The Exemplary Efforts of Father Flanagan
Through his ministry to thousands of troubled boys, Father Edward Flanagan set an example we should strive to emulate.
*This article was originally published by Philanthropy Daily
There is no such thing as a bad boy, only bad environment, bad modeling and bad teaching.
This ethos has been—and continues to be—the bedrock of Boys Town, an organization dedicated to housing and educating children suffering from abuse, addiction, or abandonment. Initially serving five boys in a Victorian mansion in Nebraska, Boys Town now spans nine sites across the United States and has helped at least 392,000 boys and girls since its establishment in 1917.
According to Boys Town, 80% of the children who enter their facilities arrive with “significant academic deficiencies and behavioral challenges”; however, the turnaround in both capacities is awe-inspiring, as 97% graduate or continue their education after leaving. There are countless testimonials speaking to Boys Town’s impact on those under its auspices—like brothers Jorge, Enrique, Frankie, and Gabriel, who all escaped Las Vegas gang violence, received schooling and care from Boys Town staff, and went on to serve in the U.S. Marine Corps.
These remarkable transformations of mind and spirit stem from the charism of Boys Town’s founder, Father Edward Flanagan—a Catholic priest and social reformer in the early 20th century—who once said, “Kindness and love will open the heart of any problem boy. That heart will melt within the warmth of the sunshine of love.”
Father Flanagan was born in Ireland on July 13, 1886, the eighth child of John and Norah. With aspirations to become a priest at a young age, he immigrated to America in 1904 to fulfill his vocational calling, though chronic health issues kept him from being ordained until 1912, according to his biography by Nebraska Stories. Once a priest, Father Flanagan focused his ministerial duties by tending to the temporal and spiritual needs of the homeless in Omaha, Neb., opening the Workingman’s Hotel—which provided housing for low-income workers and homeless men, regardless of race or religion—in 1916.
That said, what moved him most deeply was witnessing impoverished, orphaned, or neglected children resort to delinquency, and how society deemed them lost causes. He quickly realized that the most productive cure for ‘bad boys’—and later homeless, hopeless men—was developing an environment that could foster love, education, and virtue.
“I learned that many of them had been homeless in their youth, and that gave me the idea that would be better to work with boys, homeless, neglected boys, who could still be turned into good American citizens,” the priest once said. “I have learned that reformatories do not reform because you can’t reform a boy behind bars.”
On Dec. 12, 1917, the priest borrowed $90 from a friend to rent a boarding house that he named “Father Flanagan’s Home for Boys,” where he sheltered five Nebraskan children. Word spread and the mission quickly grew. Within a year, Father Flanagan moved his operations to the German American Home, which could house 150 boys and had ample space for educational purposes.
Growing pains were not the only concerns Father Flanagan faced. As shared by Nebraska Stories’ documentary, the priest “began receiving violent death threats” for “accepting boys of mixed religions and race, and not segregating them.” Yet he did not fold, remaining resolved to serve any child.
A true visionary, Father Flanagan was also a practical man, seeing the German American Home’s limitations. He eyed farmland (Overlook Farm) ten miles west of Omaha as a suitable location to provide “safety and space to grow,” as noted by Nebraska Stories. After raising funds with the support of the boys in his care, he purchased the property and opened Boys Town.
The new facility opened on Oct. 22, 1921. At the new Boys Town, the children “raised some of their own food in a vegetable garden and had room for a baseball diamond, track, and football field,” according to Nebraska Studies. The following year, a five-story building on the property became operational that had “classrooms, [a] dining hall, gym, dormitory, chapel, and infirmary.”
Nearly 300 boys called Boys Town home by the next decade. Father Flanagan’s mission gained a national reputation for giving boys a “new start,” even inspiring the 1938 and 1941 movies Boys Town and Men of Boys Town, respectively, which starred Spencer Tracy (who won an Academy Award for the former) and Mickey Rooney.
Invited by the renowned Gen. Douglas MacArthur, Father Flanagan traveled the world, sharing his “ideas for youth care” in countries ravaged by World War II. Listeners took heed as, reportedly, 89 programs “across the globe are directly inspired by his example,” according to the Father Flanagan League: Society of Devotion. Yet the journey’s strain was too much for him. He died after suffering a heart attack on May 15, 1948.
Father Flanagan’s story, however, did not end there. In 1999, a group of Boys Town alumni “helped ignite” his canonization process, according to Omaha Magazine. By 2015, Archbishop George Lucas advanced his cause to the Vatican, where a tribunal investigated whether the priest lived a holy life. Last September, Catholic News Agency reportedthat Father Flanagan is “expected to soon be declared Venerable by the Vatican, placing him on the path to canonization.”
To be declared a saint, Father Flanagan would need two miracles attributed to his intercession to be approved by the Catholic Church.
Until that day, Father Flanagan’s life is worth remembrance and emulation, particularly by civil society. Tremendous efforts have humble origins; they start within our own hearts, homes, and communities. As the priest said, “If the future of our country is to be secure from dangerous enemies from within, parents and guardians of children must become more conscious of the responsibilities which God has placed upon them. We must become more virtuous in our own lives, that we may teach more effectively the lesson of proper citizenship by example as well as instruction.”
Yet anxiety and depression continue to grip children and teens, the divorce rate is still rising in America, and “boys from non-intact families are more likely to spend some time in jail or prison before age 30 than they are to graduate from college,” according to the Institute for Family Studies.
Father Flanagan’s observation, from nearly a century ago, remains relevant and striking to a modern audience grappling with the collapse of the American family. His vision, as evidenced by Boys Town, is a remedy for many social ills plaguing society today. May we all follow his example—to see the inherent dignity in every person and lovingly provide opportunities to develop good, educated citizens.
A truly good mam.