Father McGivney's Founding of the Knights

      Father McGivney was assigned as curate (assistant) of St. Mary's Church, the first Catholic parish in the busy port city of New Haven. There he faced challenges related to a priest shortage, parish debt, illnesses, and hostility toward Catholics. The church became a lightning rod for anti-Catholic derision, expressed in a New York Times headline, “How an Aristocratic Avenue Was Blemished by a Roman Church Edifice.” Against this backdrop, Father McGivney navigated relationships with non-Catholics gracefully, while striving to prevent the culture’s hostility from eroding the faith of his people.

Sought out for his wise counsel, and instrumental in a number of conversions to Catholicism, Father McGivney had a gift for touching hearts and leading souls to God.

In a notable case that gained widespread press coverage, he ministered to James “Chip” Smith, a 21-year-old Catholic who was on death row for shooting and killing a police officer while drunk. Father McGivney visited the condemned man daily to offer guidance, prayer and Mass in the city jail over many months, with a profound effect. The young man’s change of heart was so marked that local newspapers hailed Father McGivney’s ministry.

After Mass on execution day, the priest's grief was profound. Smith comforted him, saying, “Father, your saintly ministrations have enabled me to meet death without a tremor. Do not fear for me, I must not break down now.” Father McGivney walked with him to the end, leading him in prayer and blessing him at the scaffold.

    With a priestly heart, he accompanied those of all ages and walks of life in their suffering and uncertainty, and found practical ways to address their needs. While his first concern was always the faith of his flock, he was attuned to familial, social, financial, civic and societal issues as well. His strong, serene demeanor spoke both of God’s law and mercy, and people were naturally drawn to his reserved yet welcoming manner. Intent on building a dynamic parish for his hard-working and largely poor flock, he staged parish plays, outings and fairs, and he revitalized a group dedicated to overcoming alcoholism within his community.

   According to one of his contemporaries, Father McGivney’s “life was an open book, whose pages all might read, and the influences that radiated from his active, energetic and zealous personality, brought many a poor wanderer to the house of God, back to the faith of his childhood, and to the sacred tribunal of penance, where with faith, contrition and humility, he became reconciled to his Heavenly Father. Father McGivney was nothing, if not active. His energy was restless, ever seeking new outlets, and to this disposition are we indebted for the existence of the Knights of Columbus.”

       In an article titled “The Personality of Father McGivney,” a fellow priest described his demeanor in almost mystical terms: “It was a ‘priest’s face’ and that explains everything. It was a face of wonderful repose. There was nothing harsh in that countenance although there was everything that was strong.” In a similar vein, a layman wrote of how Father McGivney’s steady and reassuring voice attracted even some non-Catholics to the church to hear him preach.

      A man of strategic vision, Father McGivney worked closely with the city’s leading Catholic men, whom he gathered in the basement of St. Mary’s Church to explore the idea of a Catholic fraternal benefit society. The new Order would help men keep their faith; make the case that one could be both a good Catholic and a good American citizen; and  provide financial help for families who had lost a breadwinner to stay together, thereby not only protecting their temporal well-being but also helping them avoid a disbanding that could erode their faith as well.

       In the words of one parishioner, “He was a man of the people. He was zealous of the people’s welfare, and all the kindliness of his priestly soul asserted itself more strongly in his unceasing efforts for the betterment of their condition.”

       Having created a thriving parish community, when Father McGivney was transferred from St. Mary’s Parish in New Haven to become pastor of St. Thomas Parish in Thomaston, the grief among his parishioners was palpable. A journalist covering his last Mass at St. Mary’s described the scene: “Never, it seemed, was a congregation so affected by the parting address of a clergyman as the great audience which filled St. Mary’s yesterday. Some of those present wept aloud and others sobbed audibly.”

      Decades ahead of his time, Father McGivney had a keen sense of the layman’s unique vocation, needs and potential contributions, and he drew his people into the life and activities of the parish. This respect for the laity led Father McGivney to found the Knights of Columbus, a fraternal organization for Catholic men, in 1882.

     The young priest designed a way to strengthen the Catholic faith of men and their families while providing financial protection when they suffered the death of the breadwinner. He well knew that keeping families together assisted both temporal and spiritual needs. At the time, without means of financial support, families were often split up, threatening both the integrity of the family and — depending on the destination of the various family members — their faith as well. His new fraternity was designed to provide Catholic men with an alternative to anti-Catholic secret societies that offered social and employment advancement but drew them away from the faith.

     Father McGivney proposed that the new group be named for Christopher Columbus. Universally esteemed at the time as the heroic discoverer of the New World, Columbus would highlight the deep roots of Catholics in America, and the long history of Catholic evangelization in the hemisphere.

     On March 29 – a day celebrated annually as Founder’s Day – the Connecticut legislature granted a charter establishing the Knights of Columbus as a legal corporation.

      The name “Knights” appealed to the Civil War veterans in the group who saw noble principles of knighthood in the Order’s protection of the faith, family finances and the civil and religious rights of Catholics. A charter member wrote that Father McGivney was “acclaimed as founder by 24 men with hearts full of joy and thanksgiving; recognizing that without his optimism, his will to succeed, his counsel and advice, they would have failed.”

      In a letter to priests of his diocese, Father McGivney said that his first goal in founding the Knights of Columbus was “to prevent people from entering Secret Societies, by offering the same, if not better, advantages to our members.” His second purpose was “to unite the men of our Faith throughout the Diocese of Hartford, that we may thereby gain strength to aid each other in time of sickness; to provide for decent burial, and to render pecuniary assistance to the families of deceased members.”

       The Order’s original principles were unity and charity. “Unity in order to gain strength to be charitable to each other in benevolence whilst we live and in bestowing financial aid to those whom we have to mourn,” Father McGivney wrote. Principles of fraternity and patriotism were added later. Knights were led by their founder to take on the many challenges facing Catholic family life — poverty, early death, secret societies, anti-Catholicism — with the flexibility to take on other duties in the future. With a vision for growth, he asked the pastors in Connecticut to kindly help “in the formation of a council in your parish.”

        As an indication of the respect the first Knights had for Father McGivney’s leadership, they moved to elect him head of the new Order. However, the humble priest insisted that a layman should lead the lay organization. James T. Mullen, a Civil War veteran, was elected the first supreme knight and Father McGivney took up the office of supreme secretary. Two years later, when operations were on a sound footing, Father McGivney resigned his executive post to become supreme chaplain, explaining that his first obligation to the Order was to serve as a priest.