[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 63 (Wednesday, May 9, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4588-S4589]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                GOODBYE TO ARCHBISHOP FRANCIS T. HURLEY

 Mr. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I rise today to honor someone 
who has done so much good for his adopted State, it makes any 
politician blush with envy at his list of accomplishments. I speak of 
Roman Catholic Archbishop Francis T. Hurley, who is retiring on May 16, 
2001 as the Archbishop of Anchorage, after a 25-year career as head of 
the Roman Catholic Church in Alaska.
  It is a great honor to speak about the Archbishop. I first met the 
Reverend Hurley in late winter of 1970. I and my family were living in 
Juneau, the capital of Alaska, serving as Alaska State Commissioner of 
Commerce and Economic Development, and attending church at the 
Cathedral of the Nativity, built on the hillside overlooking downtown 
Juneau and the lovely Gastineau Channel. Reverend Hurley had just been 
named in February by Pope Paul VI as the Bishop of Juneau. He arrived 
in town on March 20, 1970.
  From his first sermon delivered in America's smallest Catholic 
Cathedral, it was clear of his admiration for Alaska and of his love 
for and concern for the physical and spiritual well-being of the people 
of Alaska--not just the 4,000 Catholics of the Diocese of Juneau in the 
Panhandle of my State--or 6 years later, of the tens of thousands of 
Catholics who live in all of the 49th State, but of all Alaskans 
regardless of race or creed who live and work and learn and play in the 
far north.
  While Bishop of Juneau, he quickly founded Catholic Community 
Services to help the poor of the Panhandle. He founded St. Ann's 
Nursing Home in Juneau to provide health care for the elderly, and 
centers for senior citizens in Juneau, Ketchikan and Tenakee Springs to 
help the elderly deal with the daily concerns of aging. He also began 
the ``Trays on Sleighs'' program to provide hot meals to senior 
citizens, Alaska's version of the national Meals on Wheels program.
  In 1970, after serving on President Richard Nixon's National Advisory 
Commission on Minority Enterprise, the Bishop, with a group of local 
Juneau residents, formed the Alaska Housing Development Corp. to foster 
low-income housing in the region, a desperate need to this day in 
Alaska.
  On May 4, 1976, the Bishop was named the second Archbishop of 
Anchorage. Under his leadership for the past 25 years, Catholic Social 
Services has established a day care center for the handicapped, built 
the Brother Francis Shelter in Anchorage to care for the more than 
1,000 homeless who used to live and seek food in the subfreezing winter 
temperatures on the streets of Alaska's largest city. He helped develop 
Clare House, a shelter for women and children; McAuley Manor, a home 
for young women; and also helped found Covenant House of Anchorage.
  In both sectarian and religious ways he has excelled in improving 
education both in Alaska and nationwide. The Archbishop, a native of 
San Francisco, Calif., was born on Jan. 12, 1927. He received his 
education in San Francisco and at St. Patrick's Seminary in Menlo Park, 
Calif. After being ordained to the priesthood on June 16, 1951, he 
served as assistant pastor in a San Francisco parish and worked as a 
teacher at Serra High School in San Mateo, Calif. He undertook his 
graduate studies in sociology from The Catholic University of America 
in Washington, D.C. and later at the University of California in 
Berkeley.
  In 1957, he was assigned to the national coordinating office for the 
Catholic Bishops of the United States, now known as the National 
Conference of Catholic Bishops. From 1957 to 1970 he served as 
Associate General Secretary of the conference and worked long hours to 
help craft the national Elementary and Secondary Education Act during 
the Presidency of Lyndon Johnson, to this day the landmark legislation 
governing federal funding for elementary and secondary education in 
America.
  Given his knowledge of education it was only natural for him to serve 
on the board of trustees of Alaska Pacific University, starting in 
1977, and to have worked to establish the Cardinal Newman Chair of 
Catholic Theology at the Anchorage campus of the Methodist institution.

[[Page S4589]]

  The Archbishop, selected yearly as one of Alaska's top 25 most 
``powerful'' citizens since 1996, also became the first religious 
leader in Alaskan history in 1997 to be named ``Alaskan of the Year.'' 
But his religious achievements are an equal to his sectarian 
accomplishments.
  Shortly after arriving in Juneau in 1970, the Bishop moved to bring 
the Catholic faith to the small villages of Alaska. In August 1970 he 
held the first Mass at Excursion Inlet, a former fish cannery at the 
head of a fiord near Glacier Bay National Park. ``There are many more 
people out in those coves and inlet. We priests must become more 
mobile,'' said the Reverend Hurley. And he quickly implemented his 
belief.
  A private pilot, and later a member of the Anchorage Civil Air 
Patrol, the Archbishop won grants from the Knights of Columbus and the 
Extension Society in 1970 for two diocesan airplanes so priests could 
visit small villages to say Mass. He expanded his church initiating the 
construction of churches in the Southeast villages of Hoonah and 
Yakutat. Over the years he has been responsible for the construction of 
five churches in Southeast Alaska and seven more statewide, a 
significant legacy.
  The Archbishop, the most senior archbishop in the United States, has 
earned his retirement. When Pope John Paul II accepted his retirement 
on March 3, 2001 it speeded the transition of his leadership to 
Archbishop Roger Schwietz, who had moved to Anchorage 13 months earlier 
to begin learning about the uniqueness of Alaska. While the State will 
be in good hands, it will be hard to follow in The Reverend's shoes.
  Archbishop Francis T. Hurley has done much for the economic well-
being of the poor, the homeless, the ill and the elderly in Alaska. And 
he has done even more for the spiritual well being of Alaskans 
everywhere. All of us in public life will miss his wisdom and guidance, 
his intellect and good humor. And we will miss his energy and patience. 
But we all are better for his service to the 49th State. Best wishes 
and Godspeed in his future endeavors.

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