MARTIN T. GILLIGAN: AN AMERICAN HERO …media.speroforum.com.s3.amazonaws.com/James Thunder/Bio -...

© 2017 James M. Thunder Re: Fr. Martin T. Gilligan

Dec. 8, 2017

MARTIN T. GILLIGAN:

AN AMERICAN HERO NEGLECTED -- UNTIL TODAY

Saving Lives During the Communist Takeover in China, 1946-1952

as published by Spero Forum, www.spero.com, Dec. 8. 2017

Father Gilligan Legacy Society, St. Charles Borromeo Parish

Msgr. Martin T. Gilligan, as he appeared when the author knew him (1964-1967)

as first pastor of St. Charles Borromeo Parish, Kettering, Ohio, Archdiocese of Cincinnati

by James M. Thunder1

In 1976, 14 year old Artemis Joukowsky was in 9th grade. A teacher required members of the class to interview someone who had shown moral courage. Artemis asked his mother for suggestions and she encouraged him to talk to her mother. The account the young Artemis obtained from his grandmother, Martha Sharp, became public and resulted in Martha and her husband 1 Mr. Thunder is a Washington, D.C., attorney. Among his 150-plus essays are his Dec. 7, 2015, “The Illustrated Story of Bishop Walsh of Maryknoll,” an American missionary to China, http://www.speroforum.com/a/CDJHJKSACQ48/76856-The-illustrated-history-of-Bishop-Walsh-of-Maryknoll-especially-for-Catholic-teens-and-young-adults#.VmdRTGeFPcs and a September 2015 essay critical of the University of Notre Dame’s serious and long consideration of accepting a proposal to establish a liberal arts college in the People’s Republic of China, http://www.speroforum.com/a/LIEQWIOOGY47/76423-Should-Notre-Dame-University-go-to-Communist-China#.VfguqGeFPcs . The latter lists a number of witnesses to the Faith in China. In the spring of 1971, as a junior at the University of Notre Dame, before President Nixon announced his historic trip to China, he initiated the Chinese language program at the university.


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Waitsill being honored as “Righteous Among the Nations” at Yad Vashem in 2006. Moreover, on September 20, 2016, PBS broadcast Ken Burns’ Defying the Nazis: The Sharps’ War.

This example of making public a story of moral courage known only to a few prompts me to write today. The following is what I know - - from a eulogy delivered by Monsignor Lawrence K. Breslin at Monsignor Martin T. Gilligan’s 1993 funeral and which I obtained a couple of years ago.

Story No. 1:

After the Communist takeover of mainland China in 1949, Catholic missionaries were being expelled as criminals. Although Hong Kong was British territory, Hong Kong officials were fearful of invasion by the Communists. They decided it was prudent to do nothing to aggravate the Communists, as for example by helping any of these missionaries who had made it to Hong Kong. The wily Msgr. Gilligan, then working in Hong Kong for the Vatican, sent a telegram to one of his bosses, a Monsignor Montini at the Vatican Secretariat of State, asking Montini to contact the London Home Office (the British office in charge of Hong Kong) and thank the Home Office for the fine treatment the missionaries were receiving in Hong Kong. After the Home Office conveyed these thanks from the Vatican to the Hong Kong authorities, the Hong Kong authorities decided to live up to its reputation and ensured that its police were hospitable to the missionaries.

Story No. 2:

Catholic foreign missionaries expelled from the mainland to Hong Kong had passports, but Chinese nationals did not. There were a thousand Chinese priests and religious in Hong Kong who expected to be forcibly returned to the mainland, persecuted and executed. (Msgr. Breslin said “thousand” in his eulogy, but a 1953 report quoted in full below says “thousands.”2) Msgr. Gilligan, with the help of unidentified co-conspirators, manufactured official-looking Vatican passports, using expensive leather and vellum, and issued these documents to these people. With these false papers, they were able to depart Hong Kong.

Msgr. Breslin said in his eulogy that, when he was in Rome (without specifying whether this was before his 1957 ordination in Rome, or during his 1968-74 term as vice rector of the North American College), he met one of the Chinese nationals who assured him he was alive because of Msgr. Gilligan. To help demonstrate Msgr. Gilligan’s daring, I report to you the following: Today, there are about 600 citizens of Vatican City. About half of them (300 or so) are members of the Vatican diplomatic corps and reside abroad in the 190 or so countries. In 1949, when the Communists took over mainland China, there were only a few dozen countries in the entire world and even fewer than the current 300 members of the Vatican diplomatic corps. Yet Msgr. Gilligan made at least triple that number of people of Chinese ethnicity appear to be Vatican citizens.

2 “Hong Kong Papal Secretary Returns to U.S.A.”, The Advocate (Melbourne Australia), Feb. 5, 1953, p 13, https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-10450-47224347/advocate-melbourne-vic?trp=&trn=organic_google&trl=:


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Moreover, he did so between October 15, 1949, and December, 1952—at the rate of more than eight per week!3

I believe these stories are evidence of moral courage because, with respect to the first, Msgr. Gilligan could have faced harsh repercussions from Vatican and British authorities for lying. With respect to the second, he and his associates, could have been subject to punitive action by the Communist Chinese even if the Communists did not invade Hong Kong.4

In 1952, The Vatican asked Msgr. Gilligan to relocate to Taiwan to help establish diplomatic relations between the Vatican and the Nationalist Government on Taiwan. Msgr. Gilligan decided instead to leave the Vatican diplomatic corps to become a parish priest in America. He submitted his resignation to Msgr. Montini who refused it, telling him that no one just up and leaves the corps. When Msgr. Gilligan insisted, Msgr. Montini accepted it.

Msgr. Breslin added that, at a time when they were both living in the same rectory (St. Charles Borromeo Parish, Kettering, Ohio), Msgr. Gilligan received a card in the mail with a Vatican stamp on it. It read:

Dear Marty, someone mentioned your name in an audience the other day. I just wondered how you are?

Pope Paul VI Pope Paul VI (1897-1978, pope 1963-1978) was the Monsignor Giovanni Montini whom Msgr. Gilligan knew before and during his China days. Montini himself would leave the Vatican diplomatic corps for pastoral service, at Pope Pius XII’s behest, by becoming archbishop of Milan in January 1955. * * * * *

With this background, actually with this “foreground,” we can turn to Msgr. Gilligan’s life before, during, and after his time in China, but first a word about my connection to Msgr. Gilligan.

3 We do not know the precise numbers and we do not know the precise range of time. It would not have been earlier than when Msgr. Gilligan arrived in Hong Kong, about Oct. 15, 1949, and not later than when he departed in early January, 1953. Did it continue under his successor after his departure? 4 I should add that Msgr. Gilligan’s action put others’ lives at risk. These would be not only the people who helped him, but if the activities had been discovered , authorities could not distinguish between real and fake papers and would suspend all departures, putting those with real passports at risk.


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CONTENTS

My Connection . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Before China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

In China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Assisting Chinese Refugees. . . 33

After China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Post-script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

MY CONNECTION

Four years ago I decided to check the Web to see what had become of Monsignor Martin T. Gilligan, who had been the pastor of my parish, St. Charles Borromeo, Kettering (a suburb of Dayton), Ohio, during my high school years. I recalled only four things about him. He would pronounce “God” as “Gaud” (as in “Maud”). He would say, at the beginning of some Sunday sermons, in order to goad late arrivals to come earlier, that “on time [for Mass] meant before time.” Thirdly, he made it clear he didn’t want to be called “Monsignor” but “Father.” For that reason, I will refer to him as “Father” for the remainder of this essay. And the fourth thing: When a Maryknoll5 priest, recently returned from Peru, working in a Cincinnati office, visited my family’s home, he said he had checked in with Father Gilligan to thank him for what he had done, when he was with the Vatican, for Maryknoll missioners in China. Father Gilligan never spoke of anything he had done for the Vatican at any Mass I attended and I never asked him about it.

