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t « / sn QU «the new yori: office furnish#a the b ., following information:, ...<- : "In May, 1952, my wife and I learned that our oldest daughter, Susanne, age 5, was stricken with acute leukemia and had approximately six months to live. As the realization of this news impressed itself upon us day by day, we found ourselves in a state of great anxiety and personal distress. In August, 1952 we wrote to Bishop Fulton J. Sheerffand explained our situation relating to our daughter. In reply he invited us to visit — him with Susanne to receive his blessing. His letter of reply was sub- sequently published in Collier's Kagazine in the Jamuary 2,11953 issue after the names were deleted. . : . nWe accepted Bishop Sheen's invitation and visited him on August 19, 1952 at the national office of the Propagation of the Faith, 109 East - . 38th Street, New York Citys He greeted us with great warmth and was ‘extremely cordial and gracious and went to great lengths to make our visit a happy and memorable one. The Bishop gave Susanne several lovely gifts to delight a child, including a gold ring and an ivory rosary, both of which - were subsequently buried with her. “In addition ‘he gave her his biretta which he autographed as well as a statue of the Blessed Mother and an ivory crucifix. He presented my wife with a beautiful World Mission rosary . and gave me a heavy St. Christopher medal for my care We spent approximately 45 minutes with the Bishop that daye. He gave Susanne his special blessing and blessed us tooe We cherish this visit deeply ‘pince it gave us a consider- able amunt of strength and consolation to stand behind us for what we were to faces. °° OS ar eee | , foie th. - #Thereafter we kept the Bishop advised of Susanne's condition and were in fairly regular correspondence with him even to the present time, receiving six letters in all from him. The Bishop tried to arrange to visit Susanne at New York Hospital as her condition grew worse but unfortunately he was away visiting the missions in Alabama at the time. When she died on November 11, 1952, he was attending a Catholic-Episcopal conference in Washington, D.C. We received a lovely letter of consolation from:him upon his return to New York and another one when our new child, Marian, was born on November 26, 19520 © 0s hue ts Loe j “tity wife's most recent contact with Bishop Sheen was at <he end of April, 1953 when she spoke to him on the telephone after her discharge from the hospital. He has extended an invitation to us to visit him at any “ time that we feel the need or if there is anything that he can do to help USe Bishop Sheen is aware of my association with the Bureaus" - . wv