From New York Magazine: The Fireman's Friar

It isn't just on September 11th that some of us remember Father Mychal Judge, OFM, but all year round, because he continues to influence many.

Here's a brief recap of his life. Read it till the end; you won't be sorry.

[url]http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/sept11/features/5372/[/url]

One month after Mychal Judge's body was pulled from the shattered lobby of 1 World Trade Center, and three weeks after his televised funeral, some of the friar's friends decided to hold a smaller memorial evening of Celtic music and storytelling. Priests, nuns, lawyers, cops, firefighters, homeless people, rock-and-rollers, recovering alcoholics, local politicians, and middle-aged couples from the suburbs all streamed into the Good Shepherd Chapel on Ninth Avenue. Pete Hamill read one of his columns from the Daily News, the Irish band Morning Star played jigs and reels, and Malachy McCourt -- actor, author, and irrepressible raconteur -- stationed himself by the altar, briskly moving things along as emcee. The crowd was so motley, so colorful, it looked like the setup to a joke. (A priest, a lawyer, and an Irishman walk into a bar . . . )

Most of the mourners had no idea that Judge whirled through the city in so many different orbits, even though he had an extraordinarily high profile as one of five chaplains of the New York City Fire Department. Most also had no idea why they were commemorating a Catholic priest in an Episcopal church, until one of the event's organizers explained that this was where Judge used to go for AA meetings -- the other cornerstone of his spiritual life, besides the church -- and therefore had a very special significance to him.

"Only Father Mychal could get a room like this together," said Joe Hartnett, an electrician and father of five from New Jersey, when he took his turn at the altar to speak. Judge had been a pastor at Hartnett's parish in East Rutherford when he was a teenager. "I mean, I see firemen, policemen, recovering alcoholics, and people who are -- uh, here's a word I don't use very often -- gay."