In searching the Web, I learned that a Knights of Columbus Council (#14882 in Dayton, Ohio, serving St. Henry Parish) was named after Fr. Gilligan. I asked the Council if it had any biographical information on Fr. Gilligan. They had nothing handy. A year later, the Council sent me a copy of the eulogy given by Msgr. Lawrence K. Breslin, who was then the pastor of St. Charles, at Fr.Gilligan’s funeral, June 24, 1993.

In the mid-1960’s, when Fr. Gilligan was pastor of St. Charles, then-Father Breslin had been his assistant pastor.6 As mentioned, Fr. Gilligan and Fr. Breslin lived in the rectory. In his eulogy, Msgr. Breslin said that Fr. Gilligan had told him some stories of his time in China but he said that he had learned much more from missionaries who visited their rectory. Of all these stories, Msgr. Breslin related just the two I provided above.7

5 Maryknoll is the informal name for the Catholic Foreign Mission Society of America. 6 I knew Fr. Breslin, not only through the parish, but because, at the time, archdiocesan priests taught at my high school. Fr. Breslin taught me freshman year religion five days a week. He taught my older sister junior year religion. 7 I am writing about what I know at this time, hoping that, when the Vatican Archives makes the papers associated with the pontificate of Pope Pius XII (1939-1958) available, someone will carry my baton and focus on the activities


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BEFORE CHINA

Martin Thomas Gilligan, Jr., was born on February 25, 1914, in Cincinnati, to Martin, Senior, and Mary Patton.8 He was one of their seven children and, after his mother’s death when he was nine, and his father’s remarriage, he also lived with two stepsiblings.9 He was baptized at Annunciation Church in Clifton, confirmed at St. Rose Church in “East End,” and attended several elementary schools: St. Rose (5 years), Holy Angels (1), St. Monica (1), and St. Patrick (1). He entered St. Gregory Preparatory Seminary [high school] of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati in June 1928, and St. Gregory Seminary in September 1932, receiving his bachelor’s degree in 1936.10

While residing at the North American College in Rome from 1936 to 1940,11 he attended the Gregorian (formally the Pontifical Gregorian University) for an S.T.L.—a Licenciate in Sacred Theology, and the Lateran, for canon law, obtaining a J.C.D.12 During Fr. Gilligan’s time, he was not at the current building used by the North American College which opened in 1953. Rather, they were housed in the Casa Santa Maria, nicknamed the “House on Humility street,” (on Via dell'Umilta) located at the base the Quirinale Hill.13

of Fr. Gilligan. The archives of Fr. Gilligan’s home diocese, the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, recently received a box of Fr. Gilligan’s records from Rev. Gerald (“Jerry”) Haemmerle, who had been an associate pastor of Fr. Gilligan’s at St. Charles Borromeo, Kettering, Ohio, and many years later, the pastor of Christ the King Parrish where Fr. Gilligan resided during his last years. I have had the opportunity of reviewing correspondence from 1951-1952, but have not yet seen all of the papers now held by the archives. Also, in recent months, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (the successor of the National Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC)), has digitized some of its records. I have seen some of them and I will refer to them here. Presumably, there are also materials in the archives of the Diocese of Hong Kong. 8 Cincinnati Enquirer, Feb. 18, 1946, p. 9 (name of mother), https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/103437888/ . 9 When Denise Cozart was a young girl, she lived in the Golf Manor neighborhood of Cincinnati in a home near Katie Gilligan Smith. Ms. Cozart met the young Fr. Martin Gilligan when he came to visit his cousin. Ms. Cozart never saw him again but followed his career. When she learned I was writing this essay, she provided me, in emails dated August 4, 2017, with family information she had compiled.

Mary Patton was born in County Galway on Nov. 20, 1877, to Martin Patton and Mary Cosgrove. She arrived in Cincinnati in 1904. In 1904/1905, she married Martin T. Gilligan (Sr.). They had seven children: Winifred (1906), Margaret (1908), Alvina (1911), Martin Thomas (Jr) (1914), Katherine (1911), Andrew (1919), and Mary Ann (June 1923). Four months after giving birth, in October 1923, Mary died of cancer. Martin Jr. was nine years of age.

Martin remarried, date unknown, Katie N. Jones, who had been born in 1877 in Ohio and who had two children by a first marriage: Laura (1904) and George (1906). Martin, Sr., died in 1945. 10 Email of April 21, 2017, from Nicholas Jobe, Registrar, Director of Assessment, Athenaeum of Ohio/Mount St. Mary’s Seminary. 11 Cincinnati Enquirer, June 17, 1940 (for dates of study). 12 Cincinnati Enquirer, June 22, 1993, p.8, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/101943043/ (hereafter “obituary”); Anniversary Dinner Program, June 12, 1990, French Lick Springs, Indiana, including ordination Class of 1940 (on file with author). 13 Some pictures are here: http://orbiscatholicussecundus.blogspot.com/2014/09/casa-santa-maria.html and here https://www.pnac.org/about-us/history-of-the-college/.


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In those pre-Vatican II days, all instruction in seminaries at the college and post-graduate level, in the United States and in Rome (and elsewhere, of course) was in Latin. And, as today, seminarians in Rome were expected to become fluent in Italian.

The “Greg”—The building constructed in 1930.

To give you a flavor for seminarian Gilligan’s time in Rome, we can learn from the autobiography (1991, 2d ed. 1999) of Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C. (1917-2015), the long-serving president of the University of Notre Dame (1952-1987). Hesburgh, too, attended the Gregorian but, as a religious Order priest with the Congregation of Holy Cross, he lived in a house, not at the North American College. He started at the Gregorian in 193714, a year after Fr. Gilligan, and his studies were suspended in 1940, as were Fr. Gilligan’s, after the Nazis had invaded the Low Countries15 (culminating, short-term, in Dunkirk). Father Hesburgh wrote:

Our routine [in the Holy Cross home] was rigid. Up at five, meditation and morning prayer, Mass, breakfast (bread, cheese, coffee), classes, noon chapel, lunch, classes, an afternoon walk, study, chapel, a light supper, half-hour

14 Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., God, Country, Notre Dame (2d ed. 1999), p. 24. 15 Id. p. 32.


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recreation (Ping-pong or bridge) in the front room, and then (at about nine) to bed or to study in your room for as late as you liked…

Our lives in Rome and at the Gregorian University were truly international, a substantial change from my fairly provincial existence in Syracuse and at Notre Dame [where he had been an undergraduate for two years]. At the Gregorian I was sitting in classes with students from every nation on earth—literally. There were forty-seven countries in the world at that time, and there was at least one student from each country at the university. Every single Catholic rite was represented.

…At the university, our classes were in Latin: chemistry, calculus, anthropology, philosophy—you name it. I even studied Hebrew in Latin…Not only were the lectures in Latin, but all the exams and the textbooks, too. I took all my notes in Latin, and typed them up in Latin at the end of the day. To increase our fluency, we always spoke Latin as we walked to and from the university. Hearing Latin four hours a day and reading it another six hours, it was not too long before I could write it as easily as I wrote English…I also studied Italian intensively…

Our daily walks at 3 p.m. were a marvelous, welcomed relief from the rigidity and routine of our studies. Rome is a diverse and fascinating city. On our walks we always wore our cassocks and the traditional round black Roman hat with a wide brim. If it was chilly, we would also wear a long black coat called a douillette…16

Father Gilligan was ordained December 8, 1939, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception,

in Rome, for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.17 After his ordination he returned in June 1940 to Cincinnati and was assigned for a short time to St. William Catholic Parish, Cincinnati.18 As of 1940, his father’s home was at 2627 Moorman Avenue. His first public Mass in the United States was at St. Francis de Sales Church.19

He then became a Secretary to Bishop Joseph Hurley (1894-1967) of the Diocese of St.

