1 00:48:31,320 --> 00:48:31,840 Speaker 1: Summer 1969. 881 Gerard Avenue in The Boogie Down. Today, it’s a Key Food Marketplace. In ‘69, it contained most of the draft records in the Bronx. On a Friday afternoon, eight young Catholics planned to descend on that address, intent on pilfering the draft records inside. Among them: a very terrified Anne Walsh who was about to become a criminal. Anne would eventually be the mastermind of Paul Couming’s political asylum at the Paulist Center, but that still was two years off. Right now, she was a rookie outside agitator getting ready to break into a Federal office for the first time. Anne Walsh I was so terrified. Anne was the daughter of a decorated WWI vet, who had many more reasons not to do this than to do it. Anne Walsh I was just like not accustomed to this whole genre breaking and entering. Last we saw her, she was starting her own renegade order of sisters in Dorchester, called the Bread Community. And inspired by her father confessor Bob Cunnane, she had traveled to the Catholic Left HQ in the Bronx to be a part of the Catholic resistance She had left her convent, the Sisters of Saint Joseph, behind to burn with spirit of her times. But that would mean — in the common parlance of the movement — “putting her body where her mouth is.” And that’s where the switch from mere dissent to active resistance is frankly, scary as shit. Anne Walsh I just wanted to have done it and have my name attached to it. But not too many people read about it who didn't like me. Like many before and after her, Anne Walsh was standing at a precipice. In the movement, when a new person was on the verge of doing something illegal for which they would probably go to jail, movement leader Phil Berrigan talked about a process of removing layers of fear. Like the taking off of coats. First you remove the layer of ‘not wanting to disappoint your parents. Then you remove the layer of ‘not wanting to lose your job’ And finally, you remove the ‘fear of going to jail.’ Once that coat was off your shoulders, you were ready. Anne Walsh So we studied the building for weeks and weeks to try to figure out all variables. They developed a plan for Anne and another Raider to walk into the building during business hours — late on a Friday afternoon — and hide themselves in a particular stairwell that had a window facing across the street… Anne Walsh The staircase window. There, some co-conspirators would crouch on a rooftop watching the activity in the building and alert Anne with painted signs when the coast was clear to let everybody in. But… Anne Walsh The FBI knew that the Bronx thing was gonna happen. They had somehow attracted the attention of J.Edgar Hoover’s G-Men. Anne Walsh So they had a policeman sitting in the office. And meanwhile, the people who were casing the joint were on the rooftop looking at the policeman in the window and then occasionally holding signs, stay where you are, stay where you are. Anne and her fellow Raider ended up in that stairwell, staring out the window and waiting for signals from a Friday at around 3:00 PM until Sunday morning. Anne Walsh So the first draft board action was aborted. She managed to sneak out of the stairwell without being caught by the lurking Feds. Anne Walsh We escaped. A part of her was probably relieved that it didn’t end up happening,but she was still strapped into the rollercoaster car, clicking up the hill. Anne Walsh We rescheduled it. Anne and her fellow raiders came up with a new plan and waited for two weeks to let the heat die down. Anne Walsh We did one in the Bronx— In the early morning hours of August 2nd, they went back to the building on Girard Avenue, broke in successfully, and trashed the place. Anne Walsh —and one in Jamaica. On August 15th, they did it again, in the Jamaica neighborhood of Queens. Anne Walsh Two boroughs. Now, I didn't know anything about New York, but I knew we were in working class neighborhoods. Anne screwed up her courage...And did it. Anne was now a criminal for justice. Anne Walsh And we had the 1-A files… 1-A files, you’ll remember from the Women Against Daddy Warbucks action, were the files of young men, about to be drafted. Anne Walsh And we destroyed a lot of 1-A files. And we sent them to the corporation multinationals like Anaconda and IT&T. [THEREFORE] THEY PLANNED TO HOLD A SURFACING AT A PRESS CONFERENCE They also planned, just like Women Against Daddy Warbucks, to “surface” rather than wait to be arrested. In one of the typewriters in the draft board office, they left a note, saying, “We destroyed these licenses of death in the name of humanity. We shall appear publicly at a time and a place of our own choosing, bearing evidence of our support to submit before the law...” They called a press conference a few days later. They brought the files and prepared to make a statementbefore being arrested on the spot. Anne was incredibly nervous. Anne Walsh We surfaced at the Overseas Press Club Which operated a tablecloth restaurant in Midtown Manhattan… Anne Walsh Which, you know, I lacked the sophistication to know what that was, even except that they had white linen tablecloths. And it was, the cops were called in the FBI and stuff like that. This was it. Anne was going to jail and would spend the rest of her life a convicted felon. Anne Walsh We had a lawyer consulting… But their lawyer had a trick up his sleeve. Anne Walsh And we thought for sure that we'd be arrested 'cause we had the 1-A files with us. But then when the lawyer said, "They can't charge you for raiding the draft board in Jamaica if in fact you did them in the Bronx.” And our lawyer, He said, “If you don't say which borough you raided, they can't indict you.” In other words, because each borough in New York City has its own district attorney, this would create too much confusion to prosecute a case. The only problem was they still had some of the 1-A files —the evidence — in their possession. Anne Walsh And he said, so what I would suggest that you do is you just put those draft files right into the linen bin with all the dirty linen on top of it. Suddenly, for Anne, it might be possible to get away with this… Anne Walsh That was an “A-ha!” moment that we had to decide among the eight of us... And they decided, they would go for it. Anne Walsh Aha. And this decision — to use this loophole to avoid arrest — would have major ramifications for the movement. Anne Walsh We just threw all the folders so that they couldn't indict us into the dirty laundry, like the linens from the table, the napkins and stuff like that. . And we had our press conference. And so the New York Eight hastily composed a new back-of-the-envelope statement: “Today, we eight outraged Americans, declare ourselves responsible for the disruption of two selective service offices in New York.” And then here's the kicker. “On August 2nd,” they said, “four of us destroyed draft files in the Bronx. And on August 15th, the other four destroyed draft files in Queens.” And since the borough DAs didn’t know which ones to prosecute, everyone was dragged before a grand jury. Anne Walsh They said, don't answer any questions at all. The lawyer said, take the Fifth Amendment consistently. Easier said than done, because I'm a sucker for people's approval. After questioning, the New York Eight were all let go. News of their triumph spread quickly. Paul Couming I didn't understand first why they hadn't gotten arrested, Paul Couming Paul Couming They took responsibility for it publicly, but they didn't get arrested. Anne Walsh So that became like a new mode of operation that we, went before the grand jury and didn't tell on ourselves or each other. And never went to trial. If you remember nothing else from this show, remember this: “Nobody talks, everybody walks.” I’m Brendan Patrick Hughes, and this is Divine Intervention. Chapter 4. The East Coast Conspiracy to Save Lives, It turns out, Anne’s first raid happened to be a part of one of the most pivotal actions during the entire anti-war movement. By “claiming responsibility,” they completed the evolution of these raids from the “stand-by” actions, like the Catonsville 9 and Milwaukee 14... Anne Walsh: Bob stood around with the Milwaukee 14. They napalmed the files and waited for the police. To what became known as the “hit and split,” in which the raiders acted more like cat burglars, stealing off into the night with 1-A files, only to claim responsibility later. This was pretty controversial even within the movement. The old guard felt that getting arrested, putting symbolic pressure on the system, filling up the jails to win hearts and minds...that was the entire point. But the new wave of younger activists felt that this common cat burglary was a much better way to physically grind down the war machine and actually make a difference through direct sabotage. So Anne Walsh roared back into Boston officially part of the new wave of raiders, ready to get back on the roller coaster as soon as humanly possible. And I don’t know if you guys have been to Boston, but… If you visit, you’ll see there are several tour trolley companies that will bring you around the city. Telling the story of the American Revolution and loving that dirty water. I myself, In my youth, spent six summers driving those trolleys. It is a pretty crazy underworld. It’s all snarling traffic, loose cash, stiff competition, and eccentric misfits who are a combination of bus driver, history nerd and colorful street tough. And your first summer driving trolleys, you are never addressed by your name. You are merely called: FNG. Or... Fuckin’ New Guy. And it’s tough, being the fuckin’ new guy. Because, you wanna be the best thing that ever happened to... whatever the hell you’re doing, but you come into these ecosystems and are told very quickly, “listen, fahkin, new guys, there’s a way things are done” Anne Walsh happened to be part of the action that totally turned the movement on its head. She had entered a new ecosystem at the bottom and now would have to face down the fact that many people were attached to the way things were done. She settled back in to Saint Leo’s, about five miles from the Paulist Center, where Patrick and Floyd–the ultimate FNGs–were doing their god-damndest to fulfill their mandate to change the world. Marianne They came to Boston, they got their assignments… This is Marianne. Marianne So when Patrick and Floyd arrived at the Paulist Center, they come guns blazing. They're ready to go. They're just coming alive with social activism. They're ready to take on the city of Boston. They're ready to take on poverty. They're ready to take on hunger and racism and the war. And this was the moment, and they were gonna do it by renewing the church from head to foot. Including Floyd taking a screwdriver and going into the chapel, and literally unscrewing all the kneelers because, that was ridiculous that was the old church. In February of 1969, Patrick and Floyd arrived at the Paulist Center. Fresh from their ordination, ready to take on the world’s oldest hierarchy. From the inside. FATHER X The Paulist center community, Park Street, Boston. In my research for this podcast, in a box in a basement in Dorchester, I came across a mysterious handwritten notebook... FATHER X Structure and function of Paulist Center… No one I spoke to recognizes the handwriting. FATHER X 20 live in priests, average age: 50 It’s filled with timelines,meeting notes, correspondence, and statistics. It seemed like the notes a journalist might have kept if they were writing an article about Patrick and Floyd's escapades. FATHER X The rest said masses heard confessions… The anonymous author of this yellowed notebook, offers us a detailed portrait into the daily goings-on of the Paulist Center in one of the most tumultuous periods in its