The Fist and the Cross

HUNTINGTON—This past week our community lost two of its most beloved radicals. I came to know both Fr. Bert Valdez and Winnie Fox during my time as an undergraduate student at Marshall. For Bert religion was about being human, and for Winnie, revolution was religion.

For Fr. Bert, spirituality was not so much taught as it was performed in front of your eyes. He understood that the symphony of life never ceases, and his attuned ear did not miss the music. He did not expect people to always understand his point, but he did expect them to think about it.

He was fond of saying all stories are true, while some of them actually happened. He once told me during a heated debate in the sacristy that he didn’t believe in the Immaculate Conception. It wasn’t until after Mass ended that we were informed that his presider’s microphone had been on the whole time!

During one homily, he likened the Church to a house of ill repute and told the story of how he watched from his window at St. Charles Seminary on Paca Street in Baltimore as a madam kicked out a male patron. Throwing his wallet in his face, the woman screamed, “this is a respectable whorehouse.”

Winnie could be just as feisty. When she became more stooped over, she would amble up to politicians using her walker and fool them into thinking she was a sweet old woman. Then she’d grab them by the shirt collar. Waiting for her arthritic hands to twist, she would pull them toward her, and explain why her cause was vital.

Winnie was born in eastern Kentucky and her father politicked for Fred Vinson, a congressman who eventually became the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court from 1946-1953. Her life as a political activist began when she stood up for her African American co-workers while working as a secretary in Washington, D.C. during the Second World War.

Winnie was always writing editorials and congressmen. She loved people and hated those in power who made decisions that benefit the rich without thinking of working folk. She was an outspoken feminist who attributed many social problems to the male perspective, but was fierce in her devotion to her late-husband Jack.

In the past few years I drifted away from both Winnie and Fr. Bert. Winnie was initially against my going to seminary, but a couple years later told a mutual friend that even though she couldn’t stand organized religion, she knew I would do right by the people and practice liberation theology. Regarding Fr. Bert neither of us picked up the phone. As I look back on my friends I don’t mourn their death so much as my own loss. Because of them I was able to find my own place, somewhere between the fist and the cross.