Augustine (Florida). Hurley had been a priest of the Diocese of Cleveland where he had been assigned from 1927-1933, and, in 1933, had been assigned as a Secretary to Bishop (later Cardinal) Edward Mooney (1882-1958), a Cleveland native, who was then serving in Japan (after he had served in India) as a Vatican diplomat. Hurley was installed as bishop of St. Augustine in August 1940. (He later returned to the Vatican diplomatic corps and was assigned to Yugoslavia from 1945-1949.) I have not yet found how Fr. Gilligan’s assignment to Bishop Hurley came about.

16 Id., pp. 27-29. 17 Cincinnati Enquirer, June 17, 1940, p.3 (dates of study and date of his return), https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/103953357/ . 18 Regarding St. William: obituary; Archdiocesan personnel card for Fr. Gilligan. 19 Cincinnati Enquirer, June 17, 1940, p 13, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/103953357/ .


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Bishop Joseph Hurley

In Florida, one of Fr. Gilligan’s duties was to serve as the editor of the Florida Catholic.20 The paper had initially been published as a weekly in Miami in 1939 and had moved to St. Augustine in 1942.21 After his 1993 death, one of Fr. Gilligan’s sisters, Kathryn Hall of Deer Park, related that, in Florida, Fr. Gilligan served his bishop by working on the placement of priests in parishes and the military. She told the reporter, “His work for the church was untiring. He helped a lot of people. He visited the sick constantly, people that didn’t have any visitors, he would go and sit with them.”22

From March to May, 1944, Fr. Gilligan was a U.S. Navy chaplain,23 receiving an honorable discharge to accept a post to the Vatican Prisoner of War Information Service in Algiers.24

20 UD Alumnus (University of Dayton), June 1957, p. 4, http://ecommons.udayton.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1142&context=dayton_mag 21 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_Catholic. 22 Obituary. 23 U.S. NAVY CHAPLAIN AND DENOMINATIONS, 1944, http://bluejacket.com/usn_chaplains_1944.html 24 Obituary.


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The caption to the above June 23, 1944, photograph in the The Guardian (now Arkansas Catholic), reads: “Rev. Martin T. Gilligan, priest of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, who is en route to Algiers, Africa, where he will direct the office of the Vatican Information Services. The Algiers office carries on the work of the Holy See on behalf of the civilian and military prisoners in that area, and in its welfare work co-operates with the War Relief Services of the National Catholic Welfare Organization.”25

This assignment to Algiers was the first posting during his two years, 1944-1946, at the Vatican in the Secretariat of State.26 During this time, he was an assistant to Msgr. Walter J. Carroll.27 Msgr. Carroll had established the Algiers Office in 1943 at the behest of Montini who had been directed by Pius XII to create an information office for prisoners of war and refugees.

25 The Guardian (now Arkansas Catholic), June 23, 1944, p. 8, http://arc.stparchive.com/Archive/ARC/ARC06231944p08.php . The Algiers office was “[s]taffed by a group of White Fathers and by members of other religious communities. . .” NCWC News Service, June 10, 1944. 26 The Advocate (Melbourne Australia), Feb. 5, 1953, p. 13, https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-10450-47224347/advocate-melbourne-vic?trp=&trn=organic_google&trl= 27 Cincinnati Enquirer, Feb. 18, 1946, p. 9, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/103437888/,


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During the years of its existence from 1939 until 1947, the office received almost ten million information requests and produced over eleven million answers about missing persons.

As indicated, Msgr. Carroll worked closely with both Montini and Pius XII. During all of the period Fr. Gilligan was working for the Vatican, not just the two years under Msgr. Carrol, but continuing until he left Vatican service in January 1953, Msgr. Montini held the title Substitute for General Affairs (1937–1952).28

Undated picture showing Msgr (he was Bishop as of 1954) Montini standing as Pope Pius XII writes.29

28 Montini worked initially under Secretary of State Cardinal Pacelli who served as Secretary from 1930 until his election in 1939 as Pius XII. Subsequently, Montini retained his same position under Cardinal Maglione. 29 https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papa_Paolo_VI#/media/.


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It is reputed that, when Rome was liberated in June, 1944, Msgr. Carroll went by bike with a message from Pius XII to ask General Mark Clark to come, urgently, for a visit. Carroll and the general went by bike to the Vatican.30

This picture above from early June 1944 at the Vatican does not show Msgr. Carroll and General Mark Clark on bicycle. Perhaps this photo was not taken in association with such a trip.

Msgr. Carroll is in the front passenger seat, with Lt. Gen. Mark Clark in the right back, looking to his right. Maj. Gen. Alfred Gruenther, in the back seat, is looking to his left toward the camera.31 (As it happens, this author and my wife had the pleasure of meeting retired General Gruenther in the mid-1970’s, after he had served ten years as head of the American Red Cross.)

Fr. Gilligan returned to the Vatican from Algiers in July 1944.32 He co-founded the USO

Club of Rome.33 After the war, he collaborated with Msgr. Carroll in the latter’s relief missions to

30 “USO Rome Dates from WWII Encounter Between Pope, General,” July 4, 2014, http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2014/07/04/uso_rome_dates_from_wwii_encounter_between_pope,_general/1102516; Andrea di Stefano and Ann Rodgers, “Pittsburgh Priest Had Role in Liberation of Rome in 1944,” Pittsburgh Catholic, June 7, 2016, http://www.pittsburghcatholic.org/News/Pittsburgh-priest-had-role-in-liberation-of-Rome-in-1944--15161412 ; “About Us,” USO Club of Rome, http://rome.uso.it/Default.aspx?SID=26823777&IID=797&MID=797 (accessed Nov. 5, 2017). 31 Andrea di Stefano and Ann Rodgers, “Pittsburgh Priest Had Role in Liberation of Rome in 1944,” Pittsburgh Catholic, June 7, 2016, http://www.pittsburghcatholic.org/News/Pittsburgh-priest-had-role-in-liberation-of-Rome-in-1944--15161412 32 Finding Aid, Archives of Archdiocese of Cincinnati. 33 Finding Aid, Archives of Archdiocese of Cincinnati.


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Germany and Austria, surveying the needs of concentration camp survivors and displaced people,34 as indicated in the news reports below.

Below: Msgr. Walter J. Carroll in the garden of the Vatican, June, 194435

Msgr. Carroll was chief operative of the Vatican Information Office for POWs. This work had taken him to North Africa in 194336 –

before Fr. Gilligan went to Algiers in 1944.