history. . FATHER X Function of the center. One chapel, masses, confessions, candles, mass cards. For our purposes, we will call him “Father X.” FATHER X February 69, arrival of Pat and Floyd. Floyd The word was that the, the Park Street really needed some help. Floyd Floyd You he had the impression, the order, was not happy with Park Street. The thing was, the national order for the Paulist Fathers had made it clear to Patrick and Floyd they were being sent on a mission from god like the Blues Brothers to save the Paulist Center from itself. Jim Carroll There was this sense… Jim Carroll Jim Carroll That The Paulist Center was a place that had to have the Vatican Two spirit brought in Marianne The Paulist fathers were clear. Marianne Marianne This was a whole new generation. It was time to renew the church in no uncertain terms. And that this was the generation, this was the class of young men who could do it. So they were sent off with a mandate to make change… And like Anne, they roared into town, burning with the spirit of their times. But they would not agitate from outside like Anne. They believed in changing an institution from within. Incrimentally. But… Marianne … they were coming into these very established churches who had older priests who were sort of running the operation. Floyd What we soon found out is that although we were left with the impression that we were going up there, as I said, to sort of rejuvenate the place. I don't think anybody told the folks at Park Street, they weren't looking for that at all. As FNGs, Pat and Floyd were immediately told they had a number of menial chores and tasks to accomplish each week. Floyd So that's what we found ourselves in. They were expected to say low masses on weekday mornings. They heard confessions. They manned the phone at the front desk. And they quickly began to grow agitated. As Floyd put it, Floyd Everything was a battle. Everything was a battle. Patrick began chain smoking, muttering to himself and kickin’ walls. JoAnn Because every time he turned around, he'd be upset about something… Patrick’s sister, JoAnn JoAnn That was going on that he just felt didn't represent the priesthood as he knew and understood it himself. He saw a lot of older priests that were just ensconced in the luxury of the priesthood, the pageantry without the substance. He started to chafe at many of his priestly duties. JoAnn Oh, he hated all of that. He really almost hated everything that was . Whatever some people would call traditional. FATHER X Patrick and Floyd's first break with the center... It was only a matter of time before things came to a head with the Paulist Center Father Superior. According to meeting notes in Father X’s notebook from the months before they got there, the Paulist Center's finances were in serious trouble. As part of a plan to dig out of the hole they were in the Father Superior had planned to re-institute prayer candles in the chapel, where a person could pay a dollar to light one. Father X Candles costing $1 for six days, which had been removed from the church a few years earlier, are reinstituted for the “spiritual well-being” of communicants. But Patrick and Floyd decided it was time to take a stand. Jim Carroll Patrick and Floyd went to war against the candles. Father X Patrick and Floyd suggest that candles given freely are just as spiritually uplifting. Their suggestion is ignored. Floyd I had no problem with people making donations. The whole notion of being able to buy prayers is something that we had trouble with. Jim Carroll Because that seemed like a terribly mercenary way to, I don't know, exchange piety for money there. There seemed to be a kind of mindlessness of it. After their suggestion was ignored, and despite being newly arrived FNGs, Patrick and Floyd threw down the gauntlet. Father X Patrick and Floyd refused to say mass in chapel, as long as the candles remain… Patrick and Floyd went on strike. For their Father Superior, it was unconscionable that these FNGs, these Young Turks, were trying to throw their weight around after having just arrived. So he decided to teach them a lesson. He told them to launch an education center for conversion classes, And they’d have to run it out of the basement. Floyd The place… The place is filled with junk! As Patrick and Floyd descended the stairs into their new home in the dusty basement, they felt themselves disappearing into the bowels of the Catholic church. Never to be heard from again. Meanwhile, down in Dorchester, Anne Walsh —fresh off her triumph in the boroughs of NYC — was now recruiting for the Catholic Left. And she knew exactly how to find new people for the resistance. Anne Walsh You’d know somebody was on your same wavelength that they would discuss the war in ways that you knew that they really were very against it. They'd go to demonstrations, they'd go to meetings. They'd go to support group for the Milwaukee 14, and then you just say, “You know, if you feel that way, you might really consider doing this.” And it just so happened her Dorchester neighbor fit the bill perfectly. Paul Couming, the kid who had flown himself out to the Milwaukee 14 trial. Who shouted from the gallery and was escorted out. Paul Couming, who would eventually seek political sanctuary in the Paulist Center,was chomping at the bit to raid some draft boards. Anne Walsh Paul was like looking for a focus for his disease with war. He hated war. Paul Couming My interest was in hitting my own draft board in Boston, .. One of the first meetings I had though was Anne Walsh took me to meet Phil Berrigan at a pub in Cambridge and felt that I was ready to do this, the draft board action. And Phil said, there's no way a kid, 20 years old is ready to do this, he wanted to question me. So we sat at the bar. I wasn't, I wasn't 21 yet because I couldn't drink. I remember Something about Paul’s passion, his sincerity and his tenacity