There are a good number of canonized saints who died before reaching thirty years of age: Saints Dominic Savio, Stanislas Kostka, Therese of Lisieux, Maria Goretti, Gemma Galgani, and Anne Line, one of the forty English martyrs, come to mind. Of course, when you speak of martyrs, we have those young valiant women who are honored in the Canon of the Mass, with the Nobis Peccatoribus. I am sure there are scores of others, who are canonized. Uncanonized? They are countless. It would be interesting to make a list of the young canonized saints. That’s an assignment that I have to commit myself to.
Blessed James Francis Kern
Yesterday, I read on the Immaculate Conception Priory website a brief biography of Blessed James Francis Kern, a Norbertine priest, who died in the odor of sanctity in the year 1924 at the age of twenty-seven. What caught my attention about Blessed James Kerns was that, while a seminarian at the diocesan major seminary in Vienna, he requested advice from his spiritual director about seeking acceptance at the Praemonstratensian Abbey in Geras, Austria. (I was a seminarian with the Norbertines for three years [1971-1973] in El Toro, California.) The director encouraged young James Francis to do so, and he was received at the Abbey in 1920. Although his order more commonly bears his own name, at least in the United States, Saint Norbert’s order is known in Europe as the “Praemonstratensians,” in honor of the marshy valley of Praemontré, in France, where Pope Callixtus II directed him, and his thirteen disciples, to found his first monastery in the year 1119.
A Sacrifice of Atonement
This being the sixth day of the Church Unity Octave (a liturgical devotion launched by Father Paul Francis Wattson, founder of the Friars of the Atonement), the intercession of Blessed James is a fitting complement to the intentions of these eight days of prayer. Why? Because the reason the young seminarian wanted to join the Norbertines was that he might be accepted as a victim soul, a “sacrifice of atonement,” as he himself requested, for the sin of schism of one, Bogumil Zahradnik , a Norbertine canon regular, who helped co-found the National Church of Czechoslovakia after the end of World War I. Later on, this National Church adopted heresies that went back to John Wycliff and John Hus and the Bohemian Brethren of the fifteenth century. That’s another story.
Brief History of His Life
James Francis was born in Vienna to a pious merchant and his wife in April of 1897, about two months after our own Father Leonard Feeney was born and five months before the death of Saint Thérèse. James’ mother dedicated her child at birth to the Mother of God. As a youngster, James’ extraordinary piety would evoke remarks of wonder and praise from everyone who knew the family; he was “the little saint,” a “child blessed by God.”
As soon as he was old enough to enter the minor diocesan seminary at Hollandbrun, James (or Francis, as his family more often called him) did. Here, he gave full vent to his passion for prayer. In those days, in Austria anyway, a good-spirited young man who, without ostentation, spent his free time in the chapel was not the butt of ridicule, but of praise. James Kern was always in the chapel. When the bell would ring for mealtime, fellow seminarians would have to go and shake him from prayer to do his community duty, which was simply to eat the meal with the community. He was not pretending: “Oh, maybe, they will think I’m a saint, because ‘I didn’t hear the bell!’” No! This was the genuine article. He was, probably, in a bit of an ecstasy while praying; who knows, but the fact is he did not hear the bell. He needed help.
The Papa I Never Knew
This reminds me of one of my mother’s stories about my grandfather. She loved her father, John James Boyle; but, he drank. I never met him. He died young, like everybody did in my grandparents’ generation. I never knew any of my grandparents on either side. When John James Boyle was on the wagon, which, as my mother told me, was “most-of –the-time,” he was a saint. He’d park his chair against the wall at their home and read, and read, and read; he knew all about the conspiracy, hated FDR’s policies, knew about and hated the Masonic agenda, and he read every book in the library, so my mother assured me.
