Father Bill as St. Ignatius
accepting weapons of soldiers

Tonight was the visitation and funeral mass for my friend Father Bill Brennan S.J. As expected there were many persons present, since in his 94 years of life Bill touched many lives. The button on his body in the casket tonight read “ = Human Rites, Ordain Women”. Bill was passionate for many causes of justice and peace but this was his last big one, a pioneer in the struggle for Woman’s ordination. One human right, not mentioned tonight, was Bill’s struggle against ROTC, military training, at Marquette University, a Catholic Jesuit University.

I have a lot of memories about Bill’s work to stop military training at this Jesuit Catholic University. One of my fondest is when we planned some street theater and needed a black robe and priest hat for someone to play St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits, Society of Jesus. Ignatius, a soldier, had surrendered his weapon before the statue of Black Madonna to become a soldier for Christ. I called Fr. Bill to see if he had the items and he said yes but had one condition for us using them: he was to play St. Ignatius in the street theater. We were glad to hear of his participation and the street drama in front of the Marquette University library went well. It was just across the street from the Jesuit residence and Father Brennan told me he was not a welcome guest for awhile at the Jesuit residence.

I was Bill at SOAWatch, the scene of his final action when he celebrated mass with a woman priest. He faced sanctions for his action but he took it in stride and till his death, and even in his casket, still spoke out for the ordination of women in the Roman Catholic Church.

His struggle for human rights, the poor, marginalized, immigrants and peace were celebrated. But one thing I noticed about Bill was that he thought out and prayed about his actions. Bill was a person of many faces but the best we can say was that, like St. Ignatius of Loyola, he was a man of prayer.

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