Bishop Francis Clement Kelley: A Romantic Adventurer

Event

1995-04-07

01:26:59

This is a lecture by James Kelly titled “Bishop Francis Clement Kelley: A Romantic Adventurer”. James Kelly discusses the life of Francis Clement Kelley, reads from a biography of Francis Clement Kelley, Kelley’s involvement in Mexican communism, the “poison banquet”, religion, controversy, World War II and other topics involving Bishop Francis Clement Kelly and his lifetime

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Held by Benevolent Irish Society

The title of this lecture is Bishop Francis Clement Kelley: a romantic adventurer. The speaker iterates the purpose of his introduction and explains why his lecture fulfills this purpose. The speaker then explains why his lecture is useful and worthwhile.
The first section of the lecture is an introduction to Francis Clement Kelley. He was born in Vernon River Parish, Prince Edward Island, and raised in Irish culture. He is worth knowing about because he was an inspiring writer, a faithful and imaginative person, and a force for good. His great faith and courage are notable even 50 years after his death.
The speaker reads a selection from the book “Francis Clement Kelley and the American Catholic Dream”. It is a part of the inscription on the Kelly Monument before the St. Joachim’s church in Vernon River parish. It’s taken from Monsignor Gaffy’s two-volume biography, which is available in the university library. Another work about Kelly is called “A Triumph of a Biography'' by John Tracy Ellis, Dean of the American Catholic Historian. The quote highlights his dream of making the American church truly Catholic and his attention to American towns and small villages. His achievements include diplomatic works in Europe after World War 1, service to the persecuted church in Mexico, being an influential essayist, being a historian and storyteller, an autobiographer, speaker, and so on.
The speaker gives some broad outlines of Father Francis’ life. He was born in Summerville in Vernon River Parish, PEI. His father was a successful merchant in Charlottetown city politics. He was one of the founding members of the first city’s water commission. He was a trader in agricultural products and he ran several saloons.
Frank attended Queen Square school and then St. Dunstan’s College. There is a book Kelley wrote in 1939, “The Bishop Jots it Down”, which is in the university library. Monsignor Alexander MacAulay was one of the people that interested him the most and was also a parish priest in Saint Peter’s Bay. At the time that Frank knew him, he was a student teaching at St. Dunstans and had just begun his theology. Kelley’s extraordinary imagination was demonstrated in his essays, “The Lament of the Penny”, and “The Story of the Candle”. In 1888, he began his seminary studies; one year at a Chicoutimi, Quebec Seminary school, and one year of private studies with Bishop Rogers in Chatham. Studying with the bishop was the original way that seminaries used to be trained until after the 16th century when it was better organized and institutionalized. He regards this year as the greatest inspiration of his life. He was ordained in 1893 in Nicolet when he was 23 years old. He was accepted into the Detroit diocese in a parish in Lapeer, Michigan that had been dealing with problems of debt and scandal.

He signed up as an Army captain in the Spanish American War to make money for the parish in 1898. Between 1898 and 1905, he traveled in America visiting poor churches and giving lectures. In 1905, he founded the Catholic Church Extension Society of the United States. A few years later, he joined the Archdiocese of Chicago. In 1907, the Extension Society received approval from the Vatican, and he received an honorary degree from the University of Notre Dame. In 1908, there was the first American Catholic Missionary Congress in Chicago and the second in Boston followed five years later. The Extension Society was really flourishing and served as a link between many different groups of people in American society. Railway cars would be furnished as chapel cars and go around the country offering mass to those who couldn’t get to church. The Hennessey family of PEI was involved with chapel cars in the United States.
The Mexican and Spanish connection began in 1914 when all the bishops in Mexico were exiled. Kelley was appointed as a representative communicating between the Bishops of Mexico and the US. In 1915, the Woodrow Wilson administration advised Kelley directly about the negotiations with Mexico. Pope Benedict the 15th named Kelley as a Monsignor Prothonotary Cepostolic dealing later with Mexican affairs. President Carranza of Mexico was recognized by the Pan-American conference which signals an approbation of the communist regime which is not good for religious freedom. Mexican group appointed Kelley (Prothonator Apostolic) to negotiate politically on behalf of Bishop Mundaline. Bishop Mundaline, later Cardinal Mundaline, became archbishop of Chicago.
The Extension Society expanded into a big organization later and they held a banquet. The anarchists attempted to poison the 300 well-known people attending the banquet with arsenic, which was discovered by the head chef and then reduced the harm.
In 1919, in the Paris Peace Conference, a special commision killed one of the articles that ensures religious freedom. Kelley lobbied for this alongside some famous people such as Cardinal Désiré-Joseph Mercier, Archbishop of Belgium, and Premier Orlando of Italy who raised the Roman Question. Kelley was recognized as an important opinion former in the US because of his writings. Forming more alliances with important people of various countries, Kelley was able to save the religious freedom article in the signing of the Treaty of Versaille. He went to Rome to meet with Archbishop Surrette and Cardinal Caspar on the Roman Question, the state of Italy, and the Church.
The speaker talks about Kelley’s diplomatic roles. After Paris, Kelley had several other diplomatic roles in London. He contacted the Indian government to stop expatriating German missionaries. He worked with Governor Bourne in Westminster and the British government on the Irish problem. In 1921, Kelley ended his duty as a negotiator on behalf of German missions. In 1924, he was appointed the Bishop of Oklahoma. He stopped being active in 1943 and died in 1948.
The transition from the second section of the talk, a long series of facts about Francis Clement Kelly and his social relationships, to the third section of the lecture about three important coincidences in his life.
The speaker emphasizes the importance of unity (not omitting a person’s relevant information) and continuity (not omitting consecutive events) in telling history. Every bit of information before and after an event is important. Some people sit in the center of a strand of history. Kelley recognized the incidents and grabbed them.

