Series: “The Spiritual and
Corporal Works of Mercy”

Part I: “Suicides Anonymous"
REV. KENNETH B. MURPHY, PRES.

Port II: "Suicides Anonymous"
REV. CAJETAN CAMPBELL, O.F.M.

JULY 19, 1959





Part I

Speaker : Rev . Kenneth B. Murphy

Last year in the United States over

16,000 people committed suicide — an

average of nearly 44 each day. There

is no way of knowing how many others

tried and failed or were saved from the

attempt by a change of heart or mind.

But these figures suggest that suicide

can touch closer to home than any of us

might think possible. Suicide, few people

realize, is more frequent than murder and

more easily predicted. There has never

been a wide campaign against it as there

has been against other less preventable

forms of death. There is no organized

public interest in it. There is very little

scientific research about it. It is among

the first ten in the list of killers. The

lowering of the suicide rate should be a

major mental health challenge.

For suicide is preventable!!!

Three times within a short period a

year ago I was called unexpectedly from

the rectory by police officers to three

different young men who were attempting

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suicide. Twice I was called out of a

deep sleep around 1 A.M. and once in the

middle of my breakfast, and each time

tho' others had tried to dissuade the per-

son I succeeded where they failed in

getting the potential suicides to change

their decisions and be rescued. I felt it

was the finger of God marking out for me

a new project, moreover I noticed that no

one seemed to know how to act on these

occasions when someone was hanging

from the ledge of the 8th floor window or

dangling outside an iron bridge railing

ready to drop 150 feet. It was like walk-

ing on eggs. I used intuition and psy-

chology and prayer.

I found there is little up to date litera-

ture on the matter, but there are a fantastic

number of suicide attempts, 93,000 in

U.S. last year; over 16,000 succeeded.

As you listen in to this program at least

two persons will succeed in taking their

lives.

I suggested to Cardinal Cushing, a

suicide bureau, and he had me interview

the best psychiatrists in the country to

see what would be feasible. They are

all enthusiastic about Rescue, Inc.

Rescue, Inc., is a non-profit, non-

sectarian organization for potential sui-

cides. It is not just a suicidal referral

service altho' it does that. I am a

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Catholic priest in Rescue, Inc., because

it was my idea, but this is not a naive

approach to problems which arise in the

field of medicine. Spiritual assistance

is no substitute for psychiatric treatment

but also psychiatric treatment is no sub-

stitute for spiritual assistance. We are

not just a center for the collection of

statistical data systematized to help pin

point ages, types, causes and places of

suicide — altho' we fulfill this service.

We are more than a public health clinic.

We have a 3-fold program of research,

(a 24 hour phone and office service) coun-

selling (psychiatric and spiritual if nec-

essary) and mutual assistance. (Like

A.A. by group therapy potential suicides

help other potential suicides.)

We are fighting a triple sickness of

body, mind and soul. 75% of our 805

authenticated cases helped by Rescue,

Inc., not by ladders and ropes — but by

persuasion, in about 4 months of exist-

ence are benefitted by psychiatric care.

The question is often asked me: —

Would a person seriously contemplating

suicide interrupt the act and call Rescue,

Inc., and wouldn't the fact he made the

call indicate that it wasn't genuine?

One person who attempted suicide but

failed, described those last moments in

these words: "It was like the quiet before

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a hurricane; — that dead stillness when

nothing moves — my mind and my emotions

seemed in a vacuum. I had no feeling

whatever/'

Yet when someone is deeply depressed

( to kill

they have a wish l to die

( to be killed

but they also have a wish to live right

down to the end.

Quick action can save a life. They

arrange the attempt so that it provides

for the intervention of a particular res-

cuer. It might be that a friend who hap-

pened by, as is the custom, and the

friend would call HA 6-6600. Attempted

suicide is Janus -faced: — One towards

death and destruction and one towards

life and preservation. Nearly everyone

who does commit suicide has given some

earlier warning.

True, many attempted suicides are not

intended to end life but are a gesture to

bring other people to terms. But fre-

quently they result in panic and acci-

dental suicide or suicide by degrees.

They gamble with death — it is the

most powerful bribe available — their
life!

Two weeks ago a woman had an argu-

ment with her husband and at 25 minutes

past five turned on the gas. For 25 years

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her husband had arrived home promptly

at 5:30
#
but on this occasion had arrived

late. The patient was dead on admission

to Boston City Hospital.

Persons who talk about suicide may

very well commit it.

My dear friends: — If one word could

sum up the life of our Lord, I think that

one word would be "merciful". "Blessed

are the merciful, for they shall obtain

mercy."

Christ's practice of mercy towards

sinners beggars description. He delights

in mercy. But there can be and there

will be no mercy toward us unless we

ourselves are merciful. In our desperate

suicide cases we see stark evidence of

lack of mercy. We need an insurrection

of kindness.