passed Phil Berrigan’s smell test. Paul Couming When we got done talking, he decided, he told Anne, well, I guess it's okay. He can invite him to meetings and, uh, we'll see how things go… Paul was in. And he was about to become another criminal for peace. Like many Catholics of his generation, Paul took this war very personally. So what he really wanted to do first was hit his home draft board in Dorchester. And soon he got his wish. Paul Couming It was November of 69. Three months after the New York 8 action, we did the Boston action. After Paul met the other raiders for the Boston action, he needed to learn how to do this. Paul Couming We're learning basically how to break it into buildings. Which starts with learning about a little B&E. Anne Walsh Okay, casing 101. Yeah. All right, so who is really good about this is Paul Couming. Paul Couming You know, we're common criminals, if you might say ... Anne Walsh I was a half-hearted, caser. Paul Couming Uh, learn the social structure of, uh, building. Anne Walsh So we studied the building for weeks and weeks to figure out all variables. Paul Couming ..how to case buildings out and how to, uh, see that their weaknesses, how to get in and out on time, and when people around and when people were not around. Anne Walsh Does it have an elevator? What's the staircase window?. Paul Couming So you'd study the light patterns, when everything got locked up. Anne Walsh You go out in a car and you'd study the building, the traffic around the building, especially after three o'clock in the afternoon. How many people go in and out? Paul Couming You had to watch 'em all night long. Casing involved a lot of sitting in a parked car at night, while trying to stay inconspicuous. Paul Couming Sometimes you would be interrupted by the police. They would say, well, what are you doing hanging out, you know, parking out here in the street, you know, but we always put people in couples and had them make out or look like they were making out if the police came along. So it would be a socially acceptable reason why they might be on the street. Brendan Did this, uh, ever create any couples? Paul Couming Uh, oh, yeah. I had hopes , but it didn't with me. When it came time for Paul and Anne to do the Boston action, they decided to get bold.. Paul Couming The Boston action upped the ante a little bit because we did four buildings and six draft boards all in one night. There were draft offices all over Boston. And the strange thing to conceive of now is the ubiquity of these offices. In the absence of computers, the federal government had to open hundreds of these little operations throughout the country. These rooms with buzzing file clerks were the government’s point of contact with nearby young men of draftable age, so it could establish a supply chain of warm bodies for the war effort. For Paul and Anne and the Boston raiders, these neighborhood offices felt like suck holes dotting the landscape, devouring local boys into the war machine. By now there were half a million troops in Vietnam and about 34,000 young American men had been killed. They spent weeks casing draft boards throughout Boston, chose four of them, drew up maps and schematics, and staged dry runs. Eventually the night came and Paul and Anne and their group felt ready. But it bears repeating. These were not professional burglars. Anne Walsh So one guy, I won't name his names 'cause I'm still afraid of the FBI, , he was running track inside Curtis Hall, , like, and he was supposed to stop at like five o'clock, The plan to sneak into the draft board at Curtis Hall in Jamaica Plain involved one conspirator, jogging the track until closing. Curtis Hall is a community center with an indoor basketball court that has a somewhat odd, narrow running track, circling it like a balcony. He would jog until the arrival of a lookout, when he would go into the locker room and find a quiet corner to hide. Paul Couming But nobody goes through the locker rooms to make sure at the end of the day that everybody is left Anne Walsh Later on, the building would get locked up, then he would let people in. At least, that was the plan. Anne Walsh The lookout person didn't come, so he was like running The poor bastard had to jog for several hours. Meanwhile, over in Copley Square, two conspirators were arriving at another draft board. They had studied the building for weeks and on the night of the raids, they realized they had been casing the wrong building. So they had to quickly improvise how to break and enter into the correct building. Kip Tiernan I think the draft raiders didn't know any more about what they were doing than the FBI, who was following them around. This is Kip Tiernan. Kip was a high powered advertising executive that the Boston Eight tapped for help with handling the press. She was a jazz pianist, a playwright, an LGBT pioneer, and a world class smoker. Kip Tiernan Cops are there. The cops heard about it. They came. Meanwhile, as Paul’s team left the Dorchester board that night, they heard police sirens. Kip Tiernan What Paul did very, very simply was drive the car three blocks and then get out and leave it there. And so the cops just thought it was somebody in the neighborhood and all of the draft cards were in there. So they had to go back later at night and get them. By the skin of their teeth, the Boston Eight successfully raided four draft boards in one night. And once they started looking closely at the files they could see the very real factors at play in this war. Bob Cunane People were getting deferred… Bob Cunnane, Anne Walsh’s father confessor in the convent turned Milwaukee 14 raider. Bob Cunane If they went to college. There were other kind of ways… In other words, the privileged were not fighting this particular war. And the files they stole in Boston bore this out. Bob Cunane And so that the bodies were coming back from Vietnam, not to