“Every book, Mom?” “Yes,” she said, “every book!” My grandfather knew about everything that led us into the Second World War. He knew that the whole thing was an orchestrated conspiracy, including the non-reaction of our government to the intelligence report pre-announcing the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Yes, “another story,” already told by many others who know far more than I do. Grandpa lived many years in sobriety, and, during that time, he tried to educate his sons, all eight of them, but most of them ended up ignorant of the Faith; two of them left the Church for stupid reasons. “Another story.”
The parish priests in the U.S of A., for the most part, were already, after WWII, spiritually atrophied. I mean long before Vatican II! “We want to be good Americans!!!” Forget about converting these English, whose ancestors starved our ancestors to death and robbed us of our homes; we want to be “Americans.” My grandfather tried; he tried, but most of his eight sons just didn’t get it. Maybe John, the eldest, did: he had been a seminarian for a while. He died young, too. I never knew him. My uncles became Kennedy Catholics. I remember one of my uncles praising Ted Kennedy, to my mother’s shocking chagrin, for his swimming ability in escaping the accident at Chappaquiddick. I never forgot it. I was sixteen. There he was, sitting in my mother’s kitchen, saying what a great a guy Ted was because he saved himself when his car was submerged in some thirty feet of water. He knew, yes my uncle knew, a girl died in the car while Teddy managed to save himself. He didn’t know about other things I won’t mention. He didn’t know that the young campaign volunteer, Mary Jo Kopechne, was a 1966 graduate of Our Lady of the Valley High School, in Orange NJ, located just a half-mile from where he was sitting as he lauded Teddy. The Kopechnes never got a letter of apology from this sick creature; all Teddy did was pay for her funeral.
The Porter for the Dominican Cloister
The cloistered Dominican nuns in Newark, New Jersey, gave my grandfather the key to their chapel door. He’d open up the church every morning. John James Boyle was his name. My grandfather. One time, before I was born, his sister came to visit him from South Jersey. My mother was embarrassed as she opened the door to greet her. My parents are dead now, but I think her name was “Annie”:
“I don’t know where my father is, Aunt Annie,” she said, “Maybe he is at the convent.” So, my mother went to the Dominican convent to see if her father was there. And he was. Yes, he was, praying before the altar. My mother told me that he looked like he was in an ecstacy. He was looking straight ahead at the tabernacle, eyes wide open. Mom says to him: “Dad, Aunt Annieis here to see you; come, she came all the way from Philadelphia.” My mother tugged at him. He would not move. No response; no response at all, not even for his dear sister Annie.
It was my grandfather, Mr. John James Boyle, porter for the chapel of the cloistered Dominicans, who are still there today, in Newark, New Jersey, who told my mother that there is no salvation outside the Catholic Church.
One of the nuns at this same convent wrote to Loreto Publications, not too many years ago, asking how much it would cost to get Brother Francis’ philosophy course on tape. I took the call. I was working for Loreto at the time. The nun was very interested in learning Thomistic philosophy. I gave her the price and promised a discount. I told the nun about my grandfather. Her voice was that of a very young woman. She explained how she, and the new young cloistered sisters, were very interested in learning Catholic perennial philosophy, and, how ( I’ve forgotten) they came across the Saint Augustine Institute website. Anyhow, the nun was calling without Mother Superior’s permission, and the higher authority ended up squelching the whole thing. So be it. These poor nuns wanted a course in Catholic philosophy and it was denied them; no doubt because the teacher was discovered to be a “Feeneyite.”
Things like this break my heart. So, where was I?
The Eulogy for a Victim Soul
Brother James Francis Kern. To make a long story short, he was enlisted to fight in the Tyrolean regiment, for Austria, in World War I. He was assigned to fight on the Italian front. He was not cut out for killing. But, God protected him from ever having to pull a trigger. His men admired him. He was no coward. He was a compadre, but he was spared mano-a-mano life/death confrontation. He prayed to get hit — basically, to get himself out of this stupid war, and to suffer for Christ. And he got hit. He received a major, life-threatening chest wound. He was diagnosed by the doctors to die in a matter of days. Nevertheless, he kept insisting that he was not going to die until he was ordained a priest. He recovered, in spite of all the doctors’ prognoses to the contrary.
