American Catholic History

Benjamin Franklin and Father John Carroll, SJ became friends on an ill-fated mission to Canada in 1776 during the opening stages of the Revolutionary War. The Continental Congress sent Franklin, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, Samuel Chase, and Father John Carroll on a mission to try to persuade the Canadians to join in the rebellion. Franklin was already ill when the trip began, and his condition worsened. He chose to leave Canada early when it was obvious that the mission would not succeed, so Father John Carroll decided to accompany him to help nurse him on the voyage. Franklin credited Carroll's ministrations with saving his life, and he never forgot Carroll's kindness and care. Because of this friendship, when Ben Franklin was the American ambassador to France, and the Church was looking to establish a hierarchy in the new American nation, he was in a position to put in a good word for Carroll. In 1784 Carroll was named "Superior of the Missions," and then in 1789 he was named the first bishop of Baltimore. He became archbishop of Baltimore in 1808, and died in 1815

The first St. Patrick's Day Festivities were held, oddly enough, in St. Augustine, Florida in 1600. More than 130 years later the first permanent St. Patrick's Day celebrations as we know them began in Boston, and then 25 years later in New York City, both in the 18th century. The first St. Patrick's Day Parade was held by Irish soldiers in the British army stationed in New York City, who got up on March 17, 1762 and paraded through the streets of Manhattan to a tavern for breakfast. The tradition has stuck. The celebration remained and grew because it was a way for Irish, particularly Irish Catholics, to assert their presence in the New World, and to celebrate their own native culture in this land where they were a minority, not always trusted, but who were intent on staying and being part of this new nation. Since the mid-20th century the American phenomenon of St. Patrick's Day celebrations has both returned to Ireland, where it is a major four-day event, and it has spread throughout the world wherever Irish can be found in large numbers.

The Josephites, formally the Society of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart, were founded in 1892 when priests of the “Mill Hill” priests from England separated from the mother order. The Mill Hill priests had been founded in England in 1866 by Father Herbert Vaughn — later the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster — who desired to establish a missionary society. In 1871 Pope Pius IX gave the Mill Hill priests the mission of evangelizing the millions of blacks in America who were recently freed slaves in the wake of the American Civil War. They did amazing work, but, in spite of fact that the American bishops, led by Archbishop Martin Spalding of Baltimore, had specifically requested aid from Rome to help with the difficult challenge of these newly freed slaves, the Church in America, at all levels, still included many people with frankly un-Catholic understandings of their obligation of charity and justice toward their fellow man. Many black Catholics, and those who helped them, like the Josephites, faced terrible racism and segregation, for decades. However, the persistence of the Josephites, and the good will of a few very important figures, put the Church at the forefront of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. The Josephites are the first, and still one of the few, religious orders that work exclusively to aid black Catholics and preserve and promote a uniquely black voice in Catholicism in America.

Episode 36 Mother Mathilda Beasley was born Mathilda Taylor in New Orleans, Louisiana in either 1832 or 1834. Her mother was enslaved, and her father was not known, though he may have been James Taylor, her mother's slave owner. She may have been baptized in the Cathedral of St. Louis in New Orleans, and she was educated as she grew. By 20 years old she was a free woman of color and had moved to Savannah, Georgia. There she worked as a seamstress and took the very risky step of educating the children of slaves.  This was forbidden by George law, and it carried harsh penalties. After the Civil War she married Abraham Beasley, but when he died she donate all of her money to the Catholic Church — perhaps because her husband, though he was black, had made money in the slave trade. She went back to working as a seamstress, but she wanted to educate children and to become a religious sister. She eventually founded one of the first Catholic religious orders for Black women in the US, and it was the first in Georgia. She died in 1903 while praying before a statue of the Blessed Mother. Her funeral was packed with Catholics and Protestants alike. 

