[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 7] [Extensions of Remarks] [Pages 9341-9343] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]MONSIGNOR JOHN J. EGAN, 1916-2001 ______ HON. JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY of illinois in the house of representatives Wednesday, May 23, 2001 Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to celebrate the life of Monsignor John J. Egan, a man who never wavered in his mission to promote justice and to better the lives of so many people. He struggled on behalf of the poor and working men and women, gave voice to the voiceless, and cared for those pushed aside by our society. I personally called him a friend and am proud to have worked with him for many years. He was also a friend of every man, woman or child who needed a helping hand, a voice, or simply a sympathetic ear. Monsignor Egan, a leader who has spoken so eloquently against racism and bigotry, was among the first Catholic priests to join the civil rights movements. He marched in Alabama in the 1960s for equal rights for all people. He was a man who led by example. Monsignor Egan was also instrumental in saving countless families from eviction and life on the streets. He understood that being poor should not translate to being homeless. He stood on many picket lines supporting workers struggling for their right to organize and improve their working conditions. People throughout the nation knew Monsignor Egan. He was admired by so many from a wide cross section of our society. He has left a lasting impression on those he has met during his years. He received a religious leaders award from Rainbow/PUSH and was honored by the Chicago chapter of the American Jewish Committee, the Travelers and Immigrants Aid, Citizen Action of Illinois to name only a few. Those awards are a testament to his effective social activism. In honor of his life, I urge that we continue to follow in his steps, learn from his example, and organize for public policies that are fair and equitable. I urge all my colleagues to read the following accounts from the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times, and New York Times celebrating Monsignor Egan's life. [[Page 9342]] [From the Chicago Tribune, May 20, 2001] Monsignor John Egan 1916-2001; Priest Was ``Conscience'' of the City (By Noah Isackson) Monsignor John ``Jack'' Egan, a priest whose battles for social justice made him one of Chicago's most influential religious leaders, died Saturday, May 19, in the rectory of Holy Name Cathedral. ``A great priest has gone back to God,'' said Cardinal Francis George, Catholic archbishop of Chicago. An archdiocese spokeswoman said Egan, 84, died of cardiovascular disease. Egan served the Roman Catholic Church for 58 years, bringing his ecumenical approach to Chicago's grittiest haunts and the nation's toughest social problems. ``He was eager to help people,'' said Bishop Timothy J. Lyne, a friend for more than 65 years. ``Especially people who were treated unjustly.'' Egan was born in New York but moved to Chicago early and grew up in the Ravenswood neighborhood. He attended DePaul University, then studied for the priesthood at St. Mary of the Lake Seminary in Mundelein. He was ordained in 1943. In 1965, Egan marched with Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma, Ala. Later, a photo of him walking with King and other protesters became a call for clergymen across the country to join the civil rights movement. As director of the Archdiocesan Office of Urban Affairs from 1958 to 1969, Egan became a powerful voice in promoting subsidized housing as a way to fight urban segregation. Later, Egan became an outspoken opponent of public housing and called Cabrini-Green ``a concrete monument to the city's racism.'' From 1970 to 1983, he was the special assistant to the president at the University of Notre Dame. He returned to Chicago in 1983 as the archdiocese's director of human relations and ecumenism. ``He was the city's conscience,'' said Rev. Robert McLaughlin, pastor of Holy Name Cathedral. ``He was a conscience not only to the politicians and the people, but the church as well, a man who dared to be a gadfly and raise important issues.'' ``He really had a way of challenging people on very serious moral issues without alienating them,'' said Rev. John Minogue, president of DePaul University. ``And with that, he kept the dialogue open so that change could actually happen.'' Egan had headed DePaul's Office of Community Affairs for four years at the time of his death. The university honored Egan by naming its urban think tank and community service organization after him, calling it the Egan Urban Center. In 1993, thousands of people attended a celebration at Holy Name Cathedral marking the 50th anniversary of Egan's ordination to the priesthood. Plumbers hosted a similar celebration at Plumbers Hall on the West Side. Buses were chartered to bring the monsignor's admirers to and from the event. He is survived by his sister, Kathleen Egan Martin. His body will lie in state at Holy Name Cathedral from 3 to 9 p.m. Monday and Tuesday. Mass will be said at 10 a.m. Wednesday at the cathedral. ____ [From the Chicago Tribune, May 22, 2001] Priest Recalled as Tireless Fighter; His Kindnesses Are Remembered (By Kevin Lynch) When Mary Louise Kurey moved to Chicago four