Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 6 — The Georgia Bulletin, March 1,1990
BISHOP RETIRES — Retired Bishop Ernest L. Unterkoefler (left),
of Charleston, S.C., talks with Bishop David B. Thompson, his suc
cessor, at a news conference Feb. 22 following the announcement of
Bishop Unterkoefler’s resignation. (CNS photo from UPI)
Bishop Unterkoefler—
Archbishop Marino Lauds
Charleston Bishop's Vision
(Continued from page 1)
mond, Va., May 18, 1944.
After pastoral assignments and diocesan
posts as notary tribunal secretary, chan
cellor and vicar general, he was named
auxiliary bishop of Richmond Dec. 31,
1961, and ordained the following Feb. 22.
He was named bishop of Charleston Dec.
12, 1964, and installed there the following
Feb. 22.
In his 25 years as South Carolina s only
Catholic bishop, he was a state leader in
ecumenism and the struggle against
racism.
During Vatican II, the 1962-65 gathering
of all the world’s bishops, he spoke out on
behalf of restoring the permanent
diaconate. When it was restored in the
postconciliar years, he played a key role in
its U.S. development as first chairman of
the bishops’ Committee on the Permanent
Diaconate in 1968-71 and again in 1975-77.
He has been a consultant to that commit
tee in the years he did not head it.
As assistant secretary of the Ad
ministrative Board of the National
Catholic Welfare Conference from 1963 to
1966, he was involved in the restructuring
of that body into the National Conference
of Catholic Bishops and U.S. Catholic Con
ference, and he was first NCCB-USCC
secretary, 1966-69.
One of the original members of the
NCCB Committee — then Commission —
for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs,
he has been a member or consultant since
1965 and chaired the committee in 1978-81.
He has been Catholic co-chairman of the
Catholic dialogue with Presbyterian and
Reformed churches since 1965. Since 1967
he has been Catholic co-chairman of the
Anglican-Roman Catholic Joint Interna
tional Commission, originally Subcommis
sion, on Theology of Marriage.
Like Bishop Unterkoefler, Bishop
Thompson is a native of Philadelphia.
Born May 29, 1923, he was ordained a
priest in 1950 after studies at St. Charles
Borromeo Seminary in Overbrook, a
Philadelphia suburb.
After ordination he obtained a canon law
degree from The Catholic University of
America, was a teacher and guidance
counselor at St. Thomas More High School
in Philadelphia, and in 1957 was named
founding principal of Notre Dame High
School in Easton, Pa.
When the Diocese of Allentown was
established in 1961, he was appointed
chancellor, secretary to the consultors and
vice officialis of the diocesan tribunal.
In 1966 he was appointed vicar general.
The following year, while remaining
chancellor and vicar general, he was ap
pointed pastor of Immaculate Conception
Church in Allentown. In 1975 he was named
rector of the diocesan cathedral.
Four months after his appointment as
coadjutor bishop of Charleston last year.
Hurricane Hugo devastated South
Carolina and Bishop Thompson coor
dinated diocesan relief efforts amounting
to more than $1.25 million in aid.
Working in the home state of anti-
Catholic fundamentalist the Rev. Bob
Jones, and with a Catholic minority that
formed less than 2 percent of the state’s
population, Bishop Unterkoefler fought
anti-Catholicism mainly by promoting in
terfaith understanding and cooperation.
His efforts were capped in 1987 when
Pope John Paul II, on his second visit to
the U.S. mainland, flew to Columbia, the
state capital, to meet with leading
representatives of the nation’s non-
Catholic Christian religions.
More than 60,000 people filled Williams-
Brice Stadium at the University of South
Carolina for an ecumenical service which
capped a long and historic day. About 5,000
people traveled from the Atlanta arch
diocese for the event.
The interfaith service at the stadium
was the highlight of the pope’s visit to the
southern Bible Belt where Catholics are a
small minority. In his talk, the pope ap
pealed for the strengthening of family ties.
Pope John Paul’s first appearance dur
ing his four-hour visit to Columbia took
place in St. Peter’s Church. He mentioned
that the church was the one where Chicago
Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, a native of
Columbia, had been baptized. The cardinal
seated in the congregation beamed as the
audience applauded the pontiff’s words.
Monsignor John F. McDonough, arch
diocesan administrator, represented the
archdiocese of Atlanta at the service since
Archbishop Thomas A. Donnellan was
gravely ill.
Between his appearance at St. Peter’s
and the stadium service, Pope John Paul
II met religious leaders of other faiths in
an historic gathering at the campus home
of the president of the U. of South Carolina.
Dr. E.C. Watson of the South Carolina
Baptist Convention, former president of
the state’s Christian Action Council, said
that “Peacemaking ’85,” an ecumenical
peace effort he and Bishop Unterkoefler
headed, “brought together what was, to
our knowledge, the largest gathering of top
leaders of church and government to
assemble in the state, other than for the
visit of the Holy Father himself. The cause
of peace and peacemaking profited great
ly.”
He called the bishop a “bold and ag
gressive church leader, effective moralist.
Archbishop Eugene A. Marino, SSJ.
metropolitan of the Church in Georgia,
North and South Carolina, made the
following comment on Bishop
Unterkoefler:
The announcement of the resignation of
the Most Reverend Ernest L. Unterkoefler
as Bishop of Charleston was for me an oc
casion of mixed feelings of sadness and
joy: Sadness that the long and fruitful
ministry of a truly outstanding Church
leader has come to an end, and joy that he
can now lay down the burden of office and
enjoy the leisure of a well-deserved retire
ment.
