[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 3090-3100]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 TRIBUTE TO FATHER ROBERT F. DRINAN, SJ

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Thank you, Madam Speaker.
  Madam Speaker, I rise with a sad duty, although also a proud one. It 
is a chance for our colleagues to mourn the death and celebrate the 
life of one of the ablest and most principled people ever to serve as a 
Member of this body, the late Father Robert Drinan.
  Madam Speaker, I will include for the Record of these proceedings the 
eulogies that were given at his funeral mass last Thursday by two of 
his fellow Jesuits, the Reverend John Langan and Professor Ladislas 
Orsy; by John DeGioia, the President of Georgetown University, where he 
taught for so many years; by our colleague Senator Edward Kennedy; and 
by former Ambassador Max Kampelman. The Speaker also gave a eulogy, 
which she herself inserted in the Record.
  Madam Speaker, Bob Drinan was an extraordinary man. He had several 
careers, any one of which would have been extremely impressive. He was 
a Member of this body for only 10 years. By Congressional standards, 
that is not a long career, and many people are surprised to learn it 
was only 10 years, because his impact on this body and through this 
body, this country and this world was so significant. He was a man of 
such force of intellect and strength of character and energy and 
determination that he made 10 years here do more than many do in 30 or 
more years.
  He was a prolific author of serious and thoughtful books. As I said 
in Massachusetts on Saturday, Father Drinan wrote more books than some 
high officials in this town have ever read.
  He was a very distinguished educator. Had he been nothing but the 
Dean of Boston College Law School, and two of our colleagues who 
attended that law school during his deanship, the gentleman from 
Massachusetts, Mr. Markey and the gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Scott, 
will be addressing us soon, had he simply been that dean for 16 years 
when he helped make that into the first rate educational institution it 
is today, that would have been a significant career.
  Then on leaving this place, he spent 26 years teaching at Georgetown. 
At 86, Bob Drinan was a vigorous and engaging teacher who was widely 
sought after by students interested in the intellectual stimulation 
that they got from him.

[[Page 3091]]

  Now, with all of this, he was, of course, a Jesuit priest, and it was 
striking to me last Thursday here in Washington, Saturday at Boston 
College, to see the justifiable pride that his fellow Jesuits had in 
this man. And not just their pride in him, but their pride and 
gratitude that he remained first and foremost a member of that Jesuit 
community, an extra community of people who have made such 
contributions to education and other important causes in this country.
  But what was particularly striking was the gap between the immensity 
of his accomplishments, the dignity of his intellect and his person. No 
one was ever less inclined to stand on ceremony. He was a down-to-earth 
individual. People who met him, and simply met him without knowing who 
he was, although that became increasingly harder as his fame grew, 
would be surprised to learn that he was a man of such accomplishments.
  He was a delight to be with. He was one of the most irreverent 
reverends you will ever meet, and did not need ceremony, did not need 
any kind of false dignity. He had the talents.
  What I want to talk about now is the common theme in that 
multiplicity of careers, of teacher and law school dean and Member of 
Congress and priest and author.
  We have a lot of debate in our society and American politics about 
morality in politics, what is the role of morality in politics, and 
there are some who style themselves as very religious, who believe that 
they are the exemplars of morality in politics and who have been 
critical of people like Father Drinan and said that he failed in that 
task.
  Absolutely the contrary is true. Father Drinan's life was dedicated 
to public morality. Few people worked as consistently and effectively 
to bring a moral tone to the relationships we have with each other.
  Now, people have said, ``well, what about on some of these individual 
matters?'' Let's be very clear. This is a man who lived by an 
extraordinary exacting moral code personally. He was a priest. He was a 
priest for over 60 years and a member of the Jesuit community. As a 
Member of Congress, he served the Jesuit community in Georgetown. When 
he went back to his district, it was the Jesuit community at Boston 
College. He voluntarily subjected himself to the very stringent 
discipline that the Jesuit community and priests in general follow.
  In 1980, when he was ordered by Pope John Paul II not to run again 
for Congress, that was a decision that caused him great anguish. It 
denied him the chance to do something that he thought was terribly 
important to his very being, and he wished that he could reverse the 
decision. But when it became clear that that decision could not be 
reversed, there was no hesitation.
  People who want to talk about living by a moral code should look at 
the example of this very important Member of Congress with great 
accomplishments behind him who voluntarily left this body because the 
moral code of the priesthood to which he had committed himself required 
him to do that.
  So in his personal life, he lived by the code of celibacy and of 
obedience and of poverty. And it was a voluntary decision, and anyone 
who knew him knew that he had talents which would have allowed him to 
break those bonds, but he didn't see them as bonds, he saw them as an 
essential part of his being.
  So for those who wonder about his dedication and personal morality, 
look at his life. Look at this man, who at 86 awoke 10 days ago feeling 
ill, feeling very sick, and ignored the advice of others to stay home 
and went to class to teach at 86 and collapsed in class, because he had 
a sense of duty and an insistence on living by that personal code that 
no one could deny.
  On the other hand, he did not believe, and I do not claim that this 
is something he told me, he was a man who taught in his life by example 
as well as articulately. As the Speaker said in her eulogy, he quoted 
Saint Francis of Assisi, who said, ``Preach the gospel, and sometimes 
use words,'' and Bob Drinan preached the gospel by his life and his 
life's work very effectively.
  I believe that his view was that, yes, he was happy to follow a 
stringent moral code personally that few human beings would be able to 
do with the dedication and discipline that he did for as long as he 
did, but he also felt that that was his personal choice. It was a 
choice that he would urge on others. He was a member of that important 
religious community, and through that religious community, yes, he 
would convey that message.
  But he did not believe, and this is what is critical, that it was 
legitimate to use the coercive mechanism of government to impose his 
personal choices on others, and that is the distinction that Father 
Drinan stands for. In those matters of life where we affect each other, 
where human beings come together and impact each other, than morality 
must guide our actions.
  I would caution many of my liberal friends who say, well, we don't 
want to have morality in politics, because they are reacting against 
people who would use the government to impose personal choices on 
others. That is not morality, and the problem there is not that they 
are imposing morality in politics, but that they are intruding politics 
into personal lives.
  What Father Drinan stood for in his writings, as a Member of 
Congress, as an activist, as an advocate, as a teacher, was that in 
those areas of life where we come together and affect each other, we 
are obligated to follow a moral code, and that is a moral code which 
focused on the dignity of human beings and the right of every human 
being to be treated decently, because that was the common core of Bob 
Drinan.
  What issues did he care about? He cared most about those issues where 
there was a danger that some people would be mistreated. In the fifties 
and sixties, he was the leader in the fight against racism and for 
racial justice, one of the great examples of wrongdoing in American 
history, of people of African descent being mistreated. Bob was a 
leader in the civil rights movement.
  He was a great civil libertarian, opposing efforts to oppress people 
who spoke in terms that other people did not like.
  He was a great defender of the Jewish community, against anti-
Semitism.
  He then became the founder, more than any other individual, of the 
doctrine of international human rights. Before the seventies, there 
were people on the left who criticized governments on the right for not 
respecting human rights. There were people on the right who criticized 
left governments for not following human rights.
  Bob Drinan was one of those who forged the doctrine that we could 
demand respect by any government of any political stripe, that they 
respect the rights of individuals, and he was a leader in his writings 
and his work here in the Congress. That was the central core, whether 
it was racism or anti-Semitism, whether it was governments denying 
people basic rights, whether it was our own government denying the 
rights of our own citizens in the name of security.
  He was a very good lawyer. In fact, in the seventies, he was working 
hard on rewriting a criminal code which some of the people on the left 
thought was too tough, because he understood that people had a right to 
be protected against those who would violate their rights and property. 
But he also believed deeply from his experience that there was no need 
for the government to disregard basic human rights in protecting all of 
us, and there were no more articulate defenders of that principle.
  When he stood up against Richard Nixon, it was because of his 
conviction that the Nixon administration was defying fundamental human 
rights, a conviction which, of course, proved to be absolutely true.
  That is the common thread. And Bob Drinan believed, and this is very 
important I think to note, that it was as a priest that he wrote, as a 
priest that he served here, as a priest that he advocated for human 
rights, because he genuinely believed that in his insistence that we 
treat each other with the dignity that human beings are entitled to, he 
was following the word of his God as he understood it, a God that

[[Page 3092]]

created in his mind human beings with this inherent dignity.
  So this is a man whose life had many parts, but they had a common 
theme. They had a common theme, whether it was in his religion or his 
politics or his writing or his teaching. It was that we owe each other 
the duty of respect and dignity. And, yes, morality belongs in 
politics, and Bob Drinan's life, both as a Member of Congress, as a 
political activist afterwards, yes, it was dedicated to morality in 
politics.
  He was a man who understood that there is no greater political 
immorality than an unjust war; that nothing more greatly degrades human 
beings than wars which violate the doctrine of the just war. And he 
came to this Congress as a leading opponent of the Vietnam War at a 
time when it was not the most popular thing, and up until his last days 
he was a leader in agitation against another unjust war as he saw it.
  So I am very proud to be the inheritor of that tradition. I do not 
claim to exemplify all aspects of it. But I do share with him this 
commitment, that people have a right to make personal choices; that 
your personal choices ought to be guided by a moral code; and that we 
ought to urge on each other that we bring out the best. But that when 
it comes to using the coercive mechanisms of the government, the 
central point is to make sure that people are treated fairly by each 
other, that the role of morality in politics is to enforce the 
fundamental right of each person to be treated with dignity and 
respect.

