Her Chicago Catholic Bubble
September 9, 2009, 6:13 am
Posted by Cathleen Kaveny
I was fascinated by Peggy Steinfels’s memoir of growing up in a Chicago Catholic world. So I thought I’d open a thread, with a question. Which little First Communicant is you, Peggy? I haven’t gotten my paper version yet.
Woops–looking again, it isn’t first communion. What is it?
I too enjoyed reading Peggy’s memoir. One little thing, however. She depicts Pope Pius XII as opposed to the historical critical method, when in fact it was he, with his encyclical “Divino afflante Spiritu,” often called the Magna Carta of modern Catholic biblical scholarship, who sanctioned and even urged the use of the method in the interpretation of the Bible. John XXIII was pope during Peggy’s four years at Loyola, and there was indeed controversy over Catholic biblical scholarship during those years, but the fear was that Pius XII’s position might be reversed. Where McKenzie’s Jesuit superiors were on all this is another question.
Another question is about the metaphor of “the Chicago Catholic bubble.” Am I correct that it offers the image of the protective bubble that insulates people with no immune system from infection? If so, I wonder if it does justice to the outer-directedness of Chicago Catholicism that made it the US center of various Catholic Action groups, YCW, YCS, CFM, etc. These were apostolic movements, out there in the world, Seeing, Judging, Acting (as the method required). Just a question. I liked the piece, Peggy. Does this mean that a longer memoir is in preparation?
What a wonderful memoir. I graduated from Loyola a couple of decades after you, Margaret. Integration was proceeding apace by then: the two young men who lived next door to me in Campion Hall were African American. But the black students tended to dine together, and so did the white students, in the school cafeteria at Lake Shore campus. And one would still hear racist comments from white students from time to time. I really hope that integration is more fully realized on campus today.
I was also a reporter, briefly, for the school newspaper, called the Phoenix in those days. But by that time, the early ’80′s, the spirit of student activism had mostly drained away. Ronald Reagan was elected president my freshman year, and the rightward turn was palpable. Loyola was still very much a Democratic stronghold, but civil rights and the Vietnam war were long in the rearview mirror by then, and there wasn’t really a Cause to unite students anymore. Feminism was vital in the women’s dorms, and there was a brouhaha in the Phoenix one year occasioned by an undergraduate’s expression of anti-gay sentiments in a letter to the editor. My recollection is that the faculty and campus ministry staff (many of whom had come of age in the ’60′s themselves) were continually trying to prick the students to social consciousness and action, but with only fair success.
St. Ita is a lovely, lovely church. One of the many parish church buildings in Chicago that outshines our cathedral for magnificence. I lived on the North Side for a number of years – St. Ignatius, St. Clement, Our Lady of Victory – but mostly worshipped at Loyola and Northwestern.
Ms. Steinfels – for what it is worth, enjoyed your recollections. As a Texas boy, I met roughly 20 Chicago students my first year in college. It was an experience. They identified themselves by what catholic parish/school they attended (unheard of in Texas). They seemed to know a wide range of parishes, schools, priests, etc. (again, not my experience in Texas).
Their stories about growing up catholic were basically the same but, depending upon the ethnic background, there was a whole host of other stories, experiences e.g. Italian, German, Irish, Polish parishes seemed mysterious with rituals, etc. that I had never been exposed to. In some ways, it seemed richer to them; more alive.
Any way, wound up attending DePaul University and got my own Chicago experience and have never regreted it. I would agree with others that reading the works of Unsworth, Greeley, and other Chicago catholic authors made me appreciate the history of the parishes, organizations, schools/universities, social agencies, etc. in Chicago from WWII on as a truly positive experience. But, remember, my college years were in the 1970′s so almost 10 years later. One remarkable experience was being trained to use the tactics of Saul Alinsky in neighborhood organizations, protesting Vietnam, etc.
CK: The picture is of my eight grade graduation. We are standing on the gazillion stairs that lead up to the front door of the church (we are facing down, however; not sure why). My First Communion picture is there; I am standing on a Chicago Catholic sidewalk with my parents and two sisters. I’m the one in the veil! I think it’s May, but the trees behind suggest that Spring has not yet come to Chicago. The final picutre in the story is of one of the Franciscans who picketed Lewis Towers and made Mrs. Lewis give way.
But the picture on the front cover of CWL is the most amazing. First grade, 55 children!. One teacher, Sister Mary Rogers (probably 22) and fresh out of the novitiate. And we all learned to read.
I love that cover shot. I feel like I can smell the chalk dust.
Joe: Of course, the story about why McKenzie was at West Baden for so many years was a story he told. The historical facts of the matter are probably buried in archives (unless Gerry Fogarty knows what’s what here). And it is certainly possible that McKenzie pushed the boundaries and the Jesuits kept him close to home. As you probably know, he eventually left the Jesuits, was incarnated in the diocese of Madison, and served as a parish priest in Southern California (and I believe may have taught at Claremont).
Bubbles: my metaphor was not to a protective device for the immune weakened, but to bubbles as in soap bubbles–the kind you blow and which float away and disappear–hence my allusion at the end to the song my father sang.
The story of the swimming pool and Mrs. Lewis briefly alludes to two important of those lay initiatives: the Catholic Interracial Council and Friendship House. There were many more as you point out: CFM (founded by Pat and Patty Crowley), and YCS and YCW–all of which landed in Chicago thanks to Fr. Louis Putz, CSC, and Msgr. Rheinhold Hillenbrand (uncle of our friend Barry Hillenbrand). There were even Catholic organizations for unions (apart of course from the unions themselves which were largely Catholic).
One of the ironies of our times is that there were far more lay initiatives and church-linked lay organizations in the fifities and sixties than there are now in the Age of the Laity.
“One of the ironies of our times is that there were far more lay initiatives and church-linked lay organizations in the fifities and sixties than there are now in the Age of the Laity.”
And yet, that sort of a vibrant laity is what the church envisions for today. Why is the laity not more vibrant today? To my mind, the laity’s strength flows from the strength of the institution – parishes, schools, religious orders, and underlying it all, the mass and the sacraments. Today, with the institution so much weaker, the basis for lay vibrancy is undermined.
Fabulous memoir!
I want to know that your friend at the end made it? That he was mostly okay considering. Did you ever hear from him again?
My uncle was in a similar situation, also Class of ’63 from the state teachers college, (hopefully minus the priest/sex part), he made it to NYC off Broadway, then San Fran, lived a good life, loved his nieces and nephews, and died of AIDS at 50.