Colman McCarthy dedicated his life to peace — from training to be a monk, to teaching and writing about peace. NPR’s Scott Detrow talks with his eldest son, Jim McCarthy, about his father’s legacy.
SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Finally today, we remember the life and legacy of a longtime advocate for peace, Colman McCarthy. McCarthy spent decades writing for The Washington Post, and that was actually just one line on a diverse resume that also included time in a Trappist monastery, a few years trying to break into professional golf and decades in the classroom where he taught students ways to create a more peaceful world. Colman McCarthy died last week at the age of 87. Here to talk about him is his son, Jim McCarthy. He is a public relations executive living in New York City. Welcome to ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.
JIM MCCARTHY: Thanks, Scott. Appreciate it.
DETROW: I want to start – a lot of things to talk about here, but I want to start talking about your dad’s column. And as I mentioned, I think a lot of people knew him through his writing, longtime presence in The Washington Post opinion page. But I think it might surprise a lot of people that, you know, he spent years living alongside Trappist monks. How did he get (ph) up as a journalist?
MCCARTHY: Well, when my dad was young, he had a very pronounced stutter, and he kind of retreated into writing and composition as a way to express himself and his thoughts. And so he always had a real affinity for the written word. And after he left the monastery, after about, I think, five years, he was writing articles, living in the back of his car, about rural poverty in America.
DETROW: He lands at The Washington Post where he starts writing a regular column, and he uses it to be an advocate for peace. And as I mentioned, he also really focused on that as a teacher as well. And I’m wondering…
MCCARTHY: Yeah.
DETROW: …What are some specific ways that you remember that cause that is the topic he cared about showing up in his writing and showing up in his life outside of writing?
MCCARTHY: Well, you know, people often forget there was a big strain of the peace movement in those years – in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s was informed by Catholic thinking. And so their activism and that part of the movement was really informed by their faith and, you know, the call in the Gospels to beat the swords into plowshares and put faith into action.
DETROW: What do you think he would have made about today’s news, if he was trying to write a column today three days into a war the U.S. has started with Iran?
MCCARTHY: Yeah, you know, Dad wrote columns opposing every U.S. military action, large and small, going back to when he first began writing columns in the late 1960s and was consistent about that throughout.
DETROW: This was – I mean, especially during the decades in which he wrote, events seem to move in the opposite direction in a lot of ways. Did he feel frustrated ever? Did he feel like this is a point worth making, even if administrations are kind of going in the other direction?
MCCARTHY: Oh, certainly, yeah. And he often lamented how, you know, the U.S. military budget rises every year and especially, you know, the absence of teaching about peace and nonviolence and, again, sort of the – you know, the messages from the Gospels. And he really thought the antidote to that was in the classrooms and trying to, you know, share those ideas, both in his writing and with young people.
DETROW: You know, your dad, at least in the pages of an obituary, is someone who seemed to really live a remarkably fulfilling life, professional success, a rich spiritual life. He was athletically active, running it seems like dozens of marathons. I’m wondering, what did you learn from him about what makes you happy and what doesn’t make you happy?
MCCARTHY: Put faith into action. You know, it’s important to be a good person and have a good moral compass, but you’ve got to take that and use your own hands to help other people in ways that you care about. And so as long as we were doing that with our own two hands, my mom and dad were happy.
DETROW: That’s Jim McCarthy, the eldest son of Colman McCarthy. Thanks so much for talking to us about your dad’s life.
MCCARTHY: Scott, I appreciate the time.
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