News

A few years ago, David and I were having one of our customary lunches at the Piccolo Mondo Restaurant in Hyde Park, two old men reminiscing about our years together, when David looked at me and unexpectedly said,” Bernie, will you give the eulogy at my funeral?” I responded, “David, I would be honored.” I’m here today to fulfill that promise, although the task is not an easy one. David was a figure larger than life, in his interests, his accomplishments, and especially in his friendships, so it is not possible (at least for me) to think of trying to catalogue, to summarize, or even characterize this expansive continent that was David Tracy. All I can do, and fairly briefly, as I’m sure David would have wanted, is to provide a few glimpses, some memories, shall we say some “fragments,” for your thoughts and meditations as we gather to say goodbye to our beloved friend.

“Eulogy.” The Greek eulogia: saying good, a good statement. Who could not speak good of David? He was a truly good person and had a genius for friendship. To meet him, and especially to come to know him, was to love him. As you know, it was on the Monday of last week that he went into hospice care. On Tuesday, I had a conversation with David’s classmate and dear friend, Joe Komonchak, and told him the situation. I also said that Pat and I hoped to see David in hospice on Wednesday morning. Alas, it was not to be. Joe’s final words to me were, “If you see him, please tell him that I love him.” Please tell him that I love him. These words, I believe, could have been said by anyone in this church. Please tell him that I love him.

David’s own love was generous, caring, gentle, compassionate, kind, and I would say universal. He never turned anyone away; he immediately tried to engage all those he met and put them at their ease. Once a friend of David’s, you knew that you would always be a friend. Although his love was broad, and even universal, there were identifiable circles of love that marked out his life. First was family. I knew David’s mother, Eileen, almost as long as I knew David. Her memory is still a blessing to me and all who met her. David and his late brother Arthur, though different in temperament, had a special fraternal bond that went beyond what one usually sees among siblings. And, of course, David’s four beloved nephews and nieces, who have been so generous to all at this trying time for them and who are here today, witness to the special character of the Tracy family.

A second circle, a shrinking one, alas, is composed of those of us who were contemporaries and classmates of David. David entered Cathedral College in Manhattan, the minor seminary of the Archdiocese of New York, in the Fall of 1952. We were not classmates, since I had come in 1951, but because we were both from Yonkers, every morning we rode the same bus and subway from Yonkers down to the West 86th Street IRT Station. In those days, David was fairly tall, very skinny, and perhaps a bit shy, but he and I hit it off almost at once, especially because of our mutual love of reading, which gave us much to talk about. David’s classmates from 1952 on, those who were with him at Cathedral College, especially Hugh Corrigan and Joe Komonchak, also accompanied him to Dunwoodie Major Seminary in Yonkers, and later in an expanded group at the North American College and the Gregorian University in Rome. They form a special cohort, not only for their devotion to each other and especially to David, but also for their many contributions to the Church.

A third circle is “the cloud of witnesses” to David’s love constituted by those who came to know him during the past fifty years and more of his life as a scholar, teacher, writer, and public figure. Many of these were originally his students, who later became his close friends, of whom the recently deceased Mary Gerhart stands out. A number of those present this morning testify to how David the mentor became David the friend. And, of course, David had a large group of colleagues at the Divinity School and the wider University over many decades. Among these, Wendy Doniger exercised a special role in David’s life as a friend and confidant, and even as an opera partner. David’s intellectual brilliance, his approachability, his humor, and the vivacity of his conversation won him many other friends, too numerous to mention, from wider circles, not only academic, but also literary and cultural. This final circle is not just American in scope, but worldwide. 

As you all know, many books, articles, and appreciations of David’s work have appeared over the years. He has been interviewed countless times. It would be foolish of me to try to give a brief summary of David’s intellectual achievement and the ways in which his thought has shaped recent theology. But I would like to mention three aspects of David’s contributions that stand out in my mind. I name them: David the Theologian; Davis the Humanist; and David the “Dialogist.” David was a brilliant theologian, concerned with fundamental theology, political theology, and, late in life, with mystical theology. I consider him the most important American Catholic theologian of our time. His intellectual interests, however, went far beyond theology into almost every area of intellectual and cultural endeavor. For example, his love for and insight into literary classics gave his theology a flavor unlike almost any other theologian of our time. David was also what I call a “Dialogist.” He wrote a good deal about dialogue, and his own thinking was characterized by the extensive dialogues he conducted with the broad Christian tradition, with modernity, with post-modernity, and with other religious traditions. David thought by talking, he learned by respecting the other; he expressed his positions by inviting others to respond. 

David seemed to have read everybody from the Pre-Socratics to the latest theory in theology, philosophy, and cultural studies. The saying used to go round that if you were not mentioned in one of David’s footnotes, you probably did not exist. In his typically generous way, he tried to learn from, understand, and appreciate even those he disagreed with. But David had his favorite authors. Plato probably headed the list, and Augustine came a close second. I think that a third, and this among the moderns, was John Henry Newman, whom David read his whole life. When David was ordained in Rome on December 18, 1963, he had made up, as we all did in those days, a card memorializing his ordination. Such cards traditionally had a text from Scripture or a prayer. David’s card was unusual in that it had a quotation from Cardinal Newman, one that I close with here, because I think it summarizes both the boldness of David’s intellectual endeavor and the fundamental humility of his spirit. Here is the quotation: “We attempt great things with the certainty of failing, and yet the necessity of attempting, and so while we attempt, we need continual forgiveness for the failure of the attempt.” 

Rest in peace, dear David.  

Bernard McGinn, Naomi Shenstone Donnelley Professor Emeritus of Historical Theology and of the History of Christianity in the Divinity School and the Committees on Medieval Studies and on General Studies, recited this eulogy at the funeral in honor of Prof. David Tracy on Thursday, May 8, 2025 at St. Thomas the Apostle Church.