                              {time}  2045

  Bob Drinan was an exemplar of what is appropriately morality in 
politics. We will miss him terribly, but we have, enduring, his example 
to drive us forward.
  Now, Madam Speaker, I want to yield to one of my colleagues, who is 
the only member of the Massachusetts delegation who was able to serve 
with Bob Drinan, one of the few Members who served with him and who has 
the dual distinction of both serving with him and being his student at 
Boston Law School and is a man who very much carried out the ethic of 
respect for human rights that Bob exemplified. The gentleman from 
Massachusetts, I yield him such time as he may consume.
  Mr. MARKEY. I thank the gentleman very much, and I thank him for his 
eloquent statement. I thank him for the eulogy which he delivered on 
behalf of Father Drinan at St. Ignatius Church in Massachusetts on this 
past Saturday. You captured the essence of Father Drinan in that 
eulogy, and I thank you for doing that on behalf of all of us.
  Mr. Speaker, the House of Representatives mourns the passing of 
Father Robert Drinan, Society of Jesus, Member of Congress. His death 
is a blow to those of us who revered his wit and wisdom, and a great 
loss for those who continue to struggle for human rights and life's 
basic necessities. Yet, tonight we also celebrate Father Drinan's life 
and know well that the life he brought to the issues of our time will 
continue to shine on in the efforts of those he touched and those whom 
he exhorted to do more.
  I had the privilege of having Father Drinan as my dean at Boston 
College Law School. I met him in August of 1968 as the school year at 
Boston College Law School was about to commence. But the truth is that 
I had set my goal to attend Boston College Law School 6 years before 
when I was a sophomore in high school because it became my goal to go 
to Boston College Law School so that I could have Father Drinan as my 
dean; and, to be honest with you, I didn't even know if you had to go 
to college in order to go to law school, such was my desire to go and 
to be in this school that was training lawyers to help humanity.
  At Boston College Law School in the late 1960s, Father Drinan used 
his power as the dean of that school to actively recruit minorities, to 
actively recruit women to come to Boston College Law School. He did so 
using the greatest power that a dean of a law school has, and that is 
admissions and full scholarships. He wanted Boston College Law School 
to be at the cutting edge of the change which was taking place in our 
society, and he wanted to ensure that those who had been excluded from 
our society would be given access to the law school education that they 
would need in order to effect the laws in our society. And today, all 
of those who were exposed to him during the years that he was dean at 
Boston College Law School continue to have a debt to him, not only 
those to whom he brought in, in order to ensure that they were not 
excluded, but all of the rest of us who were then exposed to these 
injustices and the remedies to them that Father Drinan ensured that 
that law school embodied.
  Just a few years after graduating from Boston College Law School, 
only 4 years later, I had the great honor of coming here as Father 
Drinan's colleague. I felt that there was no greater honor in fact in 
being elected to Congress than in knowing that I would be his 
colleague. It seemed somewhat asymmetrical that I would have the same 
vote that he had here on the House floor. And when he would consult me 
on which choice he should make, should he become the chairman of the 
criminal law subcommittee or the immigration subcommittee, it was an 
honor for me to be consulted by Father Drinan as a young man now, but 
his colleague in Congress, as to what was the best place. And his 
criteria of course was what was the best place where he could do the 
most good for those most in need in our society. And of course, the way 
he saw our society was not just the United States of America but the 
whole planet.
  So I had that unique opportunity to see him in both of those 
settings, both in law school and here on the House floor. And I saw him 
play the role of the catalyst, of the idealist, of the man who 
continued to push others when they say they can go no further in trying 
to strive for excellence and to stand up for an ideal. And that is the 
role that Father Drinan played not just in law school and not just here 
in Congress, but for the last 26 years since he left this Chamber.
  When we stand in this Chamber of Congress, when Members of Congress 
are coming here to cast their vote, all of our names are flashed up on 
a board over the head of the Speaker to vote ``aye'' or ``nay'' on the 
key issues of our time. During the years that Father Drinan was a 
Congressman, as the Members would look up to see how other Members of 
Congress voted, when they looked up at Father Drinan's name, they knew 
he was not casting a vote looking at the next election, but rather he 
was looking at the next generation on every vote. And that led to 
almost every one of his elections being as close as an election can be, 
because he was not factoring in his own electoral life but rather the 
life of every person in our society. His vote was true north, every 
vote that he cast here in Congress.
  As a Jesuit, he clearly lived up to the Jesuitical ideal of being a 
contemplative in action. He worked tirelessly for both tolerance and 
for social justice. He took on each task in this institution, large and 
small, as he did others in life, and offered them Ad Majorem Dei 
Gloriam, To the Greater Glory of God, which was a favorite phrase of 
St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order.
  He was unambiguous in his convictions that America could do better, 
could aspire to greater things for its people and the world. The direct 
and candid quality of Father Drinan's personality added to the moral 
force that Father Drinan brought to the quality of the debate in this 
Chamber. His personality animated these discussions in hearings and 
debates here on the floor. His eloquent, passionate, heartfelt speeches 
are greatly missed.
  Madam Speaker, I think that one of the real ironies of Father 
Drinan's career is that at its very end here in Congress, in his very 
last term here that he served in this body, that he was unopposed. In 
other words, just at the point at which he had convinced those who 
lived in his district that in fact not only was he not outside the main 
stream, but his views were those that should be embraced by everyone 
who

[[Page 3093]]

lived within that district, he was unopposed. He had fought Richard 
Nixon on Vietnam; he had called for Richard Nixon's impeachment because 
of the illegal bombing on Cambodia. He was someone who, by the time he 
had reached 1980, people looked up to with admiration that he had been 
unafraid during those fights during the early 1970s, one that had been 
able to now command the admiration of everyone in this body.
  His defense of human rights was tireless, from the plight of Soviet 
Jewry to the victims of apartheid to the dislocated and the powerless 
in Central America. He risked his own life in going down to Central 
America after the assassination of Archbishop Romero. He was the first. 
His voice was the most powerful. He brought a moral dimension to the 
crimes that were being committed in Central America. He elevated that 
to a point where Congress had to deal with it. He mobilized the Jesuit 
community, the moral community not only here but around the world to 
focus on what was happening in Central America. It was Father Drinan. 
And he was literally risking his life when he went down there in those 
early years. There was no protection for him. That was the unwavering 
commitment of his life, that he would use it in order to advance the 
cause of those who were most powerless.
  And at Trinity College, as Speaker Pelosi said, on the day before she 
was sworn in he delivered a sermon to each of us who was there on our 
responsibilities to help the children of Darfur, the children of 
Katrina, and every child in need of help around the planet. And he told 
us that it was our job here to make sure that those children were taken 
care of, that God's work was truly our own here in this great body.
  Now, when Father Drinan was forced to choose between political life 
and his priestly life, it really wasn't a choice. On that day, I went 
up into his office and sat with him and I asked him how he felt. And he 
said, ``Eddie, it really isn't a difficult choice. I am a priest for 
life, not a politician. I will find other ways to serve God, and I will 
be able to accept this, although it is difficult.'' And that is just 
how he was. And for the next 26 years, it can be argued that he had the 
most productive part of his life, because during those 26 years he, 
then at Georgetown Law School, trained thousands of young lawyers to go 
out across this country and across this world in order to advocate on 
behalf of human rights.
  So he showed us how we could pursue justice, seek continued 
incremental progress towards peace, towards a more just distribution of 
society's assets, and towards a Nation which celebrated diversity and 
fostered tolerance.
  In the final analysis, Father Robert Drinan was a gift to all of us. 
Here in the House of Representatives, the memory of this iconic and 
comprehensively decent man of our friend and our colleague will be long 
remembered and venerated. He will be sorely missed not just here in 
Washington and in Massachusetts, but all around the world.
  I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I thank my colleague. And I would now 
recognize another colleague who is carrying on very much that work. The 
gentleman from Massachusetts who just spoke alluded to Father Drinan's 
role in Central America, and our next speaker is a man who along with 
our late colleague Joe Moakley played a very important role in carrying 
forward that work of bringing people to justice which had begun with 
Father Drinan.
  I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).
  Mr. McGOVERN. I want to thank my colleague from Massachusetts, Barney 
Frank, for organizing this Special Order, and I want to thank him for 
his beautiful words paying tribute to Father Drinan as well as my other 
colleague from Massachusetts, Ed Markey, for his very beautiful words 
honoring a truly great man.
  I feel truly privileged to have known Father Drinan. As was made 
clear by the previous speakers, he was a remarkable man, remarkable in 
his incredible faith and remarkable in his strong political beliefs.
  I think all of us who knew Bob Drinan will miss him; however, I 
believe that even those who didn't know Father Drinan personally will 
feel a great sense of loss, because we have lost a man who was truly 
dedicated to good. He was a man of unbelievable intellect, of 
unbelievable conviction and compassion. He also was a man with a great 
sense of humor.
  You know, the day after his passing, I delivered a tribute to him on 
this House floor, and I recalled his early and steadfast opposition to 
the war in Vietnam and his most recent opposition to the war in Iraq.