Daniel Rudd was born a slave in Bardstown. His family was Catholic, as was the family who enslaved them. They all worshiped God together at St. Joseph Proto-Cathedral, the first cathedral of the Diocese of Bardstown which had become the Diocese of Louisville by the time he was born. St. Joseph was right across the street from the house where he grew up. He reflected later in life about how at St. Joseph he learned that in the sacraments of the Church, all were equal before God, regardless of race or class. He was freed after the Civil War and went to live with his brother in Ohio. He worked for civil rights for blacks beginning in the late 1860s. He founded the first newspaper published by a black man for black people. His paper eventually went national. He had the approbation of many bishops and cardinals in the USA and from abroad. Eventually he worked with Father Augustus Tolton to establish the Colored Catholic Congress, the precursor to the modern National Black Catholic Congress. Daniel Rudd died in 1933 in his childhood home in Bardstown, and he is buried in the graveyard at the Proto-Cathedral.

Ellis Island opened on January 1, 1892, and the first immigrant to be welcomed was Annie Moore, who was either a 15 or 17 year-old Catholic girl from Ireland. She and her younger brothers traveled over from Cobh, County Cork to join their parents who were already in American. Moore went on to marry a German and have a bunch of kids in New York City, contrary to some popular myths. Twelve million immigrants passed through Ellis Island during its 62 years of service, most of them from historically Catholic countries. Ellis Island was the first central immigration point set up by the federal government after nearly 100 years of immigration being controlled by the states.

Mother Benedict Duss hid from the Nazis in her French Benedictine monastery during World War II. After General Patton's Third Army liberated her abbey she pledged to return to the United States to establish a Benedictine monastery to pray for and bless her homeland. Through the assistance of two future popes — both of whom would eventually be canonized — and a number of other providential happenstances, the Abbey of Regina Laudis was finally established in Bethlehem, Connecticut. The story of the founding eventually became the basis for the acclaimed movie Come To The Stable, which was nominated for eight Oscars, including for the screenplay written by Clare Booth Luce. Regina Laudis has been the home of Mother Dolores Hart since she left a budding Hollywood acting career in the 1960s, and it was the place where the actress Patricia Neal found solace and healing after her tumultuous life. 

Father Aloysius Schmitt was a Navy Chaplain assigned to the USS Oklahoma at the outset of World War II. He had just finished the 7 a.m. Mass on the Second Sunday of Advent when the  first torpedoes from the surprise Japanese attack struck the ship. He aided men to escape, at the cost of his own life during the attack on Pearl Harbor. He was the first chaplain to die in World War II.

Venerable Henriette Delille overcame great opposition to establish the second religious community for black women in the United States. She was an octroon born in New Orleans in 1813. Her mother was a kept woman within the plaçage system. After Henriette learned the truth about marriage she became implacably opposed to the plaçage system, and she rejected the trajectory of her life. In her 20s she started the second religious community for black women, but it took years for the authorities to approve her religious order. Since its founding in the 1840s the community has opened the first Catholic nursing home for the elderly in the United States, as well as one of the oldest Black Catholic high schools in the USA. Henriette Delille died in 1862. Her cause for canonization opened in 1988, and she was declared venerable in 2010.

"Pope Night" was the American version of the British "Guy Fawkes Night," the annual commemoration of the Gunpowder Plot. The night of mischief and mayhem and anti-Catholic demonstrations came over with sailors and grew to include demonstrations up and down the New England coast. It was ended by George Washington, who had an affinity for Catholics — and who needed Catholic support in the war against Great Britain

In the late 1700s, Adam Livingston, who was Lutheran, moved with his family to a farm near Smithfield, Virginia. After a stranger, who turned out to be Catholic, died in his home, manifestations of a demonic infestation of their home began to disturb his family. The sound of invisible horses galloping loudly, crockery flying off shelves, a clipping sound accompanied by articles of clothing being damaged, and other disturbing occurrences. The clipping is what gave the area the name "Wizard Clip." The manifestations continued until two Catholic priests, including Father Demetrius "Prince" Gallitzin, intervened to exorcise the demons. Livingston's family became Catholic as a result. Following their conversion, a consoling heavenly voice instructed the Livingston family in the faith, led them in prayer, and inspired Livingston to do good things for others in need. When the Livingstons moved back to Pennsylvania in 1802, Adam Livingston donated 34 acres to the Catholic Church, and that land is, since 1978, the Priestfield retreat center for priests in modern day Middleway, West Virginia.

