JFK prayer card.

[Drunken Irishman]

Last edited Mon Nov 22, 2021, 01:15 PM - Edit history (1)

Hello friends.

I wanted to share with you something that belonged to my grandma.

Being what felt like the only Irish-Catholic family in Utah, my grandparents idolized the Kennedys. His death hit extra hard for them.

My grandma had this prayer card she kept for many, many years. I'm not sure if it was something she sent for or if the local diocese handed them out. Either way, from what I can tell, these cards were manufactured between November, 1963 and January, 1964. So, this is almost 60 years old now.

I thought I'd share. And maybe one of you had one too!

[Kid Berwyn]

1. Thank you.

Breaks my heart, as a Catholic and as a citizen of the United States.

[electric_blue68]

4. I was too young to get the Catholic v Christian fractious...

back & forth yet. I did know when he won (I was 7) that he was the first Catholic President but didn't know the significance.

[2Gingersnaps]

25. My seven generation family history is bathed in it.

Catholic in England when the Protestants took power, Anglican when they left England for the Plantation of Ulster, there one generation, because British Anglicans in Ulster were not a popular bunch, to America in time for the Revolutionary War, paid for service in land grants with land that did not quite belong to the new Constitutional Republic yet.

I was six when he died, in first grade. The TV sets were mounted in the hallways in my elementary and we were all taken into the hallways to watch. My siblings and I had been orphaned two years prior, so I had no idea what the country lost, but I knew what those two kids lost.

The teachers took us outside and lowered the flag to half mast. I was inconsolable and had to be sent home. Still believe with all my heart that had he lived, he would have had one tough re-election, and we would be a far better country today.

[calimary]

26. Fifth grade for me. Catholic school - nun-run.

I was 10. Sister Dorothy had been called away quietly and had left the classroom for a few minutes. We’d had no clue. Until she came back and told us - “don’t scream.” And then “President Kennedy is dead.” And I remember a collective feeling as though we’d all been hit by a speeding freight train.

We not only did not scream, we were frozen in silence - pretty much all through the lunch period, which class was just about to break for. Nobody said a word. I don’t think anybody even knew WHAT to say.

[COL Mustard]

28. I Was In Kindergarten In Alabama

We were waiting to join my Dad at an overseas posting. We got to go home early and got an extra day off. I remember watching it on TV and trying to ask the grownups "What's a President? What does assassaasssaasitnation mean? (Big word for a 5 year old). I couldn't get my questions in because they were too much in shock and too focused on the TV and Walter.

What a sad day for the country. We all lost so much innocence.

[electric_blue68]

2. A piece of such tragic history. ty

[gademocrat7]

3. Thank you for sharing this.

[Itchinjim]

5. My grandmothers and mother in Iowa had this very same card.

I believe they handed them out at Mass shortly after the assassination.

[Drunken Irishman]

6. I bet that's where she got it! Thanks!

[wnylib]

13. A collector's item today.

[AngryOldDem]

8. I think you're right.

Churches probably treated this the same as a parish funeral.

[mountain grammy]

12. Yes, many of my Catholic friends had them too.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

7. Thanks so much. JFK was my No.1 childhood hero.

Saving both to disk for remembrance.....

[AngryOldDem]

9. What is Raccolta? Pre Vatican II?

[Ford_Prefect]

30. It was a book of collected prayers. The citation is probably for the prayer on the card.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raccolta

more at the wiki page above.

[TNNurse]

10. Certainly a family treasure.

[SheltieLover]

11. Ty for sharing

[halfulglas]

14. I have that, too. My aunt gave me a laminated one.

I was 22 when that happened. I was at work and still remember so much of that terrible day.

[twodogsbarking]

16. The book "A Torch Is Passed" is worth a look.

I have a copy from 1963. You can buy it online.

[irisblue]

17. Whoa! I remember those. In Catholic school then, it was memorable days

[housecat]

18. I remember sitting in study hall in the high school cafeteria when the loudspeaker announced it.

I don't remember and didn't care about his religion or anyone else's. I cared about the man and what he meant to our country, and I cried..

[Upthevibe]

20. Thank you.........n/t

[ananda]

21. Nice!

Also raised Irish Catholic.

I remember that day so well, all of us in the
auditorium/chapel with rosaries praying for
him.

[Bluejeans]

22. My parents had that prayer card on display for years

My parents had that prayer card on display for years in the window of their standup desk...

...I found another one when I inherited my Dad's pre-Vatican II missal which contained more than a handful of other prayer cards.

I remember walking up the driveway from the kindergarten bus and seeing my mom crying uncontrollably in the doorway. When our dad came home for work a couple of hours later, he explained to my brother and me what happened to President Kennedy.

I've often wondered "What if Oswald had missed; how would history have been different?"

RIP President Kennedy

[ShazzieB]

23. Very nice, thanks for sharing.

I can't even imagine what it must have like, growing up Catholic in Utah! I'm sure there must have been many challenges.

[Irish_Dem]

24. Thank you for posting.

[Hekate]

27. Thank you for sharing this

RIP

[Larissa]

29. The memory

Thank you, Drunken Irishman, for sharing this poignant keepsake of John F. Kennedy. It, of course, brought back several, some stinging, memories of that day, and the period afterwards. I was at school when it was announced that President Kennedy had been shot. My sister and I held hands and ran all the way home. In that trip home we saw grown adults of every stripe crying openly in the street. Over the years I always believed that that would be the first and last time I'd ever see that happen.

The other observation, which I discovered more recently, was that JFK's White House staffers warned him about going to Dallas. When JFK's Air Force One landed at Love Field in Dallas, a seemingly supportive crowd awaited him and the First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. Among them was this young man, at the link below, hoisting high the Confederate stars and bars. A definition of an omen is a phenomenon that foretells the future.

https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth184596/

[Historic NY]

31. I have one

[StClone]

32. Chill of the realization we have had a President Assasinated

A great one.

Catholic like me and to see the Prayer Card of him brings back the dim memories of that day.
I don't know what I was doing but was seated. I had recently turned six so maybe I had toys to enjoy. Mother had just finished dishes and started ironing.


I looked up at the sound of my Mother's gasp as the TV issued the worst of news. "President Kennedy has been shot." It is one of the top three major historical events for which I have memories to this day.