You know those who suffer most could

well be our most important parishioners.

For when God allows us to suffer, it is

not to harm us, but to gather us into His

arms. We learn with St. Francis de Sales

that the love of Jesus begins in the

Passion.

"Sorrow", states the poet Dante, "Re-

marries us to God."

Dust we are — but living dust — and
we owe our life to the spirit within us.

Neither bodily suffering nor disgrace

can justify deliberate suicide. Yet we

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must recognize that no human being is

in top form all the time. And we know

well, what a speck of understanding will

do in a dark hour. TALK (24 hour phone

service) is the device that helps more

than we know and can realize, any emo-

tional problem. To talk it out — otherwise

they may choke or strangle from too much

introspection and deliberation over

whether it takes courage to kill self or

more courage to live and panic into self-

murder.

We, through Rescue, Inc., and our staff

of 70, thank God, are enabled to give

free psychiatric and spiritual aid, and

have aided 805 cases in 4 months.

As we set about our rescue work we

use the slogan, "Here Goes, In The Name

Of God." Mercy is that smiling daughter

of Heaven who makes no distinction among

God's children. She is the first one who

said, "All men are created equal". She

does not turn her face away even from

the foulest, blackest and most despicable

person who seeks her favor . . . she has

her ear always open to hear those words,

"0 God, be merciful to me a sinner."

There is one deep-seated need which

all of us have in common; the need to be

loved and to know that we are loved.

Without this feeling that there is some-

one who cares about us, and cares a lot,

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life at best will be tasteless and at worse,

frightening — frightening even to the point

of suicide.

What are the causes for despair today?

The two causes for modern despair are

sensuality and sadness. This is because

sensuality produces continuous disillu-

sionment. Its pleasures must be repeated

because of their unsatisfyingness — they

make hungry where most they satisfy.

They create the feeling that all life is

deceit. The fruit of pessimism blooms

on the tree of a dissolute life.

Also, sensuality begets despair be-

cause by its very nature it is directed

to a sensual object and excessive dedi-

cation to the carnal kills the capacity

for the spiritual.

There is no desire then except the

biological one; the future begins to be

disgusting. From a stage where there

is no time for God they reach another

where there is no taste for God.

The second cause of despair is sad-

ness: ie. — Surrender to states of de-

pression because of a consciousness of

sin and unworthiness. Many falls produce

melancholy; repeated defeats induce

despair.

Only when God ceases to be infinitely

merciful and only when you begin to be

infinitely evil, will there be reason for

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despair — and that will be never!

In all our work at Rescue, Inc., we

invoke this thought, namely: — "It is the

greatest of all mistakes to do nothing

because you can only do little."

We at Rescue hope our "Little Way",

like that of St. Theresa the Little Flower,

will really be a big way as we pray: —

"If it's God's will — be still."

One "Blessed Be God" in adversity

is worth more than a thousand "Thanks

Be To God" in prosperity.

Success is failure turned inside out

The silver tint of the clouds of doubt

And you never can tell how close you

are

It may be near when it seems afar

So stick to the fight when you're hardest

hit

It's when things seem worst that you

mustn't quit

And now may God be with you every

moment of your life!!

* END *

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Part II

Speaker: Rev . Cajetan Campbell, O.F.M.

The tragedy of suicide is always a

difficult thing to understand. It doesn't

make much of an impression upon us until

it affects someone we may know and love.

And yet it is something that is occurring

all too frequently especially in our large

cities.

Newspapers give us vivid accounts of

the efforts of police officers who en-

danger their lives to talk someone down

from a high place to the security of a

psychiatric ward where they can receive

help in arresting an illness that seems

to lead them to deny the very fundamental

drive to self-preservation. But what is

often not recorded is the great number of

times that the deed is uncovered too late.

Just two weeks ago while I was on

duty at St. Francis of Assisi Church here

in New York a squad car arrived at the

Monastery and asked for a priest for a

sick call. A short distance away, a young

man, twenty-four years of age, shot him-

self in a hotel room that he had checked

into an hour before. It was a hot, humid

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day and the traffic of New York's Garment

District only seemed to make it more

urgent to get to the boy before he died

but it was too late. The life of the city

went on with all its noise and confusion

oblivious of the fact that a short time

before a man in loneliness and isolation

amid thousands felt driven to take his

own life.

