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TERENCE CARDINAL COOKE
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Terence James Cooke was born in this neighborhood and baptized on March 13, 1921, in old Corpus Christi Church. When little Terence was five, the family moved to the Bronx.
In due course he entered the priesthood and rose to become an auxiliary bishop here. In 1968 he was appointed archbishop of New York and was named a cardinal the following year. On the day of his installation, April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated; that evening Cooke left a reception to travel to Harlem and plead for racial peace.
In August 1983 Cooke announced that he was terminally ill with cancer; he died on October 6, 1983, and was buried in the crypt of St. Patrick's Cathedral. His cause for canonization has been opened, and he is now titled Servant of God. The Cardinal Cooke Guild promotes his cause.
other figures connected with Corpus Christi:
Fr. John Henry Dooley
Fr. George Barry Ford