George William Mundelein (July 2, 1872 – October 2, 1939) was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of Chicago from 1915 until his death and was elevated to the cardinalate in 1924.
George William Mundelein c. 1916Mundelein as Auxiliary Bishop of Brooklyn
George Mundelein was born on Avenue C in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City.[2] He was the only son of Francis and Mary (née Goetz) Mundelein, who were of German descent; he had two sisters, Margaret and Catherine.[3] George Mundelein's grandfather fought in the American Civil War.[4]
After Mundelein returned to the United States, the Diocese assigned him to pastoral work in its parishes. He served as secretary to McDonnell until 1897. In 1897, Mundelein was appointed chancellor for the diocese.
Mundelein was named the third archbishop of Chicago on December 9, 1915, by Pope Benedict XV.[7] The pope had originally intended to appoint Mundelein as bishop of the Diocese of Buffalo, with the more experienced Bishop Dennis Dougherty becoming archbishop of Chicago. However, the British government reportedly objected to having a bishop of German ancestry in Chicago, so close to the Canadian border, during World War I.[8][9] To placate them, Benedict XV named Dougherty to Buffalo and Mundelein to Chicago.
At a large dinner held at the University Club of Chicago on February 12, 1916, chef Jean Crones slipped arsenic into the soup. His intent was to poison Mundelein and over 100 other guests, including Illinois Governor Edward F. Dunne. However, the potency of the arsenic was reduced because the kitchen staff was forced to water down soup to accommodate 50 extra guests.
As the diners started exhibiting symptoms of arsenic poisoning, a doctor at the event prepared a makeshift emetic that the victims could drink to promote vomiting.[10][11] Mundelein ate only a bite or two of the soup and was unharmed.[12] There were no fatalities. Newspapers later referred to the incident as the "Mundelein poison soup plot".
Police were unable to apprehend Crones after the supper. Their investigation revealed that his real name was Nestor Dondoglio and that he belonged to the Galleanist circle of anarchists.[13]
Catholic schools
Almost half the Chicago population was Catholic by the 1920s. For decades, the parishes had been building and running their own schools, employing religious sisters as inexpensive teachers. The languages of instruction were often German or Polish. On taking office, Mundelein centralized control of the parish schools. The archdiocesan building committee now picked the locations for new schools while its school board standardized the school curricula, textbooks, teacher training, testing, and educational policies.[14] Simultaneously he gained a voice in city hall, and Catholic William J. Bogan became superintendent of public schools.[15]
Mundelein died from heart disease in his sleep on October 2, 1939, in Mundelein, Illinois (a village renamed in his own honor 14 years prior to his death), at age 67. He is buried behind the main altar of the chapel at Mundelein Seminary, which was founded on his initiative.
Selfish employers of labor have flattered the Church by calling it the great conservative force, and then called upon it to act as a police force while they paid but a pittance of wage to those who work for them. I hope that day has gone by. Our place is beside the workingman.[21]
In 1935, Mundelein said "that not war, nor famine, nor pestilence have brought so much suffering and pain to the human race, as have hasty, ill-advised marriages, unions entered into without the knowledge, the preparation, the thought even an important commercial contract merits and receives. God made marriage an indissoluble contract, Christ made it a sacrament, the world today has made it a plaything of passion, an accompaniment of sex, a scrap of paper to be torn up at the whim of the participants."[23] He was an outspoken opponent of artificial contraception.[24]
Ethnic groups
During his tenure in Chicago, Mundelein launched an effort to unify ethnic Catholic groups such as the Poles and Italians into territorial, instead of ethnic, parishes with mixed success. St. Monica's parish, however, was endorsed by Mundelein as the city's sole black parish, leading to distaste for the archbishop in both the early 1900s and today. After constructing the landmark Archbishop Quigley Preparatory Seminary in Chicago, Mundelein built St. Mary of the Lake Seminary, later renamed Mundelein Seminary in his honor, in what is now Mundelein, Illinois.[25][26] Quigley Seminary was the site of Mundelein's 1937 "paper hanger" speech, criticizing German Chancellor Adolf Hitler and other Nazi leaders. He also organized the construction of other churches in the see, such as the Saint Philip Neri church and the Corpus Christi Church, both designed by Chicago architect Joseph W. McCarthy.[27] He publicly sparred with the Father Charles Coughlin,[28] the Detroit Catholic priest who broadcast anti-banking and anti-Semitic views to millions of radio listeners until he was forced off the air in 1939.
Kantowicz, Edward R. "Cardinal Mundelein of Chicago and the Shaping of Twentieth-Century American Catholicism." Journal of American History 68.1 (1981): 52-68. online
Kantowicz, Edward R. Corporation Sole: Cardinal Mundelein and Chicago Catholicism (U of Notre Dame Press, 1983).
Sanders, James W. The education of an urban minority: Catholics in Chicago, 1833-1965 (Oxford UP, 1977).
Primary sources
Mundelein, George William. Two Crowded Years: Being Selected Addresses, Pastorals, and Letters Issued During the First Twenty-four Months of the Episcopate of the Most Rev. George William Mundelein, DD, as Archbishop of Chicago (Extension Press, 1918) online.
_circa_1916.jpg)
