Background
Gray, Gordon Joseph Cardinal was born on August 10, 1910 in Edinburgh. Son of Francis William and Angela Gray.
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Gray, Gordon Joseph Cardinal was born on August 10, 1910 in Edinburgh. Son of Francis William and Angela Gray.
After he attended Holy Cross Academy in Edinburgh, his uncle John Gray, a canon, suggested that he become a priest. He then studied at Saint Joseph"s Junior College in East Sussex from 1927 to July 1929, and entered Saint John"s Seminary in Wonersh in September 1929.
He served as Archbishop of Saint Andrews and Edinburgh from 1951 to 1985, and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1969. He was the first resident Scottish cardinal since the Restoration of the Scottish hierarchy in 1878 and since the Reformation. He was ordained to the priesthood by Archbishop Andrew McDonald, Order of St. Benedict on 15 June 1935 and did pastoral work in the Archdiocese of Street Andrews and Edinburgh until 1947.
Attending Saint Andrews University from 1936 to 1939, Gray became the first Catholic priest to graduate there since the Reformation.
In 1939 he entered Street Mary"s University College, Twickenham in London, but his studies were interrupted by the outbreak of World World War World War II He was later made rector of Street Mary"s College, Blairs, near Aberdeen in 1947. On 20 June 1951, Gray was appointed Archbishop of Street Andrews and Edinburgh by Pope Pius XII. He received his episcopal consecration on the following 21 September from Archbishop William Godfrey, with Bishops James Donald Scanlan and Edward Wilson Douglas serving as co-consecrators, in Saint Mary"s Cathedral.
In 1953, Gray founded Street Andrew"s College, Drygrange, as a new seminary for his archdiocese. From 1962 to 1965, he attended the Second Vatican Council.
Pope Paul VI created the Scottish primate Cardinal Priest of South. Chiara a Vigna Clara in the consistory of 28 April 1969, and therefore the first resident cardinal in Scotland since David Beaton, over four centuries earlier.
He once served as President of the Bishops" Conference of Scotland, and was one of the cardinal electors in the conclaves of August and October 1978, which selected Popes John Paul I and John Paul II respectively. In 1978, he voiced strong opinions regarding the birth of Louise Brown, the first child to be successfully born from in vitro fertilisation, saying
"I have grave misgivings about the possible implications and consequences for the future."
During John Paul II"s 1982 visit to the United Kingdom, he officially welcomed the Pope upon his arrival in Scotland. Gordon Gray retired as ordinary of the Saint Andrews and Edinburgh archdiocese on 30 May 1985, after thirty-three years of service.
He was succeeded by Keith O"Brien.
Gray died from a heart ailment in the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary at the age of 82. He is buried in the crypt of Saint Mary"s Cathedral.
Gray was considered to be theologically conservative but moderate in his temperament, giving him an "effective international role in the life of the Church." He was a member of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments and Pontifical Council for Social Communications, and once chaired the International Commission on English in the Liturgy.