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Feature
The Day My Brother Was Murdered
(Page 2 of 10)
He also had a very keen interest in the field of Islamics. In addition to his studies in Arabic at Harvard, and in Islamic History at Dacca University, he had done wide reading in the field. He frequently attended seminars sponsored by the Islamic Academy.
Fr. Novak is survived by both his parents, by three brothers and a sister.
The following pages cannot help being personal. A history of Dick is in some ways my history, as mine would be his. The meaning of brotherly love comes to be understood when one brother is torn away.
1. THE SHATTERING OF HOPE
The problem of evil is for me no longer academic. My nearest brother has been murdered.
The first news we heard was that Dick was missing and believed dead. It reached us exactly two months to the day after John F. Kennedy was assassinated; the taste of senseless death was still too familiar. I had loved John F. Kennedy, and with his death lost a certain hope. Now, with another, closer senselessness, I wanted to cease trying to live, to surrender from the struggle.
My wife and I had come into Idlewild International Airport from Madrid at almost 9 p.m. on January 22. The January air was cool but not cold; the runways and buildings were apparent in the moonlight.
We were happy. We had been very glad to head back to the States on the 19th, after more than four months abroad. We drove our little white Volkswagen up towards Nice, where we intended to ship it to the United States. We had been scheduled to depart for New York via Paris on the 20th, but when we showed up at the airport we found that storms over Paris had caused our flight to be canceled. Since we were already at the airport, my wife insisted on taking the morning TWA flight to Madrid, instead of waiting 24 hours and hoping that the storm over Paris might clear. We would spend the rest of the day in Madrid, take in El Greco and Goya at the Prado, and then catch the next day’s flight, through Lisbon, to New York. All the way to New York she worried that if we crashed in that plane, she would be to blame.
Only once, in Lisbon, where we landed briefly on our way from Madrid to New York, did I share her fear. Then, returning to the aircraft after a drink in the terminal, we looked up at the serene sky. Many miles above, thin sleeves of translucent cirrus floated in the cold wind. In a few moments, we would ascend again between them and the daytime moon. I hugged Karen playfully around the waist to shield us from the chill of the air.
When we reached our hotel in New York, the first thing I had to do was rush down to my editor's office at Macmillan, to deliver the manuscript of The Open Church, which I was now bringing in a day late. Betty Bartelme, my editor, had a very tense brow and concerned manner, and told me that I must immediately telephone my father. He had been trying to reach me since the day before. Her furrowed brow and concerned manner made me worry, and I began going through scenarios of very bad news. Betty put me in a private office, and solemnly told me how to dial out.
WHEN I FINALLY GOT THROUGH to Johnstown, my father’s voice was so subdued and broken that I felt terror instantly.
"We have some very bad news," he said slowly.
"Mother," I thought with panic.
"Father DePrizio called on Monday. Richie is missing in Pakistan." That line struck terror--and guilt--into my heart. Rich was my little brother, and I felt responsible for him.
Who said so? I wanted to know. Where had he been? When did he go missing? Under what circumstance? Was anybody with him? How is mother taking it? It took several minutes of quiet questioning to get the story clear. Dick had last been seen on January 16--almost a week before. Poignantly, I remembered rereading his last letter at noon on January 16, in Rome, while clearing off my desk and packing to leave. Dick had been a bit discouraged about the current state of the missions, but hopeful about the future. He always wrote to me with exceeding frankness, and I usually thought it only fair to destroy his letters. I tried to decide what to do with the letter, and then, according to my usual custom, tore it in two and dropped it into the wastebasket. As I was tearing his letter in two in Rome, he was meeting death, alone, in Pakistan.
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David Govett| 12.24.08 @ 11:38AM
Perhaps you are starting a tradition by telling a Christmas Eve murder story. Whatever next, I wonder.
Matthew M.| 12.24.08 @ 12:18PM
David, it is said that the wood that cradled Christ in the manger was the wood of the cross upon which he was crucified. This story is a sobering balance to an overly sentimentalized Christmas.