34 The Guardian (now Arkansas Catholic), July 6, 1945, p. 3 (Fr. Gilligan’s second mission, closely following on first, working with Msgr. Carroll in Milan for Austrian and German refugees), http://arc.stparchive.com/Archive/ARC/ARC07061945p03.php; Andrea di Stefano and Ann Rodgers, “Pittsburgh Priest Had Role in Liberation of Rome,” June 3, 2016, http://diopitt.org/latest-diocesan-news/pittsburgh-priest-had-role-liberation-rome-1944 (“Msgr. Carroll led two papal missions into Austria and Germany to survey needs of concentration camp survivors and displaced people.” ). 35 http://historylink101.com/ww2_color/WorldWarIIChruchServices/PICT0223.html 36 Andrea di Stefano and Ann Rodgers, “Pittsburgh Priest Had Role in Liberation of Rome,” June 3, 2016, http://diopitt.org/latest-diocesan-news/pittsburgh-priest-had-role-liberation-rome-1944


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The following image is from the July 6, 1945, issue of the Arkansas Catholic:37

37 Arkansas Catholic, July 6, 1945, p. 3, col. 5, http://arc.stparchive.com/page_image.php?paper=ARC&year=1945&month=07&day=06&page=2&mode=F&base=ARC07061945p03&title=Arkansas Catholic&logo=http://arc.stparchive.com//images/logo/15050461562011.05.30aclogo-2011.gif


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And the next image is from the August 3, 1945, issue of the Arkansas Catholic.38

In the December 20, 1946, issue of the Arkansas Catholic, it was reported that Fr. Gilligan had been in Rome the previous Christmas (1945). At that Christmas, he had served as one of two masters of ceremony for a Midnight Mass at St. Susanna Church (used by Americans) celebrated by Bishop Hurley who was then preparing to go to Belgrade.39

One of Fr. Gilligan’s assignments was to serve as a member of a six-person team to carry the biglietto, the formal message of Pius XII to four Americans (Glennon, Mooney, Stritch, and

38 Arkansas Catholic, Aug 3, 1945, p. 1, http://arc.stparchive.com/Archive/ARC/ARC08031945p01.php 39 Arkansas Catholic, Dec. 20, 1946, p. 7, http://arc.stparchive.com/Archive/ARC/ARC12201946p19.php.


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Spellman) and two Brazilians of their appointments as cardinals. These were signed by “Substitute Secretary of State” Montini.40

Original Caption: “ROME—Four American churchmen, about to become Cardinals of the Catholic Church, await official word of their notification in 100-Day Room of Palace of Apostolic

Chancellery. Left to right are: John Cardinal Glennon, St. Louis; Edward Cardinal Mooney, Detroit; Samuel Cardinal Stritch, Chicago; Frances Cardinal Spellman, New York.

(Acme Telephoto, Feb. 23, 1946)

Cardinal Stritch (1887-1958) had obtained his bachelor’s degree from St. Gregory’s Seminary in Cincinnati,

where Fr. Gilligan had obtained his.

40 Cincinnati Enquirer, Feb. 18, 1946, p. 9, https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/103437888/; Sam Pope Brewer, “Pope to Raise 32 Prelates To the Cardinalate Today; Designates Will Receive Notification This Afternoon After Secret Consistory-- German Chaplains Urge Clemency,” N.Y. Times, Feb. 18, 1946 (mentioning Fr. Gilligan).


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Original Caption: “Archbishops Mooney and Strict Receiving “Bigliatti” Rome Italy…Officially opening the historic consistory in Rome in which thirty-two

archbishops will enter the College of Cardinals. Archbishops Edward Mooney of Detroit, and Samuel Strict (extreme right) of Chicago, receive the “bigliatti,”

informing the Cardinal-designates that they have become Cardinals. The papal messenger Msgr.41 Martin Gilligan of Cincinnati, Ohio.”

(International News Photo, Feb. 18, 1946)

41 According to his personnel card with the Archives of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, Fr. Gilligan was not made a monsignor until January 1950.


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Original dated Feb. 18, 194642

42 After the author purchased this image from Historic Images, it was lost in the mail.


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The Getty website states that the person Cardinal Glennon is facing is unidentified. We are able to identify the man in a cloak, facing away from the camera,

as then- Father Martin T. Gilligan.

After this consistory, the first held in the seven years since World War II had commenced in 1939, non-Italians outnumbered Italians for the first time in 600 years.43 While New York and Chicago (and Philadelphia and Boston) had previously had Cardinals, these were the first for Detroit and St. Louis. The first Chinese cardinal was also named in this consistory.

43 Sam Pope Brewer, “32 New Cardinals Notified of Titles in Ancient Rites,” N.Y. Times, Feb. 19, 1946.


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.

Thomas Tien Ken-sin (1890-1967), First Chinese Cardinal.

Here are excerpts of the account in the February 19, 1946, issue of the New York Times:44

44 Sam Pope Brewer, “32 New Cardinals Notified of Titles in Ancient Rites,” N.Y. Times, Feb. 19, 1946.


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Before we move on, let me mention that Msgr. Montini visited Msgr. Carroll’s gravesite in Pittsburgh in 1951. (He had died at age 41 in 1950.) Carroll “worked closely with U.S. Gen. Mark Clark, and he was recognized for assisting many Jewish refugees. It was estimated that the figure was more than 800,000.” Through him, the future Pope Paul VI became interested in the United States.45

45 John Franko, “Future Pope Visited Pittsburgh,” Oct. 17, 2014, http://diopitt.org/pittsburgh-catholic/future-pope-visited-pittsburgh;


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Msgr. Carroll and Msgr. Montini

IN CHINA

The Cincinnati Enquirer of July 27, 1946, reported that Fr. Gilligan had a private audience with Pope Pius XII before he left for China with then-Msgr. Antonio Riberi (1897-1967).46 Riberi had served the Vatican in Africa in 1933, until he returned to the Vatican Secretariat of State in 1939. (After he left China in 1951, he served as Apostolic Delegate to Ireland and Spain. He was made a cardinal in 1967 by Paul VI, and died a few months later.)

Let me provide a quick overview of the events in China and Fr. Gilligan’s movements.

The Nationalists (Kuomintang or KMT) established Nanking (now Nanjing) (650 miles to the south of Beijint) as their capital in 1927. It remained so until the Japanese captured the city in December 1937 (after which followed “the rape of Nanking”). The Nationalists relocated their capital to Chungking (now Chongquin) until Japan surrendered, at which time the Nationalists returned to Nanking. After the Japanese surrender in September 1945, Pope Pius XII had, as noted above, named the first Chinese cardinal in February 1946. In April, he established bishoprics in China having territorial jurisdictions named after their urban sees. On July 6, Archbishop Riberi presented his credentials on behalf of the Vatican. Fr. Gillian arrived in Nanking in December 1946.47 Civil war broke out between the Communists and the Nationalists. The Communists captured Nanking on April 21, 1949. The Archbishop continued to reside in Nanking, but Fr. Gilligan relocated 1,000 miles to the southeast coastal city of Canton (now “Guangzhou”) where the Nationalists had retreated. The Nationalists remained in Canton until October 15. At this time,

46 https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/100165749/ 47 It would seem that Fr. Gilligan accompanied Msgr. Riberi, yet there is the anomaly that the latter arrived in July while Fr Gilligan arrived in December.


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Fr. Gilligan moved 100 miles to Hong Kong.48 The Nationalists were in Chungking until November 25, and Chengdu until December 10, at which time they moved to Taiwan. After the Communists declared the People’s Republic in October, 1949, the Archbishop continued to remain in Nanking and hoped to establish diplomatic relations with the new government. But he and the Vatican objected to the Communist interference with Church affairs. This led eventually to Archbishop Riberi’s expulsion.49

Msgr. Antonio Riberi50

Fr. Gilligan took a six-month leave in the last half of 1948 to return to Rome to complete the requirements for his degree in canon law.51

Fr. Gilligan was made a monsignor in 1950.52

48 The movements of Fr. Gilligan are supplied in the NCWS News Service of Jan. 20, 1953, pasted below. 49 See Landry Védrenne, “The Diplomatic Relations between the Holy See and the Republic of China from 1942 to 2012: History, Challenges, and Perspectives” (Master’s thesis, National Chengchi University, 2012), pp. 42-45, http://bibliotecanonica.net/docsaj/btcajg.pdf. 50 http://limone-piemonte.blogspot.com/2015/06/monsignor-antonio-riberi.html 51 NCWC New Service, Nov. 27, 1948. 52 Anniversary Dinner Program, June 12, 1990, French Lick Springs, Indiana, including ordination Class of 1940 (on file with author); NCWC News Service, Feb. 16, 1950 (recently made a monsignor); Personnel card, Archives of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.


