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Terence James Cooke
(March 1, 1921 - October 6, 1983) U.S.A.

Terence J. Cooke

Cardinal Archbishop

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Terence Cooke was born in New York City, the youngest of three children of Michael and Margaret Gannon Cooke, who were both natives of County Galway, Ireland. He was named after Terence MacSwiney, the nationalist Lord Mayor of Cork who had died six weeks earlier from his celebrated hunger strike protesting British occupation policies in Ireland.

He studied at St. Joseph's Seminary, Yonkers, New York; The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C.; University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. Faculty member of Fordham University, N.Y., 1949-1954. Cooke was appointed auxiliary of New York, in 1965; was promoted to metropolitan see of New York, in 1968; and military vicar of U.S. Armed Forces, also in 1968. He was created cardinal in 1969.

Critic complained that Cooke's financial wizardry was not matched by comparable leadership skills or long-term vision. In such areas as the Hispanic apostolate and the academic quality of the diocesan seminary, Cooke was faulted for failing to continue the innovative policies of his predecessor. He was sensitive to criticism from the secular press and tended to avoid open confrontation on controversial issues. In public he displayed a cheery smile and exuded an unquenchable optimism.

With the clergy he was affable but a stickler for ecclesial propriety. He had a native ability to deflect a discussion of substantive issues into inoffensive pleasantries. Due to his influence his diocese was spared polarization that occurred in many other diocese due to Vatican II.

In 1980 Cardinal Cooke asked the Rev. John Harvey to "establish a spiritual support system for men and women with homosexual inclinations", and "Courage" was founded. Still led by Harvey, "Courage" today has chapters across the United States and in eight other countries. Chapters offer support groups and techniques for "suppressing" (!) homosexuality.

In August1983 Cooke announced that he was terminally ill with cancer, a lymphoma condition for which he had been secretly receiving medical treatment for the previous eight years. Cooke died in New York, and is buried in St. Patrick's metropolitan cathedral, in New York.

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