answered every question I threw at him.
As the people in the class began to get friendlier, some discovered that I was a religion writer with The Times . The recognition wasn’t unpleasant. Some remembered stories I had written before the class started. A few talked about a story I had written just before Easter, some months before. It focused on retired Bishop Norman McFarland, a giant of a man at least six-foot-four with a wide girth and booming voice. He was known for his gruffness. When his successor, Bishop Tod D. Brown, publicly released the diocese’s finances for the first time, many priests within the diocese heralded the move as the start of a new era of openness. They implied that Bishop McFarland had run the diocesan finances with an iron fist and in secret.
I had called him on a Sunday afternoon to get a response. Knowing his reputation, I dialed his number with trepidation. The bishop’s phone rang several times before he picked it up and growled an irritated, “Hello!”
“Hi, Bishop, this is Bill Lobdell with the Los Angeles Times ,” I started, trying to keep the quiver out of my voice. “I’m working on a story and would like to get a comment from you.” I paused, trying to think of something to break the ice. “How are you doing today?”
“Pretty good until you called and interrupted my goddamn football game,” he barked. “What do you want?”
The conversation didn’t get any better.
My Easter story, written much later, put Bishop McFarland in a far different light. I watched him and Father John McAndrew minister to inmates inside the Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange, California, on the eve of Good Friday. There I met inmate Anthony Ybarra, who claimed he was experiencing the best day of his life. He had been upset because he didn’t know when he would see his two-week-old son, and was crying hard. But a priest was washing his feet, just as Jesus did for his 12 surprised disciples at the Last Supper. Father John McAndrew cleaned and kissed Ybarra’s feet, along with those of 11 other prisoners. Bishop McFarland then heard Ybarra’s confession.
“My heart is still pounding,” Ybarra told me afterward. “Things just flowed out. He told me God loves me no matter what I’ve done. Something just came over me—a peace.
“The feeling is a better high than any drugs I’ve had. It was quite a surprise. This service is the best thing that’s happened to my life so far.”
The services took place in a stark chapel. White plastic chairs served as pews. Four sheriff’s deputies took the place of ushers. In between squawks on the deputies’ radios, the prisoners sang, took Communion, joined hands and got down on their knees on the polished cement floors to pray. And they cried—often.
“This is a wonderful moment,” McFarland had told the 28 inmates in orange jumpsuits gathered for one of two afternoon Masses. “There are very few times in our lives where we can say we’re doing exactly what God wants us to do.”
McFarland’s interest in the inmates at Theo Lacy began three years earlier, when the bishop faced a life-threatening aneurysm. At the time, a jail chaplain had the prisoners write get-well letters to McFarland. The bishop could still recite by heart one of those 40 letters, which read in part:
Dear Bishop McFarland,
Hi there, Norman. I’m a prisoner here in Theo Lacy because of something I’ve done. You’re a prisoner because of your health.
The writer of the letter went on to tell the bishop that he was praying for him because he could identify with being helpless. The letters touched the bishop. He received hundreds of get-well cards, but saved only those from prisoners.
Soon after that, Bishop McFarland accepted an invitation to visit the inmates for the first time. Indeed, it was his first jail visit during his 11-year tenure as bishop of Orange. He gave a homily on Christ’s conversation with the two criminals who were crucified alongside him. The
As the people in the class began to get friendlier, some discovered that I was a religion writer with The Times . The recognition wasn’t unpleasant. Some remembered stories I had written before the class started. A few talked about a story I had written just before Easter, some months before. It focused on retired Bishop Norman McFarland, a giant of a man at least six-foot-four with a wide girth and booming voice. He was known for his gruffness. When his successor, Bishop Tod D. Brown, publicly released the diocese’s finances for the first time, many priests within the diocese heralded the move as the start of a new era of openness. They implied that Bishop McFarland had run the diocesan finances with an iron fist and in secret.
I had called him on a Sunday afternoon to get a response. Knowing his reputation, I dialed his number with trepidation. The bishop’s phone rang several times before he picked it up and growled an irritated, “Hello!”
“Hi, Bishop, this is Bill Lobdell with the Los Angeles Times ,” I started, trying to keep the quiver out of my voice. “I’m working on a story and would like to get a comment from you.” I paused, trying to think of something to break the ice. “How are you doing today?”
“Pretty good until you called and interrupted my goddamn football game,” he barked. “What do you want?”
The conversation didn’t get any better.
My Easter story, written much later, put Bishop McFarland in a far different light. I watched him and Father John McAndrew minister to inmates inside the Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange, California, on the eve of Good Friday. There I met inmate Anthony Ybarra, who claimed he was experiencing the best day of his life. He had been upset because he didn’t know when he would see his two-week-old son, and was crying hard. But a priest was washing his feet, just as Jesus did for his 12 surprised disciples at the Last Supper. Father John McAndrew cleaned and kissed Ybarra’s feet, along with those of 11 other prisoners. Bishop McFarland then heard Ybarra’s confession.
“My heart is still pounding,” Ybarra told me afterward. “Things just flowed out. He told me God loves me no matter what I’ve done. Something just came over me—a peace.
“The feeling is a better high than any drugs I’ve had. It was quite a surprise. This service is the best thing that’s happened to my life so far.”
The services took place in a stark chapel. White plastic chairs served as pews. Four sheriff’s deputies took the place of ushers. In between squawks on the deputies’ radios, the prisoners sang, took Communion, joined hands and got down on their knees on the polished cement floors to pray. And they cried—often.
“This is a wonderful moment,” McFarland had told the 28 inmates in orange jumpsuits gathered for one of two afternoon Masses. “There are very few times in our lives where we can say we’re doing exactly what God wants us to do.”
McFarland’s interest in the inmates at Theo Lacy began three years earlier, when the bishop faced a life-threatening aneurysm. At the time, a jail chaplain had the prisoners write get-well letters to McFarland. The bishop could still recite by heart one of those 40 letters, which read in part:
Dear Bishop McFarland,
Hi there, Norman. I’m a prisoner here in Theo Lacy because of something I’ve done. You’re a prisoner because of your health.
The writer of the letter went on to tell the bishop that he was praying for him because he could identify with being helpless. The letters touched the bishop. He received hundreds of get-well cards, but saved only those from prisoners.
Soon after that, Bishop McFarland accepted an invitation to visit the inmates for the first time. Indeed, it was his first jail visit during his 11-year tenure as bishop of Orange. He gave a homily on Christ’s conversation with the two criminals who were crucified alongside him. The
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