I also rejoice that our dear brother
David Thompson, coadjutor to Bishop
Unterkoefler, has become the 11th bishop
of Charleston, and I take this occasion to
renew our warm welcome and our pledge
of fraternal support to him.
My first contact with Bishop
Unterkoefler came in 1969 when he was
chairman of the Bishops’ Committee on
the Permanent Diaconate and I was an in
structor in the Washington program. As a
Council Father at Vatican II, Bishop
Unterkoefler had spoken in favor of the
restoration of the diaconate as a perma
nent order in the Church.
His leadership in this effort was
recognized by Pope Paul VI, who ap
pointed the bishop to the international
commission on the diaconate established
shortly after the Council. When the NCCB
voted to implement the restored diaconate
in the U.S., a new standing committee of
the conference was established and Bishop
Unterkoefler was overwhelmingly chosen
by his brother bishops to be chairman. In
itially there were only four programs in
1969 devoted to the preparation of can
didates for the permanent diaconate.
Bishop Unterkoefler invited those in
volved in these programs, both instructors
ecumenical catalyst, warm Christian in
dividual.”
Former Gov. John C. West said that dur
ing the widespread violence in the South
over integration in the ’60s, “Bishop
Unterkoefler was one of the leaders whose
voice of moderation and whose continuous
emphasis on brotherly love and the Chris
tian religion brought sanity to our state."
After the key legal battles over racial
discrimination were won, Bishop
Unterkoefler continued to fight often
against what he called the "silent racism"
in society and the church.
Archbishop Eugene A. Marino of Atlan
ta, the nation’s first black archbishop, said
that during the ’70s it was Bishop
Unterkoefler who "worked behind the
scenes” and with "a master stroke of ec
clesiastical diplomacy” helped resolve a
crisis over start-up funding for the Na
tional Office for Black Catholics.
The original cohcept of the office, funded
through a national collection, foundered
after a public disagreement, the arch
bishop said. Bishop Unterkoefler was ap
proached privately because of his sen
sitivity to racial issues and asked to in
tervene and help reopen the discussion.
Whatever the bishop did quietly, “a
much different atmosphere prevailed,
negotiations were reopened” and the con
cept and collection were approved. Arch
bishop Marino said. “And a great cause
was won that day.”
The archbishop said it was "very hum
bling” for him to serve as metropolitan
over bishops in Georgia, North and South
Carolina, including Bishop Unterkoefler,
who had earlier been an example to him.
“I look upon him as one of the bishops I
have known the longest and the best."
That relationship began in 1969 when the
bishop was chairman of the Committee on
and candidates, to attend and to par
ticipate in the Bishops’ Committee
meetings. Those meetings stand out in my
memory as among the most exciting and
Spirit-filled expressions of the Church as it
was emerging from the Second Vatican
Council. It would not have happened were
it not for the vision, confidence and faith of
Bishop Unterkoefler.
All of us are aware of and grateful for
Bishop Unterkoefler’s forthright and
courageous stance on civil rights. When he
came to the See of Charleston, it was his
responsibility to complete and maintain
the desegregation of Catholic institutions
in South Carolina that had been initiated
by his predecessor. Bishop Paul J.
Hallinan. Bishop Unterkoefler went on to
become a respected voice for the rights not
only of blacks, but of workers and other op
pressed persons in the South. Sometimes
feared, more often admired, always
respected by his colleagues of other faiths.
Bishop Unterkoefler manifested a vision of
Church and a prophetic social con
sciousness that ideally suited him for
leadership in the emerging ecumenical
dialogue. His contributions in this critical
area of Church life are unparalleled.
For those of us who have had the
privilege of working closely with Bishop
Unterkoefler, each will have his own
recollection of how this distinguished
churchman has touched our lives and
made us better for it. I have no doubt that
as Bishop Unterkoefler begins his retire
ment he will find innovative and creative
ways to continue his enormous contribu
tion to the life and mission of the Church
And so as you begin this newest phase of
your remarkable ministry. Bishop
Unterkoefler. I wish you ad multos annos!
Most Reverend Eugene A. Marino. SSJ
Archbishop of Atlanta
Permanent Diaconate and then Father
Marino was an instructor on the fledgling
Washington. D. C. diaconte program, one
of only four in formation in the country.
The bishop worked with the Rev. Martin
Luther King Jr. in the civil rights move
ment in the early ’60s. Writing in his
diocesan newspaper. The Catholic Banner,
in a column in 1988, he recalled sitting on
the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with
several other bishops during the March on
Washington 25 years earlier and listening
to Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech.
He said that despite improvements, the
dream of blacks and whites living as
brothers and sisters is still unfulfilled. He
called on Catholics to end all forms of
racial discrimination "in the Catholic
Church, in its fraternal organizations, in
its schools, in its churches and in all its
endeavors.”
Mother Teresa of Calcutta visited the
Charleston area during a U.S. tour in 1982.
More than 9,000 gathered at Charleston's
Citadel Stadium on June 21 to hear and
cheer the tiny nun as she was presented
with the first Mater Ecclesiae Award by
Bishop Unterkoefler.
Bishop Thomas J. Welsh, of Allentown,
offered his "prayerful best wishes” to
Bishop Thompson and Bishop
Unterkoefler and the people of the diocese.
"May God grant Bishop Unterkoefler
the rewards of his ministry in the vineyard
in which he labored for 25 years. Con
gratulations to Bishop Thompson. His
roots and experience are in two dioceses
rich in church tradition and national
history - Philadelphia and Allentown. I am
sure that those things will serve him well
in his new diocese that is also steeped in
such richness."
Contributing to this story was John E.
Conick in Columbia