                              {time}  2100

  He thought both wars were senseless and moral blunders. Father Drinan 
was someone who spoke his mind, regardless of the political polls or 
political consequences. Indeed, many of his closest allies would 
caution him to be careful in some of his pronouncements on some of the 
more controversial issues that he took on.
  But even when his words were controversial, he had this kind of 
uncanny knack of usually being proven right; and whether it was the war 
in Vietnam or whether it was his call for the impeachment of Richard 
Nixon, he turned out to be right, on those issues and so many other 
issues.
  I admired his commitment to peace and human rights. Whether it was 
speaking out on behalf of Jews who were being persecuted by the former 
Soviet Union or, as mentioned, whether it was his advocacy on behalf of 
so many people in Central America who were victimized by the wars that 
engulfed that region of the world in the late 1970s and early 1980s, 
nobody was more dedicated to human rights than Bob Drinan.
  When raising his voice in Congress and trying to change U.S. policy 
was not enough, he would travel to the countries where people were 
being oppressed to speak out. Those of us who were involved in El 
Salvador during the 1980s recall with great admiration his visit to 
that country in the midst of a civil war where he said mass alongside 
of Archbishop Oscar Romero. Only a few months after that visit, 
Archbishop Romeo was murdered by Salvadoran death squads.
  We also remember in 1989 when six Jesuit priests were murdered by the 
Salvadoran military. I was working for Congressman Joe Moakley at the 
time, who was investigating those killings. Father Drinan spoke up 
forcefully, demanding justice in that case.
  It is also important to note that his service to people did not end 
when he left the House of Representatives. He continued to advocate for 
what was right and just in his teachings, his lectures, his numerous TV 
appearances and his writings.
  Many of us would get calls from him, Did you see my piece in the 
National Catholic Reporter, he would ask, or we would get letters 
citing specific passages in a book that he wrote or a book that he read 
or some article that he thought was worth mentioning. He would 
sometimes suggest we use the material in a speech or perhaps insert 
something in the Congressional Record. He never stopped making a 
difference.
  I have also had the privilege over the years of attending many 
dinners with Father Drinan. He always kind of held court. All the 
attention focused on Father Drinan because he was brilliant, and he had 
well-thought-out answers to every single policy question that ever 
existed.
  Over the last several days, I have attended his calling hours at 
Georgetown University and his funeral mass at St. Aloysius Church here 
in Washington. I was struck by how many people whose lives he had 
touched. So many of them had dedicated their lives and their careers to 
public service and education. He inspired people, and the only thing 
that he scorned was indifference.
  Mark Gearan, who was a former staffer of Father Drinan and who 
actually met his wife Mary Hurley working on Father Drinan's campaign, 
is now the President of Hobart and William Smith Colleges in New York, 
and he recently wrote an article that appeared in the Boston Globe 
entitled, ``Father

[[Page 3094]]

Drinan was our unfailing champion.'' I would just like to read a 
passage here:
  ``But for me and countless others, it was his role as a mentor that 
distinguished Father Drinan. Amid the pressures of tough campaigns and 
congressional duties, he always reached out to young staff and 
encouraged their interest in politics and policy. He took time to ask 
your opinion on issues and was genuinely interested in knowing why you 
felt that way. `Tell me something I don't know,' he would bark out in 
an elevator ride or driving to the airport. A tough assignment to 
respond to the author of 12 books with such a keen and inquisitive 
mind.''
  I recall one time attending a speech that Father Drinan gave before 
the Americas for Democratic Action here in Washington, D.C. When his 
speech was over with, he asked me what did you think. I said it was a 
great speech. He said what specifically did you like about the speech. 
I had to think for a minute.
  But the bottom line was Bob Drinan was not interested in just empty 
plaudits. He wanted to know what moved people, what worked, how to get 
things done, how to move an audience.
  This country is better off, not just because of Father Drinan. This 
country is better off because of the countless people he brought into 
the political process, people who love this country, people who want to 
make a difference, people who want to change it for the better.
  Several years ago, I attended a graduation commencement ceremony, and 
the late John Kenneth Galbraith was the speaker, and he said to the 
audience of students, I would ask you to go out and comfort the 
afflicted, but given the current political climate that might be 
considered eccentric. So instead I will ask you to go out and afflict 
the comfortable.
  That is what Father Drinan did, and that is what we are going to 
miss, a truly great man who did some extraordinary things not only for 
this country but for people all over the world.
  Let me close as I began by saying I feel it a great privilege I had 
the opportunity to get to know this wonderful man, and I thank my 
colleague.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I thank the gentleman. Let me call on 
another of Father Drinan's former students who now serves on the 
committee where Father Drinan did such good work, the gentleman from 
Virginia (Mr. Scott).
  Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank you for organizing this 
Special Order so that we could pay appropriate tribute to Father 
Drinan.
  I rise today to honor the memory of our former colleague, the 
distinguished gentleman from Massachusetts, Father Robert Drinan. 
Father Drinan was elected to this body in 1970 on a platform that 
advocated progressive ideals, basic human rights for all, and ending 
our involvement in Vietnam.
  During his tenure in the House, Father Drinan was a powerful voice 
for the poor and disadvantaged; and as a man of faith, he clearly 
understood morality in its true sense. Just 2 years ago on NBC's ``Meet 
the Press,'' Father Drinan eloquently stated:

       There's a common core of moral and religious beliefs, and 
     frankly, we are in total violation of that. We are supposed 
     to be good to the poor; we have more poor children in America 
     than any other industrialized nation. We're supposed to love 
     prisoners and help them; we have 2.1 million people in 
     prison, the largest of any country on the Earth. We also 
     allow 11 children to be killed every day. All of the 
     religions are opposed to that. That's violence. Why don't we 
     organize on that?

  Father Drinan spent his life advocating to change these realities. As 
chairman of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Father Drinan strived 
to reform our still broken criminal justice system; and as the new 
chairman of that subcommittee, I hope to carry on Father Drinan's 
legacy in that regard.
  Father Drinan's compassion for the disadvantaged did not end with his 
tenure in Congress. After leaving Congress, Father Drinan continued to 
advocate for basic rights with his service with the International 
League of Human Rights, the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, the 
International Labor Rights Fund, and the NAACP Legal Defense and 
Education Fund. He also spent the last 26 years as a law professor at 
Georgetown University.
  I did not have the personal privilege of serving alongside Father 
Drinan in this Chamber, but I first encountered Father Drinan's 
commitment to equality during my senior year in college. At that time, 
Father Drinan was dean of the Boston College Law School, and he went 
out of his way to open opportunities for minorities at the law school. 
This motivated me to apply to Boston College Law School, and today, I 
am a proud graduate of the class of 1973.
  Mr. Speaker, this evening we pay final tribute to one who dedicated 
his life to improving the lives of others and making the American Dream 
accessible to all. A Jesuit priest who, even as a Member of Congress, 
lived in a small room in the Jesuit community at Georgetown, Father 
Drinan helped make better the lives of countless millions of Americans 
of all religious, racial and ethnic backgrounds. Our great Nation will 
certainly feel the loss of this courageous and compassionate 
humanitarian.
  I thank you for yielding to me and thank you for the opportunity to 
pay tribute to Father Drinan.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
his contribution, and now let me call on another member of the 
Massachusetts delegation who did not serve with Father Drinan here, but 
has provided very important service to the Commonwealth of 
Massachusetts in the State legislature as a leader during the time that 
Father Drinan was here and another one who carries on in that 
tradition, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Olver).
  Mr. OLVER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Massachusetts for 
organizing this tribute, and I am grateful for the opportunity to add a 
few thoughts to the eloquent comments of my colleagues in celebration 
of the life of Father Robert Drinan.
  Priest, lawyer, teacher, author, law school dean, Congressman and 
international statesman, Father Robert Frederick Drinan was an amazing 
individual who touched the lives of thousands.
  More than 100,000 of my current constituents in the northern part of 
Worcester County, Massachusetts, were fortunate enough to have been 
represented by Father Drinan during his time in Congress, and they were 
served extremely well by his unique brand of politics and conscience.
  Father Drinan was elected to this House by what was essentially an 
anti-Vietnam War platform. He was the first to call for the impeachment 
of President Nixon but not on Watergate grounds. Father Drinan's cause 
was the President's illegal bombing of Cambodia.
  He was a passionate supporter of international human rights. Father 
Drinan spoke out against injustice wherever he saw it. He even 
privately funded several humanitarian missions to Chile, El Salvador, 
Vietnam, the Philippines, and other developing countries torn apart by 
violence and oppression. He repeatedly urged the President and Congress 
to do more to restore religious and social freedom to the people of 
Russia, Bolivia, and Iran.
  While he served in the Congress, he uniquely balanced matters of 
faith with matters of state. Although he opposed abortion on moral 
grounds, he held that particular religious belief as separate from the 
issue of the legality of reproductive rights and thus was a fervent 
supporter of those constitutionally protected rights.
  In his district, Father Drinan worked to increase affordable housing 
in older cities like Fitchburg and Gardner, both of which are in my 
current district. He was also instrumental in securing funding to begin 
the cleanup of the Nashua River in north Worcester County. Twenty-five 
years later, his efforts are the foundation on which we build today.
  Later in his life, Father Drinan continued his crusade for 
international human rights by teaching that subject at Georgetown 
University and by lending his expertise to numerous international 
justice organizations here in