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There is a published overview of Fr. Gilligan’s tour of duty in China. After it was concluded, the NCWS News Service issued the following report on January 20, 1953. He made a stopover in Australia and the Australian press sketched his time in China, as follows:53

The report continued: From 1947 to 1953, Monsignor Gilligan was the Military Vicar Delegate

for the Catholics in the U.S. Armed Forces in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macao. Likewise, he was the China Representative of War Relief Services-National Catholic Welfare Conference of the United States.

In this latter capacity he found the opportunity to obtain vital and useful aid for the thousands of northern refugees who escaped from communist China to Taiwan and Hong Kong.

Monsignor Gilligan upon his resignation from his office now returns to work for souls in his own diocese, a task to which he has long desired to devote

53 NCWC News Service, Jan. 20, 1953; “Hong Kong Papal Secretary Returns to U.S.A.”, The Advocate (Melbourne Australia), Feb. 5, 1953, p 13, https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-10450-47224347/advocate-melbourne-vic?trp=&trn=organic_google&trl=:


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his time. The genuine appreciation of Monsignor Gilligan’s work was shown by the stream of visitors who poured into his office on the morning of departure and by the priests of every Order and congregation who accompanied him to the airfield.

When Fr. Gilligan was in Hong Kong, he was working with Hong Kong Bishop Valtorta

(1883-1951) and Maryknoll Bishop James E. Walsh, M.M. (1891-1981), then General Secretary of the Catholic Central Bureau in China, who was working in Shanghai, to find placements for priests, religious and seminarians outside China.54

Bishop Valtorta, a native of Italy, first Bishop of the Diocese of Hong Kong. He spent his entirely ministry, from 1907, to his death in 1951, in China.55

54 NCWC News Service, May 20, 1949. 55 Archives of the Diocese of Hong Kong, https://web.archive.org/web/20050817222824/http://archives.catholic.org.hk/administrators/valtorta.htm


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Archives Mount St. Mary’s University

Bishop James E. Walsh, 1930

Bishop Walsh arrived in China from the United States in 1918.

He was consecrated a bishop in 1927 at age 36. In 1951, the Communist Chinese closed down his Catholic Central Bureau.

In 1956, he was placed under house arrest. He was sentenced in 1958 and released in 1970 at age 79.

In a report dated June 10, 1950, Msgr. Gilligan told a reporter “There are almost 14,000

Catholic missionaries” in China. “This figure includes priests, Brothers and Sisters, Chinese and foreign…The Catholic missionaries have remained at their posts at almost full strength.” He continued:

This, of course, is as it should be, for we do believe in lasting and unchanging truth, and we do profess faith in the ultimate triumph of right and truth. In a word, we believe in God and we affirm that this is God’s world. This singular record of the Catholic missionaries in China is a logical conclusion of everything in which they believe and to which they are dedicated.


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Why have these 14,000 missionaries remained in China? There is a temptation to answer this question by denying all the false charges which are made about thee missionaries. I prefer her just to affirm positively, in simple and plain language, the principal reasons why our missionaries remained at their posts.

They did so, first, because of their sincere friendship for the Chinese people. The missionary can never be a merely foreign missionary He is not an ordinary foreigner, but he is one who gives up his native land and home and adopts the land and livelihood of the people to whom he ministers. He is more interested in the universality and unity of the human family than in even the legitimate national barriers which exist amongst men. The missionary dedicates his life to the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.

I know of no other class of people who are so practically and so totally dedicated to this ideal. The missionary becomes a part of the land of his adoption and he is bound by the ties of sincere friendship with the people of that land. He considers that people his own flock. On the basis of this sincere friendship, the missionary will not desert his people in time of trouble. Our missionaries remained with their people because they are friends of those people. The fact that they remained is proof of the sincerely of their friendship.

The second reason why our Catholic missionaries remained is that this is a part of the age-old Catholic tradition. The Church takes the spiritual life of man very seriously. From century to century, in peace and in war, she has affirmed the primary importance of the spiritual man as against the animal man, the economic man or the political man. In the Catholic tradition the soul of man is supreme importance. No matter what exterior circumstances prevail in human society, the Church will continue her mission to souls.

The third reason might be attributed to the discipline and organization of the Catholic Church. The Church has no police force, no armies, no bombs of any kind. But the Church does command free obedience and the Church does have a recognized leader. We are witnesses in China today a magnificent example of how serene and fruitful discipline and organization carries on in time of crisis, in obedience, in patience, in hope.56

On August 31, 1950, Fr. Gilligan was anxious to report that the Church in China was not dead or dying. “The simple fact is that the Church in China, in keeping with Catholic tradition, is continuing to live her life and to do her work as best she can.” He reported that the Church was “carrying on through its 140 dioceses, its 150 bishops, its 40 religious orders of men and its 90-odd congregations of religious women in China.” There were, he said, “254 Catholic orphanages in operation, over 200 hospitals and almost 1,000 medical dispensaries.”57

56 NCWC News Service, June 10, 1950. 57 NCWC News Service, Aug. 31, 1950.


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The following image is from the September 14, 1951, edition of The Guardian (now Arkansas Catholic), page 6. The boldfaced segment reports that, when Archbishop Riberi arrived in Hong Kong on September 8, 1951, after a four-day train trip accompanied by guards, Fr. Gilligan was there.58

58 Accord New York Times, Sept. 9, 1951.


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The above is not from the Arkansas Catholic. It shows Archbishop Riberi crossing into Hong Kong.

In December, 1952, Fr. Gilligan reported that there were one million people in Hong Kong

who “fear, with good reason, the loss of their freedom and their lives, if certain changes were to take place,” referring to a possible Communist takeover of Hong Kong.59 Fr. Gilligan typed out, on 2-1/2 pages, double-spaced, a statement of the situation as it then existed and entitled it: “Christmas 1952 – China – Hong Kong.” There is no indication of the identity of the intended audience. It would seem to be a “Christmas letter” that people routinely send to their friends, but it doesn’t say so. And it gives no personal information about Fr. Gilligan, including the fact that he has resigned from the Vatican diplomatic corps and would be returning to the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.

CHRISTMAS 1952 CHINA – HONGKONG

It is the task of a small group of priests in Hongkong to record the nearest

possible thing to an eye-witness account of the persecution of the Church in the ancient land across the border from this tiny British Colony. Much of this is a saddening job. A look at the Church in China from this island of refuge on the

59 NCWC News Service, Dec. 4, 1952.


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edge of Eastern Asia presents a sad Christmas picture, but it is sadness relieved by evidence of deep faith and great constancy. Christmas 1952 in China, with its broken altars, imprisoned bishops and priests and persecuted faithful, is still Christmas with both the sorrow and joyful hope of Bethlehem.

In the past year over eleven hundred missionaries have been forced out of China. Two archbishops and two bishops have died in prison and fourteen more bishops are in jail; three others are under house arrest and in this past year forty-three bishops have been expelled. In a word, the Church’s hierarchy in China is under unrelenting attack. Priests in China share the lot of their bishops; twenty-four of them have died in prison this year, one hundred foreign priests and two hundred Chinese priests have been thrown into unbelievably dirty and crowded jails. These are figures which we know of in Hongkong, the actual numbers are certainly higher. As for the unknown soldiers – the Chinese Catholic laity who have been executed, imprisoned or impoverished – their names are known to God alone.

