Mike Potemra over at The Corner posts an interesting excerpt from Ted Kennedy's recently released book, True Compass. It is the late senator's reflections on receiving his First Communion from Pope Pius XII:
"I wore a blue suit and had a white rosette on my left arm. As he blessed me, [the Pope] said, 'I hope you always be good and pious as you are today.' It caused a great deal of a stir in some circles – a seven-year-old American boy given his First Communion by the Pope, who himself was giving that honor for the first time as Pope and to a non-Italian to boot. [Pius had been elected just 13 days earlier.] But it was among the greatest moments of my life."Potemra goes on to explain that this was not the first meeting between the young Kennedy and the pope. From Potemra's post:
"Three years earlier, Joseph Kennedy had escorted then-Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli on a tour of the United States. 'One of his last stops was at our house. I remember crawling up onto his lap. I was fascinated by his long robe and scarlet skullcap, and his long aristocratic nose. We still have the couch where he sat, and the plaque that Mother put on it.' A remarkably domestic encounter between two men who would be each be the subject of more than his share of controversy, during his life and even after his death."