[[Page 3095]]

Washington. For his distinguished career in public service, the 
American Bar Association and later this House of Representatives 
awarded him official honors.
  Father Drinan's life's work is an enduring example of public and 
humanitarian service that few will ever equal, but we should all aspire 
to follow his example. He led with superior conviction, and he lived 
his life with universal compassion. He will be remembered for many, 
many years to come.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I thank the gentleman, and finally, very 
appropriately, a colleague of Father Drinan's in the fight against 
racism on the central, moral fights then and now in this country, the 
delegate from the District of Columbia, a woman who prior to coming 
here was a leader, as she still is, in the movement against racism and 
for civil rights, and in that capacity, worked very closely then and 
later with Father Drinan who paid her the ultimate political tribute I 
think of becoming her constituent. Although I think he was still voting 
absentee up in my district, I will tell the gentlewoman, but you had 
his body. I had his vote. It was a good trade. I recognize now the 
gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me, 
and he will understand that Bob Drinan was also a politician; and by 
voting for you in Massachusetts, he at least had a vote. Whereas living 
in the District, I appreciate that you provided him with a way for him 
to express his views.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I think the gentlewoman would agree that 
he was confident there would not have been much daylight between our 
voting records. So he could do either one.
  Ms. NORTON. The gentleman knows well that he would have expected you 
to lead this Special Order and he would have wanted you to lead this 
Special Order, and he would have been right. He would have been right 
not only because you had the good fortune to inherit his district, but 
as he would have known, that the gentleman who inherited his district, 
the new chairman of the Financial Services Committee, would bring it 
all together for us.
  I appreciate the way you have capsulized Bob Drinan's life, and I 
appreciate the words of his several colleagues, because each has, in 
his own way, told us something we did not know about this remarkable 
man.
  Now, I have listened in patience to my Massachusetts colleagues who, 
with some reason, can claim Father Robert Drinan, son of Massachusetts 
after all, a man who represented the State, a man who after all was 
born and spent much of his life in the State; but you will forgive me 
if I come forward to speak for the residents of the District of 
Columbia and especially for my colleagues at Georgetown University 
where he lived and worked as a priest and scholar who also this evening 
and forever will lay claim on Father Bob Drinan.
  For me this is a very sad occasion because I was and remain a tenured 
professor of law at Georgetown University and go every other week to 
teach a course there. How else could I retain my tenure which is harder 
to get than to be selected, and he and I joked about that.

                              {time}  2115

  But the fact is that there has been an outpouring on the Web site of 
students, of faculty, because Bob died so suddenly. We got a faculty 
notice just last week saying Professor Drinan is ill, he is in the 
hospital, we fully expect his recovery, and telling us that we should 
leave notes for Bob in a faculty box, and they will see that they got 
there. This is a man who died on his feet, remarkably vital to the very 
end. He died the way we all want to die, just like that. No long 
illness, going to his last class, he died as he lived.
  I must say, to the gentleman from Massachusetts, I can only imagine 
what the experience must have been when Bob Drinan was on this floor, 
because I did not know him as a Member of the House. He was gone for a 
long time by the time I got there.
  He was 86 when he died, that is living a long life. I was tickled to 
read a quote of his in the Legal Times when he was asked about whether 
he thought about retiring from the faculty? And Bob Drinan said, 
``Jesuits don't necessarily retire,'' they just did what you do, and he 
did keep doing what he did, and he did it through a fare thee well. 
Dean Aleinikoff said, well, when writing for the faculty and students, 
he said, ``his life was fully devoted to the service of others--in the 
church, in the classroom, and in Congress.''
  Of course, Bob does not need more recognition. I am not sure there 
was a more recognized man. He loved being recognized. Not out of 
hubris, but out of the delight and joy that was just a part of his 
life. He was joyful every time you saw him. He was a man of ideas who 
always wanted to stop you to pluck one of those ideas out of his brain 
and see where it would go in yours.
  Among the honors that are most delighted him was the faculty, the 
vote of the faculty at the law school to establish the Robert F. Drinan 
Chair in Human Rights. I suppose the only thing that might have 
delighted Father Drinan as much as what we did in just last year, an 
award, that is, seldom given to past Members of Congress. After all, 
all of them merit our love for their service, and he was one of three 
you heard Speaker Pelosi speak about how rare is that honor.
  In 2004, the ABA awarded him its highest award, calling him a man of 
the stuff of which legends are made and legendary, and he was, even in 
his lifetime. He is really, and we have to face it, the first and the 
only priest to serve in the Congress. He will be the last probably.
  I note that there was a nonvoting delegate who served before him, but 
you see it doesn't count in the Congress. That is why D.C. is trying to 
get the vote. So Rob Drinan is the only priest who served. When he 
first ran, he was asked by one of the Boston papers, well, why are you 
a priest running for Congress, and he answered, ``Why? Why not? Jesuit 
priests always have been avant-garde. Right?'' Right, Bob, but have no 
doubt about it. Bob was a priest first.
  When he wore the collar on the floor, he was not trying to impress 
anybody. He was, I think, being entirely candid when he said it is the 
only suit I own. Of course, it startled those who have never seen a 
priest on this floor, much less as a Member.
  When he was running for Congress in Boston, there were some who 
irreverently said ``Our father, who art in Congress,'' as an unofficial 
campaign slogan. Yet, when he bowed to the discipline of his church and 
was asked whether he had pain and regret, he answered it is just 
unthinkable that he would renounce the priesthood to hold office. Here 
I am quoting him, ``I am proud and honored to be a priest and a Jesuit. 
As a person of faith, I must believe that there is work for me to do 
which somehow will be more important than the work I am required to 
leave.'' I hope Members of Congress will hear those words, this man who 
had a life after Congress understood, that honor though it be to be 
elected to the House and the Senate, that may well not be the greatest 
honor you will ever receive.
  For Bob Drinan, it was not what, of course, you, Mr. Chairman, have 
spoken of, what his colleagues from Massachusetts have spoken of, is 
the extent to which his deep religious beliefs did not stop at the 
altar, did not stop at the church door.
  I think that Father Drinan would have been very much at home with the 
bishops, the bishops who are first to stand up against war, the bishops 
who are the first to speak out for the minimum wage, the bishops who 
are the first to decry the inattention to the poor. Bob Drinan was, 
indeed, a priest.
  He, when he went to teach at Georgetown, this was no favor to the law 
school. I had to go on a tenure track like everybody else, 7 years of 
writing. Bob Drinan did not, he had been a dean of a great law school, 
he had gotten his tenure, and he was welcomed with open arms at the law 
school. He was no first-time scholar. What was his discipline? In law 
school you have to teach what the law school needs, but if you have a 
specialty, it becomes yours. Can anybody doubt why Father Drinan 
focused

