Fr. McGivney Beatification

On Saturday at the Cathedral of St. Joseph in Hartford, Connecticut, Father Michael J. McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, was declared “blessed” by the Church, he is on the road to sainthood. Many local members from Knights of Columbus viewed the mass as it was live-streamed into our Church. During the beatification Mass, Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey — Pope Francis’ representative for the liturgy — read aloud an apostolic letter in Latin from the pope stating that the 19th-century parish priest, “whose zeal for the proclamation of the Gospel and generous concern for the needs of his brothers and sisters made him an outstanding witness of Christian solidarity and fraternal assistance,” will be celebrated on Aug. 13. “He worked to keep families united in dignity and security,” Cardinal Tobin later said during his homily, in which he described Blessed Michael McGivney as an apostle who cared for victims of an epidemic that would eventually claim his own life just two days after his 38th birthday. Said Cardinal Tobin, “130 years after his death, the brief life of this holy man speaks eloquently to our own path of holiness.” Father McGivney is the third U.S.-born priest to be beatified, after Blesseds Stanley Rother and Solanus Casey, both of whom were beatified in 2017. During the Mass, Carl Anderson, the supreme knight of the Knights of Columbus, spoke on Father McGivney’s legacy. “To this day, Father McGivney’s holiness of life and exemplary service continue to inspire priests across America and around the world, and his vision for an active and engaged laity serves as a witness to the power of spiritual brotherhood and charity.”