Joseph Patrick Hurley

[1] In 1927, Hurley accepted an offer to serve as secretary to Archbishop Edward Mooney, his former professor at St. Mary's Seminary and now apostolic delegate to India.

[1] Following Mooney's return to the United States as bishop of Rochester in 1933, Hurley remained in Japan to serve as chargé d'affaires of the apostolic delegation from 1933 to 1934.

[5] He played an influential role in shaping the Vatican's policy towards Father Charles Coughlin, a controversial Michigan priest and radio personality.

[2] On August 16, 1940, Hurley was appointed the sixth bishop of the Diocese of St. Augustine (then the only Catholic see in Florida) by Pope Pius XII.

[3] Some believed that his appointment was made to allow Hurley to remain in contact with the ailing Myron Charles Taylor, the American emissary to the Vatican.

[2] Hurley received his episcopal consecration on October 6, 1940, from Cardinal Luigi Maglione, with Archbishops Celso Costantini and Clemente Micara serving as co-consecrators, at the chapel of the Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome.

Before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in World War II, Hurley was considered the most outspoken interventionist among the American Catholic bishops.

[2] In a radio address in July 1941, he expressed his belief that President Franklin D. Roosevelt alone should decide upon U.S. entry into the war, saying, "It is up to him to safeguard the interests of the nation in times of great emergency.

"[9] These remarks drew sharp criticism from Archbishop Francis Beckman, who subsequently denounced the "dictatorship pseudo-officially canonized by a brother cleric.

[2]Hurley described the 1943 Allied bombing of Rome as a "tragically mistaken decision," and predicted that "much of our national unity, much of the respect we enjoy abroad now lie with San Lorenzo, in ruins.

"[13] However, his relationship with Pius XII became strained after Hurley expressed his opposition to both the Vatican's policy towards Tito and to the removal of Archbishop Stepinac from his post in Croatia.

Hurley was a staunch opponent of the American Civil Rights actions during the 1960s, even avoiding Martin Luther King Jr. at the airport when their paths crossed unexpectedly.