This is but one isolated incident of

something that any priest in a busy parish

will meet in the course of his work. His

greatest regret is that he could not reach

the individual in time. Fortunately, how-

ever, most disturbed individuals do not

end this way because the parish priest

following the example of Christ, the

Eternal Priest, whom he representsj often

helps the lonely and despairing soul to

realize that he is not alone. The parish

priest will use the age-old pastoral tech-

niques of the Church to instill in the

troubled soul the hope that was extended

to every person in trouble by our Divine

Lord when he said "Come to me all ye

who are troubled and heavy-burdened and

I will refresh you." His essential mis-

sion is to show the person that life has

hope and meaning when it is guided by

the principles of the Gospel.

The priest is aware that there are many

and varied reasons why a person will

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become depressed. When, however, a

serious depression exists, the priest will

attempt to direct the individual to ade-

quate medical help for the danger of sui-

cide is a very real possibility and the

scope of treatment is beyond his field of

competence. However, there are many

ways in which the priest can enable the

troubled soul to meet the problem of life

in a way that will help that person to

accept his suffering and to use it to grow

in the knowledge and love of God and

avoid the despair that so often leads to

suicide. At one time or another a seri-

ous crisis develops in every life and it

is at this time when things seem to be

beyond human comprehension that the

light of faith can give a human being

courage to accept the will of God. The

love and understanding that is so much

a part of the virtue of charity has the

power to penetrate the loneliness and

confusion of a troubled soul and this,

coupled with the virtue of faith, can help

build an abiding hope amid the complex-

ities of modern living.

The parish priest is ready and willing

to assist an individual to sort out the

confusion that has arisen in his soul and

bring him back to the realities of a life

that is based on the truths of the Gospel.

Through the administration of the

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Sacraments of Penance and Holy Eucha-

rist he can bring the tremendous influence

of Divine Grace to the assistance of the

individual. His effort and understanding

often leads the despairing person to a

realization that God is very close to him

in his suffering and will give him the

strength to cope with life's problems as

long as he is willing to change his life.

The priest indeed will do all in his power

to avert the tragedy of suicide but he is

powerless to render any assistance un-

less he is made aware of the condition.

Too often the suffering person will seek

every other means of escape from his

anxieties before approaching the assist-

ance of the priest. Hence the priest

requires the assistance of Catholic lay-

men in his mission to the despairing

because it is they, the laymen, who are

so often in a position to make the troubled

person aware of the help that is avail-

able to him. This the layman can do by

the practice of the spiritual and corporal

works of mercy.

The spiritual and corporal works of

mercy are practical applications of the

virtue of charity but they are so often

overlooked in our busy world. Much of

our living has become sheltered in the

routine of daily existence so that we are

little aware of what is happening in the

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lives of those about us. The guilty ra-

tionalization "am I my brother's keeper?"

has often been used to solve the uneasy

conscience of the person who knows in

his heart and soul that he could have

done so much more to help another if he

were not so engrossed in himself. One

of the distinguishing marks of the early

Christians was the love they had one for

another. We seem to have lost something

of that today in our hurried attempt to

build for ourselves a financial and pef^

sonal security that can at most bring us

an uneasy realization that we have done

the best we could. The cult of success,

so much a part of the business philosophy

of the contemporary American has dulled

our sense of charity as we become en-

grossed in a ruthless attempt to achieve

prominence and importance despite the

cost in the shattered lives of others.

The individual who has broken under the

stress of modern living will very often

reach out for help but we are so desper-

ately afraid to become involved in the

problems of another that we often dis-

regard them. Many of these individuals

must turn to those outside their families

because those close to them are often

so involved in their life problems that

they feel they cannot offer them very

much help. Hence it is important for the

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other members of the Mystical Body, the

Catholic layman, to be ready to offer his

friendship and help in time of need. Very

often a simple little patient listening

with an attempt at understanding will

make a burden seem so much easier to

carry. The effort required on our part is

so little in comparison to the peace we

can bring to the heart of another. We so

often find in helping others we, in turn,

help ourselves. It seems that unselfish

love which is extended to another person

for no motive of personal gain aids in our

growth to spiritual maturity. In our cities

where the problem of the lonely and de-

spairing person is so acute there is much

for the Catholic layman to do. We have

heard the example of how one city has

attempted to cope with its problem. It is

a splendid effort and it will achieve suc-

cess. However, organizations of this

kind should only reinforce our own con-

viction that it is we as individuals who

must practice the spiritual and corporal

works of mercy among those with whom

we come into contact if we are to do our

part as members of the Mystical Body in

alleviating the suffering of the despairing

soul. This may seem like a tremendous

task but really it isn't. Within your own

circle of acquaintances and friends you

probably know individuals who need your

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comfort and understanding. Why not make

an attempt to practice the spiritual and

corporal works of mercy in a realistic

way by offering your comfort and solace

to those who seek your assistance. In

the words of St. Francis of Assisi we

might all become instruments of God's

peace to the despairing $oul. In this

way, we can do our part in assisting the

Church and the parish priest in aiding

those who seem to have lost hope.

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