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| May 16, 2008 |
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OBITUARYJesuit Father William Kidwell, 83The ‘Pied piper’ for life took young people to March for Life in Washington for more than 20 years. Memorial Masses for MIAMI | Had his health permitted it, 83-year-old Father William Kidwell would have been braving cold and ice this weekend, leading a group of young people to the annual March for Life in Washington, D.C. He had done the same thing — in his words “spent many a cold day marching for life” — for more than 20 years, since arriving in the Archdiocese of Miami in 1986 and before that, when he was assigned to the Diocese of St. Petersburg. A Jesuit known as the “Pied Piper” for his ability to bring youths to pro-life events, Father Kidwell died Jan. 13 of complications from pneumonia. He had lived at Our Lady of Wisdom Health Care Center in New Orleans since leaving the archdiocese in August 2007. His last thoughts were with the more than young 100 people from Miami who will be going to the march this year. Two days before his death, he dictated a letter to Jim Dugard, chairman of the religion department and director of campus ministry at Christopher Columbus High School in Miami. The letter urged participants to continue “to speak up and to rally around (the unborn) since much of America is not doing this.” “He said he was happy that I was running the trip and he could be content that it was in good hands,” Dugard said. “I sort of had a feeling he was saying goodbye.” Dugard had known Father Kidwell since the mid-1980s when they both worked at Belen Jesuit Prep in Miami. His first trip to Washington with Father Kidwell was in 1994. “In the early ’90s, many students would come from all over the archdiocese and there would be no teachers except myself and Father (Kidwell) on the trip,” Dugard recalled. “Those days were quite chaotic. Yet through it all Father (Kidwell) was always bright and optimistic.” “Each year he worked for months, calling people and making arrangements with buses, airlines and hotels,” said Father Thomas C. Griffin, a fellow Jesuit who ministers at Gesu Parish in Miami. Dugard took over as chief organizer of the trip last year when Father Kidwell missed it for the first time. He had undergone open-heart surgery in November 2006. In tribute to Father Kidwell, the high school students from the archdiocese going to this year’s march will be wearing blue backpacks emblazoned with the words, “Kidwell’s March for Life, Archdiocese of Miami.” They also have been asked to carry the lead banner and, as in years past, were selected to lobby Congress, a unique privilege accorded to the Miami youths. “I think that’s why we got chosen for lobbying because they knew they could count on him bringing a contingent every year,” said Joan Crown, respect life director for the archdiocese. She had known Father Kidwell for more than 20 years, since seeing him at state pro-life conferences in the 1980s, always with a group of youths in tow. “We called him the Pied Piper because he always had this long group of kids behind him. He always seemed to make it happen when nobody else could get kids to go,” Crown said. Dugard said Father Kidwell impressed many people with his dedication to young people. “We all called him Yoda, after the ‘Star Wars’ figure, and in some ways he was our Yoda, always vigilant, ancient and ever-knowing,” Dugard said. “He was the type of priest who would listen to any problems that you would have without judging you, but he knew when to tell you if you were messing up. He was the true definition of the word ‘father,’” said Aiken Cabrera, a member of the young adult Christian Life Community of Miami. Father Kidwell had worked with a number of those groups throughout his years in south Florida. He had served as chaplain at Belen Jesuit Prep, Our Lady of Lourdes Academy and St. Brendan High School between 1986 and 1997. From 1997 to 2004, he ministered to the sick at Mount Sinai Medical Center and Miami Heart Institute on Miami Beach. He also had worked at St. Richard, Our Lady of Lourdes and Gesu parishes in Miami and St. Patrick on Miami Beach. “He was a saint sent from heaven to guide us and teach us,” said Jose Garrigo, a physician at Mount Sinai and member of another Christian Life Community. “He was an amazing person and I feel completely blessed to have been touched by him as a mentor and a friend.” Father Kidwell was born Aug. 11, 1924, in Montgomery, Ala., and joined the Jesuit Province of New Orleans in 1942. He was ordained in 1955 and spent most of his priestly life teaching at the high school, grade school, college and university levels. He served as associate pastor of Sacred Heart Parish in Tampa from 1984 to 1986 and chaplain at Jesuit High School there from 1979 to 1984. Burial is scheduled for Jan. 18, in his home parish in Alabama. Memorial Masses in Miami are scheduled at St. Richard Church on Jan. 22, and Gesu Church on Jan. 26. “I know that he is surrounded by all of those children who died from abortion and God has rewarded him for his tireless effort on behalf of the unborn,” Dugard said. Florida Catholic correspondent Anne DiBernardo contributed to this report.
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