[[Page 3096]]

on legal ethics and international human rights?
  Mr. Chairman, you have said he virtually created the field. It is a 
field now that our students, Georgetown and throughout the country, 
study. It is one of the great and growing legal disciplines of our 
time. One of his last statements was made in a book called, ``Can God 
and Caesar Coexist,'' balancing religious freedom and international 
law? For Bob Drinan, father and priest, God and Caesar existed 
together, but the magic and marvel of the man, that when he spoke and 
acted for Caesar, for the State, he understood that he was subject to 
the discipline of the State, and that meant the first amendment of the 
United States Constitution, which protects, after all, the State and 
the church from each other.
  They are dangerous for each other. They can impose their will on each 
other. It is the great first amendment that keeps that from happening, 
standing side by side, freedom of religion, but that is impossible in 
our country only when there is no action connoting the establishment of 
religion.
  The President, Mr. Chairman, and you have already, I think, entered 
for the Record, the statements of those who spoke at the funeral, you 
and I, and many other Members who attended, President of Georgetown, 
John DiGioia, said in his statement something that reminds us the deep 
character of man for whom choices that many of us would find difficult 
were easy because he had assimilated who he was decades before, and our 
President DiGioia said, At the peak of his engagement Bob Drinan was 
told he could no longer serve as an elected Member. And we can all 
imagine how difficult that choice might have been for us. But for Bob, 
there was never any real choice. The true character of the man, the 
depth of his identity as a priest was revealed by his act of obedience.
  Mr. Chairman, my appreciation is particularly great to you. I have 
waited my turn. I have waited my turn, not because of seniority, but 
because those of you who came from the Massachusetts delegation were, 
of course, those who spoke first and foremost for and about Father 
Drinan. But if I may say so it is with the greatest sorrow and the 
greatest respect that the residents of the District of Columbia, the 
faculty and students of Georgetown University join you in honoring a 
remarkable Member of Congress, a remarkable priest, a remarkable son of 
Massachusetts and, yes, a resident of the District of Columbia.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I thank the gentlewoman.
  As I summarize, let me say I think there is a common theme here. We 
have discussion again about the global morality of politics, and the 
role of morality in our lives. Father Robert Drinan exemplified that. 
In his personal life for over 60 years a priest, he gave the exemplary 
disciplined life that he chose as a priest and adhered to a code of 
personal morality that very few human beings achieve with a dedication 
and a belief.
  At the same time, he recognized that the personal moral choices he 
made as a priest, and that he urged others to make, were those personal 
choices and voluntary choices, and he understood the difference in the 
scope of governance. He understood that there is a private morality and 
a public morality. Not that they are in conflict, but that they cover 
different spheres, and where human beings interact with each other, it 
is required that government set the rules.
  He was a man who did as much to make sure that those interactions 
were governed by a set of moral principles founded on what was for him 
a fundamental religious belief and the dignity of man, and in his side-
by-side example of a strict code of personal morality, which he 
followed as a matter of choice, and his insistence that government, 
when it became coercive, followed the morality of recognizing the 
dignity of all human beings, he helped us, if, when we listen and read 
the lesson of his life, to understand what for some people is a 
difficult decision.
  Mr. LANTOS. Mr. Speaker, it is with great sadness that I rise today 
to honor a remarkable man, whose recent passing leaves a tremendous 
void in the world. I am referring of course to Father Robert Frederick 
Drinan, the first Catholic priest to serve as a voting Member of 
Congress and a pioneer advocate for human rights.
  According to news reports Father Drinan passed away from 
complications from pneumonia and congestive heart failure, but during 
his life Father Drinan spoke out clearly and loudly on behalf of those 
without a voice. His passion to protect the fundamental rights of the 
human condition both great and small was second to none.
  Mr. Speaker, Father Drinan's was a powerful force on behalf of human 
rights and he helped pave the way for the establishment of the 
Congressional Human Rights Caucus. Although I came to Congress after he 
was forced to resign his seat, I fondly remember working with him in 
the defense of Soviet Jews in the early 1980s and I recall that he was 
routinely denied entry into the Soviet Union because of these 
convictions.
  I think it is poignant to know that Father Drinan never got caught up 
in the trappings of power or the personal ambitions of high public 
office. The best evidence of this fact is that Father Drinan never 
considered resigning from the priesthood when Pope John Paul II asked 
him to retire from Congress or resign.
  Robert Drinan was born in 1921 in Boston and entered the Society of 
Jesus after graduating from Boston College in 1942. He completed his 
seminary work at Weston College, where noted activist Daniel Berrigan 
was a classmate. After earning a master's degree from Boston College in 
1947, Father Drinan headed south to Washington, DC, where he received 
two law degrees from Georgetown University. Father Drinan was ordained 
in 1953 and completed his doctorate in theology from Rome's Gregorian 
University. In 1955 he returned to his native Boston to take a position 
as associate dean and professor at Boston College Law School. He became 
dean of the law school until 1969, when he left to run for Congress. 
After besting a 14-term Member in the Democratic primary, Father Drinan 
sailed to victory to become the first Catholic priest to be elected as 
a voting Member of Congress. During his 10 years as a Member of the 
House of Representatives, Father Drinan was an active member of the 
House Judiciary Committee and brought the first resolution of 
impeachment against President Nixon. For years after he left office 
until his death he continued to write and teach as a professor at the 
Georgetown University Law School.
  Mr. Speaker, during his time in Congress Father Drinan's dual role as 
priest and Representative personified the beauty of our constitutional 
underpinning of the separation of church and state. Using his priestly 
authority, he easily fit the mold of moral architect on efforts to end 
the war in Vietnam and to highlight abuses of human rights around the 
globe. However, he also disregarded church doctrine to faithfully 
represent the views of his ``pro-choice'' constituency on issues like 
abortion that rankled and angered many conservative Catholics.
  Truly, Father Drinan was a beacon to follow for those of us who know 
the difficulties and challenges of having to fight for sometimes 
unpopular positions. He fought those fights all of his remarkable life 
that we will long remember.
  Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to celebrate the life of our 
former colleague and man of faith, Father Robert Drinan. I never had 
the honor to serve with Father Drinan in Congress, but the effects of 
his advocacy and leadership remain. In the years after he left Congress 
and contining through my election and service, I was encouraged and 
honored to have the friendship and counsel of Father Bob.
  His life is unique in American history. He was the only Roman 
Catholic priest to be elected to Congress. He represented the best that 
we, as Members of Congress, can aspire to. Not bound to special 
interests or enticed by political gains, he truly cared about the 
people who had elected him and those around the globe who were 
persecuted or malnourished, who could be called ``the least of these.''
  He was a passionate advocate for the poor and he called ending world 
hunger his ``number one passion.'' His opposition to the Vietnam war 
was the centerpiece of his 1970 campaign. Asked by a reporter for the 
Boston Globe why he decided to run for Congress, Father Drinan replied, 
``Why? Why not. Jesuit priests have always been avant-garde. Right?''
  Born in Boston on November 15, 1920, Father Drinan never strayed far 
from the city and people he loved. After earning his bachelor's degree 
at Boston College in 1942, he enrolled in the Society of Jesus. He 
completed his seminary work at Weston College, earned a master's degree 
from Boston College, and a law degree from Georgetown University. In 
1953, Father Drinan was ordained and shortly

[[Page 3097]]

