James Francis McIntyre

James Francis Aloysius McIntyre (June 25, 1886 – July 16, 1979) was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as archbishop of Los Angeles in California from 1948 to 1970, and was created a cardinal in 1953. He previously served as an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of New York from 1940 to 1948.

He was a highly successful builder of new parishes, churches, and schools. He was notable in church politics, and his reputation remains highly controversial.

Early life James McIntyre was born on June 25, 1886, in Manhattan to James and Mary (née Pelly) McIntyre. His father was a native of New York City and member of the mounted police, and his mother was from Kiltormer, County Galway, Ireland. McIntyre attended Public School No. 70 because there was no room for him at the local parochial school.

His father became totally disabled after falling from his horse in Central Park in Manhattan; his mother then opened a dressmaking business to support the family. He then studied at Cathedral College in Queens for a year before entering St. Joseph's Seminary in Yonkers, New York, where he was a friend of future Cardinal Patrick O'Boyle. As archbishop, he led the successful effort to repeal the state tax on Catholic schools. DuBay never returned to ministry; he married in 1968.

In 1967, McIntyre banned members of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary from teaching in schools in the archdiocese. The nuns had recently abandoned some traditional elements of cloister life, such as compulsory daily prayer and the wearing of habits in the classroom. In 1968, the Sacred Congregation of Religious in Rome ruled that the nuns had to restore their former practices or request dispensation from their vows. Of the 380 members of the order, 315 chose to leave.

According to The New York Times, by the end of his tenure, McIntyre was the subject of protests by Blacks, Hispanics, and his own clergy. As the result of rule changes by Pope Paul VI, on January 1, 1971, he lost the right to participate in a Papal conclave due to being over the age of 80.

Retirement and legacy

McIntyre retired after 21 years as archbishop of Los Angeles on January 21, 1970. He then served as a priest at St. Basil's Parish in Downtown Los Angeles, where he privately celebrated the Tridentine Mass on the side altars of St. Basil's.

McIntyre died at St. Vincent Medical Center in Los Angeles, at the age of 93. In 2003, his remains were transferred to the crypt of the new Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels.

Reputation John Cooney writes in his 1984 book The American Pope that McIntyre harbored racial prejudices and was approached privately by the priests of his archdiocese who asked him to refrain from making racial slurs.

Charles Morris in his 1997 book American Catholic states:Today, McIntyre's name is associated mostly with his sad, slightly ridiculous octogenarian flailing against the cultural and religious revolutions of the 1960s. But if he had retired at the canonical age of 75 in 1961...he would be remembered as one of the great builders of the American Church. Monsignor Francis Weber, in his two-volume biography of McIntyre, tries to rehabilitate the cardinal's reputation. In a 1997 review of Weber's book, historian Kevin Starr agrees with Weber and articulates the alternative version of McIntyre and the 1960s. Starr writes:Sadly, this kindly (most of the time) and, in his own way, holy prelate became the scapegoat for those pushing the ecclesial revolutions, so frequently self-destructive, of the 1960s after the Second Vatican Council.

Viewpoints

Abortion In 1967, McIntyre lobbied California Governor Ronald Reagan regarding a proposed law to legalize abortion in that state under certain conditions. He convinced Reagan to veto the law if it allowed abortions in case of birth defects. The California State Legislature dropped that provision from the bill and Reagan signed the law, which decriminalized abortions when done to protect the health of the mother.

Anti-Semitism In 1944, while auxiliary bishop, McIntyre said that accounts of anti-Semitism in New York were "a manufactured movement...for the deliberate purpose of besmirching the minority Catholic population."

Church reform McIntyre opposed the liturgical revisions of the Second Vatican Council, held between 1962 and 1965.

When Bishop James P. Shannon expressed views critical of the Church hierarchy in an NBC documentary in the late 1960s, McIntyre described Shannon's views as constituting "incipient schism."

Communism McIntyre sent his priests to meetings of the John Birch Society, a right wing group of the 1950s, to supposedly educate themselves about communism. He also recommended subscriptions to American Opinion and other Birch publications in his diocesan newspaper.

Media By 1955, filmmakers in the United States were ignoring some of the restrictions in the Hollywood Production Code. which engendered criticism from the Catholic Legion of Decency. In a statement to the pastors in the archdiocese, McIntyre warned them about "an obvious trend toward laxity" in films.