Lamy of Santa Fe (73 page)

XIII

DAY'S END
AT SANTA FE

1884–1889

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Changeover

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N NOVEMBER
1884, Lamy went to Baltimore—by rail, now, all the way—to sit with his fellow American bishops in the Plenary Council presided over by Archbishop Gibbons. Each delegate was to bring two theologians with him. Lamy had none to call upon, or perhaps to spare, from Santa Fe. He asked that two be assigned him by the cardinal. His voice was heard in the debates. It was not so strong as many remembered it. He was more than gaunt—almost emaciated now. His robes hung loosely upon him, and the great size of his skull was accentuated by the outlines of bones and the hollows of his cheeks sculptured by age. His bulky biretta sat high upon his head. His eyes were entirely recessed in shadow, and his face was wholly pale. The long Mexican ordeal, coming after his illnesses and beyond these the lifetime of extraordinary exertion demanded of his so often vulnerable health, had hurried the reckoning which he was ready to meet.

On his return to Santa Fe, he wrote to Leo XIII in December submitting his resignation, with explanations which were sufficient. Now that the succession was insured and vested in Salpointe, Lamy asked again in January 1885 that Simeoni press for the Pope's acceptance of his petition. The request was not yet known to Santa Fe.

Salpointe, after nineteen years in Arizona, returned to Santa Fe in February, now as an archbishop. Lamy at once began to divide his tasks with him. One of his gravest wishes was still to obtain governmental help to establish Pueblo schools; and after discussing the matter with him, Salpointe went to visit the ten nearest pueblos, to examine the state of affairs, and to determine whether such schools would be welcomed by the Indians. Their decision, he found, was unanimously in favor of them. He would now be able to present their case if it fell to him to do so.

Father Peter Bourgade of Silver City had been appointed to succeed
Salpointe at Tucson, and in April he was summoned to Santa Fe to be consecrated by Lamy. Inviting Machebeuf to the ceremony, Salpointe wrote, “Do not forget to bring your mitre, crozier, and pontifical vestments. You know we aren't rich here, and have here only what is needed in our rituals.” He told Machebeuf also that Lamy was well enough, but now that he had a coadjutor, he wanted to do nothing. “I can't blame him—he worked long for the right to rest.…” The old archbishop assisted by Salpointe and Machebeuf endured the four-hour ritual of raising Bourgade to the episcopate on 1 May, in the half-new, half-old cathedral; and daylong celebrations followed, with a great dinner, fireworks, and artillery salutes, for it was the first ceremony of its kind ever to have been performed in Santa Fe.

Six months after he had offered it, Lamy's resignation was laid before Leo XIII during the papal audience of 28 June 1885. “His Holiness diligently examined the reasons presented by Archbishop Lamy.” On 18 July, the Vatican wrote to Lamy that “the Holy Father, with saddened heart, saw the Archdiocese of Santa Fe being widowed by the departure of its good and most worthy Pastor. However, after a close examination of the reasons revealed by Your Excellency, His Holiness has accepted your resignation. Certainly, it seems right and just that Y.E., after all those years of such great and excellent labors in the vineyard of our Lord, should deserve to spend the rest of your life in peace and tranquility.… Under your guidance and administration the cause of our faith has made great strides in remarkable growth.…”

On the same day, Cardinal Simeoni sent instructions to Salpointe to succeed Lamy immediately, advised him that between them they should arrive at suitable financial arrangements for a pension which would provide a “decent living” for Lamy, and assured Salpointe that at the next papal consistory the pallium would be requested for him.

All formalities accomplished, Lamy was now in a position to take a tablet of faintly blue-lined paper and in the enlarged, deliberate, but still firm handwriting of his seventy-second year, set down the “Resignation of Abp. Lamy and his farewell to the clergy and faithful of the Diocese of Santa Fe,” reading:

For some years past we had asked of the Holy See a coadjutor in order to be relieved of the great responsibility that rested on our shoulders since the year 1850, when the supreme authority of the Church saw fit to establish a new diocese in New Mexico, and in spite of our limited capacity we were appointed its first Bishop. Now our petition has been heard and our resignation accepted. We are glad, then, to have as a successor the illustrious Mons. Salpointe, who is well known in this bishopric, and worthy of administering it, for the good of the souls and the greatest glory of God.

