Great day for the Knights

Richard A. Sokerka

On Oct. 31, the Knights of Colum­bus were treated to a special day as their founder, Father Michael McGivney, continued on his path to sainthood with his beatification in the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Hartford, Conn.

As members of the organization beamed proudly, Father McGivney was formally beatified through an apostolic letter from Pope Francis that was read by Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, appointed representative of Pope Francis, who was the principal celebrant of the beatification Mass.

“Father McGivney’s life is an illustration of how a holy priest can provide the necessary and intimate connection, so crucial in the life and mission of a parish,” Cardinal Tobin said. “The signature accomplishment for which he is remembered, founding the Knights of Columbus, grew out of his ministry as a parish priest. This great brotherhood of 2 million now spanning the globe was born from the pastoral ingenuity of a parish priest to respond to the twin challenges faced by the people he served. Because he knew his people well, so well,” he said.

In his apostolic letter, Pope Francis wrote that Father McGivney’s “zeal for the proclamation of the Gospel and generous concern for his brothers and sisters,” “made him an outstanding witness of Christian solidarity and fraternal assistance.”

At the Mass was Michael “Mikey” McGivney Schachle, whose live birth after a prenatal diagnosis of fetal hydrops, a rare, typically fatal, condition, was confirmed by the Vatican to be a miracle attributed to the intercession of Blessed Father McGivney. Accompanied by his parents and siblings, “Mikey” presented a monstrance containing a relic of Father McGivney to Cardinal Tobin.

“We acknowledge gratefully the providence of God by confirming in the holiness of this witness by the miraculous cure of an unborn child, healed in utero of a fatal, multi-organ failure, after prayer by his family to Father McGivney,” said Cardinal Tobin.

Supreme Knight Anderson believes the beatification will reinvigorate the Knights’ charity and strengthen the Order’s fraternal brotherhood. He evoked Pope Francis’ new encyclical, “Fratelli Tutti” — which calls Catholics to decide whether to be “Good Samaritans or indifferent bystanders” — saying it was “providential” that it was published the same month as Father McGivney’s beatification.

Most certainly, the charitable works of the Knights of Columbus today stem from the humble actions of that simple parish priest now on his way to sainthood.