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To the Editor:
On Oct. 19 the Archdiocese lost a great man. Msgr. William B. O’Brien passed away at age 90 (CNY, Oct. 30). Until a few years ago, he was still running Daytop Village, which he founded. It became a worldwide organization of substance abuse treatment centers. He truly changed and saved many lives.
It started at his first parish assignment at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in the 1950s, when a desperate mother came knocking at the rectory door for help with her son. That became his lifelong mission. He had audiences with presidents and popes, authored a book and won numerous awards. He was truly ahead of his time, and at the forefront of an issue for which I believe this world will long be indebted to him.
To parishioners of St. Brendan’s in the Bronx, where he spent the majority of his years as a parish priest in residence, he was simply Msgr. O’Brien. Most parishioners did not even know about monsignor’s “other life.”
They knew him as the pipe-smoking priest who walked up and down 207th Street saying the Rosary in the morning. Or they attended his weekday 6:45 a.m. Masses, or Sunday Masses, where his sermons were both entertaining and educational, and he never forgot to publicly acknowledge the altar boys.
Despite his busy schedule, he always made time for his parishioners, as he did when he was the main celebrant at my brother’s wedding.
He will live on in so many ways, mainly through Daytop, which will continue to help people all over the world. I cannot think of a better legacy for a man who treated every child and young adult as if they were his own.
Jim Salerno
West Palm Beach, Fla.
