The Man Who Said Yes
An Augustinian missionary, class of 1923, is a candidate for sainthood

Maureen McKew

Villanova's alumni association probably has many saints among its ranks, but they are known to God alone.  However, noe alum is on the road to official canonization by the Catholic Church.  What's more, he was a local boy, a native of Media, Pa.

This year, the cause for the beatification of the Rev. John Joseph McKniff O.S.A. '23 may be introduced in Rome by the Rev. Fernando Rojo, O.S.A., his postulator or advocate.

The process of canonization was greatly simplified in 1997 by Pope John Paul II. In broad strokes, this is the procedure. No fewer than five years after a candidate’s death, a postulator will request that the bishop of the diocese in which the candidate died give permission to open the cause. Once it is granted, a documented biography of the candidate is prepared, demonstrating that the candidate exhibited the “heroic virtue” required for that person to be canonized and held as an example to the community of faith. The postulator carries this evidence to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in Rome, where an even more intensive investigation gets underway. In order for the candidate to be beatified, a miracle must be attributed to his or her intercession. For sainthood to be declared, another miracle is required.

Father McKniff spent most of his priestly life as a missionary in the Philippines, Cuba, and Peru.  His ministry in Havana took place in the aftermath of the Bay of Pigs invasion of 1961.  For many years, he was the only Augustinian left of a great mission that had flowered in Cuba during the years before Fidel Castro's revolution in 1959.  

That Father McKniff was left behind in Havana appears to be a quirk of timing or fate.  Or perhaps it was divine intervention.  It certainly appears to be the sort of incident that marks the life of someone of heroic virute.  

A Child of Media, Pa.

John Joseph McKniff was born in Media, Pa., on Sept. 5, 1905. He was the child of John McKniff and his wife, Mary Cecilia (nee Starrs) and had two brothers. After two years at East Media Public School, he transferred to Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary School, where he completed his primary education. He graduated from Villanova Preparatory School in Villanova in 1923 and entered the Novitiate of the Order of St. Augustine. He pronounced simple vows in 1924 and solemn vows in 1927, all at Villanova. That same year, he graduated from the University and was sent to Rome for additional theological training at the College of St. Monica. He was ordained in Rome in 1930 and the following year was awarded a doctorate in philosophy from the Academia de Santo Tomasso.

Father McKniff returned to Villanova and lived at St. Mary Hall for a year.  Then he moved to Staten Island where he taught at the Augustinian Seminary.  

The missionary begins his work

In 1935, Father McKniff took on a new ministry: teaching at the Colegio de San Augustin in Iloilo, a high school in the Philippine Islands. He remained there until a bout of tuberculosis sent him to the U.S. for recuperation in California. When he recovered,  he was assigned to the Augustinian mission in Cuba. In 1939, he arrived at Santo Cristo de Buen Viaje and stayed there for the next 29 years. As the Rev. J. John Kelly, O.S.A., his biographer and friend, wrote: “[Father McKniff’s] own sprituality and still youthful energy were invested in training the people to be solid Catholics through catechesis and the Legion of Mary.”

Through the years, Father McKniff went about his ministry as pastor, serving the spiritual and temporal needs of his parish.  The Augustinian mission to Cuba flourished.  

Then in 1959, a Jesuit educated young rebel, Dr. Fidel Castro, led a revolution to overthrow the government of dictator Fulgencio Batista.  Castro was acclaimed at home and abroad as a hero but within a few years, what had seemed like a triumph for democracy became a Marxist state with close political and financial ties to the Soviet Union. Thousands of Cubans fled the island for the United States, and many began planning to retake the island from Castro and the other communists. Castro began to treat the Catholic Church in Cuba as the enemy of his revolution.

In April 1961, a daring expedition of Cuban refugees began a landing operation on the shores of their homeland. Even as it began, the United States government sensed it would fail and declined to provide air cover. Many Cuban freedom fighters were killed; others were interned in Cuban jails. Castro tightened his grip on power and began to drive Americans, including clergy and religious, out of his nation. On June 15, all but one Augustinian departed from the country that the Order had been serving since 1607. The American Augustinians had been there since 1898 and had even established a university, Santo Tomas de Villenueva. June 15, 1961 was a dark day in the history of the Order.