John Barry was born in Ireland in the late 1740s to Catholic peasant farmers. Being Catholic they had no rights, and by the time John was ten they had been evicted from their land and moved to a coastal town. John became a sailor on his uncle's fishing vessel and by 15 had risen well. That year he moved to Philadelphia, the most important port city in the British colonies in America. By 21 he was a ships captain making runs to the Caribbean regularly. He rose in prominence as a captain and a man of great character and generosity in Philadelphia society. When the Revolutionary War broke out in 1775 he sold his ship, the Black Prince, to the Continental Congress, and offered his services as a sea captain. On board his new command, the Lexington, he won the first naval engagement of the War. He spent time on shore during the War, taking part in the battles of Trenton and Princeton, among other actions. When he returned to sea, after refusing to take a bribe from the British to switch allegiance, he commanded two other ships and won other significant battles, including the final engagement of the War. After Independence was won he went back to merchant shipping until President George Washington tapped him to lead the organization of the new permanent US Navy. He oversaw construction of the first naval vessels and took command of the first ship, the United States. Washington nominated him as the first officer, and first flag officer, of the new U.S. Navy, effective in 1794. He died in 1803 of asthma. There are at least three statues commemorating Barry — one in Washington, DC, one in Philadelphia, and one in his native Wexford, Ireland. For his efforts as a sea captain and establishing the US Navy, John Barry is considered the Father of the US Navy.

Dubbed "The Cathedral of the Plains" by William Jennings Bryan, the Basilica of St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen was completed in 1911. It was the largest and tallest church west of the Mississippi River at the time. It was built by the community of Volga Germans who had moved en masse to Victoria, Kansas in the last few decades of the 19th century and in the first decade of the 20th. The community grew quickly through immigration after the Tsar of Russia had rolled back many of the privileges and protections that they had enjoyed in Russia for nearly a century. The Basilica was built in just three years through the hard work and sacrifice of the families of the community. The effort was led by the Capuchin friar who was their pastor, Fr. Jerome Mueller, OFM Cap. He levied a duty of $45, six cartloads of stone, and four cartloads of sand on every male 12 years old and older. Many families took out loans to afford this duty, but they took on this debt willingly to have their church, and they contributed their own time and industry to build it. The title "Cathedral of the Plains" was given by Bryan in 1912 as he arrived in Victoria by train, while stumping for Woodrow Wilson's presidential election campaign. The church is easily visible from Interstate 70, and is visited frequently by people who are drawn to it due to its size, beauty, and splendor. It was named a Basilica in 2014.

Sister Blandina Segale had a second chapter to her life. After spending 20 years bringing civility and the light of Christ to the Wild West, Sister Blandina and her biological sister, Sister Justina, worked hard for immigrants and those in need in Cincinnati, Ohio. They began their work in 1896 and organized the Santa Maria Institute in 1897 to provide catechesis, social services, and homes for those in need. They worked initially among the immigrant Italian population, but their scope expanded as more and more people in need flooded into Cincinnati in the first quarter of the 20th century. They fought against bigotry, religious persecution and opposition, and sometimes an adverse legal system. But their efforts became one of the largest and most important social services organizations in Ohio, Santa Maria Services. 

Vince Lombardi, legendary coach of the NFL's Green Bay Packers, was arguably the greatest football coach of all time. What made him a great coach was his ability to motivate his players, and get their best out of them. His coaching philosophy came largely from his Catholic education, and sounded a lot like how Catholics talk about virtue. As a coach he never had a losing season, and took the Green Bay Packers from a decade of futility to a decade of success, including winning the first two Super Bowls. But the sudden onset of cancer took his life after just one season of success with the Washington Redskins. 

Sister Blandina Segale was a spitfire of a pint-sized Italian nun who faced down lynch mobs, tamed outlaws, outwitted juvenile troublemakers, and built or rebuilt schools, orphanages, hospitals and convents, often with her own hands and the those of anyone she could cajole or convince to help. Whew! She was originally from Italy, but after her family immigrated when she was 5, she became a Sister of Charity at 16. At 22, in 1872, she was sent to the frontier mining town of Trinidad, Colorado. She spent 20 years out west, and her impact was tremendous. But this episode is only part of her amazing story. After she was recalled to Cincinnati in 1892 she spent another nearly five decades working equally hard for women and children in that town. But that will be a story for another day. 