Ken| 12.24.08 @ 6:41PM
A tale of family loss, set against the hope and glory that is Christmas. You can't expect people like Paddy or David G. to understand or even appreciate such a story. In their world, personal sacrifice is anathema to them. It is for people such as Paddy and David G. that we should pray. Merry Christmas.
David Govett| 12.24.08 @ 10:36PM
Ken: You evidently derive satisfaction from flaming complete strangers on the Web. If indeed you are as callow as your behavior evinces, experience probably will remedy your boorishness. If not, not. In either event, please consider behaving civilly toward your fellow humans, even though they are not you.
wanda keith| 12.24.08 @ 11:05PM
Mr. Novak,
Thank you so much for sharing your sad, yet beautiful story. It is clear your family has many happy memories of your brother. The world is poorer for having lost him.
Stephen Eakin| 12.25.08 @ 4:18AM
Mr Novak
I was educated by the Dominicans, the Christian Brothers and the Jesuits.
There were a few loonies in all those groups, but the majority were straight up and down, with problems, as described about your brother.
I am a better person to having been through the system. It didn't scar me. It made me a better person (for which I am truely thankful).
We are Anglo-Celtic stock full of Catholics, Anglicans, Hueguenots, Presbyterians, Welsh, Maronite Lebanese, left and right Oz's, and the only punch-up's (metaphorically) are are birthday
parties, weddings, christenings and funerals.
Why can't other groups accept the way that we do it?
Our story is the story of your family.
We have been so fortunate that we have not had to have undergone your family's bereavement.
We just have a refeeeeend punch up because of our Celtic female backround.
Our attitude is that you do your own thing. Your are on your own from the time you pop.
However, in our family there are squillions of
rellos to provide support.
Is this not the reason why God invented the extended family?
God works in misterious ways.
'Tis a pity that your brother was not here to listen to such a brilliant eulogy.
lillith| 12.26.08 @ 8:01PM
Father Richard gave his life doing what he knew he needed to do.
We are lesser in the lose, but he is in a better place.
My your family receive the peace the passing understanding.
L
Peregrinus| 12.26.08 @ 8:02PM
I write this from a place just a few miles from Stonehill, and, like Mike and Dick, as someone who, in "the old days," went very young to the seminary of an Order that drew into Community the most diverse group of individuals and made us a remarkable, if somewhat "weird" family of brothers who, across the years and miles and myriad changes are still in touch today (thanks to email and the Internet!).
The week of the Christmas Octave features in the liturgical calendar, the Saints who are dubbed the "comites Christi," the companions of Christ, a royal retinue for the newborn King, Saints who suffered: Stephen, John the Evangelist, the Holy Innocents, Thomas Becket.
What a worthy addition to that procession your brother Dick is, Mike! Thanks to you - and to your sister - for letting us share the story.
And, as TS Eliot wrote of one of those Christmas Saints in his Murder in the Cathedral: "It is this which forever renews the world, though it is forever denied. For wherever a martyr has shed his blood, there is holy ground, and the holiness shall not depart from it."
May his intercession help bring peace to the land and people he loved - and to ours!
Tim Allen| 1.9.09 @ 7:27PM
A sacred thing, this story. I am reluctant to even slightly touch it with comments, so I'll simply say thank you, Mr. Novak.
Irving M.Levine| 1.12.09 @ 10:19PM
Friend Michael. What a moving and fascinating tribute to a brother long gone but well remembered Once again, in our episodic history of knowing one another, I owe you gratitude for sharing from a rich Catholic life to this unreconstructed, but sober liberal who reads you with occasional disagreement but with abiding affection .
G| 1.28.09 @ 7:47PM
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Angela V. McDonnell| 2.26.09 @ 2:02PM
Dear Mr. Novak,
I am Johnstown Catholic High School classmate of Dick's.
I talked with your Dad once when he called to ask me to organize with him a reception for Dick after his ordination. I was sorry that I could not help, as I had recently had a third child.
Later, the news of Dick's slaying was too sad.
His was a unique personality; many of us knew him in such different ways. I enjoyed his droll sense of humor; I saw him as laidback, carefree. I was in many classes with him, he seemed always to be prepared.
Angela v. McDonnell