months ago, she was overwhelmed by the size of the city and the scope of its social problems. But then Monsignor John Egan delivered a sermon one Sunday encouraging parishioners at Holy Name Cathedral to take an active approach to their religion. Within a few weeks, Kurey had joined the fight against Chicago's social ills, starting with a single boy. She began tutoring a 4th grader at St. Joseph School, and she now can't imagine life without their weekly study sessions. ``I was new to the city, and I felt a little shy about getting involved,'' said Kurey, 26. ``He made me feel very much at home . . . and inspired me to reach out like he did in his life.'' Kurey was one of hundreds at Holy Name Monday to pay respects to Egan, 84, who died Saturday in the church rectory. His body lay in state Monday during visitation, which will continue Tuesday from 3 to 9 p.m. A funeral mass will be said at 10 a.m. Wednesday in the cathedral. Mayor Richard Daley said the city has lost ``one of its most courageous moral and spiritual leaders.'' Egan ``never wavered in his commitment to the poor and underprivileged and to equal rights for all,'' Daley said in a statement. ``Jack Egan didn't just talk about social change; he worked hard for social change for his entire life, and he helped make Chicago a better city.'' Though Egan was best known for championing desegregation and organized labor and improving education and housing for the city's poor, many who filed past his casket Monday remembered his small acts of kindness. ``I bumped into him in the hall one day and introduced myself,'' said Dan Ursini, 48, a library clerk at DePaul University, where Egan headed the Office of Community Affairs since 1997. ``He was a very approachable, down-to-earth person. I doubt that he would have remembered my name, but whenever I saw him after that, he'd take the time to chat.'' It was Egan's seemingly inexhaustible dedication to social causes that set him apart from other activists, Ursini said. ``It's one thing to see a person help engineer an important social change during one part of his life, but to see him keep it up 20 or 30 years later, that's even more impressive. In that way, he was a deeply inspiring individual'' Ursini said. Last year, Egan decided to take on the payday loan industry after meeting a parishioner who became trapped in a long cycle of debt after borrowing $100, said Rev. Robert McLaughlin, pastor of Holy Name and a longtime friend of Egan's. His efforts led to a bill introduced in Springfield this year that would set caps on payday loan interest rates. ____ [From the Chicago Sun-Times, May 21, 2001] Holy Name Mourns Egan (By Maureen O'Donnell) Reflecting on his life, Monsignor John J. Egan would say: ``You know, I didn't leave any enemies behind.'' And then, with a little smile: ``They all died before me.'' ``Jack'' Egan was remembered Sunday at Holy Name Cathedral by some of the people who knew him best as a man of courage, compassion and wit. Usher Bob Gowrylow, 64, marched for civil rights alongside Egan in the 1960s. ``They threw rocks at us and called us the 'n'-word,'' said Gowrylow. ``It was the most frightening thing.'' Bystanders spat on marching priests and nuns, but Egan never faltered. ``He kept walking, linking arms, walking together,'' Gowrylow said. ``He never would falter in anything. The man was unbelievable.'' Egan, who died Saturday at age 84, was part of a group of priests whose commitment to justice and civil rights made the Chicago priesthood one of the most exciting in the country, said Father Jack Farry, associate pastor at Holy Name. The monsignor became a hero to Farry while he was in the seminary. ``Before that, priests and sisters kind of stayed out of things,'' Farry said. ``But he made it very clear to people this was something we needed to be involved in.'' Egan's commitment to the poor kept him an activist until the end, as he campaigned against payday loan operations. His interest in the issue was stirred when a woman came to Holy Name for help. She couldn't get out from under her debt because of excessive interest. Egan hopped on a bus to pay off her loan. ``Here's this little 83-year-old guy going to the West Side on a bus with somebody he didn't even know to help them out,'' said parishioner Ralph Metz, 46, an investigator with the Cook County Public Defender's office. But he wasn't just a big-picture priest, friends and associates said. A rapt listener, he made each person he spoke with feel like they were the only person in the world. He used the same conversational starter for everyone, be they a celebrity or everyday Chicagoan: ``So, where did you come from?'' People would launch into stories of their childhoods and where they grew up and where they went to school, said Peggy Roach, his administrative assistant of 35 years. Soon after asking actor Joe Mantegna ``Where do you come from?'' he had his whole life story, Roach said. He and the actor became fast friends. Egan would even start conversations on elevators, said Margery Frisbie, who wrote a book about Egan titled An Alley in Chicago: The Ministry of a City Priest. He made Holy Name feel like a home. ``He used to stop mass to say, `Hey, you in the back, there's a seat up here,' '' said Florence Agosto. ``He didn't take it too seriously, even though it was a cathedral. He was an old-time, wonderful