Joseph Patrick Hurley

Biography

Early life

Joseph Hurley was born on January 21, 1894, in Cleveland, Ohio, one of nine children of Michael and Anna (née Durkin) Hurley. His parents were both Irish immigrants; Michael was from County Mayo, and Anna from Sligo. Hurley received his early education at Holy Name School from 1901 to 1909, and then attended St. Ignatius High School in Cleveland until 1912. He was the only one among his siblings to continue his education past age 16. Hurley applied to the US Military Academy at West Point, nominated by U.S. Representative Robert J. Bulkley. However, the nomination was disallowed when the US Army discovered that Hurley was not a resident of Bulkley's 21st congressional district.

Hurley attended John Carroll University in Cleveland from 1912 to 1915. At John Carroll, he was president of the College Debating Society and the speaker at the commencement ceremony. He also played football for the Geiger Clothes Company team, earning the nickname "The Breezer." Hurley began his studies for the priesthood at St. Bernard's Seminary in Rochester, New York. He was then sent to study theology at St. Mary's Seminary in Cleveland in 1917. During his summer vacations at St. Mary's, he worked as a naval observer in Sandusky, Ohio.

Priesthood

On May 29, 1919, Hurley was ordained a priest for the Diocese of Cleveland by Bishop John Farrelly at the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in Cleveland. His first assignment was as an assistant pastor at St. Columba's Parish in Youngstown, Ohio, where he remained for four years. In 1923, he received an interim assignment to St. Philomena's Parish in East Cleveland, Ohio. Later that year, Hurley was appointed to Immaculate Conception Parish in Cleveland.

In 1927, Hurley accepted an offer to serve as secretary to Archbishop Edward Mooney, his former professor at St. Mary's Seminary and now apostolic delegate to India. He accompanied Mooney in 1931 to Japan when Mooney was transferred to the apostolic delegation there. Following Mooney's return to the United States as bishop of Rochester in 1933, Hurley remained in Japan to serve as chargé d'affaires of the apostolic delegation from 1933 to 1934. During this period, he helped resolve a conflict that arose between Japan and Canada. Newspapers in Kagoshima, Japan, had accused Canadian Catholic missionaries of spying on the fortified islands off Kagoshima Bay.

Hurley was named a domestic prelate by Pope Pius XI in 1934. That same year, he became the first American to serve as an official of the Vatican Secretariat of State. During his work at the Secretariat of State, he acted as a liaison between the Vatican and the American Catholic hierarchy. He played an influential role in shaping the Vatican's policy towards Reverend Charles Coughlin, a controversial Michigan priest and radio personality.

Bishop of St. Augustine

On August 16, 1940, Hurley was appointed the sixth bishop of St. Augustine by Pope Pius XII. At that time, the diocese covered the entire State of Florida. Some believed that Pius XII appointed him there so that Hurley could remain in contact with the ailing diplomat Myron Charles Taylor, the American emissary to the Vatican. Others believed the appointment was a punishment; Hurley had become a critic of the wartime policy of the Vatican, believing that Pius XII was overly fearful about communism and not fearful enough about Nazism.

Hurley received his episcopal consecration on October 6, 1940, from Cardinal Luigi Maglione, with Archbishops Celso Costantini and Clemente Micara serving as co-consecrators, at the chapel of the Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome. Returning to the United States, Hurley was installed as bishop of St. Augustine on November 26, 1940.

Before the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in World War II, Hurley was considered the most outspoken interventionist among the American Catholic bishops. He made enemies among isolationist Catholic clergy and laity by labeling the Nazi Party "public enemy No. 1" of the United States and the Catholic Church. He declared, "The foe of all we love, both as Americans and as Catholics, is the Nazi. Communism is still our enemy but ... in point of urgency if not in point of teaching, communism has now ceded its primacy to national socialism."Hurley aligned himself with the U.S. Department of State and began to act under the direction of government officials. His efforts were largely composed of black propaganda, the use of false source attributions. In a radio address in July 1941, he expressed his belief that US President Franklin D. Roosevelt alone should decide upon U.S. entry into the war, saying, "It is up to him to safeguard the interests of the nation in times of great emergency. ...The problem [of entering the war] should be left to the Commander-in-Chief, who alone ... is capable of bringing us safely through." These remarks drew sharp criticism from Archbishop Francis Beckman, who subsequently denounced the "dictatorship pseudo-officially canonized by a brother cleric."

After the American entry into World War II, Hurley in 1943 became the only American bishop to demand Catholics to speak out against the extermination of the Jews taking place in the Nazi concentration camps, claiming that "the very basis of the Roman Catholic faith" compelled Catholics to challenge the "orgies of extermination" being perpetrated against the Jews.Hurley described the June 1943 Allied bombing of Rome as a "tragically mistaken decision," and predicted that "much of our national unity, much of the respect we enjoy abroad now lie with San Lorenzo, in ruins." He also opposed the idea that the United States should ally with Germany to oppose the Soviet Union.

Death

Joseph Hurley died at Mercy Medical Center in Orlando, Florida, on October 30, 1967, at age 73.