Cardinal Joseph Bernardin’s inner circle of family and friends drew closely around him Wednesday, as the dying prelate spoke by phone to the pope and the president.
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The Archdiocese of Chicago officially announced, “The cardinal’s condition is grave” but did not elaborate on what appeared to be the rapid deterioration of Bernardin’s health over the past two days.
Inside the cardinal’s residence on North State Parkway, where he is expected to remain until his death, a small buffer of privacy now surrounds the cardinal–insulation not only from curious media and the public but from the official world of the archdiocese.
Bernardin, who lived so much of his life in the public eye, spent the day instead with a small group of those closest to him personally.
Among them were his only sibling, Elaine Addison, who traveled from her South Carolina home last weekend; Bishop Raymond Goedert, the vicar general of the archdiocese, who returned early from the National Conference of Catholic Bishops Tuesday night; and Monsignor Kenneth Velo, a longtime aide and friend who lives at the residence with Bernardin and Goedert.
Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles flew from Washington to Chicago and said mass with Bernardin on Wednesday afternoon.
Shortly before, at 2:30 p.m., Pope John Paul II called from Rome and spoke to Bernardin, who is suffering from pancreatic cancer.
“He gave the cardinal his blessing, and he thanked him for all he had done for the archdiocese and the universal church,” archdiocese spokesman Bob Quakenbush said.
“He expressed his hope that the cardinal would offer his suffering for the well-being of the Chicago area and the United States.”
That is a common theme for the pope, who has said in recent years that his own injuries and illnesses have brought him closer with the suffering of Christ on the cross and served as a sort of sacrifice for all people.
The pope then spoke with Goedert, extending his apostolic blessing to the archdiocese.
In the morning, President Clinton called and told the cardinal that “he and Hillary love the cardinal very much,” according to Quakenbush.
Around Chicago there were other tributes to Bernardin as well.
“It has been a great privilege to know a very great man,” said Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu of the Anglican Church of South Africa, who was in Chicago for a religious conference.
“We want to thank God for his ministry and for his witness, for the fact that he has stood out very significantly as someone those who are the oppressed . . . turned to easily as a friend and as a champion.”
Mayor Richard M. Daley took a moment during his own news conference to offer his thoughts on Bernardin. “He’s kind of a role model for all of us to reach out and help one another, in time of sickness or illness,” Daley said.
Though the progress of Bernardin’s illness has been faster than he expected, close associates say it has still left the cardinal time to prepare for his death, spiritually and sacramentally.
Several days ago, Bernardin was administered the “anointing of the sick,” a sacrament that has replaced “extreme unction,” the formal name for the last rites that used to be offered at the moment of death.
It is the same sacrament he offered thousands of other sick Catholics in September, during a series of healing services Bernardin held across the archdiocese.
Church historians say that this sacrament is similar to one practiced by Christians in early centuries before there was a formal church hierarchy. As priests took over the role of administering the sacrament, however, and it became linked to a rite of deathbed reconciliation, it was often postponed until the last moments of life.
It was not until the Second Vatican Council (1962 to 1965) reasserted physical healing as an important function of the anointing of the sick that the sacrament became common well before death. Those who recover may be anointed again when they face new illness.
The ritual works in three ways for a Roman Catholic, according to Rev. Luke Buckles, a professor of sacramental theology at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley, Cal.
The first is spiritual strengthening; the second is forgiveness of sin; and the third is the hope of resurrection.
As part of the modern Catholic liturgy he helped implement, Bernardin has also received at least one other last rite, the apostolic blessing given Wednesday by Pope John Paul II.
Bernardin may also have received the sacrament of penance, though the relationship between a priest and his confessor–another priest to whom he confesses his sins–is highly private.
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The last communion he receives will make up the final sacrament of dying, the viaticum. According to those close to him, Bernardin has continued his decades-long practice of saying mass every day, despite his pervasive fatigue and significant pain.
Roman Catholics believe that in mass, bread becomes the body of Christ. Monsignor Charles Gusmer, who has written about the history of the Roman Catholic liturgy, explained that this last communion is meant to be food for the journey to eternal life.
“As the forms of bread dissolve, you no longer need it in sacramental form,” Gusmer explained. “You see Jesus face-to-face.”
It is those needs, rather than medical intervention, that Bernardin has concentrated on since he made his final public appearance two weeks ago.
After he discontinued his chemotherapy, Bernardin said that he would not take extraordinary medical measures to prolong his life.
In practice that has meant that he has chosen to die at home, with medical treatment limited to the relief of pain and other symptoms. Although his oncologist, Dr. Ellen Gaynor, visited the cardinal at his residence Tuesday night and again Wednesday, it has been more than a week since Bernardin visited the cancer center at Loyola University Medical Center that now bears his name.
Theologians say that Bernardin’s approach fits comfortably inside the Roman Catholic belief in a natural beginning and end to life.
Hospice advocates, meanwhile, hail Bernardin’s choice of dying at home, as naturally as possible.
“The point of hospice is not that the patient is being put out to pasture to die,” said Dr. Nicholas Christakis, who studies end-of-life treatment at the University of Chicago.
“Hospice is about loving care of the patient at the end of their life. Part of the philosophy of hospice is that it neither hastens nor postpones death. It just recognizes that dying is a part of life.”