Three coincidences and their consequences. They include Kelley's lectures, home missions, and the national and international stage.
When Kelley was 23 years old, he was a parish pastor in Michigan in a parish that faced some debt and scandals. He faced them using public debates first. People used to have public lectures for entertainment and information before the age of social media.

The speaker talks about social problems, religions, and Kelley’s plan to fix the problems of the poor by appealing to the wealthy to help them through the Extension Society.
Francis Clement Kelley, at age 35, created the Catholic Church Extension Society of the United States of America to connect the wealthy to the poor. Society deals with donations to the less well-off churches. He founded the Extension Magazine and took on the position of editor for 20 years. By 1917, the magazine reached a national circulation of 300,000. He used his significant interview talents to become one of the loudest voices in America for the Catholic Church. He also spent time in Rome helping the poor churches and desolate people.

Being an opinion former, his initiation looks into the workings of the Catholic Church at the highest level. The structure of the Catholic Church system was borrowed from Imperial Rome, which was the largest and most powerful Empire of Antiquity. This relates back to a colonial system. The Catholic Church obtained its freedom in the 4th century by borrowing the Roman structure. It established a department to propagate the faith (Congregation de Propogande Fide) which is still active. All the Canadian churches were under its influence until the 1910s. The Propaganda College in Rome was a place to which Maritime Canadian churches used to send priests.

Kelley’s dream was for a highly integrated church in America. This was at odds with the Roman central church. He made 25-30 trips to Rome to lobby for a more flexible style of government. He developed a deep understanding and good contacts there. When he was only 5 years ordained, he was sent as a Church government chaplain to Cuba along with the head chaplain on the order of President Teddy Roosevelt during the Spanish-American War to investigate atrocities against Spanish citizens and extreme destitution due to the communist regime of Mexico. He realized that this mission was linked to his Catholic Church Extension Society along the Mexican border. Kelley was appointed as a representative of the Mexican Church.

The terrible religious persecutions (the ban on public worship, religious dress, and even the murder of priests and bishops) were met by American foreign policies that turned a blind eye to this because of trade benefits. Kelley's book, written in 1935 “Blood Drenched Altars” tells the story of terrible things happening in Aztec civilization, such as the human sacrifice of 80,000 people per year, as well as the terrible impact on primitive cultures by Western civilization.

Tape squeal
The French Revolution started off as the first of big world changes, disaffection, disillusion with royalty and aristocracy, age of average people, liberalism, Christianity, religion replaced by reason, Age of Enlightenment, devastating the old intellectual landscapes. The Protestant Reformation (1517), led by Martin Luther, was triggered by the church’s negligence of the poor and the corruption within the church. The church’s cleanup “Council of Trent” came 28-29 years later. One of the signs of corruption of the church is in the counties of Italy. A number of the counties came into possession of the Pope.
Reform was needed due to corruption in the church. After the wave of liberalism came to Europe, 1848 was an important year of the Reformation, involving a lot of people like Giuseppe Garibaldi. Later, when Rome was threatened at the time of Pius 9th, a papal brigade was formed, the Zouaves. The Pope protested, however, and this resulted in him being a prisoner by walling him in until 1929. When the city fell, King Victor Emmanuel installed himself as king. Mussolini created the Vatican City.
Summary of remaining talk.
Summary: Kelley is a true Celt. His grandparents on both sides came from Ireland and suffered persecution. His love for French Canada, experience in Mexico, and hatred of all wars demonstrates that he is a true celt. He opposed the US entry into World War 1. He contributed to the peace conference by opposing the treatment/oppression of religious freedom in German missions. On the Roman Question raised by Cardinal Mercier, Kelley pointed out that German missions were picked as scapegoats. Empires were going to topple, even though Germany had the best missions in the world. They were going to be stripped. He realized that Christianity needed to expand or it would diminish. He helped improve religious freedom in many countries, which helped with this problem.
Kelley met the English Cardinal Bourne, who wasn’t interested in problems with Ireland. Kelley's intervention changed Bourne's opinions. Bourne petitioned the government which made a difference in the Irish Question. Kelley also met Cardinal Orlando in Paris by accident and they had a lot of interesting discussions.
Kelley went to Oklahoma as Bishop in 1924. He befriended Alfalfa Bill Murray who was the first governor of the state and also wrote the constitution. Mankin, a prominent literary critic, who wasn’t religious, also became his friend. Kelley was never content about routines, thinking about how to improve things efficiently. He also used his personal connections for doing good work.

He wrote 16 books of biography and 1 autobiography and several books about spiritual counseling for all people, especially religious people. He was early into the radio industry. The speaker used a paragraph from an article written about architecture to demonstrate Kelley’s high regard for this art, quote: “The 10 centuries glorified this and showed us the beauty of the Roman times.”
The speaker mentions that Father Art O’Shea wrote a biography of A.E. Burke. He was brilliant and uncontrollable and a great friend of Kelley’s. The correspondence between them is entertaining.
The speaker read from Cardinal Samuel Stritch’s tribute to Kelley. He praised Kelley’s gift of intellect, literature, poetry, appreciation of the arts, and how he used his gifts to fulfill his life’s purpose.

Lecture ends, applause
Questions-story of going to Detroit, land in Summerfield is, life in Oklahoma, Kelley's family, attitude towards Native Americans and assimilation.
Final comments, applause