Epilogue Let Us Be on Our Way
By G. Wayne Miller
September brought a crush of business for Bishop Thomas J. Tobin, and by the end of the month, when he boarded an Alitalia flight to Rome, he looked forward to a break. It was Sunday, Sept. 30. The bishop had last visited The Eternal City in 2004, to fulfill the quinquennial — once every five years — obligation that bishops have to report in person to the pope. John Paul II was still alive, and Bishop Tobin spent a few moments with him — their final meeting, as it happened. On this trip, he was hoping for an audience with the current pontiff, Benedict XVI. Bishop Tobin stayed at his alma mater, Pontifical North American College. He dined with old friends and treated himself to two new miters at Barbiconi, Rome’s leading clerical tailoring and insignia establishment. He bought calendars and bookmarks blessed by the pope as gifts for friends back in the United States. On Wednesday, Oct. 3, Pope Benedict granted Bishop Tobin a private audience. Tobin kissed the pope’s ring and shook his hand, and the two shared small talk about Benedict’s plans to visit the United States in April. The bishop conveyed prayers and blessings from his diocese, and the pope offered the same for Rhode Island. The next day, Tobin joined 10 bishops and some 300 priests in ordaining 21 North American College seminarians, including 2 from the Diocese of Providence, as deacons, one of the last steps on the road to full priesthood. In celebration, someone from Pittsburgh, Bishop Tobin’s hometown, waved a Steelers towel as the congregation spilled out of St. Peter’s Basilica. “I was very much at home!” the bishop later recalled. Inevitably, Bishop Tobin’s week in Rome brought back memories of the four years he had spent there as a student. One of the most vivid settled on him when he visited Chiesa di Sant’Onofrio, a church built in the 15th century on a hill overlooking the city. The bishop’s parents, Mary and Raymond, had joined their son in Rome for his own deaconate ordination, in 1972. The occasion coincided with their 38th wedding anniversary, which they had celebrated with Tom during a Mass at Sant’Onofrio. “Obviously, as a student, I had no idea where the future would lead me,” Bishop Tobin said. “And looking back, there were no obvious signs, either. Again, I just have to trust that God is leading this process — even though I don’t understand it.” A FULL SCHEDULE of confirmations, Masses and internal meetings awaited Bishop Tobin back in Rhode Island. But the aftermath of the priest sex-abuse scandal lingered in Rhode Island, as it did throughout America. During Tobin’s first week back, an independent Boston-based group hired by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to review dioceses’ compliance with its “Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People” sent two investigators to One Cathedral Square, in Providence. After its weeklong review, The Gavin Group concluded that the Diocese of Providence was in full compliance. That conclusion, Bishop Tobin said in a statement, was “witness to the strength and effectiveness of our child protection program.” On Oct. 19, an abuse-awareness group called a news conference to allege that the diocese had publicly under-reported the number of priests accused of abuse between 1950 and 2002, before Bishop Tobin arrived in Rhode Island. The group, bishopaccountability.org, said court documents revealed that accusations had been brought against about 125 priests, not the 56 reported in a 2004 national survey ordered by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. In a statement, the diocese attributed the disparity to “a difference in reporting criteria and methodology.” On Nov. 1, All Saints Day, Tobin visited Bishop Hendricken High School, in Warwick. After celebrating Mass, the bishop spoke to the freshmen, who would spend the next day, All Souls’ Day, cleaning up St. Patrick’s Cemetery near Douglas Avenue in Providence. The final resting place for many Irish immigrants, St. Patrick’s had fallen victim to litter and vandals. “Our ancestors in faith have given us so much — material gifts and personal gifts and mostly our spiritual gifts,” the bishop told the boys. “So we always want to keep their memory alive and give them the reverence and respect and the love that is due to them.” The bishop reminded the students of souls in Purgatory, “those who are deceased, but not yet completely purified and redeemed.” He urged the students to pray for them, “with the hope that soon they will receive complete redemption and salvation in Christ.” On All Souls’ Day, the Rev. Michael A. Colello, the bishop’s administrative secretary, drove his boss to Middletown’s St. Columba Cemetery, which overlooks Narragansett Bay. As they approached, the bishop remarked that he could live comfortably here in the caretaker’s house. The cemetery would be a good place to walk his dog, Molly, and the view beat what he has now from his home at Gate of Heaven Cemetery, in East Providence. Bishop Tobin celebrated Mass in St. Columba’s small chapel. Forty people, most of them in their 70s or 80s, attended. One man breathed oxygen from a tank, and another talked to himself during the service. The bishop did not carry a crosier or wear a miter, only a red zucchetto, or skull cap, and simple white vestments. “Death from a merely human point of view seems so final, so tragic, the end of everything for which we had lived,” the bishop said in his homily. “No wonder our hearts sometimes are troubled. On the other hand, Jesus says, ‘Do not let our hearts be troubled, have faith in God and faith in me.’ ” For those who do, the bishop said, “that sadness gives way to hope and joy and peace because we believe in God and we believe in our Lord, Jesus Christ. And we believe we are entitled to share in eternal life.” The bishop greeted the worshipers as they left the chapel. “Good to see you again, Father,” said the man who talked to himself. “Where are you assigned now?” “Providence,” the bishop said, shaking the stranger’s hand. On the ride back, Bishop Tobin said that answer was easier than explaining who he really was. The incident amused him. He would add it to the long list of encounters in which people mistook him for someone else. AS ADVENT neared, the national issues on which Bishop Tobin is so vocal remained in the news. The abortion debate followed Republican presidential candidates to Iowa, where critical first caucuses will be held on Jan. 3. The Rhode Island Supreme Court heard arguments on a petition to allow divorces for same-sex couples married elsewhere. And the arrest of two Division of Motor Vehicles clerks for allegedly falsifying Rhode Island drivers’ licenses for illegal immigrants, some with criminal backgrounds, fueled the already incendiary immigration dispute. On Nov. 7, diocesan communications director Michael K. Guilfoyle drove his boss to Woonsocket for a live appearance on radio station WOON, 1240-AM. Host Don Brunelle, a kindly man, began his interview with questions about the Latin Mass and the bishop’s background. Twenty-four minutes in, Brunelle’s tone changed. “Illegal immigrants are breaking the law,” he said. “Where do you fall on this?” The bishop explained the Church’s position: immigration laws need to be changed, but immigrants here now, documented or not, should be treated with compassion and dignity. Brunelle said another Catholic bishop has advocated granting illegal immigrants “rights and privileges” that only U.S. citizens should have. “It seems to me that’s breaking with the Bible tradition of one must obey the law,” the radio host said. “You have to make some distinction between those rights that are basic human rights that everybody has,” said the bishop, “rights given by God regardless of their paperwork, their documentation. Here we’re talking about food, clothing, shelter, medicine, heath care. Everybody has a right to those things.” “You would not encourage illegals to continue breaking the law,” Brunelle said. “I would not encourage anyone to break the law — unless it’s an unjust law. Our tradition is also very clear about saying you should never follow an unjust law. You have to make some distinctions there.” On the topic of abortion, Brunelle noted that bishops urge Catholic politicians to publicly oppose it — but if every one followed that advice, wouldn’t some Catholic candidates never get elected? “Aren’t you putting some of these individuals in a tough spot?” “What we encourage all of our politicians to do is work for the common good and promote those values that are not just Catholic religious issues or Christian religious values but to promote and protect those things that are human values,” the bishop said. “Catholic politicians have a special obligation.” “But wouldn’t he or she be better off saying ‘a medical decision is a private, personal decision.’ ” “What we would want a Catholic politician to say is that ‘every time an abortion takes place a baby dies and therefore I’m going to do my best to resist it.’ ” “Even though that may cost him the election and he would then no longer have a voice?” Brunelle said. “We all have to be faithful to our conscience — including politicians. If they find that their job is in conflict with their faith, they should quit their job.” “Then you might wind up with all pro-choice candidates.” “Well, that’s possible,” the bishop said. “That’s where we as Catholics have to be involved in the political process and encourage and support and vote for politicians who will reflect these basic human values.” THIRTY-EIGHT years before, on the weekend after Woodstock 1969, a young man bid his parents goodbye and traveled for the first time to Rome, to attend Pontifical North American College. Tom Tobin was 21. Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that would legalize abortion, was four years in the future. Immigration still conjured images of foreigners welcomed to the land of opportunity. Most homosexuals kept their orientation secret. American Catholics attended Sunday Mass in great numbers, and the priesthood was revered. Few people imagined that one day, the Church would be rocked by a sex-abuse scandal caused by some who had answered that sacred calling. In 1969, Tom Tobin had not heard of Bishop Karol Wojtyla, of Krakow, Poland, the prelate who nine years later would be elected Pope John Paul II. Today, in his home study, the Most Rev. Thomas J. Tobin keeps a copy of Rise, Let Us Be On Our Way, the late pope’s 2004 reflections on being a bishop. Bishop Tobin says he still does not understand why he, the son of a Sears salesman and a housewife from an old steel town, has risen so high in the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church. He does not claim to know what is ahead. At 59, he is young enough that archbishop or cardinal might lie in his future — but Tobin says he does not think so. Ask him, and he will say he expects to spend his remaining years as bishop in Providence. Then again, the 21-year-old who left for Rome in 1969 aspired to be only a pastor. John Paul ends his book with a message for fellow bishops: “Echoing the words of our Lord and Master, I too say to each one of you, dear brothers in the episcopate: ‘Rise, let us be on our way!’ Let us go forth full of trust in Christ. He will accompany us as we journey toward the goal that He alone knows.” The Series Starting in October 2006, Bishop Thomas J. Tobin granted staff writer G. Wayne Miller unprecedented access into a high level of the Roman Catholic Church. Over the next year, Miller and photographer Mary Murphy attended internal meetings and traveled with the bishop throughout the diocese. The bishop opened his personal archives and diocesan documents, and allowed unrestricted contact with administrators and priests. The result is a rare journey through a church, a diocese and the life of a man. |
On Monday, Oct. 29, Journal staff writer G. Wayne Miller hosted 