Wellesley and Newton, but to South Boston. And, the working class areas where the kids kind of went in. Of course, the poor have been canon fodder since time immemorial, but for the raiders, to see it in black and white in the files, felt sickening. Paul even knew someone from Dorchester —or, in Boston-ese, a “Dot Rat” —whose file he liberated that night. Paul Couming One was a friend of mine, He happened to be in one of the draft boards I went into and, and destroyed his file. After the raid, they held their press conference, with the help of Kip Tiernan. And just like the New York Eight, they simply claimed responsibility. Kip Tiernan Well, we had the press conference at Warwick house after the Boston raid. John Henning, who was a reporter for one of the television stations, said that apparently we had grabbed the stuff from the draft board, that he was listed in . So he couldn't wait to not go to war. This new wave of young raiders had proven they could hit multiple boards in one night, and they could avoid getting arrested. They put a serious dent in the government’s ability to draft Boston’s working class kids. These fuckin’ new guys were taking the movement to places no movement had gone before. Back at the Paulist Center... Christine It was a very tough time in the history of our country. The war, if it were only the war, This is Christine Trufant, she was one of the first volunteers to find her way to the Paulist Center shortly after Patrick and Floyd’s arrival. Christine And in many ways, it sounds like today, with people really needing to find out how are they gonna make ends meet. Patrick and Floyd had one look at their new basement home — with its open floor plan, its performance stage, and its working industrial kitchen —and they thought, if we're always in trouble anyway, then as John Lewis once said, why not get into some good trouble? So instead of starting a snoozy Catholic education center, as they’d been asked — one that would focus on conversion classes, pre-cana, bible study, that kind of crap —Patrick and Floyd used their basement to launch about a thousand non-profits. Floyd We ran a English program for Spanish speaking kids. There was the tutoring program. Floyd Well over a hundred volunteers would meet these kids. There was the film series. Floyd There was a projection booth down there Christine Friday nights, and we would show films. Floyd ...Truffaut... There was ROPES. Floyd Ropes. Christine Which was Rehabilitation Of People Entering Society. Floyd for people who had trouble relating to others, socially. Their most ambitious plan was to open a soup kitchen. But they hated how patronizing the traditional setup felt for the clientele. And then, they came across an idea... Anne Tobin Based on a program that the little brothers of the poor did in France for the poor people of Paris.. Anne Tobin, or just Tobin, who at this point was a fellow volunteer with Christine. Anne Tobin …where they were brought to a place for dinner and they put linen tablecloths on the table and silverware and plates and glasses so that they were served in dignity as opposed to like a soup line where you're just putting a ladle of soup in somebody's bowl as they're walking by. Instead of a soup kitchen, Patrick and Floyd started the Wednesday Night Supper Club. Anne Tobin So it was a sit down dinner… With tablecloths and silverware and, and then the food was all being prepared in the kitchen. Their Supper Club was based on the simple idea that not only do the hungry have a right to food, but that they have a right to eat with dignity. Hungry people who came didn’t stand in line to get food. They were waited on by volunteers like Tobin and Christine. They were brought entres, coffee and dessert. And they actually paid a dime or a quarter for the service. Marianne He was passionate about ending hunger. Marianne Marianne About how unnecessary it was that anybody in this country or anyone in the world over went to bed hungry. And there was no reason that we couldn't eradicate hunger. And it was a matter of raising consciousness and changing minds. When Patrick started the Wednesday Night Supper Club in nineteen sixty-nine, it drew a lot of people to their basement— the self described “drunken banjo player” certainly knew how to throw a party— much to the great dismay and confusion of the older priests upstairs. Anne Tobin Sometimes the people would just sing, you know, like Patrick. And, and some of the singers would get together and start, and they would have their instruments. And so it was, it was great. A lot of people were coming to that… Floyd That was a big, big deal. A lot of people did a lot of work for that. And people came in and cleaned and cooked and so forth, you see. So, with the quick success of their basement shenanigans, the rising numbers of interested young volunteers showing up to wait on the poor and struggling, Patrick and Floyd decided to push their luck with the men upstairs, and get a little wild and crazy... with the Eucharist. Jim Carroll The Eucharist, the masses that Pat and Floyd presided over at the Paul Center. Jim Carroll, Patrick & Floyd’s seminary brother. Patrick and Floyd were... Jim Carroll ....Determined to break away from the stuffy and pretty much incomprehensible language of the Nicene creed. The Nicene Creed, you’ll remember from AP history class, was created at the Council of Nicea in 325 AD. Jim Carroll I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of Heaven and Earth. Light from light, true God from true God begotten, not made of one substance with the Father. Excuse me. You know, people would just go through these words, route as if anybody understood what it was, light from light, true God from true God. That may have meant something in the fourth century. What did it mean now? And as a way of getting away from that, I think that they started having their mass down in the basement