thereafter completed his doctorate in theology from Gregorian 
University in Rome. As dean of the Boston College Law School, he 
transformed the institution into one of the premiere law schools in the 
country.
  In 1980, when he left Congress, he returned as a teacher to 
Georgetown University Law School. It was there that he not only taught 
but wrote important works of scholarship and continued to serve as a 
moral compass to his students, government officials and all Americans. 
He was deeply interested in human rights, constitutional rights, civil 
liberties and ethics. Until the very end of his life he continued to 
celebrate Sunday evening mass with the law students he taught and 
loved.
  It has been recalled recently that when asked about his decision to 
wear a clerical collar and a black suit, his standard reply was, ``It's 
the only suit I own.'' He was a sharp wit, but also a deeply moral man. 
Many current and former members have called Father Drinan ``the 
conscience of the House.'' Senator Edward Kennedy said of Father Drinan 
that, ``of all the hats he wore, none fit better than teacher, for he 
was a teacher to all of us.'' Father Drinan will be sadly missed by 
this institution and our Nation. I am glad that last year the House 
honored Father Drinan with the Distinguished Service Award for his 
decade of service in the House.
  I knew Father Drinan best from his work as chairman on PeacePAC, a 
division of Council for a Livable World, and as director of the Center 
for Arms Control & Non-Proliferation. He was a man who believed deeply 
in world peace and he struggled mightily to achieve it. He and the 
Council for a Livable World encouraged me when I first considered 
running for this office, and I will always remember their support and 
true belief that peace should be a goal of all Members of Congress.
  In November of 2006, the Council for a Livable World established the 
Father Robert F. Drinan National Peace and Human Rights Award to be 
given annually by the council to the individual who best exemplifies 
Father Drinan's commitment to peace. As Father Drinan said at the 
unveiling of the award, ``people will be reminded that: you cannot just 
make war.'' He was right to oppose the Vietnam war and right to oppose 
the Iraq war. We can all learn from his life's commitment to peace.
  Georgetown University President John J. DeGioia recently eulogized 
that, ``Bob Drinan never faltered, was never discouraged. It remains 
for all of us to carry on the work for which he prepared us, to build 
an earth in which justice will prevail.''
  Mr. Speaker, let us carry the spirit of Father Drinan in our hearts 
as we in Congress continue to work to complete the work he called us to 
do.
  Mr. RANGEL. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to the life of 
Father Robert F. Drinan, his enduring faith, and lifelong commitment to 
human rights. Father Drinan passed on January 28, 2007, at his 
residence in the Georgetown University Jesuit community in Washington, 
DC. He was 86 years old and had recently been ill with pneumonia and 
congestive heart failure.
  Father Drinan was an unwavering defender of the civil and human 
rights of all Americans. His commitment to these principles was 
anchored by his religious conviction and a fundamental belief in the 
rights of all people to be respected and protected by their governments 
and elected leaders. It was this conviction that led Father Drinan to 
politics in 1970 when he sought a seat in the U.S. House of 
Representatives. During his tenure in Congress, Father Drinan was an 
outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War and was the first person to call 
for the impeachment of President Nixon. Father Drinan was re-elected 
four times, serving from 1971 until 1981. He stepped down in accordance 
with a directive from Pope John Paul II, barring priests from holding 
public office.
  Father Drinan was the first Roman Catholic priest to serve as a 
voting member of the U.S. Congress. I had the honor of serving with him 
on the Judiciary Committee during the Watergate proceedings. He was a 
man of deep convictions, a passionate leader and a good friend. Long 
after he left Congress, Father Drinan continued to be a vocal supporter 
of human rights. Through his words and his actions he demanded morality 
in our political leadership. Ever committed to his work, Father Drinan 
spent the past 21 years as a professor at the Georgetown Law Center 
where he focused on legal ethics and international human rights.
  We all mourn the loss of Father Robert F. Drinan, a man who committed 
his life to standing up for what he believed. He will be greatly 
missed.
  Mr. HONDA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to memorialize the recent 
passing and pay tribute to a great and former Member of this House, 
Father Robert Drinan. Many Members of this House have already praised 
his advocacy of human rights and women's rights, his efforts to uphold 
government morality, his role as an educator, and his commitment to his 
Catholic faith. I rise today to highlight and honor Father Drinan for a 
particular element of his human and civil rights advocacy work.
  In 1981, as a former Congressman and noted advocate for social 
justice, Father Drinan was named to the Commission on Wartime 
Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC). This commission was 
formed to investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding Executive 
Order (EO) 9066 and the impact of this order and the ensuing exclusion, 
relocation, and internment on American citizens and permanent resident 
aliens of Japanese ancestry.
  The CWRIC found that EO 9066 and the decisions that followed were not 
justified by military necessity, but shaped by racial prejudice, 
wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. As a member of 
the commission, Father Drinan was among the most outspoken about the 
need to remedy the injustices done to these loyal Americans and 
permanent residents. Based on the CWRIC's findings and recommendations, 
Congress passed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which provided a 
national apology and redress to all surviving individuals who were 
excluded from their place of residence due to EO 9066.
  The CWRIC and its findings are cited as historic and remarkable due 
to their impeccable credentials, solid research, and far-reaching 
influence, As such, we cannot understate the role of Father Robert 
Drinan in the proceedings and findings of this commission. He spoke for 
redress to former internees in his Congressional testimony on behalf of 
the commission. His testimony was truly instrumental in the passage of 
the Civil Liberties Act and sent a message to the Nation and the world 
that the U.S. Government is able to admit its mistakes and take 
responsibility in making reparations. In a speech before Congress in 
1987, Father Drinan profoundly stated, ``No U.S. Government may take 
away the liberty of its citizens, even in wartime, unless there is some 
clear and provable reason. Lacking any such reason, the deprivation of 
liberty of any U.S. citizen is a clear violation of the Constitution, 
which states in the 14th Amendment that no person may be deprived of 
`life, liberty, or property without due process of law.'''
  Father Drinan maintained his commitment to the causes of human 
rights, education, and promoting awareness of the triumphs and follies 
of U.S. history throughout his life and well after his tenure on the 
CWRIC. On the matter of Japanese American Internment, Father Drinan was 
among the founding board members of the Civil Liberties Public 
Education Fund which was created by the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 to 
fund educational and humanitarian purposes related to the wartime 
internment of Japanese Americans. As part of this board, Father Drinan 
ensured that we as a Nation never forget the mistakes in our history 
and are reminded to uphold the virtues of equality and justice for all.
  Mr. Speaker, Father Robert Drinan has certainly impacted this Nation 
in innumerable ways, but I have been personally touched by Father 
Drinan's work and advocacy on behalf of the Japanese American community 
towards redress. Our Nation owes Father Drinan much honor, respect, and 
gratitude for his work to address the wrongs done to Japanese Americans 
during World War II and his tireless effort to ensure this Nation lives 
up to its own standards. He will be sorely missed.
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I appreciate the indulgence of the House; 
I appreciate the Members who spoke and submitted information and 
material for this Record.
  Mr. Speaker, I submit for printing in the Record the eulogies for 
Father Robert Drinan referred to previously.

         St. Aloysius Church, Washington DC, February 1, 2007.

             Homily for the Funeral of Robert Drinan, S.J.

                         (By John Langan, S.J.)

       John XXIII, in his great encyclical, Pacem in terris 
     (1963), which was written exactly halfway through the course 
     of Robert Drinan's life, has a passage which puts before us 
     an important goal, the vision of a society of citizens 
     exercising and claiming rights: It is agreed that in our time 
     the common good is chiefly guaranteed when personal rights 
     and duties are maintained. . . If any government does not 
     acknowledge the rights of man or violates them, it not only 
     fails in its duty, but its order completely lack juridical 
     force.'' Pacem in terris (60-61)
       A society built on the practice of rights is not so sweetly 
     transcendent as the holy mountain of feasting and joy which 
     Isaiah summons up for us; it is not so intimately and 
     delicately responsive as the virtue of charity or agape which 
     St. Paul commends

[[Page 3098]]