That Father McKniff didn’t leave was providential. In an interview conducted in 1992-3, he explained what happened. “My passport and documents were taken from me, so I had no identification papers. The Swiss Embassy [which was assisting the exiles] had made a mistake.” Finally the mistake was rectified;  a birth certificate, filled-out papers, protective passport were issued. Then, as Father McKniff was clearing out his desk, the phone rang. ‘This is Monsignor Oddi, Internuntio in Egypt. I’ve heard you are leaving Cuba. Why?” “Orders of the provincial.” “Are you willing to stay in Cuba?” “Yes.” “Then, in the name of the Holy See, STAY IN CUBA.”

So Father McKniff remained in Cuba for seven more years, traveling among parishes on foot and by public transportation to minister to dwindling numbers of Catholics who dared to practice their faith openly. Finally, in 1968, he developed bursitis and was forced to return to the U.S. for treatment. When he tried to go back to Cuba, Castro’s government denied him entry. However, his missionary zeal was undiminished.

Starting over in Peru

For three years, Father McKniff repeatedly requested a new mission assignment. Finally, in June of 1972, he got his wish and departed for Peru. He was 67 years old, an age when many other missionaries wanted to come home. His friend and colleague, the Rev. Richard Appicci, O.S.A. recently suggested that after years of dealing with poor people in the Philippines and Cuba, Father McKniff was uncomfortable in the ease and wealth of the United States.

Father McKniffe arrived at San Jose Obrero Parish in Chulucanas, where Father Appicci was pastor. Just as he had done in Cuba, he gathered men and women into the Legion of Mary and later the Secular Augustinians. Soon there were more legionaries of all ages in Chulucanas than in all the rest of Peru. Those legionaries would prove to be pivotal to the success of  a great initiative in the parish, called the Better World Movement. Father Appicci recalled his colleague’s contribution.

“This was an intense program that took years to build and was designed to give the people  more ownership, if you will, of the parish by providing more opportunities for their talents. It was all done with moderators who were priests of religious. Father McKniff and his Legion of Mary – there must have been about 20 thousand members - were pivotal. They went door to door, visiting families to see if they needed spiritual or temporal assistance, sacraments, whatever. Father McKniff himself was tireless in visiting parishioners. Day after day, year after year, he trudged through the streets, wearing a big sombrero to protect him from the sun.”

December of 1993 saw a decline in Father McKniff’s health and he returned to the United States for rest and recuperation. He had every intention of returning to his Peru and almost succeeded. In late January of 1994, he wrote to his friend Jack Kelly, whom he was stopping to visit in Miami on his way back to Peru. In his letter, he noted that his Aeroperu flight was to leave Miami on February 25, 1994, at 6:30 a.m.

Father Kelly met his friend at the Miami Airport as he arrived from Ontario. Father McKniff appeared to be all right but the very next morning, he felt unwell. He was taken the doctor who found nothing amiss. However, the next morning, Father Kelly found him unconscious on the floor of his room and rushed him to Palmetto Hospital, where he died the following March 24.

What in Father McKniff’s life has led his brother Augustinians to promote him as a man of heroic virtue? He wasn’t martyred. He wasn’t an internationally known preacher or teacher. However, what he did was to persevere in his missionary work, for nearly 60 years. He declined the comforts of the United States to work with the poorest of the poor, even when he was well past the age when many other dedicated missionaries might have come home to retire.

Perhaps most importantly, at a time when he could have simply said no to that Vatican representative who asked him if he was willing remain in Castro’s Cuba in an environment hostile to all Catholics, he instead said yes.

Perhaps his life demonstrates  what separates the saints from the rest of the population. It is not enough to say no to evil. That is the easy part. The more challenging part is that at one point or another, every human is asked to say yes to a heaven-sent and probably daunting opportunity to do good. Therein lies the meaning of heroic virtue.