while the more traditional mass was upstairs. The Catholic mass had of course been going on in some form for almost two thousand years. But Patrick and Floyd had some notes... Jim Carroll Rules governing the liturgy had been changed quite dramatically in the last couple of years of our time in the seminary. So yes, we definitely were there to help people adjust to the new rituals of the liturgy changed by the Second Vatican Council. This gave Patrick and Floyd an opening to quietly reinvent this two-thousand-year-old tradition, on Sunday evenings in their basement. Floyd So we started having that liturgy. One of us would offer our, uh, homily on the gospel, whatever. But then we might try to spruce it up a little bit. In their basement full of junk, Patrick and Floyd began hosting a few people for a Sunday evening consideration of life’s rich pageant. Marianne Patrick, one of his incredible talents was creating these unbelievable liturgical experiences Floyd But we had to prepare little skits and slideshow and a multimedia approach to the, uh, sermon emphasizing that a picture is worth a thousand words. Jim Carroll He was a master of the liturgy. Patrick was a pioneer in this use of the new technologies as a way of expressing the deepest longings and fears and hopes that we have. Marianne Patrick was a genius at it. Christine Way way ahead of his time. Jim Carroll In Pat’s time, in our time, that took the form of slides. Christine It was probably, you know, as technologically advanced as a church could get with the money that they had at the time. Bob Cunane Those slideshows were really powerful stuff at that time. And they made an incredible impression. And over that spring of nineteen sixty-nine, their basement liturgy became very, very popular. Floyd It started off probably with four or five people. And then the following Sunday there were 11 or 12. And then the next Sunday there were 25. Christine Every week. It seemed to, I mean, I know this is probably not the case, but it seemed that the numbers of people doubled. Floyd Uh, the thing just took off like you wouldn't believe. [BUT] THEN SUDDENLY A CALL FROM NBC WITH A REQUEST FOR A PRESENTATION And then, an insane thing happened. Patrick got a phone call from NBC. Father X Patrick, as a result of media publicity regarding his work with tutoring in the south end, free dinner and breakfast programs, et cetera, Father X... Father X was asked by NBC to do a program for national TV to be presented during the time when the astronauts would be sleeping. The Apollo missions had taken over national airwaves —and broadcasters were getting creative with their space-related coverage. News articles about Patrick's Wednesday Night Supper Club had caught the attention of the tall buildings in New York City. Father X Patrick put together a multimedia presentation from Genesis to the moon and back regarding man's place in the universe and his relationship with God and his fellow man. Patrick assumed that NBC and NASA wanted some sort of elegiac celebration of man's lunar achievements. And how they might be contextualized as still within the boundaries of Christian belief. But, this is what Patrick decided to give them instead. From Genesis to the Moon and Back Apollo two cost more than Apollo one. Apollo one costs plenty… Photographs of astronauts and NASA scientists trying on spacesuits, testing in the desert, and building rockets accompanied a narration conveying the astronomical price of putting a human on the moon. From Genesis to the Moon and Back Apollo eight cost a fortune, but nobody minded because from the moon, the astronauts read the Bible to the delight and edification of all Christians. But then the photos switch to depictions of poor farmers in Nicaragua, who progressively become poorer, generation over generation. From Genesis to the Moon and Back The people who live today in Nicaragua are less hungry than their children. The grandparents of the Nicaraguan people were less hungry than the parents. Blessed are the poor for they shall possess the moon. He simply had to point out how asinine it is, that we were spending untold billions to leave a planet on which we hadn’t even solved basic hunger yet. I can only picture the suits in the boardroom at NBC watching this and being like, "We can't show that!" He knew they wanted some valentine to man’s achievement, but devilish trickster that he was, he couldn't resist giving them, and American viewers something bigger to think about. And not to editorialize, but it's just so badass that he did this. What a lunatic. So punk rock. Father X Moonwalk’s scrubbed and Pat's presentation as well. NBC abandoned the presentation. So Patrick just decided to show it at his next Sunday's basement liturgy. Father X Patrick presents his program at the Sunday night liturgy. Instead, the impact the music slides, banners, lights, et cetera, is so immense that in one week, word of mouth brings 600 people to the following Sunday service. After which, their subversive basement masses suddenly started doing incredible box office. Father X Patrick and Floyd, by this time, had built a large following at Sunday evening mass. $450 in contributions per service, and no fees for music. So a good money maker. Out of nowhere, Pat and Floyd were pulling in huge donations and the joint was jumping. Floyd Downstairs, which was now a pretty good size hall, two more months that we didn't fit there. Score one for the inside incrementalists! Floyd What are we doing down here when there's this big church that holds 1200, people upstairs? And at the very time that we're doing down here, packed to the gills, people passing out in the heat. At the very same time there would be a mass upstairs with 15 people in it, you know, that didn't make any sense. The basement auditorium at the Paulist Center is roughly 50 by 50. You could maybe fit 250 people in there comfortably. The chapel