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250 • Part II. The Sacraments: The Faith Celebrated
In his last book,
The Gift of Peace
, he wrote of embracing suffering
and finding new life. In a general way, he constructed the book around
the Stations of the Cross, testifying that our search for peace on our life’s
journey is nothing less than embracing the Christ of Calvary. “In an age
like our own, marked in part by the quest for instant relief from suffering,
it takes special courage to stand on Calvary. Uniting our suffering with
that of Jesus, we receive strength and courage, a new lease on life, and
undaunted hope for the future.”
In his last week on earth, he wrote a letter to the Supreme Court of the
United States. He begged the justices not to approve of physician-assisted
suicide. “As one who is dying, I have come to appreciate in a special way
the gift of life,” he wrote. He added that to approve a new right to assisted
suicide would endanger America and send the false signal that a less
than “perfect” life was not worth living.
A few weeks before he died, eight hundred archdiocesan and reli-
gious priests joined him for a prayer service at Holy Name Cathedral
in Chicago. He concluded his homily with these words, which he had
originally spoken to the priests on the evening before his installation as
Archbishop of Chicago in 1982:
As our lives andministries are mingled together through the break-
ing of the Bread and the blessing of the Cup, I hope that long
before my name falls from the Eucharistic prayer in the silence
of death you will know well who I am. You will know because we
will work and play together, fast and pray together, mourn and
rejoice together, despair and hope together, dispute and be rec-
onciled together. You will know me as a friend, fellow priest and
bishop. You will also know that I love you. For I am Joseph, your
brother! (Cardinal Joseph Bernardin,
Gift of Peace
[Chicago:
Loyola Press, 1997], 141-142)
The Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick brings the compassion-
ate presence of Christ into the midst of the sufferings of those who are ill.
Cardinal Bernardin was both a minister of that Sacrament and a recipient
during his own illness.
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