What has prompted this determination is our advanced age, that often deprives us of the necessary strength in the fulfillment of our sacred ministry, though our health may apparently look robust. We shall profit by the days left to us to prepare ourselves the better to appear before the tribunal of God, in tranquility and solitude.

We commend ourselves to the prayers of all, and particularly those of our priests who, together with us, have borne and still bear the burden of the day, which is the great responsibility of directing the souls in the road of salvation. Let the latter remember that, in order that their holy ministry be of any benefit, their example must accompany their instructions. It is with pleasure that we congratulate the most of the clergy of this diocese for their zeal and labors; and we desire those who might have failed in their sacred duties may give, henceforth, better proofs of being the worthy ministers of God.

We also commend ourselves to the prayers of the faithful, whose lively faith has edified us on many an occasion. We exhort them to persevere in this same faith, in their obedience to the Church, in their faithfulness to their daily obligations, in the religious frequence of the Sacraments, and in the devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, which is one of the most efficacious means of sanctification.

Finally, we hope that the few religious communities we have had the happiness to establish in this new diocese will Offer some memento in their prayers for our spiritual benefit.

We ask of all to forgive us the faults we may have committed in the exercise of our sacred ministry, and, on our part, we will not forget to offer to God our humble prayers for all the souls that the Lord has entrusted to us for so many years.

J. B. Lamy, Archbishop

Given at Santa Fe, N.M., on the 26th day of August, 1885.

The letter was read, in Spanish, in all the churches on Sunday, 6 September. In due course, Lamy, no longer entitled Archbishop of Santa Fe, was granted by the Vatican the courtesy title of Archbishop of Cyzicus.

The end of his term of duty was, like each year of diocesan administration, the occasion for a statistical report to the Society for the Propagation of the Faith in France, which bore so great a share of the expenses of the mission districts the world over. For the end of 1885, the annual report from Santa Fe recorded 238 churches and chapels where Lamy, in 1851, had found 66; 54 priests instead of 12 (which was reduced to 9); 2 colleges, 8 schools, many parish schools, Indian schools, a hospital, and an orphanage, where there had been none of these, thirty-four years ago. This was merely the skeleton of his work. The body of his accomplishment stood forth in the whole character of those people to whom he had given himself, and in the gradual effect of their lives upon the society as it changed—the move toward amenity,
through respect for three cultures, and ultimately their civilized union.

So long as he was able, the archbishop had pursued his share of this task with a sort of grave passion, extending the graces of education, charity, and civil progress for all citizens, and the blessings of religion for those of his faith, across his domain of responsibility, which at its greatest had measured about one tenth of the total area of the United States. As he gave over his task, he wrote to the Society at Lyon: “In the future, kindly address your letters to Mgr Salpointe, who is taking my place, the Holy See having accepted my resignation.… For some years I have felt myself incapable of managing my diocese any longer.' and in the same letter, he said fervently, “I take this opportunity to thank you for all you have done for my diocese during the 35 years I have managed it, without which help my mission would not be as it is now.… I hope to end my days in the midst of the faithful I have tried to direct into the way of virtue.”

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The Old Men

I
N YIELDING UP THE THRONE,
Lamy told Simeoni that Salpointe would occupy the greater part of the bishop's house, “which is sufficiently comfortable; and he shall also have the few resources of my Diocese. For my support, the rents of a few small houses which have been built near the Cathedral will suffice.”

At first, this seemed to Salpointe like a suitable arrangement, and he said as much to Rome, since Lamy “is not asking for any money but will support himself by the rent of some houses he owns in Santa Fe which he wills to the Church.” Lamy, he was glad to report, had “no illness,” and was “strong enough to walk and travel by horse, but unable to give sustained attention to anything serious.…”

But when the next annual allocation of funds came from Paris, there was a requirement of a pension of 7,500 francs for Lamy, along with Salpointe's own salary of the same amount. With all the other fixed expenses, and a debt of 80,000 francs at five per cent interest, the pension was a decided burden.