upstairs, meanwhile, is amazing, and cavernous with a wrap-around balcony. Floyd It seemed obvious to us, you know, in, in other words, it's that we should be upstairs and they perhaps should be downstairs, but it wasn't obvious to them. Marianne They started to create this extraordinary community in, in weeks, in months. I mean, it was no time that literally, I think 2000 people, were coming in over the weekends to experience these liturgies. And it caused just this extraordinary conflict within the Paulist fathers that the community then became very aware of and very much a part of. because of course, once a community gets launched, it takes on a life of its own. Father X Crowds at the 4pm and 6pm masses are too large for the basement. Father X... Father X With approximately 40 people upstairs and six or 700 downstairs, Patrick and Floyd request use of the chapel for a 5:15 PM mass, which would have to be sandwiched in between the 4:00 PM and 6:00 PM. They are refused. FNGs though they were, Patrick and Floyd had ignited something in the basement that would inevitably culminate in a clash with the upstairs brass. And eventually...with the National Order of Paulist Fathers. For Anne and Paul, and their merry band of draft board raiders, the pressure to escalate their war sabotage, soon hit a fever pitch NEWS ARCHIVAL The draft lottery. A live report on tonight's picking of the birth dates for the draft On December 1st, 1969, Americans gathered around their televisions as blue plastic pellets were rolled around a giant drum and extracted by dignitaries… NEWS ARCHIVAL Pursuant to the executive order. The director selective service is going to establish tonight a random selection, uh, sequence for induction for 1970. Each pellet had a slip of paper inside with a different calendar day printed on it. If your birthday was pulled, you’d be the next to be drafted. The country was dead quiet that night watching, and you could hear screams from neighbor's houses as birthdays were announced. NEWS ARCHIVAL September 14th… Birthdays could always be counted on as uncontroversially happy occasions until December 1st, 1969, when — for an entire generation —they became a young man's death sentence. NEWS ARCHIVAL April 24th! The horror of this night, in which friends, neighbors and brothers discovered they were now living on borrowed time, led Anne and Paul and their friends to go nuclear. The group identified Philadelphia as the site of their next raid. It would be their largest and most complicated draft board raid to date. Cookie Ridolfi Paul and I went into Philadelphia Draft board, and we went in during the day. We knocked, you know, we entered the public office and Paul said he had a question about conscientious objector status. This is Cookie Ridolfi. She was a local South Philly Street tough who met a member of the Boston eight one day while playing hooky and quickly fell in with the Raiders. Cookie Ridolfi And he was talking to them about that Paul Couming I'd go in and register for the draft under a false name. And, uh, I would look around the office while I'm asking questions that the person wasn't used to answering. So it would take longer for them to come up with an answer or go get somebody else. Cookie while I was looking around and memorizing the room to the best of my ability. Paul Couming And all the time I was pretending I was taking notes and I was little, making little sketches of where things were. And so I had marked down where an A one file cabinet was. Cookie And then immediately when we left I drew out what I saw. So we started having layouts and things like that. By this point, rather than city plus number — Baltimore Four, Catonsville Nine, Milwaukee 14 — the Raiders began looking for catchy names for their actions. J. Edgar Hoover always referred to their movement as an “East Coast Conspiracy," so it seemed like the next logical step: Anne Tobin We had a very modest name. We called ourselves the East coast conspiracy to save lives. The East Coast Conspiracy To Save Lives. Soon, raiders began to arrive from up and down the eastern seaboard and took over a little row house in North Philadelphia on Susquehannah Avenue. The Raiders decided to focus on draft boards in poor neighborhoods. Paul Couming Philadelphia action was another city where we were hitting four buildings in one night. Ted Glick We were at a North Philadelphia complex of draft boards... This is Ted Glick, one of the raiders. Ted Glick Anne, and Paul Couming and others were at the one on Broad Street downtown. And then there was a third one in Kensington in the northeast section. Paul Couming They were even more complicated buildings and one of them had a security guard in it. We tried to avoid buildings with security guards 'cause we didn't want to confront them and have them take out a weapon against us. Often security guards and buildings like this were older people. We certainly didn't want one of 'em to have a heart attack just because they stumbled upon us. Finally, the day arrived to pull off the most complicated raid the movement had ever attempted. Cookie Ridolfi The plan was that on the day we were gonna execute this action… Cookie Rodolfi, who was, lest we forget, a teenager. Cookie Ridolfi …some people would go into the board and do the action and others would be outside paying attention to how they're gonna get out, how they're gonna get in, making sure somebody's there to pick them up. So I was involved in the group outside. Several people, maybe seven or eight. I don't remember how many people went into the draft board. I don't remember who they were. Anne Walsh was one. Anne Walsh This is kind of a interesting , kind of a funny story. I wasn't planning to raid that draft board, but somebody dropped out of the action. And so in order to pull it off, I said, okay, I'll go. Paul Couming In the one building where there was a security guard, it was