priest.'' Even when it was 10 below, he was out on the steps in his fedora and topcoat shaking people's hands, said Beverly Todhunter, 73, a downtown retiree. Sister Anne Marie Dolan remembered his kindness to the homeless people he met on the street. ``I don't think he ever passed any one of them without giving them a donation,'' she said. Egan loved classical music and chocolate milk, which enabled him to get all his medications down, Roach said. Until the very end of his life he interceded on behalf of others. On the day he died he was in great pain, but he knew there were ordinations going on at Holy Name. Despite his discomfort, Roach recounted, Egan asked God to help the new priests: `` `Lord, I want to pray for the 10 men being ordained today. Give them courage.' '' Visitation will be at Holy Name from 3 to 9 p.m. today and Tuesday. His funeral will be at 10 a.m. Wednesday at the cathedral, with burial at All Saints Cemetery in Des Plaines. [[Page 9343]] ____ [From the New York Times, May 22, 2001] John J. Egan, Priest and Rights Advocate, Is Dead at 84 (By Peter Steinfels) Msgr. John J. Egan, a Roman Catholic priest in Chicago whose work on issues of civil rights, changing neighborhoods and poverty shaped church efforts in those areas nationally, died on Saturday in Chicago in the rectory of Holy Name Cathedral. He was 84. An influential figure for over four decades in both the religious life and neighborhood politics of Chicago, Monsignor Egan exerted an influence that stretched far beyond that city. His work in the 1960's with Saul Alinsky and Mr. Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation laid the groundwork for what is now a national pattern of community organizing projects based on interfaith coalitions of congregations. Ordained a priest in 1943, Monsignor Egan directed the Cana Conference of Chicago from 1947 to 1958. The conference was a ministry to married couples that developed a marriage preparation program, Pre-Cana, that has also been influential nationally. From 1958 to 1969, Monsignor Egan directed the Chicago Archdiocesan Office of Urban Affairs, where he became deeply engaged in struggles over racial integration and urban renewal. In 1965, despite his doctor's orders to avoid stress to a damaged heart, he responded to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s appeal to members of the clergy to march in Selma, Ala. He was already known for publicly criticizing the effects of urban renewal projects and public housing on established neighborhoods. He tangled with Mayor Richard J. Daley of Chicago, challenged the University of Chicago's neighborhood renewal plans and complained of ``the dictatorial powers'' of urban planners like Robert Moses in New York City. Some proponents of urban renewal and integrated housing attacked Monsignor Egan in turn as a self-interested defender of largely white Catholic neighborhoods. Conservatives, including some pastors, recoiled at his working partnership with Mr. Alinsky, a self-styled radical agitator. Eventually, Cardinal John Cody disbanded the Office of Urban Affairs in 1969, and Monsignor Egan spent the years from 1970 to 1983 at the University of Notre Dame. There he directed the Institute for Pastoral and Social Ministry, and with Peggy Roach, another veteran of struggles for racial justice, he continued his work of recruiting and advising leaders in community organizations. Many of those he influenced called him a ``surrogate bishop'' for Catholics engaged in social and political struggles. Brought back to Chicago in 1983 by Cardinal Joseph Bernardin to direct the archdiocese's Office of Human Relations and Ecumenism, in 1987 Monsignor Egan became head of the Office of Community Affairs at DePaul University in Chicago, a position he held until his death. John McGreevy, a historian at Notre Dame and the author of ``Parish Boundaries'' (University of Chicago Press, 1996), a prize-winning study of the Catholic Church's handling of racial issues in Northern cities, compared Monsignor Egan to ``the classic parish priests early in the century who were great politically skilled organizers.'' But Monsignor Egan, Professor McGreevy said, ``made the transition to organizing outside the church as well as within it.'' Monsignor Egan did not shy from internal church controversies. In the 1960's he led a group of reform-minded priests in Chicago, and recalled painfully a single year in Cardinal Cody's tenure when no fewer than 45 priests came to tell him about their decisions to leave the priesthood. A month ago, he circulated for publication a plea for the church to ordain women and married men and give women leading roles in the Vatican. ``Why are we not using to the fullest the gifts and talents of women who constitute the majority of our membership throughout the world?'' he wrote. ``I realize that even to raise aspects of this question, I label myself a dissenter. Yet prayerful, responsible dissent has always played a role in the church.'' Despite his deep identification with Chicago, Monsignor Egan was born in Manhattan, on 134th Street in what was then an Irish section of Harlem. His father, a bus driver, and his mother, a dressmaker, were immigrants from Ireland, and moved to Chicago when John was 6. He is survived by a sister, Kathleen Egan Martin of Rockford, Ill. ____________________