     to us. But it is essential to the realization of the common 
     good in a world which is marked by enormous human diversity 
     and intermittently intense social conflict. It is a reality 
     which protects those of us who are neither beasts nor angels 
     from our own worst impulses and from the harms which others 
     would do to us. It is the not the realm of the best but of 
     the imperfect good and the necessary. It has been the favored 
     realm of Anglo-American jurisprudence and a refuge for those 
     who suffered from brutal and destructive social experiments 
     carried on in the name of ideology and religion. It is a 
     realm which Robert Drinan, as a distinguished American lawyer 
     and professor of law, and John Courtney Murray, the great 
     American theologian, valued and commended to other Catholics, 
     especially for its affirmation of religious liberty. It is a 
     realm of ideas which has enabled Catholicism to flourish in 
     this country and which has taught Catholicism important 
     lessons about the theory and practice of human rights, a 
     cause to which Bob Drinan devoted enormous amounts of his 
     apparently inexhaustible energy and many years of that life 
     whose end we now mourn. It is a realm which always needs to 
     be defended, but especially in times of fear and uncertainty 
     when false prophets would persuade us that the magnitude of 
     some threat justifies the overriding of those rights which 
     constitute the core of our liberty. It is a realm which we as 
     Americans have been anxious to extend, perhaps even beyond 
     the limits of our capabilities. In taking up the causes of 
     South African victims of apartheid, of Soviet Jews, of the 
     disenfranchised in Central America and the disappeared in the 
     Southern Cone, and of the Muslims of Darfur, and in arguing 
     for effective judicial protection for universal human rights, 
     our friend Robert was preaching the same values and ways of 
     thinking as he did in opposing segregation and capital 
     punishment and protecting civil liberties in this country.
       For the most part, his advocacy of human rights harmonized 
     with the social and moral teaching of the Catholic church. 
     But it must be acknowledged that on the immensely painful 
     subject of abortion there was sharp conflict, a conflict 
     which I wish neither to minimize nor to revisit but only to 
     put into a larger context of common concern for the well-
     being of women and children in a society wracked by moral 
     disagreement. This point also reminds us that the notion of 
     human rights is not transparent in its content but is often 
     used to express profound conflicts in a common legal 
     language. It is not what Bob would call a MIGA, it does not 
     ``make it go away.'' In the matter of abortion, it is 
     important to remember that a decisive point of disagreement 
     for many Catholic politicians is about the appropriate limits 
     of state action and about the attainability of a stable 
     democratic consensus on a matter on which the major religious 
     and philosophical traditions reach conflicting conclusions, 
     not about the moral issue in itself or about Catholic 
     teaching. The shape of legislation can be a matter for 
     prudential disagreement, not an issue of faithfulness.
       Three years after Bob began his career in Congress, Roe v. 
     Wade turned abortion from a contested legal issue to a 
     divisive political issue. This he had to live through, for in 
     addition to being an advocate for human rights, he was also a 
     practicing politician. This, in combination with his 
     priesthood, was the feature of his life which most attracted 
     the attention of the media and the general public. It was 
     also what made him particularly significant to his 
     colleagues; for here was a moral and religious leader who was 
     ready to walk the walk and talk the talk of politics with 
     them. In fact, it became clear to everyone that he enjoyed 
     doing so and that he was very good at it. In listening to 
     comments from various of Bob's colleagues over the years, I 
     heard a gratitude and a pride which arose from the fact that 
     he as a priest was ready to work alongside them in the 
     demanding though often derided task of legislation in a 
     modern democracy. This is an indispensable and noble 
     contribution to our common life, a vocation in itself. Bob 
     had the vision and the grace to combine two difficult 
     vocations in a way which strengthened the commitment and the 
     morale of his colleagues. His ability to do this was a 
     consequence of the fact that he lived what he was doing as 
     the work of justice, not merely the ambitious pursuit of a 
     career.
       The contribution which he made as a priest in politics was 
     a suitable prelude to the work of his later years in 
     promoting the study of legal ethics and in founding the 
     Journal of Legal Ethics here at the Georgetown University Law 
     Center. Events of the last twenty years have presented a 
     series of disillusioning crises which have created widespread 
     public demands for reform of the profession and a continuing 
     need for careful scholarship and prudent judgment. This was a 
     work in which Bob could find a happy convergence of his 
     professional and priestly roles. It also provided an academic 
     and professional counterpart to the concern he always had for 
     the growth and the well being of those aides whom he called 
     his ``minions'' and whom he enjoyed for the generous energy 
     which they brought to political life. This energy was, of 
     course, their imitation of and response to his own enormous 
     energy and sharpness of focus. If Robert Drinan, was like 
     Christ and all Christians, a grain of wheat destined to fall 
     into the earth and die, as today's Gospel reminds us, he has 
     born much fruit in those supporters and aides and in the 
     generations of students who cherished him as one of the most 
     remarkable teachers they ever had and who have been filling 
     up the web page at the Law Center with testimony to his 
     impact and his dedication.
       But the underlying unity of the incredible amount of work 
     he did as teacher, writer, speaker, political leader was his 
     commitment to his identity as a member of the Society of 
     Jesus and as a Catholic priest. When he was confronted with a 
     very stark and public choice, he made it clear what his own 
     priorities were. This may have puzzled and pained many of his 
     friends and colleagues, but it made it clear that his 
     commitment to the work of justice in the law and in politics 
     was truly an expression of his response to the love of God, a 
     response which affirmed that love and justice are indeed 
     bound together, but that neither requires a particular office 
     or role, that at the center of his being he would be God's 
     faithful servant first, last, and always and that this meant 
     he would continue to be a very American, very pragmatic 
     idealist, an advocate of the society of right in which the 
     work of justice still needed the dedication and guidance of 
     one who would remain priest and prophet.
       I do not know what purgatory will be like for Bob. He would 
     dismiss any form of physical suffering or infirmity as a 
     trivial restraint on the desire of his heart for the good and 
     an empty distraction from the important work to be done, as 
     he did in the year before his death. I surmise that the 
     central part of his purgatory will be accepting that he has 
     indeed arrived in a jurisdiction where justice can be 
     attained without lawyers and where the administration is 
     reliably good and beyond impeachment. But I cannot imagine 
     that this will be a long or traumatic episode.
       Through his eighty-six years he learned much and gave much 
     to his students, his colleagues, his country, and to his 
     community of vocation and choice, the Society of Jesus. As a 
     result, so many of us mourn him and look to him as an iconic 
     and exemplary figure, a man in whom the religious and 
     political issues of our age came together fruitfully, if not 
     always happily. We salute a life well lived for the good of 
     others. We recognize a Catholic son of New England, who 
     learned Protestant virtues and institutions and who came to 
     share Jewish joys and sorrows, and who in consequence became 
     more comprehensively Catholic and more universally human. We 
     give thanks for a man of talent who seized opportunities to 
     serve and a man of peace who was not afraid of conflict. We 
     give praise for a friend who gave generously of his time and 
     his knowledge to so many of us even while he remained 
     splendidly and eccentrically himself.
       But in this task of capturing Bob's special union of the 
     vitally personal and the universally good, the deeply 
     Christian and the proudly American, I will give the last and 
     best word to our fellow Jesuit, Gerard Manley Hopkins, who 
     wrote in 1881 this sonnet:

     ``As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
     As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
     Stones ring; like each tucked string sells, each hung bell's
     Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
     Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
     Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
     Selves--goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
     Crying What I do is me: for that I came.

     I say more: the just man justices;
     Keeps grace: that keeps all his goings graces;
     Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is--
     Christ--for Christ plays in ten thousand places,
     Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
     To the Father through the features of men's faces.''

       So we salute a man who has challenged our judgments of what 
     is truly important, who has given a superlative example of 
     generous service, and who never rested from his desire to do 
     the work of justice. As he said to me in what turned out to 
     be our final conversation, ``I do not rest in the daytime.'' 
     He goes on one final trip back to the district, where he will 
     finally rest with his brother Jesuits in New England. We 
     pray--may God be with you, Bob, and may God be with us as we 
     take up our share in the great work. For, as Congressman 
     Hoyer reminded us the other day of the motto above the 
     Speaker's Rostrum in the House, where Bob spent his happiest 
     and richest years, ``In God We Trust.''
                                  ____


                      Eulogy for Fr. Robert Drinan

                         (By Ladislas Orsy, SJ)

     At this sacred place,
     As the ancient and solemn prayers are unfolding,
     And our spirits are finding peace and rest,
     We remember the faithful servant of God, Robert Drinan, our 
           friend.

     He was a priest who offered prayers on our behalf in troubled 
           days;
     He was a teacher who had no fear to tell the truth in 
           confused times;

[[Page 3099]]

     He was a voice for those who had no voice;
     He reached out for those who were in distress.

     In our spirit he is still alive, his words still echo in our 
           mind.

     Now, a silence envelops him,
     A silence surrounds us.

     How shall we keep his memory alive?

     Powerful persons build monuments for themselves so that they 
           are remembered: the pharaohs built pyramids in their 
           quest for immortality.

     But, a good person will be remembered for what he was: he 
           needs no monuments; he lives in the minds and hearts of 
           those who knew him.

     My task is to speak well of him (this is what eulogy means).

     This task is hard and easy.

     It is hard because he had a rich and complex personality.
     And throughout his life he struggled to receive an abundance 
           of grace.
     And God struggled to get hold of him.

     It is easy because what I am going to say you already know, 
           all I do is to articulate what you have perceived.

     Let me then say it simply and plainly--with no ornament:

     Fr Robert Drinan was a good man.
     He had an immense capacity to give: that tells it all.

     Whenever his restless eyes caught sight of someone,
     He or she could be a local or a visitor, a student or a 
           teacher, a poor soul or a rich benefactor,
     If conversation ensued
     Fr. Drinan invariably unfailingly was ready to help him, to 
           help her; and then he the helper said gently ``Thank 
           You!''

     He fulfilled the greatest commandments in the law:

     ``You shall love the Lord, your God''
     And ``you shall love your neighbor as yourself.''
     These two commandments--Jesus said--Are the perfection of the 
           law (cf. Mt. 22:34-40).

     He was therefore a good lawyer: he fulfilled the greatest 
           commandments of the law.

     How did he come to that? He gave from his own riches.

     I presume, (I do not know, but no other assumption makes 
           sense),
     That once upon a time,
     The young Robert Drinan discovered the gift of this beautiful 
           creation,
     And had a glimpse of its almighty Creator,

     Thus he became rich
     And he conceived a gratitude
     For all that he received,
     And responded by enriching others.

     And then the decisions that shaped his life simply followed:
     He became a priest, a teacher, an advocate of human rights, a 
           helper of those in distress.

     The goodness that he received and possessed shaped his 
           personality,
     And throughout his life he kept giving,
     Assiduously and impatiently,
     Perfectly and imperfectly,
     But always magnanimously
     To all and sundry.

     In one way or another, we all experienced it.
     I am indeed articulating what you know.

     Indeed, he was a good lawyer.
     And he fulfilled the perfection of the law.

     In response to the gift that he has received he wanted to 
           mend a broken world.
     Now we understand his bursts of energies, his broken 
           sentences, his impatient gestures, and--the quiet 
           retreats year by year.