a tall building. We knew that there was a three hour window when he would not be on that floor. Two o'clock in the morning he made rounds. So they came up with a foolproof plan. Paul Couming There was a closet on each floor off a men's room. We taped the door with scotch tape on the outside to see if anybody ever opened it. And nobody in a period of three months ever opened that door. So we knew that that was a pretty safe place to be. Cookie Ridolfi The plan was to drop off the people who were gonna be in the draft board in the day so they could walk in. When the building was open… Anne Walsh I was hiding in a men's room utility closet with, it seemed like a kick line from like a chorus line or something like that. We're all lined up like this. Six deep and then down below us on another floor wasn't where another six people... Cookie Ridolfi On the day of the action, John — John, Peter Grady, the kind of mastermind of all this. Cookie Ridolfi He would always wear a suit and tie and like shoes, the kind of shoes FBI agents wore, you know, tie up nice lace shoes, , although they weren't wingtips. J. Edgar Hoover insisted all FBI agents wear wingtips. It was a whole thing. Cookie Ridolfi So the day he, where he and I are running around doing some errands or whatever and he says, they must be hungry, let's go get them some sandwiches. Meaning that people who were inside hiding in the building. We went to a deli, got a bunch of sandwiches Grady talked his way past the security guard. Cookie Ridolfi and we went to the building so the two of us go upstairs and we open the doors and our friends are there. And they almost had a heart attack 'cause they think they've been found. And it's us with a bag of deli sandwiches, . So everything was going according to plan. Cookie Ridolfi Everything was going fine… But. There was a fly in the ointment. Paul Couming We did not realize that the pipes that were going up were gonna get hot and cold all night long and the people were gonna burn up and then get chilled and burn up and get chilled. So six people have to stand really close to each other for hours inside these closets, roasting. Paul Couming It was so hot and miserable that they had to come out and they couldn't remember why they had to wait until after two o'clock in the morning. So they came out at one o'clock in the morning . So they're like, oh God, we can't take it. . And they burst out of the closets... Paul Couming And they went into the draft board and they started doing their business and putting files into things and tearing up index cards. So I got a call when they got in the draft board at one o'clock and they said they were there and I realized it was too early. But the conversation was very brief on the phone and I couldn't think quick enough or assert myself enough to say, wait a minute, you're not supposed to come out of closet until two because the guard's gonna come by that office at two o'clock in the morning. And they hung up before and I didn't have their phone number to call in. The important takeaway here is that Paul is just too dear to have asserted himself enough to make sure they got back in the goddamn closets. And sure enough, the guard comes by for his 2 AM rounds, sees flashlights, hears commotion, looks through the office door window and hauls ass down the corridor. Anne Walsh You know, I was there tearing up draft files and then the night Watchman came with his flashlight and saw that the place was a in shambles Paul Couming Next thing I know, they called out and said the guard just came on the floor. This is right after two o'clock. And he went running and he left the floor, went downstairs. What should we do? Well, I knew the layout of the building and I knew that the guard had to go to the first floor and probably call the police. And I said, well, the best thing to do is just to go out the exit. You're supposed to go out, get on the street, and we will get cars down there to pick you up somehow. Anne Walsh But I didn't know the exit plan in case the night watchman came down. Paul Couming When they left the office, someone announced it that we were all leaving the office. One person didn't hear it, and that was Anne Walsh. Cookie Rodolfi We all got out except Anne Walsh. Paul Couming She was hiding under her desk and she didn't hear the, uh, order to go down the stairwell and leave the building. Anne Walsh So everybody who knew the plan exited except me. I hid under the typewriting table as if that was relevant. And when I realized that wasn't relevant, I went back to where I had been in the men's room, utility closet, Suddenly Anne's years in the convent, praying silently in a little bed chamber, came in handy. Anne Walsh And I hear all these dogs, German shepherds. And we had raided four draft boards that night in Philadelphia. Four different draft boards. And I was the only suspect in the utility closet. At like 2 o’clock in the morning. Philly was supposed to be a triumph for the movement’s second wave of FNGs... But now Anne sat in a roasting utility closet as she listened to the dogs get closer and closer… Divine Intervention is a production of iHeartPodcasts, it’s produced by Wonder Media Network. It was created and written by me, your host, Brendan Patrick Hughes. Our glorious producers are Carmen Borca-Carrillo, Abbey Delk, Paloma Moreno Jimenez, Grace Lynch and myself. Our Editor is la sonic knight Grace Lynch. For Wonder Media Network, our executive producers are Emily Rudder and Jenny Kaplan. For iHeartPodcasts, our executive producer is Cristina Everett. Father X was Voiced by the brilliant Hollywood producer Adam O’Byrne, a Canadian National Treasure. Our kickass theme and end credit music was composed and performed by the very kickass Tanya Donnelly and mastered by Ben Arons who also kicks... a certain amount of ass. This is Brendan Patrick Hughes, thank you for listening to Divine Intervention.