In 1965, when John Cody arrived by train to become Archbishop of Chicago, he was greeted by the governor, the mayor, a crowd of well-wishers and three brass bands. Cody came to town with a reputation as the tough-minded, hard-driving archbishop who had quickly raised millions of dollars for parochial-school expansion in Kansas City, Mo., and later pushed through the racial integration of Roman Catholic schools in New Orleans. Lately the brass bands have been silent. The same stubborn streak that won Cody his early acclaim gradually worked against him in the nation's biggest archdiocese, which has 2.5 million parishioners.
As bishops elsewhere, in the spirit of the Second Vatican Council, were becoming more approachable, Cody seemed to many priests to grow ever more remote and authoritarian. He did, however, accomplish a good deal. He rejuvenated the Catholic Charities program, established a pension fund and medical insurance for priests and lay employees, and created a Priests' Senate to consult with him. But as one of its members complained last week, "What is the purpose of consultation if the cardinal chooses to ignore everything that is recommended to him?"
Last May Cody's announcement that he was closing four parochial schools in black neighborhoods brought to a head long-simmering dissatisfaction with his administration. Given his New Orleans record and the fact that the cardinal has allocated $21 million in subsidies to various projects in Chicago's inner city, it was ironic that he ran aground over black education. It was not the decision itself that caused the trouble. Enrollment at the schools had been dwindling steadily, and Cody argued that the costs had become prohibitive. One thing that upset some priests was that the school shutdowns came four months after Cody had unveiled a closed-circuit educational-TV network for the archdiocese that cost $4 million to build and will take $750,000 a year to run. At the time, the cardinal told reporters that there were plenty of surplus funds around. More infuriating was the manner in which Cody acted, not even consulting the Priests' Senate or the archdiocesan school board, whose constitution, approved by Cody in 1972, gives it a say in such matters.
A Tyrant Imposed. When priestly, lay and neighborhood groups protested, Cody sent an aide to the June meeting of the Priests' Senate to read a statement saying flatly that "in the law of the Catholic Church, in each diocese, there is but one authority—the Ordinary"—that is, the bishop in charge.