When Law was a student here, the Church severely frowned upon the consumption of meat on Friday.

Oliver vividly remembers Law going out of his way to ensure that the vegetable soup served in the dining hall on Friday did not contain any beef stock.

“Most of the religious students at Harvard would not have pursued it,” Oliver says. “They would have been content with the vegetable soup because they were following the spirit of the law.”

Law followed the letters of the Church’s rules—and sought to promote them among other undergraduates. He served as vice president and then president of Harvard’s Catholic Club, according to Thomas L. Barrette ’52, who edged out Law by one vote for the presidency during Law’s junior year.

Law’s Catholic roots ran deep, having considered the priesthood since high school.

He was born in Torreòn, Mexico, and his family moved to St. Thomas, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, in the 1940s.

His Catholic father was a distinguished pilot and a colonel in the U.S. Army. While on the island, Law’s mother gave piano lessons, and her son developed the skill as well.

Law was close to his parents and while at Harvard stayed in touch with them by frequently writing letters home, according to Romanus Cessario, a Dominican priest who has known Law since the 1980s.

The Crimson was unable to reach Law for this story.

Cessario, who is still in contact with Law, says the cardinal was unavailable for an interview due to a trip to Rome.

Alfred Heath, Law’s classmate at Charlotte Amalie High School in St. Thomas, said Law had been editor of the high school newspaper and contributed to the local daily.

Even after becoming a priest, he remained involved in journalism, editing a diocesan newspaper in Mississippi while a parish priest there.

“He was going to go into journalism,” Heath says.

But Heath says Eldra Schulterbrandt, a guidance counselor who advised both Law and Heath, redirected the aspiring journalist towards service to the Church.

“Mrs. Schulterbrandt saw something he didn’t see—he was inclined toward the religious,” Heath says. “So she told him to take some philosophy classes, and the rest is history.”