Archbishop John Aloysius Murphy (1905–1995), whose life, like that of St. John Henry Newman (1801–1890), spanned the better part of the century in which he lived, is a man worthy of remembrance for several reasons. During his tenure as Bishop of Cardiff (Wales) from 1949 to 1961, he became rightly known as “The Builder.” When he arrived in Cardiff there were only two Catholic secondary schools in the whole of South Wales. Before the end of the decade, the archdiocese had established 14 comprehensive schools to meet the needs of the thousands of Catholic children in the region. Between 1960 and 1980 Archbishop Murphy supervised the building of 39 churches, 14 new secondary schools, and 33 new primary schools. His achievement was both singular and historic. The Bishop’s involvement in his building program for the Church, however, did not deter him from making a significant contribution to Vatican II.
He was well known throughout his diocese not only for his visitations to the parishes, but also for his pastoral letters which showed that he had a gift for writing. He stated that if he had not become a priest, he would have enjoyed pursuing a career as a journalist. Not all of his words have faded into oblivion.
Being sensitive to the times, he predicted that “in some secular humanistic future, when the only sin will be pain, the only evil ill health; when children will be looked upon as a disease, and terminal illnesses will not be tolerated; when it is just possible that the free, human beings will be forbidden to have a child;…in that cold, clinical future, you will search in vain for the rebels save in the ranks of the Catholic Church.”
Even if the Archbishop’s words were not a prediction, nonetheless, they were a warning. He was prescient in predicting the pandemic of abortion and the proliferation of euthanasia. But he saw the tendencies inherent in a godless secular world for being incapable of correcting itself. Only the Catholic Church would be left to save the world. Only Catholics who were willing to be “rebels” could steer the world back to health.
If Catholics in the present world were to take Rev. John Aloysius Murphy’s warning seriously, they would rebel against a world that makes a god of comfort and finds the pain of birth and the loneliness of the elderly to be intolerable. Secular humanism contains the seeds of its own destruction within itself. This is what Archbishop Murphy understood. And this is why he saw the critical need for Catholics (no doubt including other bishops) to rebel against an enemy of life.
Those who defend life should not be intimidated by people in high places. In Beal v. Doe (1977), Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall expressed his contempt for defenders of life. “I am appalled,” he wrote, “at the ethical bankruptcy of those who preach a ‘right to life’ that means, under present social policies, a bare existence in utter misery for so many poor and their children.”
It is worth noting that Clarence Thomas, who became a Supreme Court Justice, was born in his parents’ wooden shack in Pin Point, Ga. He most emphatically experienced a poor childhood. After his father abandoned the family, he was raised by his grandfather in a poor Gullah community. Thomas’s earliest known ancestors were slaves. It wasn’t until he was seven years old that he first enjoyed such amenities as indoor plumbing and regular meals. By Thurgood Marshall’s reckoning, Clarence Thomas, now the longest serving member of the Supreme Court, should have been aborted.
It would seem that Thurgood Marshall also has little affection for Christians, since their founder was born in a manger. Political leaders should be leading the poor out of their poverty rather than consigning them to an early extinction on the gratuitous assumption that poverty will always be their curse. Justice Marshall was well educated. He may not have read, His Eye Is on the Sparrow, the autobiography of Ethel Waters who was conceived through rape in a dismal suburb of Philadelphia and went on to become an immensely successful jazz singer and a distinguished stage and screen actress. He may not have known about Wilma Rudolph, the 17th child born to poor black parents who, despite being crippled at an early age, won three gold medals in running events in 1960 at the Rome Olympiad. Without believing in a provident God, hope vanishes and despair sets in. People in high places can have low opinions of other people.
Archbishop Murphy should be remembered and imitated as a builder of hope and as a model of courage for today’s bishops who have been severely criticized for their alleged moral inertia. Faith, hope, and charity are not the cornerstone of secular humanism. The secular world places its hope on career, comfort, and cash. Life, when it does not fit into these factors, is deemed expendable.
There are people who rebel simply because they are angry at life or that they have nothing better to do. Archbishop Murphy is calling Catholics to rebel for a good reason, to oppose the moral bankruptcy of a world that has no concern for the sacred character of life and regards defenders of life as its enemies.
Who shall inherit the world? The answer is: all those to whom God has given the gift of life.
