Bernard James Sheil

Background

He was born on February 18, 1886 in Chicago, Illinois, United States, the son of James Bernard Sheil, an Irish dealer in coal and real estate and the local Democratic party ward leader, and Rosella Barclay.

Education

He received his primary and secondary education at St. Columbkille's Parochial School and in 1904 entered St. Viator's College, Bourbonnais, Illinois, where he excelled in debate and public speaking and as a baseball pitcher. His no-hit, no-run performance against the University of Illinois championship team led to trial offers from the Cincinnati Reds and the Chicago White Sox. Sheil rejected them in order to prepare for the priesthood at St. Viator's Seminary, where he completed his theological studies.

Career

He was ordained in May 1910. After serving at Chicago's Holy Name Cathedral, Sheil was named curate at St. Mel's Roman Catholic Church in that city. Following a chaplaincy at the Great Lakes Naval Training Station in 1918 and 1919, he rejoined the cathedral staff, where his duties included the chaplaincy at the Cook County Jail.

After he joined the staff of the chancery office in 1923, Sheil rose rapidly in the administration of the Chicago archdiocese. Named chancellor in 1924, he was consecrated as auxiliary bishop of Chicago and titular bishop of Pege by George Cardinal Mundelein and was named vicar-general of the archdiocese in 1928.

Sheil joined Saul Alinsky in 1939 to found the Back of the Yards Council, which transformed the stockyard slums into a model working-class community, and in 1940, to form the Industrial Areas Foundation, which organized poor communities across the United States for social action.

Despite Sheil's close relationship to Archbishop Mundelein and the support of the Roosevelt administration, Pope Pius XII named Samuel Cardinal Stritch of Milwaukee to succeed Mundelein in 1939, and in the new administration, Sheil lost his position as vicar-general of the archdiocese. While his power in the archdiocese declined, Bishop Sheil continued to champion liberal causes, including the United Nations, Zionism, and racial justice, and the Catholic Youth Organization and his other social projects grew and multiplied. He transformed Lewis College, an aeronautical school that he had founded in 1930 at Lockport, Ill. , into a four-year coeducational liberal arts college. He established a radio station, WFJL FM, in Chicago, and a radio news bureau in Brussels, Belgium. Joining the National Committee Against the Persecution of the Jews in 1944, he repeatedly attacked anti-Semitism.

In a speech before an international educational conference of the United Automobile Workers in April 1954 Sheil attacked the tactics of Senator Joseph McCarthy's anti-Communist crusade. Four months later, under attack from those who called him "Judas Iscariot Sheil, " the bishop defended his right to address moral issues. "The clergyman at times must throw all his energy into the struggle for a Godcentered world, " he argued. "There may be times also when silence would be a shameful thing. "

By September 1954, conservative churchmen's withdrawal of financial support had combined with Sheil's ill health to force his resignation as director of the Chicago CYO. Thereafter, most of his programs were dismantled or decentralized. In 1959 Sheil was appointed titular archbishop of Selge. He continued to serve as pastor of St. Andrew's Roman Catholic parish in Chicago from 1935 to 1966, when he was removed after a dispute with Archbishop John P. Cody over parish finances.

Sheil died in Tucson, Arizona.

Achievements

• Bernard James Sheil was Bishop of Chicago later Archbishop for over forty years, led the American church in the early twentieth century to the socially activivity. He founded the Catholic Youth Organization (CYO), which established hundreds of centers across the United States, Canada, Latin America, and Italy. He also established the Sheil School of Social Studies, an adult education center in Chicago. He was awarded the Silver Buffalo Award by the Boy Scouts of America in 1942. The Sheil Catholic Center at Northwestern University is named for him.

Politics

Sheil became a leader in liberal Catholic social action, opposing the regime of Franco in Spain and the rantings of Father Charles Coughlin. he supported Chicago's non-Communist labor organizers in the 1930's.

Sheil insisted that Communism presented no serious threat to a society where justice and charity prevail.

Views

Quotations: "You cannot effectively fight tyranny with tyranny. "

"I have taken my stand, " he once said, "uncompromisingly on the side of the poor, the disinherited, and the dispossessed. "

Personality

He was f colorful churchman, popular with Chicago newsmen.

Connections

Father:

James Bernard Sheil

Mother:

Rosella Barclay

coworker:

Archbishop Mundelein

References

• Bishop Sheil and the CYO