Tom Harpur 4-Book Bundle. Tom Harpur
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it all much better than I had thought he would. Perhaps he was secretly rather relieved. He even ordered a second Scotch as he gave his consent and wished me well. We continued on the very best of terms throughout his term as bishop and mine as religion editor for the Toronto Star.
When a notice of my decision to “leave the active use of holy orders,” as it was described in official Church language, appeared in the monthly Anglican publication The Journal, two or three Toronto clergy called to chat about it. (Anglican doctrine, as in the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions, holds that “once a priest, forever a priest.” The reasoning behind this is that ordination by a bishop in the Apostolic Succession confers upon the recipient an indelible character, character indebilis, which remains. Thus my action was described as giving up the use of holy orders, not the reality itself.) Their major concern was that I would feel a great sense of loss, particularly since I would no longer be officiating at the Eucharist, or Holy Communion. I assured them that I truly felt a new sense of freedom. I told them this was especially important to me because I hoped soon to write a book, together with a regular opinion column in which I would most likely be compelled by new insights and convictions to take positions that would at times conflict directly with official Anglican dogma and practice. As I was convinced that the Eucharist (for Roman Catholics, the Mass) was one of the most poorly worded and misunderstood parts of the ritual or liturgy, I shocked them a little by saying I didn’t think I would miss celebrating it very much at all. The honest truth is, I never have. Over the years that followed, my understanding of “the ministry,” like so many other things, broadened and deepened enormously as I came to see that through my writing and work in mass media it was possible to reach and in effect minister to a far larger parish than would ever have been reachable had I remained in a much more traditional role.
All columnists have critics and enemies. Some of these tried to circulate a rumour that I had been “unfrocked” by Garnsworthy. Nothing could have been more untrue.
Significantly, the one person I hadn’t discussed this whole matter with was my then wife. When I finally told her, she became quite upset. We had sadly by this point reached that stage in the marriage where almost anything of major importance became a battleground.
Nobody was really surprised when the news came from Rome in the late spring of 1979 that Most Reverend G. Emmett Carter, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Toronto, had been named a cardinal by the new Pope. The Star immediately hired a small plane to take a photographer to London, Ontario, the new cardinal’s old stompin’ ground, where it had been learned he would be playing tennis all that day with a staff member of St. Peter’s Seminary. I wrote a story and it appeared with a large photo of His Eminence in full tennis garb in action on the court. I learned later that there had been a last-minute panic at the photo desk when the editor noticed that the fly on Carter’s shorts was definitely not zipped up. Judicious touch-ups were required.
A few days following the announcement of his promotion, the Chancery Office sent out a press release outlining the date in June set for the induction in Rome of several new cardinals into the Church’s highest office next to that of the papacy itself. The release also stated that a commercial jet was being chartered to take the archbishop, some aides, a couple of score of Canadian Catholic dignitaries, plus a full press corps from Toronto to Rome for the ceremony. The managing editor came to my office to give me the word that I would be going and that proper accreditation was being sent by courier that afternoon. Ron Bull, a Star photographer and a friend of long standing with whom I had often worked on previous stories at home and abroad, was to be part of our team as well.
The trip to Rome in June 1979 produced little hard news, but I did get to know Cardinal Carter a lot better, particularly during a lengthy interview on the plane going over. We were just over an hour out from the ETA at Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci–Fiumicino Airport when the Chancery Office press secretary, Father Brad Massman, came back to where I was sitting and whispered in my ear that the cardinal-elect was inviting me to come forward and join him in the front row. Carter greeted me warmly and said he thought my readers might be interested in an interview on the eve of his being elevated as a prince of the Church. I was, of course, only too happy to seize the opportunity. It was obvious that in Rome, once he was caught up in the preparations and in the event itself, there would be little if any chance for a truly one-on-one conversation.
Before going any further, I should note for anyone not already aware that the College of Cardinals is unique in many ways but most notably in the function it has of electing his successor upon the death of a Pope. The word cardinal itself comes from the Latin word cardo, “a hinge.” The members of the College of Cardinals are the critical hinge upon which the institution itself depends when the crisis of a vacancy in the succession occurs.
When I joined him, Carter was in a very expansive mood and went on at considerable length about his new role and about how he would have much greater influence than ever before on the Canadian scene. He made it clear he now saw himself as about to become one of the prominent movers and shakers of Canadian society. The message was that he was going to be given genuine power and that he fully intended to wield it for the benefit of his Church as well as for the wider common good. I had always liked Carter in the past, even though he often seemed more like a chairman of some large corporation than a leading spiritual figure. But in this interview the impression was of a very large ego about to become much larger, with a dash of potentially manipulative scheming thrown in.
As the outskirts of the city of Rome itself appeared beneath us and word came to prepare for landing, I fired off a quick question about the issue of religion in the schools. Now that Ontario premier Bill Davis had given full financial support to the separate schools in Ontario, did Carter not feel it was only just for the Catholic bishops to go to bat with the Ontario government to seek extension of funding to all religious schools—Jewish, Anglican and the rest? He said he agreed with that position and that he and the bishops would do that sometime in the near future. Of course, that never happened, and when the Progressive Conservative leader of the day, John Tory, made it a central plank of his platform in the Ontario election of 2007, he and his party were soundly defeated at the polls.
I thanked Archbishop Carter warmly and went back to my seat for landing.
The weather was glorious, with Rome at its very best. The pomp and ceremony was colourful and stirring—even moving at times. There is a reason that Italy has produced such great operas and opera stars: Italians have a natural gift for drama and music, and the Vatican, with its history, its setting and its resources, knows how to put on a show. Very few assignments were as wholly enjoyable and as soft to cover as that one turned out to be, and I was glad to have had the privilege. Spiritually speaking, however, I had to wonder seriously what all the pomp and show seen up close had to do with the Gospels or a true religion of the heart.
I heard indirectly in due time that the cardinal was pleased overall with my reporting on his receiving the cardinal’s hat. However, our relationship took a sharp downturn over my critique of John Paul II later in the same year and culminated in a showdown of sorts a few months afterwards. I received a note from press secretary Massman saying the cardinal wanted me to call his office and offer a date on which we could meet for a chat. It sounded a little ominous, but I was naturally keen to keep the door to communication open and so went along with the idea. When the day arrived, I was shown into his large outer office (where he conducted most of his business affairs) and told to wait. Carter soon afterwards opened the door to his inner sanctum, a smaller, more private yet elegant setting reserved for confidential consultations, discussions and decision making. I recall seeing a marble bust of Pope John Paul II on top of the bookcase as I entered. It was inscribed as a gift from Premier Bill Davis.
The cardinal seemed sterner than I remembered ever seeing him before, and he grew sterner still as the encounter went on. He told me he thought I had been slanting my writing against Roman Catholicism in general and the Vatican in particular in recent months. He said this was most noticeable whenever I added a personal column to the religion page but that he felt its presence elsewhere as well. There was more, but that was the gist of the matter.
Apart from the minor tension once with Anglican Archbishop Garnsworthy, I had never been fully leaned on by any religious leader before, but as our