For two entire years the persecution in China has raged, now fiercely, now quietly, but inexorably. The first year of the Communist “liberation” was calm, but in December 1950 the attack on the Church was launched simultaneously all over the land. The missioners expelled from China since that time bring to Hongkong enough of the story to provide the pattern but not the whole story. Three points made by the expellees recur over and over again: First, the Faith is strong in China and provides a living demonstration of the divine quality of the Church. Secondly, what has happened in China can happen anywhere and the survival of the Church in any land depends more on deep Faith than on any other factor. Thirdly, it is the Chinese bishops, priests and people who will remain in China and face the worst; for them there is Hongkong gateway to freedom

This Christmas in China will have little of the traditional external manifestation of the Christmas spirit, but, nonetheless, several million of them will observe the day. The Church has given her priests the widest faculties and privileges to ensure the consolations of religion to the greatest possible number. There will be few midnight Masses, but there will be Mass at literally all hours and in many places. There will be general absolutions60 and hidden ceremonies of praise and hope. Young men and women will risk their freedom to carry the Blessed Sacrament61 to prisoners and to the sick, and, here and there, wherever local conditions permit, there will be Christmas cribs and prayers, and even an occasional Christmas feast offered to the priest by his faithful people.

60 “General absolutions” are Confessions made under emergency conditions. Father William Corby, C.S.C., (1833-1897), later a president of the University of Notre Dame, issued one on the field at Gettysburg, to the Irish Brigade. The scene of Fr. Corby blessing the troops was depicted in the 1891 painting of Paul Wood, Absolution Under Fire, and was dramatized in the 1993 film Gettysburg. 61 Consecrated hosts of bread.


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Of special concern to this writer are his three hundred brother priests, Chinese and foreign, who will celebrate the birthday of Christ in chains. For them there will be no Mass, no Eucharist, no Breviary,62 often no rosary beads. For them there is the apostolate of imprisonment, suffering and silence in union with the Babe of Bethlehem as they bear their own eloquent witness to the Truth of Christianity and of the Church. If Catholic priests and people in Hongkong and around the world will glance toward China, they will see a compelling Christmas story valid for all the world and for the entire year.

We who live in Hongkong have special reasons for pondering what Christmas means in China this year. We see in this free and hospitable Colony much evidence of the pattern of persecution. Sometimes there is a temptation to be depressed by all of this. Christmas reminds us that God so loved the world as to send His only Son to be a Savior. Christmas recalls that after all it is God’s world, that China and Hongkong and the world belong to God, and that He will never forget it.

“Fear not; for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy that that shall be to all the people: For this day is born to you a Savior Who is Christ the Lord.”

62 Daily prayers recited by all priests and vowed religious.


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Archives of Archdiocese of Cincinnati

Above: Fr. Martin T. Gilligan seated far left in December 1952, a month before his departure from China.

On January 20, 1953, Jesuit Father Albert O’Hara, reported from Hong Kong on Fr.

Gilligan’s departure from China. In addition to his role with the Vatican, Fr. Gilligan had served from 1947 to his departure as the “Military Vicar Delegate” for the Catholics in the U.S. Armed Forces in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macao, and also as the China Representative of War Relief Services – National Catholic Welfare Conference of the United States. “The genuine appreciation of Monsignor Gilligan’s work was shown by the stream of visitors who poured into his office on the morning of departure and by the priests of every Order and congregation who accompanied him to the airfield.”63

Before returning to the U.S., Fr. Gilligan made a final report to the Vatican.64 Sometime in 1953, Pope Pius XII awarded him the Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice (For Church and Pontiff) medal.65

63 NCWC News Service, Jan. 20, 1953. 64 NCWC News Service, Feb. 14, 1953. 65 UD Alumnus (Univ. of Dayton), June, 1957, p. 4. Fr. Gilligan delivered sermon at baccalaureate Mass. http://ecommons.udayton.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1142&context=dayton_mag


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ASSISTING CHINESE REFUGEES

Let me ask some questions about Father Gilligan’s assisting Chinese religious out of Hong Kong with false Vatican papers and I’ll tell you what I know.

1. Whom did Fr. Gilligan help? According to Msgr. Gilligan’s eulogy, it was priests and religious (sisters, presumably also brothers). I don’t know about bishops. And I don’t know about any laity, including those who worked for the Church such as catechists, office staff, etc.

2. How many did he help? As noted above, Msgr. Breslin said “thousand” in his eulogy, but a 1953 report quoted above said “thousands.”66 Precisely, it said, “vital and useful aid for the thousands of northern refugees who escaped from communist China to Taiwan and Hong Kong.”

3. What did a false passport look like and how was it made? Msgr. Breslin said they were official-looking documents that employed expensive leather and vellum. I have some information on this below.

4. Over what period of time did Fr. Gilligan do this? As stated above, it would not have been earlier than when Fr. Gilligan arrived in Hong Kong, about Oct. 15, 1949, and not later than when he departed in early January, 1953.

5. Did it continue under his successor after his departure? I have no information on this. 6. What means of transportation did the people Fr. Gilligan help take out of Hong Kong? There

were commercial flights67 and ships from which to choose. 7. To what countries did they go? I have no information. 8. Who paid for the creation of the false papers and who paid for their transportation? I have no

information. 9. Did Fr. Gilligan alone create the false papers and making arrangements for transportation?

Since he may have aided as many as eight per week, or more, it is unlikely that he worked alone. Who helped him? I have no information. They may have, or may not have, included people who worked in his office.

10. In what languages did Fr. Gilligan and his aides work? I have not found any information about the language(s) used in Fr. Gilligan’s office in Hong Kong. The languages used in Hong Kong were, and are, English and Cantonese. Given that he had been in China since 1946, he may have picked up some of the Chinese languages, perhaps Mandarin. As indicated above, he was fluent in Latin and Italian, as would be any priests who were educated in Rome. Fr. Gilligan was also fluent in French.68

11. Where did Fr. Gilligan, or his aides, create the false papers? I have no information. I provide below some information about his office.

66 “Hong Kong Papal Secretary Returns to U.S.A.”, The Advocate (Melbourne Australia), Feb. 5, 1953, p 13, https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-10450-47224347/advocate-melbourne-vic?trp=&trn=organic_google&trl=: 67 As to flights, Qantas, for example, inaugurated its Australia-Hong Kong service on June 26, 1949. John Gunn, CHALLENGING HORIZONS: QUANTAS 1939-1954 p. 257 (1987). 68 Email of Nov. 17, 2017, to the author from Rev. Gerald Haemmerle


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12. Is there anyone alive who helped him or whom he helped? There should be. If such a person were 18 in 1952, and therefore born in 1934, such a person would now be 83 years old.

13. Did any Vatican precedent inspire Fr. Gilligan? Had he been aware, by 1951, of the activities of the Vatican diplomat, Irish Msgr. Hugh O’Flaherty, who protected 4,000 Allied POWs from capture by the Nazis in Rome? (His exploits are portrayed by Gregory Peck in the film The Scarlet and the Black (1983).) Or did he know, by 1951, of the Jews hidden in Castel Gondolfo, monasteries, convents, colleges, private homes, and as supposed members of the Palatine Guard?69

14. What did Pius XII and the future Paul VI know of Fr. Gilligan’s activities, and when did they learn it?

Fr. Gilligan’s Office

Fr. Gilligan’s correspondence from 1951 and 1952 bears the following address: King’s Building, 8 Connaught Road, Hong Kong. This location is now occupied by Chater House and it is now inland from Victoria Harbor because of landfill. In Fr. Gilligan’s time, however, it was on the water.

