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Real Answers™
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Copyright: © 2008 Kendall Wingrove
700 words

RUSSERT REMAINED TRUE TO THE AUTHOR OF HIS BELIEFS

By: Kendall Wingrove

Sister Lucille Socciarelli had her hands full when a precocious 13-year-old entered her seventh grade classroom at St. Bonaventure Elementary School. The young man was gifted in many ways and as the days progressed, the sister quickly realized that he was intelligent, witty, and a math whiz.
 
The class clown also had many outbursts that landed him in detention.  Hoping to channel this tidal wave of excessive energy, the sister asked the student to create a school newspaper and become its first editor.  The chief of “The Bonnette” eventually had one of the most extraordinary careers in American journalism.
 
Sister Lucille taught in Buffalo, New York.  It was 1963 and the boy was Timothy John Russert, Jr.
 
When that noteworthy journalism career recently came to an abrupt and unexpected end, Sister Lucille joined lawmakers, broadcasters and other opinion leaders offering eulogies for the respected moderator of NBC’s “Meet the Press.”  The mourners gathered to bid farewell during a memorial service at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. 

It’s fitting that the ceremony was held there considering JFK’s death had set the course for Tim Russert’s life more than four decades earlier.  When the president was assassinated, Russert and the student newspaper staff produced a special edition and sent copies to the Kennedy family and other dignitaries.  They eventually received personal responses and that exchange of correspondence helped convince Russert to become a journalist and public servant.

He pursued both professions with enormous enthusiasm.  Long before American audiences came to know Russert from network television, he worked on the staffs of Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan and New York Governor Mario Cuomo.  Years later he returned to journalism and thrived as head of the NBC News Washington Bureau. 

Sister Lucille’s lessons stood the test of time.  Young Tim was always taught to do his homework and he perfected that technique when preparing to interview guests.  Public figures appearing on “Meet the Press” had to defend their record and explain any changes in their thinking.  As the years went by, Russert’s affable personality and probing conversations set the standard for Sunday morning political talk shows. 

The goal was to educate viewers rather than offer them a lengthy monologue of the host’s viewpoints.  While on the air and off Russert was following the advice of the apostle Paul, written in a letter to a friend almost two thousand years ago:  “Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to your care.  Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge.”

Russert always remembered the folks back home and developed programming to help people better understand the political process and cope with the world around them.  It was the same goal he had in mind when interacting with individuals in his personal life.   Russert’s outreach was based on a strong faith.

“We have an obligation to help people who are less fortunate, who are needy – that is where you see the presence of God in others,” Russert said. 

Many saw that presence in Russert as he helped his aging father and raised his own son, Luke.  These events were chronicled in widely acclaimed, best-selling book “Big Russ and Me.” 

Despite the fame, Russert remained aware of his own shortcomings and never forgot the sacrifices that his parents had made along the way.  His beliefs, forged in the working class neighborhoods and Irish Catholic churches of Buffalo, kept him focused on the needs of others.

Timothy Shriver, a nephew of JFK, captured the sentiments of many when he said: “People will remember that Tim Russert was a man raised and steeped in faith – a faith that focused on service, a faith that is confident in God’s plan, and a faith dedicated to the love of peace and the love of justice.”

Because that faith was evident throughout the pages of “Big Russ,” a fan once wrote to the author: “It’s better to watch a sermon than to hear one.”  By remaining true to the author of his beliefs, Tim Russert gave millions of us a chance to watch a sermon we won’t forget for a long time.

Kendall Wingrove is a free-lance writer from East Lansing, Michigan.

"Real Answers™" furnished courtesy of The Amy Foundation Internet Syndicate. To contact the author or The Amy Foundation, write or E-mail to: P. O. Box 16091, Lansing, MI 48901-6091; amyfoundtn@aol.com

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