Of all the victims of 9/11, one of the most intriguing is Fr. Mychal Judge, who lost his life providing last rights to the dead and dying at the World Trade Center on 9/11.

Greater love hath no man than this,
that he lay down his life for his friends.
John 15:13

A new film looks at the complicated life and work of the man who some call the Saint of 9/11.

“Saint of 9/11” is a touching elegy for the Rev. Mychal Judge, the much-loved New York City Fire Department chaplain who was one of the first to die at the World Trade Center when debris fell on his head as he was following firefighters into the lobby of the north tower. Although the film makes tentative gestures toward being a full-blown biographical portrait, it isn’t that. Directed by Glenn Holsten and narrated by Ian McKellen in a stately, funereal voice, it is a tender memorial to a complicated man who devoted his life to service.

Its hushed, reverential tone is established early on with an image of Father Judge’s body being carried from the rubble while a talking head compares the picture to a Pietà. As the stories of his good deeds accumulate, he is remembered as a charismatic, down-to-earth man of the people who lived selflessly and joyously.

Father Judge didn’t achieve his state of grace without struggle. The movie delicately approaches his twin demons — alcoholism and homosexuality — but offers no stories of carousing or of sexual misadventure. If the film doesn’t state outright that he was celibate, it strongly implies that he was. By the time of his death, at 68, Father Judge had been sober for 23 years and had saved countless lives by taking people to Alcoholics Anonymous. One man remembers living in a box on the street until Father Judge found and rescued him.

His sexual orientation, which he acknowledged to friends but kept largely hidden from his colleagues at the Fire Department, led him to work closely with the gay Catholic organization Dignity and brought him into conflict with the conservative Catholic establishment. He marched in a St. PatrickÂ’s Day parade organized by the gay activist Brendan Fay, a prominent talking head in the film and one of its producers.

In the early days of the AIDS epidemic, when even medical personnel were fearful of physical contact with quarantined patients, Father Judge ministered to dying young men at St. VincentÂ’s Hospital and physically embraced them. Even when he encountered hostility from patients who wanted nothing to do with religion, he discovered that rubbing their feet with holy oil before talking with them would usually break down their resistance.

If anything, this portrait of a man who repeatedly put his life at risk for love of his fellow man, and who died in doing so, proves the old adage that Christians are not perfect, just forgiven. It also reminds us that we each have our burdens to share as we walk the road to Calvary with our Saviour, carrying our own cross in imitation of him.

Posted by: Greg at 10:45 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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