Prayers needed for Archbishop Philip Hannan

>>>Here is a local news story about the health of retired Archbishop Philip Hannan, 97. It has been my privilege to assist the Archbishop at Mass, both as an acolyte and a Deacon. He is the heart of the Catholic Church in and of New Orleans. We need to storm Heaven with prayers for this good and gentle holy man.


by Dennis Woltering / Eyewitness News
wwltv.com
Posted on December 13, 2010 at 11:14 AM

Updated today at 7:11 PM

NEW ORLEANS – Retired Archbishop Philip Hannan, now 97, became ill this weekend with a bronchial infection, according to Archbishop Gregory Aymond. Then the infection developed into pneumonia.

Aymond said Hannan is now in bed at home in Covington, and he’s very weak.

“To be very frank he's like the Energizer Bunny. And he’s had about 95 lives. So all we know is that he is weak,” Aymond said.

Aymond said Hannan had a very tough night Sunday night, but was better Monday morning.

“And a sign of the weakness he himself yesterday said, ‘I cannot go to the Saints game.’ When Archbishop Hannan says, ‘I’m not going to the Saints game,’ you know that he's weak,” Aymond said at a Monday afternoon news conference. Earlier in the day, Aymond had notified parish priests of Hannan's condition, asking for prayers from local Catholics.

Aymond said the bed in which Hannan is resting in his St. Tammany home has a lot of history. It's the one where the retired archbishop and all eight of his siblings were born, and it's the bed where Pope John Paul slept when he visited New Orleans in 1987.

“And he has said consistently, both humorously and seriously, that he wanted to take his final breath of life before meeting the lord in that bed,” Aymond said.

Aymond said Hannan, the former World War II chaplain, has what he calls a paratrooping spirit and has always been larger than life in New Orleans. He said if there were a pope of New Orleans, it would be Hannan.

Many will never forget that he was appointed archbishop of New Orleans just 20 days after Hurricane Betsy ravaged the region in 1965.

“He left Vatican II and came to New Orleans after Hurricane Betsy and put on the boots and went out in the weight in the water and tried to get a sense of what’s happening,” Aymond said. “So from that point on he has truly endeared himself to so many people and has become an important fabric of our community, of our society.”

Aymond said Hannan is asking only for what he described as "ordinary medical treatment."

Aymond said that Hannan is a man of great determination and strength, and he is stable right now. But at 97, when Hannan has a bout of illness like this, in Aymond's words, "he never bounces back to where he was before."