     Fr. Robert Drinan needs no monument to be remembered:
     His spirit is alive in many minds and hearts,

     May his spirit be the driving force of our lives.
                                  ____


   Father Drinan Funeral Mass February 1, 2007, St. Aloysius Church, 
                             Washington, DC

                          (By John J. DeGioia)

       ``Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen one in whom 
     I delight; I will put my Spirit on him and he will bring 
     justice to the nations.''
       These words of the Prophet Isaiah describe a man we all 
     know as a true servant of the Lord, because he was a true 
     servant of justice.
       Our University community, our country, our global 
     community--we were all profoundly fortunate to have known 
     him, to have benefited from his wisdom, his keen intellect, 
     his principled leadership, his great heart.
       A devoted patriot, he demanded that the government serve 
     all of the people and not only the wealthy and the 
     influential.
       A cherished pastor, he shared the joys of countless 
     weddings and baptisms and provided guidance and unwavering 
     support to so many as they wrestled with difficult questions 
     and great personal challenge.
       A gifted teacher, he expected that students master the 
     letter of the law, while cultivating in them a respect for 
     the spirit of justice and preparing them to accept the 
     ethical responsibilities of their profession.
       A man of deep and abiding faith, embraced the command to 
     love his neighbor--and for Bob, that meant solidarity with 
     those in need throughout the global community.
       Bob understood that human dignity is not contingent on the 
     whims of the state. It is an absolute, objective good that 
     government, that power, that the rule of law must protect and 
     promote. Human dignity is not constrained by manmade 
     boundaries and borders, and neither is our obligation to 
     foster and support it. Bob traveled the globe on human rights 
     missions, telling the stories of those whose voices those in 
     power could not or would not hear, and championing those who 
     could not fight.
       The way Bob brought his faith into public life can be an 
     inspiration to us all. Public service was a means of living 
     out his deep faith, his vocation as a priest. And so, he was 
     a public servant of extraordinary compassion and conviction, 
     conscience and character who knew that the power and platform 
     of public office were subordinate to justice.
       It was the depth of commitment to his vocation that was the 
     most striking dimension of Bob's character.
       I first met Bob more than 25 years ago when I was serving 
     as assistant to Father Tim Healy, then President of 
     Georgetown. For those of you who knew Tim, you will remember 
     that he was not easily awed.
       When he spoke of Bob Drinan, there was a sense of awe in 
     his voice.
       No doubt, Tim was as impressed by Bob's achievements as all 
     of us were. But there was something else that moved Tim when 
     he reflected on the example of Bob Drinan. They shared the 
     most profound dimension of their identities--they were both 
     Jesuit priests.
       When asked about his ability to serve Georgetown, Tim would 
     often say, ``I serve at the will of our Board of Directors, 
     but I am available to serve because my superiors in the 
     Society of Jesus permit me. If my superiors believe that I 
     can best serve in some other way, then I will do as I am 
     told.''
       At the peak of his engagement in the Congress, Bob Drinan 
     was told he could no longer serve as an elected member. We 
     all can imagine how difficult the choice might have been for 
     us. But for Bob, there was never any real choice. The true 
     character of the man, the depth of his identity as a priest, 
     was revealed by his act of obedience.
       The passage from Isaiah concludes, ``He will not falter or 
     be discouraged until he establishes justice on earth.''
       Whether as a dean of law school at Boston College of 14 
     years, or as a member of Congress for 10 years, a member of 
     our Law center faculty for 26 years, a Jesuit of 65 years, 
     the call was that of justice. Bob Drinan never faltered, was 
     never discouraged.
       It remains for all of us to carry on the work for which he 
     prepared us, to build an earth in which justice will prevail.
                                  ____


 Remarks of Senator Edward M. Kennedy at the Mass of the Resurrection 
                   for Reverend Robert F. Drinan, SJ

       Father Brown, Father Langdon, Madam Speaker, Helen, Betsey, 
     Suzy, Anne and all family and friends of Father Drinan, and 
     members of his Georgetown Community. It's an honor to join in 
     celebrating Bob's extraordinary life and enduring legacy. 
     More than any person I've ever known Bob took to heart the 
     belief that here on earth, God's work must be our own.
       We know how hard he worked every day to make our community, 
     our country and our world a better place. Now he is with God, 
     and we know the Lord has told him, ``Well done, thou good and 
     faithful servant.'' Well done indeed Bob.
       To look back over the sweep of his incredible life is to 
     see vivid proof of what even lone individuals--armed with 
     moral clarity and courage--can do when they set their minds 
     on making a difference. He demonstrated constantly that each 
     of us has the capacity to work for change and have an impact, 
     and he did it by example--through his service, his faith and 
     ministry, and his writings and his passion for education.
       Of all the hats he wore, none fit him better than that of 
     teacher, and we'll never forget all he taught us.
       His election to Congress was a dramatic turning point in 
     the effort to end the tragic, misguided, and wasteful war in 
     Vietnam. We miss him more than ever in the halls of Congress 
     today, when that cruel history is repeating itself.
       He stood up to the abuses of a President--at first as a 
     lonely voice, but in the fullness of time, the nation agreed 
     and the President stepped down.
       He took on immensely challenging and often unrewarding 
     tasks such as rewriting the federal criminal code to make the 
     administration of justice both effective and fair. The 
     challenge was tough; it was complex; it was thankless; it 
     took a decade--but it was no match for the brilliant legal 
     mind and the will of iron of this Jesuit.
       He summoned all of us to ease the plight of the oppressed--
     whether African Americans in our own country; Jews in the 
     Soviet Union, or the countless heartbreaking number of 
     impoverished, dispossessed and neglected throughout the 
     world. He held up a mirror to our conscience, both in and out 
     of

[[Page 3100]]

     Congress. He touched us all, and made us see in our own lives 
     the truth of those great words:

     For I was hungry, and you gave me food,
     I was thirsty, and you gave me drink,
     a stranger and you welcomed me,
     naked and you clothed me,
     ill and you cared for me,
     in prison and you visited me. . .
     whatever you did for one of these least
     brothers of mine, you did for me.

       When I think of Bob Drinan, I'm reminded of the famous 
     lines from Oliver Wendell Holmes: ``As life is action and 
     passion, it is required of a man that he should share the 
     passion and action of his time at peril of being judged not 
     to have lived.''
       He served with us in Congress for only ten years, but for 
     that brief time, he was like a meteor across our sky. I think 
     back to that first campaign, and to the team of extraordinary 
     young people he inspired--like a young John Kerry--whom he 
     affectionately referred to as his ``minions.''
       They were brimming with ideas and determination to change 
     our nation for the better, and--decades later--many remain 
     passionately engaged in the public square unbent and unbowed 
     in their commitment to serving others.
       That's how great his influence was, and I'm grateful too to 
     Bob, because from this group of young idealists, I think I've 
     gotten a Senate colleague; at least two chiefs of staff; a 
     pollster; a team of advisors; and one determined core of 
     volunteers. So thank you Father!
       That his droll wit, immense intellect, and his unwavering 
     commitment to justice and peace are gone from us now, makes 
     me sad.
       But we know that ``Blessed are the peacemakers for they 
     shall be called the children of God''--and we know too that 
     our great teacher, friend, and leader is smiling down on us 
     today. God Bless you, Father Drinan.
       Your inspiration still guides us.
                                  ____


                        Tribute To Father Drinan

                         (By Max M. Kampelman)

       Father Drinan and I first met in early 1980, the last year 
     of the Carter administration. President Carter had 
     unexpectedly asked me to spend three months in Madrid heading 
     the American delegation to the Conference on Security and 
     Cooperation in Europe, known as the Helsinki process and 
     consisting of thirty-five countries.
       The Congress had established a joint House and Senate 
     Commission to make certain that the United States would not 
     permit the human rights dimension of the agreement to be 
     buried by the Soviet Union and those states more interested 
     in economics and security. Father Drinan was an active member 
     of the Congressional Commission.
       In my role as Chairman, I invited the Commission to be an 
     integral part of our delegation and urged its Members to 
     spend as much time in Madrid with me as they could. Father 
     Drinan took advantage of that opportunity and I was proud to 
     have him, a frocked Jesuit and a Member of Congress, 
     symbolically and actively representing our country and our 
     values.
       The meetings lasted for three years and not for three 
     months. With the help of Father Drinan and the Members of the 
     Commission, our Delegation decided not to bring the meeting 
     to a close until we could see signs of improved Human Rights 
     on the part of the Soviet Union and its Eastern European 
     colleagues. We quietly negotiated significant achievements in 
     that area.
       Father Drinan and I remained friends even after he left 
     Congress. The decision by the Pope that he leave politics 
     and, in the Jesuit tradition, engage in teaching was, we 
     know, not an easy one for him to accept. My own view was that 
     the Pope knew that Massachusetts would be in good hands with 
     Ted Kennedy in the Congress and that there was an urgent need 
     for the legal profession to learn what Father Drinan would 
     teach.
       Our last meeting was a few weeks ago when he invited me to 
     lunch in the lovely new dining room for Priest at Georgetown 
     University. I pointed out to him that I was five days older 
     than he and, therefore, should be considered the senior, but 
     he insisted on paying the bill. He had read an article I had 
     written which was published in The New York Times calling for 
     a serious active rebirth by our government of the Reagan 
     effort for the world to destroy all of our nuclear weapons of 
     mass destruction. This interested him immensely. I told him 
     of the progress being made in that direction and I promised 
     to keep him informed. I will. Death, after all, is only a 
     horizon; and the horizon is only the limit of our sight.

     

                          ____________________