of the Catholic Laymen’s
Association. He arranged annexation of an addi
tional eleven acres of land for Savannah’s Catholic
Cemetery.
Bishop O’Hara’s personable, young secretary,
Father Joseph Kavanagh, began working with
youthful Catholics in the Catholic Young People
Association. With his considerable style, Bishop
Prayers for peace
(Continued from page I)
Renad Naber, 19, a business administration stu
dent at Bethlehem University, said: “We all hope
our country will live in peace. This is the Holy
Land, and we have to live here peacefully. It is
possible, but we have to work at it very hard. In
my heart I have hope that the fighting will stop.
“We will pray for peace and the recapturing of
our land—all of Palestine. We want to live here
without Israel. The president here would be
Palestinian and the Israelis can live with us in
Palestine if they want,” she said.
Her friend Mima Dalou, 18, also a business stu
dent at Bethlehem University, said, “We must have
war to make (the Israelis) realize that we can do
something. If all the Arab countries (cooperate)
this will happen. There will be more people killed
and injured, but we want to have a war so we can
Archbishop Gerald P. O’Hara
O’Hara, as one monsignor later commented, “put
the church on the map in Georgia.” One example
of this “style” was the purchase of the former
headquarters of the Ku Klux Klan in Atlanta and
its subsequent replacement with a church stmcture,
which is now the Cathedral of Christ the King.
Bishop O’Hara also established a home for
patients of all faiths who had incurable cancer. The
present Saint Mary’s Home in Savannah was built
during the bishop’s tenure and dedicated on
Sunday, May 7, 1938. An especially meaningful
project to him, the $40,000 debt on Saint Mary’s
was later cleared by Savannahians to honor their
bishop’s sacerdotal jubilee.
Noting the rapid growth of the diocese in north
Georgia, Bishop O’Hara welcomed the papal
decree changing the name of his diocese to the
Diocese of Savannah-Atlanta. Every inch a bishop,
Gerald P. O’Hara, supplied an increasingly respect
ed persona for the Catholic Church in Georgia. As
a southern matron once commented about a wo
man from “the north” who had energetically spear
headed club activities: “Now I know why the
Yankees won the War!”
solve this problem forever. It is better to have a
war for one week and finish with it rather than to
continue to live this way.”
They said they want Jerusalem for themselves
and not as a capital of Israel and added that before
this outbreak they might have been able to live in
peace with Israel, but now that would be impossi
ble because they no longer feel safe.
In the United States, Cardinal Adam J. Maida of
Detroit and Archbishop Theodore E. McCarrick of
Newark, N.J., issued separate statements asking
people in their archdioceses to pray for peace in
the Holy Land.
“There are so many lives in the balance. The
path to answers is through dialogue between and
among the peoples involved, not through more
violence or a cessation of human rights,” said
Cardinal Maida.
People of the Diocese of Savannah-Atlanta
might well say the same as Bishop O’Hara pushed
forward plans for additional parishes throughout
the state. It was inevitable that O’Hara’s talents
and training would move him beyond his Georgia
diocese. World War II had ended and, by 1946,
postwar Romanians, thwarted in their practice of
religion by the Communist regime, needed a strong
Christian advocate in their midst. Pope Pius XII
selected the Bishop of Savannah to perform this
role as Regent of the Bucharest Nunciature. By
standing up to the Communists, Bishop O’Hara
won the hearts of the Romanian people, many of
whom are members of the Romanian Orthodox
Church, a church not affiliated with Rome.
According to information compiled by Charles N.
Bransom, Jr., Bishop Gerald P. O’Hara ordained
ei^ht bishops while serving as Regent of the
Apostolic Nunciature in Bucharest. The bishop
continued to perform valuable service in Romania
until the Communists expelled him and two other
Nunciature officials in 1950.
At this time, O’Hara emphatically denied
charges of interference in governmental affairs of
Romania and of using his position for espionage
purposes. Governor Eugene Talmadge, aware of
the bishop’s status as a national hero, designated a
day honoring the prelate, and the Vatican named
Gerald P. O’Hara Titular Archbishop of Pessinus in
Asia Minor.
Archbishop O’Hara’s diplomatic career next took
him to Ireland where he served as Papal Nuncio.
This appointment was not without controversy as
Paul Blanchard, an author dedicated to separation
of church and state, called for revocation of the
archbishop’s American citizenship. When the
Vatican responded that Archbishop O’Hara’s duties
were solely religious in nature, Blanchard backed
off. Archbishop O’Hara was transferred to London,
as Apostolic Delegate to England and Wales, in
1954. He often traveled great distances to be on
hand for important dedications and ceremonies in
the Savannah Diocese during his years of service
to the Church abroad.
In 1956, when Georgia was divided into two dio
ceses, Gerald P. O’Hara remained Bishop of
Savannah while Francis E. Hyland became the first
Bishop of Atlanta. In 1959, when his duties in
London and Savannah began to weigh on him,
Archbishop O’Hara resigned as head of the Savan
nah Diocese and Auxiliary Bishop Thomas J. Mc
Donough was elected administrator by diocesan
consultors. Pope John XXIII appointed McDo
nough the tenth Bishop of Savannah on March 2,
1960.
On July 17, 1963, the Savannah Morning News
announced: “Archbishop Gerald Patrick O’Hara,
Vatican diplomat and ninth bishop of the Diocese
of Savannah, died yesterday at the Apostolic
Legation in London four days after being stricken
by a heart attack.”
Blessed with charm, intelligence and zeal, Arch
bishop Gerald P. O’Hara, ninth bishop of
Savannah, had an extraordinary influence on his
diocese as well as other parts of the world.
According to a diocesan spokesman: “He had
made many friends among people of all faiths who
will feel a great personal loss in his death.”
Rita H. DeLorme is a volunteer in the
Diocesan Archives.