Early Life
Robert Emmet (Mychal) Judge was the son of Irish Catholic immigrants from County Leitrim and the firstborn of a pair of fraternal twins. With his twin sister Dympna and his older sister Erin, he grew up in Brooklyn, during the Great Depression. His lifelong affinity for the poor began at a young age; he often gave his only quarter to beggars on the street.
At the age of six, he watched his father die of a slow and painful illness. To compensate for his father's inability to work, Judge shined shoes at New York Penn Station from where he would visit St Francis of Assisi Church on West 31st Street. Seeing the Franciscan friars there, he later said, "I realized that I didn't care for material things ... I knew then that I wanted to be a friar."
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Famous quotes related to early life:
“Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians ...”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)
“... business training in early life should not be regarded solely as insurance against destitution in the case of an emergency. For from business experience women can gain, too, knowledge of the world and of human beings, which should be of immeasurable value to their marriage careers. Self-discipline, co-operation, adaptability, efficiency, economic management,—if she learns these in her business life she is liable for many less heartbreaks and disappointments in her married life.”
—Hortense Odlum (1892–?)