One day into his term as governor of New York State, David A. Paterson, in a kind of preemptive act, disclosed his past marital infidelities.
Advising Paterson for sure is a well-connected lawyer and former Jesuit priest, perhaps just the right person to help deal with an issue that mixes political and moral realities.
Charles J. O’Byrne, who holds the title of chief of staff and secretary in the Paterson administration, is a Kennedy family friend who is seen by observers as a smart, caring, but tough political practitioner.
“He was one of the few naturals in politics I have ever met,” Ethan Geto, who worked with O’Byrne on the 2004 Howard Dean presidential campaign, told The New York Observer.
“I think his background prepared him in one critical way. Charles is extremely empathetic. He can really put himself in the shoes of another human being.”
Born in New York City, O’Byrne, 48, graduated from Columbia University in 1981 and Columbia Law School in 1984.
While he was in law school, O’Byrne met and became friends with Stephen Smith Jr., the nephew of former president John F. Kennedy.
After law school, O’Byrne spent a few years at Rosenman & Colin LLP, a New York City law firm, before leaving to study for the priesthood, becoming a novice in the Society of Jesus, the Jesuit order, in 1989.
O’Byrne took his vows as a Jesuit in 1991 and was ordained as a Roman Catholic priest in 1996.
That same year, he married John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette in a ceremony on Cumberland Island, Ga.
In 1999, O’Byrne was the presiding priest at a memorial Mass in New York City for John and Carolyn Kennedy after they died in a plane crash.
Later in 1999, O’Byrne unofficially left the Jesuit order. He was dismissed officially in 2002.
In September 2002, O’Byrne caused some scandal with a first-person article in Playboy entitled, “Sex & Sexuality: One Man’s Story About Religious Life and What Seminaries Really Teach About Sex.”
In the article, O’Byrne portrays his fellow seminarians as men who entered the religious life with “little or no sexual experience.”
As recalled by O’Byrne, the seminarians made up for lost time. “There was sex all around me,” he writes, “including relationships between Jesuits.”
O’Byrne describes himself as not so much shocked by the sexual activity as he is disturbed by what he sees as the order’s hypocritically advocating celibacy but allowing sexual activity.
Not surprisingly, the Playboy story caused “resentment” toward O’Byrne, one priest told Jason Horowitz of the Observer.
O’Byrne joined the Dean campaign in 2003. And after Dean left the race in 2004, he volunteered in New York City educational programs.
He then went to work for Paterson, a Democrat who was serving as the minority leader of the New York state Senate. O’Byrne filled various roles before becoming then Paterson’s acting chief of staff.
After he was elected lieutenant governor in 2006, Paterson named O’Byrne his chief of staff at an annual salary of $140,000.
According to columnist Bob Herbert of The New York Times, Paterson turned to O’Byrne on March 10, soon after he got word that then-Gov. Eliot Spitzer had been implicated as a client of a prostitution ring.
“Boy, I’m not sure how he gets out of this,” Paterson told O’Byrne.
“This is not going to work out for him,” O’Byrne replied.
Two days later, Spitzer announced he would resign. A week later, Paterson was sworn in as governor with O’Byrne looking on.
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