McNamara’s Blog on Hiatus for the Weekend

Dear Friends,

This weekend, for the first time in over two months, McNamara’s Blog will be on hiatus, as I will be on retreat at St. Ignatius Retreat House in Manhasset. The house was originally the Long Island mansion of the financier and philanthropist Nicholas Brady (1878-1930) and his wife Genevieve. Named Inisfada (Gaelic for “Long Island”), Brady was a devout convert who served Mass daily in his private chapel. When Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pope Pius XII, visited the United States, he stayed at Inisfada. In her will, Genevieve Brady left the house to the Jesuits. Lore has it that the Marianists at Chaminade, Nassau County’s sole Catholic boys’ high school, feared the Jesuits breaking their monopoly. They supposedly asked the local ordinary not to let the Jesuits use the house for a high school, and their wish was granted. The Jesuits were allowed to use the home for any purpose except a high school. For about twenty years it was a house of studies for scholastics (Jesuits in training) before it became a retreat house. How true is the story? Maybe a little? Who knows? At any rate, please keep Pat McNamara in your prayers this weekend as he goes on a much anticipated retreat! Thanks for your many expressions of support!

Sincerely,
Pat McNamara