Cardinal George (R to L) reviews his 1951 class photo with fellow alumni Sr. Frances Ryan and Mary Ann Rosso Ulm during a reunion in the gymnasium of their alma mater, St. Pascal Catholic School on March 4. The cardinal graduated with the class of 1951 and was ordained a priest there in 1963. (Brian J. Morowczynski/Catholic New World)
When then-Archbishop Francis George’s plane touched down in Chicago in 1997, one of the first people to greet him was Edward Klein, a police officer stationed at O’Hare International Airport and a former classmate of the archbishop. Cardinal George had just been named the successor to the late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin.“I told him, ‘I’m so proud of you, just like you were my brother,’” said Klein, who, like Cardinal George, graduated from St. Pascal School in 1951. “He told me, ‘You are my brother.’”The two spent eight years at St. Pascal, going to school and often walking home together because they lived in the same direction. Klein, who still sees Cardinal George socially, said he was always friendly, always responsible, always smart.“Even as a child, he was very spiritual, very serious about religion,” Klein said.By eighth grade, Francis George was in charge of the altar boys and the patrol boys, and the school gave him a gold ring for finishing his elementary school career with the best academic record in the class — despite missing months of eighth grade because he was ill with polio.“He was there, and then he was just gone,” recalled Daughter of Charity Sister Frances Ryan, then called Loretta Ryan, another member of St. Pascal’s class of 1951. “No one was allowed to see him at all.” But he picked up right where he left off, editing a final edition of the school newspaper for that year and writing an editorial comment that Sister Frances said reads like a homily. The nuns who gave the young George so much responsibility were correct in their assessment, Klein said. “He was very dependable, and if he said he was going to do something, he did it,” Klein said. When he entered high school seminary after eighth grade, none of his classmates were surprised. “We all knew he wanted to be a priest,” Klein said. Classmate Mary Ann Rosso, now a former president of the Archdiocesan Council of Catholic Women, agreed that it was common knowledge that Cardinal George hoped to be a priest from a young age. But that didn’t set him apart from the other students, she said. “He was a perfectly normal kid, just like everyone else,” she said. “He was always very friendly.” Neither Rosso nor Klein could remember an occasion when young Francis got in trouble in school. Rather, he was always “intense in his studies,” even as a child, Klein said. That was one reason he became friends with Sister Frances. Her family lived on the same street as the Georges, and they would often walk to school together. “He read these books, and he could talk about ideas,” said Sister Frances, whose religious ministry brought her back to Chicago long before Cardinal George’s did. “There weren’t many other people in our class who could talk about ideas like that.” Cardinal George had hoped to attend Quigley Preparatory Seminary for high school and pursue becoming an archdiocesan priest, but seminary officials were concerned about him taking the bus downtown after his bout with polio impaired his mobility. Instead, he attended a boarding school seminary run by the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Our Lady of the Snows in Belleville, Ill., and was eventually ordained a priest of the congregation.The Oblates educated him to be a seminary professor, but before long, he was provincial for the Midwest Province and then vicar general, living in Rome and visiting Oblate missionaries around the world.Klein, who kept in touch over the years because their families were friends, said that experience served him well.“He went all over the world, and he came back to be the cornerstone of the church in Chicago,” Klein said. His experience as an Oblate “gave him a good start on seeing people in different positions in the world. He became very understanding of the way things were in that respect.” Sister Frances said there was a period of about 15 years when she was not in touch with the cardinal, starting with when he was in the seminary when she entered the convent after high school. But their work brought them back into contact when she was in a diocesan chancery office in Jackson, Miss., and he was provincial for the Oblates of Mary Immaculate in St. Paul, Minn., and she had to write to him about something. After that they maintained a correspondence, and she would visit his parents when she returned to Chicago. Since he returned to Chicago, he consistently has made time for friends from his childhood, including schoolmates and former neighbors. “He is very faithful to his friends,” she said. “I know how busy his schedule is, and he never cancels.” Over the years, Sister Frances said, her respect for Cardinal George has grown. “I think he has an integrity about himself,” she said. “He knows who he is, and he is true to himself. He came at a time when things in the church were very turbulent, especially when he was president of the USCCB (2007-2010), but he doesn’t take the popular stand. And he does it with a depth of intelligence. Whether you agree or disagree, his voice needs to be heard.”