69 See the research undertaken by Pave the Way Foundation, www.ptwf.com.


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1928 Postcard. King’s Building is on the water, far left.70

Here are two street views:

Library of Congress

Hong Kong Post Office Building; Connaught Road Central, c. 1923

70 https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:King%27s_Building_(Hong_Kong)#/media/File:Hong_Kongfromtheharbour_c1920.JPG. The following shows that the King’s Building is to the far left, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:King%27s_Building_(Hong_Kong)#/media/File:Hong_Kongfromtheharbour_c1920_cropped.jpg


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Connaught Road in the 1930s71

Vatican Passports

Paul Good was sworn in as a member of the Swiss Guard on May 6, 1950. He is now retired and there is an online source with his passport. I cannot decipher the year. It looks like 1949. (The month and day are November 14.) Perhaps it was issued to him before he was formally admitted in 1950.72

71 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connaught_Road#/media/File:Blake_Pier_West.jpg. 72 Father Richard Kunst, “Paul Good: A Swiss Guard’s Gift to Papal Artifacts,” http://www.papalartifacts.com/portfolio-item/paul-good/


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Outside Cover


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Inside Cover


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And below is a formal Vatican document signed by Archbishop Riberi issued to a nun in Nanking on December 28, 1949, who was leaving for her native Germany, via the Philippines, with plans to return. It’s in English.73

73 https://www.passport-collector.com/2-vatican-passports/ . To repeat the chronology stated above: The Communists captured Nanking on April 21, 1949. The Archbishop continued to reside in Nanking, but Fr. Gilligan relocated 1,000 miles to the southeast coastal city of Canton (now “Guangzhou”).


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AFTER CHINA

When Fr. Gilligan returned to the United States, Archbishop John T. McNicholas, O.P. (b. 1877, archbishop 1925-1950) had died, in 1950. The new archbishop was Karl J. Alter (1885-1977; archbishop, 1950-1969). During his 19 years as archbishop, the Catholic population of the archdiocese grew from 300,000 to 500,000. Archbishop Alter established 98 churches, 94 elementary schools, 14 high schools (one of which, Archbishop Alter H.S., Kettering, Ohio, this author attended), 79 rectories, and 55 convents.74

74 Toledo Blade. 1977-08-23. (quoted in wiki entry for Alter).


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Archbishop Karl J. Alter of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati (1885-1977; archbishop, 1950-1969)

Father Gilligan, probably 195775

75 UD Alumnus (Univ. of Dayton), June, 1957, p. 4. Delivered sermon at baccalaureate Mass. http://ecommons.udayton.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1142&context=dayton_mag


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For a while, Fr. Gilligan continued to speak and write publicly about affairs in China. For example, there was the NCWS New Service report from Cincinnati of April 2, 1953:

“Communism is not being brushed over China just like a thin veneer, but like a dye it is being forced deep into the fabric of the country and its people.”

This warning was sounded here by Mgr. Martin T. Gilligan, former secretary of the Papal Internunciature to China, who has now returned to the United States.

The Monsignor cautioned against the idea that Communism is just a passing thing which is not taking root in China. He noted that the Communists have one of the most efficient propaganda set-ups in the world and are using it wisely to propagate their ideology and indoctrinate the people in its basic concepts.

Mgr. Gilligan based his convictions on his own close study from Hong Kong of Communist events in China and his lengthy interviews with some 2,000 Catholic missionaries expelled from the Red mainland.

The Reds are deadly earnest in their determination that all Chinese citizens understand Communist principles and work for their application in China, the former Papal diplomat stressed. They are doing a good job of spreading their doctrines both "vertically and horizontally," he said, explaining:

“The Reds are getting their ideas to all the people, and they apparently are making them sink in through force, deception, and all the tricks of total control.”

Mgr. Gilligan emphasized that the Red indoctrination of the youth is particularly thorough. "It is their constant food in schools. They may skip ordinary school subjects on the slightest pretext. But they may not absent themselves from the indoctrination class, even if they have to drag themselves from their sick bed."

The communist propaganda system presents tremendous challenge to the Church, the priest said. We of the Church must go far to produce one as effective as that of the Reds.

Turning to the condition of the Church in China, the priest said it is suffering “a collective martyrdom” The Reds are in fact trying hard not to make martyrs of individuals, he noted, but they are in effect “martyring the Church as a whole. They are trying to kill the entire Church because of their hatred for the Faith and of their fanatic devotion to their own cause—world revolution.”

In its external form the Church has been almost completely demolished in China, Monsignor Gilligan related. Its real life is now in the hearts of the faithful, and this life is stronger than ever.

The regime’s devastation of the Church can be compared to that of a bull in a china shop. But in this case the wreckage occurred because the bull failed to see Red, the priest noted. Bishops, priests and Religious have been killed, imprisoned or expelled. Schools, churches, hospitals, dispensaries and orphanages


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have been confiscated or closed. In many dioceses the ministry must be carried on in secret.

“But the faith of the Catholics have been strengthened under the Red persecution,” the priest said. “The lay people have devised ingenious ways of receiving the Sacraments from imprisoned priests or those in hiding. Wherever the Catholic lay people have shown any weakness or wavering it is not a choice of open apostasy but rather of temporarily submitting until they can find a way out. The heroic suffering and faith of the laity are the Church’s greatest promises of a glorious future in China when Red tyranny has passed. Nonetheless the persecuted Catholics in China cry out to the free world for prayers.”76 Two months later, Fr. Gilligan delivered the baccalaureate sermon at Our Lady of

Cincinnati College. He spoke of the “perennial vitality of the Catholic Church” that had “weathered 20 centuries.” He spoke of “the China story” which was that “of the Church’s greatest missionary effort – a campaign to convert almost 500,000,000 persons” and that there were 3.5 million Catholics, 3,000 Chinese priests and 4,000 Chinese nuns. But now there were 3,000 foreign missionaries expelled, 50 bishops expelled, over 500 priests in prison, and more than 200 bishops and priests killed. He saw the 3,000 expelled missionaries as a way that God “is talking to the world through China.”77

The New York Times carried this letter to the editor by him in its January 31, 1954, issue:

Robert Payne’s review of “Nun in Red China” by Sister Mary Victoria says that the persecution of Catholics in China is merely the result of “that vast surge of anti-foreign feeling which accompanied the Communists to power.” May I suggest that it is not so.

Those of us who have been engaged in keeping the record of Catholic Missions in China have found that the Chinese Catholics, clerical and lay, have suffered far more intensively and extensively, than their foreign colleagues. Seven hundred Chinese priests are known to be in jail today, generally for refusing to turn Judas by joining the puppet “Independent National Catholic Church.” More than one hundred Chinese priests are known to have died at the hands of the Communists in the past six years. The foreign Catholic missionaries are expelled via free Hong Kong, that glorious little isle of asylum and freedom on the edge of doom, while their Chinese brethren are left at best to rot in squalid prisons. Our experience has been that it is not foreign influence which the Reds primarily attack and fear but its religion, and the native Catholics suffer first and worse. Xenophobia is not the answer.

76 NCWC News Service, April 2, 1953; Southern Cross (Adelaide, South Australia), June 12, 1953, https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-10450-51925121/southern-cross-adelaide-sa 77 NCWC News Service, June 2, 1953.


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* * *[Omissions shown in orig.] And I dare say that no free reporter in Hong Kong today would subscribe to Mr. Payne’s choice of word “depressing in referring to the Chinese Communist treatment of Christian missionaries. Rather, the Red war on religion is in moderate language “an outrage against man and God.

