My brother Joseph

by Eugene C. Kennedy

My Brother Joseph is a song of friendship between two men, born in the same year, each of whom would become a priest and meet in the exciting years of reform and change after Vatican Council II called the Catholic Church to minister more responsively to the modern world. The friendship they forged was simple and unself-conscious, and although Joseph Bernardin rose to become a Cardinal Archbishop and Eugene Kennedy left the priesthood to marry, it deepened and, like everything true, needed no words to call it forth. They knew that whether they shared a small blessing or a large crisis, they could count on each other. This memoir of their friendship allows readers to know Joseph Bernardin better and to discover that they, too, can be inspired by the profoundly spiritual life that fully emanates from this narrative.