In 1917, with the war raging, and the Blessed Mother appearing at Fatima (which heavenly visitation, of course, he did not know about) James Francis Kern came home, a wounded soldier, and went back to the seminary. In 1922, on July 23, he was ordained a priest in St. Stephen Cathedral in Vienna. His first Mass was scheduled to be celebrated in the convent of the sisters at Voecklahe. He was barely able to offer the Mass. The night before, he suffered a particularly severe hemorrhage from his chest wound, which nearly canceled the celebration. But, he did manage to offer the Mass. When asked why he had to suffer so on the eve of his first Mass, he said, “That’s what I deserve. I expect nothing less.”
According to the Norbertine website biography, in August, 1923, surgeons removed four of James’ ribs to allow free flow from the infected area of his body. Father James spoke of it: “In all times, God desires some men to work, other to suffer, and if the Lord has chosen me to suffer, I will suffer as long as the Lord wants.” In August, 1924, there was more severe hemorrhaging from his chest. In September, 1924, four more ribs had to be removed. That’s eight ribs removed in one year: “It couldn’t last so long if it were not for the love of God for me,” he said, “and if I did not love Him so much.” Another operation was scheduled.
The victim soul had more to suffer. He had offered himself in atonement for the sin of schism of a fellow Norbertine. Schism doesn’t mean much today in this false spirit of “ecumenism.” I mean, we have this Balamand Declaration of 1993. The Vatican approved Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue signed an agreement between the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church, which stipulates that the Roman Catholic Church will not proselytize the schismatic “orthodox.” This agreement brushes aside the sin against charity, which is schism, and insults the martyrs, like Saint Andrew Bobola, S.J., who were tortured and killed by the schismatic “orthodox” Russians because they would not renounce the supreme authority of the pope.
Father James wanted to suffer fully with Christ on the Cross. Jesus accepted his offering. Jesus, in His humanity, felt the pain of abandonment, not only from His apostles (John excepted) but, even from His Eternal Father. What a mystery is this! How could the Son of God living among us, who saw His Father in His human intellect at every moment of His earthly life, feel that He was abandoned by Him: My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me”?
Father James entered into this mystery. He felt abandoned. No solace, whatsoever, not even from Jesus. Why do I say “Not even from Jesus”? Because Father Kern was being crucified. Jesus gives Himself to souls in Holy Communion, and that “Communion,” for some, like Father James, was excruciating. Jesus gave Father James His agony of loneliness, and He gave it to this victim in His Eucharist, the Real Presence, in Holy Communion. This was the medium of consubstantiality. If we want to be a “victim soul,” then, be one with me, “die with Me.”
Father James Francis Kern died on October 10, 1924. He told his aunt two days before: “On Monday, I will not awaken from the operation.” That Sunday evening James happily told his sister, a nurse: “Tomorrow at this time, I will already have seen the dear Mother of God and my guardian angel.” He asked for Communion arrangements the following morning because “the first and last Communion should be especially solemn.” On October 10, 1924 – as he had foretold – James went to his eternal home.
There is a book about the life of Father James Francis Kern. It was written in German by Herman Josef Weidinger. It has recently been translated by Father Hubert Szanto, a Praemontratensian canon regular from Saint Michael’s Abbey in Silverado, California. The book is titled: Blessed James Kern: The Priest of Atonement. This is very personal for me, because Father Szanto was my novice master when I was a seminarian at Saint Michael’s from 1971-1973. He was as humble as his name “Hubert,” which I know doesn’t mean “humble.” I still, almost forty years later, hold him in the fondest of memory. I can’t believe all these years have past. God bless you, Father Szanto. I hope you read this. If you do, please pray for Frater Michael.