--Msgr. Martin T. Gilligan, former Secretary of the Vatican Legation in China; former Director of the Papal Office in Hong Kong.

Cincinnati, Ohio After a few assignments in the chancery (the archbishop’s office) of the Archdiocese, Fr.

Gilligan was made pastor of Our Lady of Loreto Parish.78 On June 9, 1953, the same day he was appointed pastor of Our Lady of Loreto, he was made an assistant director the National Society for the Propagation of the Faith,79 then headed by Bishop, now Venerable, Fulton J. Sheen (1895-1979), with whom he had corresponded from China.

78 NCWC News Service, Oct. 22 and Nov. 27, 1953; Cincinnati Enquirer, July 15, 1953, p.7 (announcement), https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/103294036/ 79 Personnel card, Archdiocese of Cincinnati. I have not yet learned his duties in this position nor his length of tenure. The Society’s archives appear to contain a letter from Archbishop Harold W. Henry (1909-1976), S.S.C.M.E. (Columban), of Cheju, South Koreau, to Msgr. Martin T. Gilligan, dated Dec. 10, 1975. Mary J. Oates, THE CATHOLIC PHILANTHROPIC TRADITION IN AMERICA 202, n.90 (1995), but there are no further records with the Pontifical Missions Societies offices in New York or Cincinnati.


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Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, 1952

National Director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, 1950-1966

Consecrated an Auxiliary Bishop for the Archdiocese of New York, June 11, 1951 Weekly Television Program (when TV was new), 1951-1957

(30 million viewers in 1950 population of 150 million) Declared Venerable June 28, 201280

Fr. Gilligan founded St. Luke Catholic Parish, Beavercreek, Ohio, in 1956; was assigned

as pastor to Sacred Heart Catholic Parish in Dayton in 1961; founded St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Parish, Kettering in 1962; and in 1974 was assigned as pastor of St. Henry Catholic Parish, Moraine (outside Dayton), retiring in 1989 at age 75, when he took up residence at Christ the King Parish, Cincinnati. He died June 21, 1993, at age 79, and is buried in Calvary Cemetery.

80 Frank Maurovich, “Archbishop Sheen Brought Missions to Vatican II,” Catholic New York, Oct. 18, 2012, http://cny.org/stories/Archbishop-Sheen-Brought-Missions-to-Vatican-II,8292 (Bishop donated $10 million to the Society; he made 16 “interventions” in the four years the Council met (1962-1965)).


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St. Charles Borromeo Parish

The first Mass celebrated at St. Charles in its original church, August, 1964, and used as the parish church until 1993.81

In 1966, while Fr. Gilligan was pastor, St. Charles opened an addition to its school, consisting of 23 classrooms and “Walsh Hall.”82 It was named after Maryknoll Bishop James E. Walsh, M.M., who was then a prisoner of the Communist Chinese.

81 http://stcharles-kettering.org/school/about-us/history-tradition/ 82 St. Charles, History and Timeline, http://stcharles-kettering.org/church/about-us/history/ (date); Tribute by Fr. Hammerle to Fr. Gilligan, St. Charles Light, Issue #1, January 2012 (reason for name of building).


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1966 Excalibur Yearbook of Alter H.S.

Father (later Msgr.) Lawrence K. Breslin. He was an assistant pastor to Fr. Gilligan at St. Charles Borromeo Parish.

He delivered the eulogy at Fr. Gilligan’s 1993 funeral.

St. Charles Borromeo Parish

Msgr. Lawrence Breslin, far right, appointed the third pastor of St. Charles, 1986. Fr. Gilligan is in center.


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Msgr. Martin T. Gilligan Knights of Columbus Council

Fr. Martin T. Gilligan (1914-1993)

POST SCRIPT

After reading Fr. Gilligan’s reports on China, we should ask what has changed in the 65 years since Fr. Gilligan departed from China. Yes, the economy of the Communist People’s Republic of China has improved. And no, the relationship between the Communist government and the Catholic Church has not improved. The Communists continue to imprison bishops, priests and lay Catholics. Just one example: Bishop Cosma Shi Enxiang died in prison in early 2015 after being held in secret for 14 years. Consider two things: first, his age, 80 when he was imprisoned, and, secondly, he was held during those 14 years under the presidencies of Jiang Zemin (1993-2003), Hu Jingtao (2003-2013), and Xi Jingping (2013-present).

It is important for us to use the names and faces of our persecuted brothers and sisters, so I paste a picture of the Bishop below. He was 94 when he died. He had been ordained in 1947, during Fr. Gilligan’s tenure in China. He spent at least 40 years in prison.83 May 24 is the Catholic Church’s World Day of Prayer for China.

83 Nina Shea, “Cosma Shi Enxiang: Catholic Bishop Dies After 40 Years in Communist Prison,” The Christian Post, Feb. 6, 2015, https://www.christianpost.com/news/cosma-shi-enxiang-catholic-bishop-dies-after-40-years-in-communist-prison-133689/ ; Michael Forsythe, “Questions Rise on Fate of Catholic Bishop,” N.Y. Times, Feb. 13, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/14/world/asia/chinese-catholics-seek-answers-to-fate-of-bishop-cosma-shi-enxiang.html


Dec. 8, 2017

Cosma (sometimes “Cosmas”) Shi Enxiang,84 1920-2015

Bishop of Yixian (Yisien)

Not only Catholics of course are persecuted. The Communists continue to imprison other Christians and raze their churches. They prosecute journalists, lawyers, activists, Tibetans. They continue to support North Korea, as they did during the 1950-52 Korean War. They continue to claim sovereignty over Taiwan.

And there are many new bad developments since Fr. Gilligan’s time in China. Here are a few:

The Communists adopted the “one-child policy” in 1979, that is, a couple needed governmental permission to bear children. With this policy came coerced abortion.85 It was only slightly modified in 2015.

Falun Gong didn’t exist until 1992. Practitioners have been prosecuted since 1999. The Communists have been in charge of Hong Kong since 1997. The Internet has come to China, but the government places restrictions on its content. There is now technology, like facial recognition, for the government to use to spy on its

residents. China’s military growth has been exercised in the South China Sea, contrary to the claims

made by Brunei, Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam.

84 Photo from Bernardo Cervellera, “Beijing hides the body of bishop Cosma Shi Enxiang: too "dangerous," AsiaNews, Feb. 9, 2015, http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Beijing-hides-the-body-of-bishop-Cosma-Shi-Enxiang:-too-dangerous-33415.html 85 Then Vice President Joseph Biden, a Catholic, infamously said, on Chinese soil in 2011, that he “understood” the Chinese policy.


Dec. 8, 2017

In October, the Communists entrenched the “though” of Xi Jinping the current president and chairman of the Party.86

There have been reports of Communist China influencing New Zealand politics87 and Australian publishing.88

Given this history of, and current, violations of human rights, there is certainly at least irony

in American, Western entities – companies, universities -- flocking to the People’s Republic, while such entities are boycotting American entities who trade with Israel, or Indiana and North Carolina over their “bathroom” laws.

86 See Simon Denyer, “Chinese Universities Scramble to Open Centers to Study President Xi Jinping Thought,” N.Y. Times, Nov. 2, 2017. 87 Charlotte Graham, “A New Zealander Lawmaker’s Spy-Linked Past Raises Alarms on China’s Reach, N.Y. Times, Oct. 4, 2017. 88 Jacqueline Williams, “Australian Furor Over Chinese Influence Follows Book’s Delay,” N.Y. Times, Nov. 20, 2017(delay in publishing esteemed author Clive Hamilton’s SILENT INVASION: HOW CHINA IS TURNING AUSTRALIA

INTO A PUPPET STATE).

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