"Religious Belief and Public Morality" by Mario Matthew Cuomo
thank you very much, father hesburgh, father mcbrien, all the distinguished clergy who are present, ladies and gentlemen:
i am very pleased to be at notre dame and i feel very much at home, frankly -- not just because you have seven or eight hundred students from new york state, not just because -- not just because father mcbrien's mother's name is catherine botticelli -- a beautiful name -- not just because father hesburgh is a syracuse native, but also because of your magnificent history of great football teams. oh, the subway -- they mean a lot to us, the...great fighting irish. the subway alumni of new york city have always been enthralled. and for years and years all over the state, syracuse north and south, out on long island, people on saturday's would listen to their radio and now watch their television to watch the great fighting irish wearing the gallic green. it's marvelous. the names of your great players reverberate back from the years: nick buoniconti, nick pietrosante, angelo bertelli. how about ralph guglielmi? what a great player he is.
i want to begin this talk by drawing your attention to the title of the lecture: "religious belief and public morality: a catholic governor's perspective." i was not invited to speak on "church and state" generally, and certainly not to speak on "mondale against reagan." the subject assigned to me is difficult enough. i'll not try to do more than i've been asked.
i'm honored by the invitation, but the record shows that i'm not the first governor of new york state to appear at an event involving notre dame. one of my great predecessors, al smith, went to the army-notre dame football game each time it was played in new york. his fellow catholics expected smith to sit with notre dame; protocol required him to sit with army because it was the home team. protocol prevailed. but not without smith noting the dual demands on his affections: "i’ll take my seat with army," he said, "but i commend my soul to notre dame!"
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