Charlene Richard was an ordinary girl in south central Louisiana. She was a typical cajun Catholic girl, good at sports, good at her studies, a devout Catholic, and known to get into a little trouble here and there, just like every other kid her age. But when she was twelve everything changed when she was diagnosed with leukemia, and died just 13 days later. How she suffered for others, and how she accepted her coming death, inspired by St. Therese of Lisieux, made all the difference for “the Little Cajun Saint.”

"Stagecoach" Mary Fields was a hard-drinking, gun-toting, street-brawling black woman in the Montana frontier. She also was a kind-hearted guardian to the children of the Montana frontier, including native children, and she was a dear friend to the Ursuline nuns who had set up a mission near Cascade, Montana. In spite of her hard work, dedication to those in need, and generosity, she was treated poorly by those in positions of power. She spent eight years as a mail carrier running a Star Route in Montana. She was good at it, but some were upset by how good she was at it and gave her the nickname "Stagecoach Mary" as a way to denigrate her service. After leaving the Star Route she took on other jobs to make ends meet. While some resented her abilities, most loved her and appreciated her generosity and hard work. When she died in 1814 her funeral was one of the largest that Cascade, Montana had ever seen.

Shrines dedicated in honor of St. Anne are among the oldest Catholic establishments in the U.S. St Anne de Detroit, for instance, is the second-oldest parish in the United States, while the shrine on Isle la Motte, Vermont, was part of a French fort protecting the southern approaches to Montreal. Some shrines have dramatic stories, like the National Shrine of St. Anne in Scranton, Pennsylvania which nearly collapsed due to mining activity in the hill beneath it. Most have a relic of St. Anne, the grandmother of Jesus. The Shrine of St. Anne in Fall River, Massachusetts was built to rival the great shrine of St. Anne de Beaupre in Quebec, but demographic changes brought that awe-inspiring structure nearly to the point of demolition. These shrines often arose where French and French Canadians settled, as the French have historically had a deep devotion to the  mother of Mary and grandmother of Jesus.    Image credits: St. Anne de Detroit, creative commons license, Polonia90; St. Anne's Church and Parish Complex, Fall River, Massachusetts, creative commons license, Kenneth C. Zirkel 

Stanley Rother was born in Okarchee, Oklahoma the oldest of four children to a family of Catholic German farmers. He grew up learning the ways of farming, playing sports, and serving Mass. He entered seminary but struggled with some theology classes and Latin. The seminary eventually sent him home saying he wasn't priest material. Fortunately his bishop and Mount St. Mary's Seminary in Emmitsburg, Maryland wanted to give him another chance. He graduated and was ordained a priest for Oklahoma City-Tulsa in 1963. In 1968 he requested to be a missionary in Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala where the Diocese had a mission. He went and learned both Spanish and the difficult Tzutujil language of the small community of native peasants among whom he served as a missionary. He poured himself into the work, eventually translating the Mass and even the New Testament into Tzutujil. He also worked to bring modern farming techniques to the community and taught math along with language and catechetical lessons. His efforts, however, made him a target of both the government and left-wing militant groups who were fighting a bloody civil war that lasted decades. A number of his parishioners were victims of the Civil War as they refused to cooperate with either side of the fight. Father Rother wrote that "the shepherd doesn't flee at the first sign of danger." Eventually he was found to be number 8 on a death list, so his bishop ordered him to return to Oklahoma. He spent a few months at his family farm, but eventually requested permission to return to Santiago Atitlan to be with his people for Easter. He returned in April 1981, but on July 28, 1981 he was gunned down in the rectory in the middle of the night. He was regarded as a martyr and a great man from immediately after his death. His body was returned to Oklahoma, but his heart was returned to Santiago Atitlan where it remains. His cause for canonization opened in 2010, and he was beatified in a large outdoor Mass in Oklahoma City in 2017. A large shrine dedicated to Blessed Stanley Rother opened in 2023 in Oklahoma City.