Cardinal Named Grand Marshal of 2015 St. Patrick’s Day Parade

For First Time, Gay Group to March Under Own Banner

Posted

Cardinal Dolan won’t be watching the 2015 St. Patrick’s Day Parade as it passes by St. Patrick’s Cathedral on March 17 as he typically does. Instead, all eyes will be on him as he takes to the parade’s front lines as its grand marshal, just as two of his predecessors have done: Cardinal O’Connor in 1996 and Cardinal Egan in 2002.

“It is with genuine humility and deep gratitude that I gratefully accept this honor,” the cardinal said after the news was officially announced Sept. 3 at a press conference conducted by the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee.

In a break from tradition, and not without controversy, the parade committee announced the same day that a marching unit from Out@NBCUniversal, a gay and transgender organization at the broadcasting company, would join the parade and march under its own banner.

The cardinal addresses the issue, and his decision to serve as grand marshal, in his CNY column on Page 5. In it, he said that “the most important question I had to ask myself was this: does the new policy violate Catholic faith or morals?...

“From my review, it does not. Catholic teaching is clear: ‘being Gay’ is not a sin, nor contrary to God’s revealed morals. Homosexual actions are—as are any sexual relations outside of the lifelong, faithful, loving, lifegiving bond of a man and woman in marriage….

The cardinal said “the committee’s decision allows a group to publicize its identity, not promote actions contrary to the values of the Church…I have been assured that the new group marching is not promoting an agenda contrary to Church teaching, but simply identifying themselves as “Gay people of Irish ancestry.”

An Irish bagpiper played festive music as Cardinal Dolan, an Irish-American, and parade officials made their way into a room at the New York Athletic Club in Manhattan for the early evening press conference.

The cardinal said he looks forward to this coming March 17 when he’ll once again begin the day’s festivities by celebrating Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, “and then for the first time, taking my place and leading the march in honor of St. Patrick.”

The cardinal acknowledged a familial link to Ireland in heartfelt remarks at the press conference. “Go back to 1851: an 18-year-old man, very poor, hungry from the famine, scared, but with a deep faith and trust in Almighty God, and full of hope for a better life in the United States, began a journey” from Ireland to St. Louis, Mo., where he put down roots and began his new life as a proud Irish-American.

“I’m glad that this young man, my great-great-grandfather, Patrick Timothy Dolan, had the courage to make that journey,” the cardinal continued. “And I’m sure he’d be surprised but fiercely proud” that his great-great-grandson has been selected as grand marshal of next year’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

At the press conference, it was announced that after a unanimous vote by the parade officers and board of directors, for the first time since the parade stepped off in 1762, a marching unit from a gay organization, Out@NBC Universal, would join the parade and march under its own banner.

WNBC TV, a local affiliate of NBC Universal, has long been the parade’s broadcast partner in televising the parade live nationwide, the parade committee said in a statement the same day.

In the past, members of the gay community were allowed to march in the parade but not under a banner identifying themselves as such.

The cardinal, at the press conference and in a statement issued earlier that day, backed the parade committee.

“The St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee continues to have my confidence and support,” the cardinal’s statement said. “Neither my predecessors as Archbishop of New York nor I have ever determined who would or would not march in this parade (or any of the other parades that march along Fifth Avenue, for that matter), but have always appreciated the cooperation of parade organizers in keeping the parade close to its Catholic heritage.

“My predecessors and I have always left decisions on who would march to the organizers of the individual parades. As I do each year, I look forward to celebrating Mass in honor of St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, and the patron saint of this Archdiocese, to begin the feast, and pray that the parade would continue to be a source of unity for all of us.”

Mayor Bill de Blasio attended this year’s St. Patrick’s Day Mass but did not march in the parade. He had said he disagreed with the organizers of the parade, and by extension the parade’s stance that homosexual persons were not permitted to march with banners announcing that fact. He was joined on the sidelines by a number of other political leaders.

The parade committee, in its statement issued in welcoming the group, said “organizers have diligently worked to keep politics—of any kind—out of the parade in order to preserve it as a single and unified cultural event. Paradoxically, that ended up politicizing the parade. This grand cultural gem has become a target for politicization that it neither seeks nor wants because some groups could join the march but not march with their own banner.”

The committee also claims the parade remains “loyal to Church teachings and the principles that have guided the parade committee for so many decades.”