Yet Lamy did not want it—he persisted in his own plan for his
maintenance, which gave Salpointe much to complain of in a letter to Simeoni in November. “His Grace does not wish an annual pension; he is asking to retain, during his lifetime, the interest of the houses and gardens known under the name of property of the Archbishopric, another house in the city, and a property of little revenue in the country. In keeping all this for himself, Mgr Lamy leaves me absolutely nothing, not even a place to stay. During the seven months that I have been here, I have had to accept the poor hospitality that the priest of the cathedral has had the charity to offer me and which, however sufficient for me, is far from being suitable for the position which I hold. On the other hand, I must say that if I am obliged to pay a pension in cash to the former Bishop, should the Holy See oblige me to, I don't know where I would obtain the necessary funds, for money is scarce here. The accounts for the year 1884 show that the revenues of the diocese did not reach $3000.00 which is quite insufficient to insure a livelihood for the present Archbishop and also to permit him to meet the costs of the administration.”

Salpointe was quite willing to live in a modest portion of any one of the houses held under Lamy's ownership. But “here again a difficulty is presented. For Mgr Lamy tells me that the diocese is in debt for a total of $15,000.00 which I must take charge of.” But how would one raise money for current needs if one had no property to mortgage? “What is more, I could die before Mgr Lamy, but could I by document oblige my successor to accept the position which I will have to accept and which will not be very agreeable?”

Salpointe reminded the cardinal of what he had said in Rome: “I agreed to come to Santa Fe by pure obedience. I resolved not to appear condescending to the wishes of Mgr Lamy and I believe that I have not deviated from that resolve, but it has been very difficult. If it were only a question of my own personal suffering, I would readily submit to it. What bothers me, however, is to see that there are many needs for which the diocese has but few resources.… Mgr Lamy wishes to give me the property titles which I mentioned, while keeping the interest for himself for the rest of his life. I will await for a reply from Your Eminence before accepting the documents. The property could give under $1500 per year.…”

It was a squabble between two old men grown testy, Lamy at seventy-one, Salpointe at sixty. From Rome, Simeoni reminded Lamy that a friendly settlement was to have been worked out between the retired and the active archbishops of Santa Fe, and he was shocked to discover “recently that nothing has been done in this matter. Moreover; I understand that the Most Reverend Salpointe has as yet received only a single room from the priest of your cathedral church.
Therefore, in order not to force him to live outside the Archiepiscopal Palace, I ask you to assign a suitable part in your Archiepiscopal mansion to the Most Reverend Salpointe.” Simeoni then wrote Salpointe: “I think that this letter of mine will be welcomed and accepted by him.…”

By the time Simeoni's letters—with their air of restrained exasperation—reached Lamy and Salpointe, the problem had vanished. Salpointe replied at once to say that he was very glad to report that “there is no more difficulty between me and the Most Reverend Lamy.” The fact was, Lamy “changed his decision,” and gave to Salpointe “all the documents and deeds of all the church property without restriction.” Salpointe had found adequate living quarters; and Lamy went into permanent residence at the Villa Pintoresca in mid-summer 1885. There, as he often said, he would be able, far from the hurry of the world, to prepare himself more readily for his mortal end, whenever. So, said Salpointe, it was there that he lived “in the silence of retreat,” and he noted that for several years it had been evident that Lamy's powers were slowly fading, though he never complained of any illness.

Lamy returned on 21 November 1885 to invest his successor with the ultimate insigne of archbishop. On that morning Salpointe received the pallium from him in a most quiet ceremony. The new archbishop had planned to hold a solemn pontifical ceremony, bringing his two suffragan bishops to Santa Fe for the event, to be performed for the public to see, and all to bear witness. But there were no means to cover the costs of such grandeur, and no time to wait, for without the pallium he would not technically be able to fulfill his functions as archbishop. In explaining all this to Machebeuf, he reported that Lamy was well.