Biden inauguration prayers: O’Donovan and Beaman represent the new president’s priorities

Like everything that happens at a presidential inauguration, the choice of the clergy to pray at the ceremony is not just a formality – it is a statement by the incoming president, telegraphing his administration’s values ​​to the country.

And for Joe Biden – a longtime Catholic who has frequently quoted his faith in his recent speeches, citing everyone from St. Francis of Assisi to the hymn “On Eagle’s Wings” – the two men who offer prayers have personal meaning. Father Leo J. O’Donovan, a Jesuit priest and spiritual mentor from Biden, will make the invocation at the beginning of the service on January 20, and Rev. Silvester Beaman, friend and confidant, will give the blessing at the end.

The participation of Beaman and O’Donovan in the possession of Biden puts them in a long line of clerics who prayed at the inauguration events, which dates back to the second inauguration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, an episcopal, in 1937. Trump’s inauguration in 2017 counted with six religious leaders, a record, including Franklin Graham (who participated in the inauguration of George W. Bush in 2001), Paula White and Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York City.

Biden is only the second Catholic to become President of the United States, after the election of John F. Kennedy in 1960. But in recent years, he was also criticized by other Catholics for his position on the right to abortion. In 2019, he announced that he no longer supported the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funding for abortions, a more progressive stance than he previously (although he agreed with what his fellow Democratic presidential candidates in 2020 proposed).

Some Catholic clerics have suggested that he should be prevented from participating in Holy Communion – the central feature of Catholic Mass – and some have already denied it completely. However, Biden claims that he is a devout Catholic (he received a congratulatory phone call from Pope Francis after his election), and his invocation of his faith throughout his campaign suggests that his Catholicism will be an important part not only of his inauguration ceremony, but also of his presidency.

Fr. Leo O’Donovan’s invocation is a sign of Biden’s connection to his Catholic roots

Biden and O’Donovan’s careers have spanned for decades. O’Donovan, a native New Yorker, served as president of Georgetown University from 1989 to 2001, a time marked by the university’s evolution to a highly selective, more diverse and more financially stable institution. But there were also controversies; most notably, in 1992, he was ordered by a Vatican court to disallow an abortion rights organization on campus.

In 1992, while Hunter, Biden’s son, was a student in Georgetown, O’Donovan invited the then Sen. Biden to give a talk on how his faith influenced his public service. “I never spoke about my faith publicly,” Biden told Esquire in 2011. “In any case, I have never worked so hard on a speech in my life. What I realized in writing that it was the biggest sin that a man or woman can commit is the abuse of power. “

Kevin Mazur / Getty Images for Georgetown University

Since leaving Georgetown’s presidency, O’Donovan has returned to teaching as a visiting professor at institutions such as Fordham University, General Theological Seminary and Union Theological Seminary. At the request of former Disney CEO Michael Eisner, whose son studied at Georgetown, O’Donovan served on the Walt Disney Company’s board of directors.

In 2015, Biden’s son Beau, a former Delaware attorney general, died at 46 after a recurrence of brain cancer. Biden asked O’Donovan to do the homily at Beau’s funeral. “Joe, I’m sorry,” O’Donovan told Biden, and then he started to cry.

“He started to comfort me,” O’Donovan later told the National Catholic Register. “He became the pastor there.”

In 2016, O’Donovan became mission director at Jesuit Refugee Service USA and has since strongly criticized President Trump’s immigration policies. On November 12, 2020, days after his election, Biden participated in a virtual fundraiser for the Jesuit Refugee Service, during which he announced that he would increase the goal of refugees admitted to the United States from 15,000 to 125,000 a year under the Trump administration. Biden also wrote the preface to O’Donovan’s 2018 book Blessed are refugees: beatitudes of immigrant children.

On opening day, O’Donovan’s prayer will represent not only a long friendship and a connection to one of the most tragic events in Biden’s life; it will be a statement about the new president’s continued connection to his Catholic roots. Biden always spoke of his faith as a “consolation” in a time of tragedy and sadness for the loss of his own family. And that seems especially important for a president who takes office at a time marked by the suffering and pain of many Americans.

Rev. Silvester Beaman’s blessing is a reminder that there is work to be done

O’Donovan’s invocation – traditionally, a prayer for help – he will probably ask for God’s blessing at the ceremony and in Biden before the new president vows to uphold the constitution. After the ceremony, Rev. Silvester Beaman will offer a prayer of blessing, or a blessing to those gathered.

Beaman was born in Niagara Falls, New York, and graduated from Wilberforce University, the first historically black private university to be administered and administered by African Americans. Wilberforce is associated with the African Methodist episcopal denomination, as well as Beaman’s church, Bethel AME, a predominantly black church located in Wilmington, Delaware. (Biden’s main residence is in Greenville, a suburb of Wilmington.)

Biden and Beaman met in 1993, after Beaman took over Bethel. Biden attended a community event that Beaman organized and introduced himself to the new pastor, and the two men became friends. Beaman occasionally traveled with Biden during his previous presidential campaigns and became friends with the entire Biden family, especially Beau.

Beaman told NBC News that although Beau Biden was the attorney general of Delaware, he found a partner in his work. “Beau and I have become soul mates,” said Beaman. “We became good friends in the trenches that deal with social issues in Wilmington and the state.” He also attended Beau’s funeral in 2015.

Jim Watson / AFP via Getty Images

On June 1, 2020, amid national unrest and protests against racism and police violence following the death of George Floyd, Biden – who had drastically reduced his public appearances due to the coronavirus pandemic – met with 15 black community leaders at a meeting at the shrine in Bethel. He promised to address institutional racism and create a police oversight body during his first 100 days in office, if elected. “The vice president came to hear us,” said Beaman before the group prayed. “This is a homeboy.”

The June 1 meeting at Beaman’s church became food for three misleading and racist advertisements from the Trump campaign, which used images of Biden kneeling in the church sanctuary in front of Beaman and other black leaders. In an ad released in June, the video was overlaid with images of violent protests, with the context of the church blurred and a narrator saying: “Antifa destroys our communities. Rioting. Plunder. Still, Joe Biden kneels. ”

In August, the footage was digitally altered to make it appear that Biden was alone in an ad designed to imply that the former vice president was cringing and defeated, having almost given up on campaigning.

In September, the footage reappeared, this time in slow motion and with black leaders visible. The words “Stop Joe Biden and his hooligans” followed the footage, with audio from Vice President Mike Pence saying, “You won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America.” Beaman told Religion News Service that this ad was “openly racist”, an “attack on the African American Church”. Along with other AME leaders, Beaman signed a letter denouncing the ad and calling on federal authorities to investigate it, as “it can incite violence and stimulate racial tensions that lead to people of color in danger”

On Wednesday, Beaman’s blessing – a friend and confidant for almost 30 years – will signal the promise of being connected to the interests of black communities, a matter of great importance as Biden takes over the presidency at this time.

And Beaman is well aware of what is at stake: “I will be in front of a building that slaves built and I will be on a podium that a crowd has profaned,” he told NBC News. “The last word that day will be the voice of God. I am asking God to use me to channel his final grace at the time and speak for the moment. And it’s an honor to do that. “