T he Catholic Church in the United States

1. The Catholic Church in the United States 1492 to the Present

2. Direction of Intention My God, give me the grace to perform this action with you and through love for you.In advance, I offer to you all the good that I will do and accept all the difficulty I may meet therein.St. Ann, Pray for us.St. Francis de Sales, Pray for us

3. Overview • The World in 1492 • Catholics in the early colonies • Building a Nation • Catholics, Slavery and the Civil War • Immigrants, Immigrants, Immigrants • Catholics in American Politics • The Catholic Parish – post WWII • Catholic Saints • Catholics Today

4. The World of 1492 • Church Affairs • Election of Rodrigo Borgia • Leadership of the Church concerned with worldly affairs • Church both a spiritual and temporal influence • Christendom • World Affairs • The closing of the Mediterranean Sea to trade • Portugal circumnavigates Africa • Spain unites and expels the Moors • Columbus Voyage

5. Missionary World • Life After Columbus – 1492 to 1600 • Let’s NOT spiritualize the initial voyages • The first waves of Europeans were seeking trade and wealth • Religion only becomes important after the Protestant Reformation – 1517 • Fight for the SOULS of Native peoples

6. Missionary World • The Catholic Church intervenes and sides with Native Americans • Franciscan friar, Bartolomé de las Casas, first made Europe aware of the fate that had befallen thousands of the natives in enslavement by the Spanish conquerors. • Prompted Pope Paul III in 1537 to issue the bull Sublimis Deus in which he declared: "The said Indians and all other people who may later be discovered by Christians, are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the faith of Jesus Christ." (American Catholicism, 5)

7. Our Lady of Guadalupe • 1st Apparition: At dawn on December 9, 1531 • Juan Diego, an Indian convert, was going to Tlatelolco to attend catechism class and hear the Mass. Passing Tepeyac Hill, Witnessed a young woman dressed in native clothing asking that a shrine be built on the hill side • Subsequent Apparitions – December 10 – 12 • The Image and the Flowers • From 1531 onward – a place of pilgrimage – hope and identity

8. The Catholic Church in North America • Catholicism first came to the territories now forming the United States with the Spanish explorers and settlers in present-day Florida (1513) South Carolina (1566) Georgia (1568–1684 • The first Catholic Mass in North America??? • Solemnity of the Epiphany, January 6, 1494, Dominican Republic • In March 1509, Juan Ponce de León, with a group of colonists, including priests, landed in Puerto Rico at “Caparra” Mass was celebrated (US Territory)

9. The Catholic Church in North America • In June 1526, two Dominican priests with expedition land near at Cape Fear (near present-day Wilmington, North Carolina) possibly First Mass in NC. • 1559 Catholic Mass celebrated in Pensacola, Florida. Recorded • Saint Augustine Florida is the oldest European city in the United States. And has the oldest continually functioning church in the United States First Mass celebrated on September 8, 1565 • First Catholic Mass in original British Colonies - St. Clements's Island, Maryland on March 25, 1634,

10. A Word about the French Territories • French Catholic in Canada late 1500s • French Catholics in what would be the United States • Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan (1668), St. Igance on the Straits of Mackinac, Michigan (1671) and Holy Family at Cahokia, Illinois (1699) • Colonies and forts in Detroit (1701), St. Louis, Mobile (1702), Kaskaskia, Il (1703), Biloxi, Baton Rouge, and New Orleans(1718). • The French possessions were under the authority of the diocese of Quebec • 1639 Ursuline Nuns first arrive in Quebec • 1720, the Ursulines were operating a hospital in New Orleans.

11. First American Martyrs • Also known as Canadian Martyrs; Isaac Jogues and 7 Companions; Jesuit Martyrs of North America; Martyrs of New France. (Canada an dup state New York) 1643 – 49) • The Martyrs of Virginia • "Martyrdom of Johannes Baptista de Segura - 1570

12. Catholic in the English Colonies • Virginia – Named after… • Early reference to Polish (Catholic) glassmakers – prior to1620 • No religious tolerance for Catholics and popery • Catholics in Massachusetts • Strict religious laws. • Laws in 1647 and 1700 forbade Catholic priests to reside in the colony under pain of imprisonment and execution

13. Catholic in the English Colonies • Catholic Maryland • 1634 - the Province of Maryland by Cecil Calvert, 2nd Baron Baltimore • The first settlers were accompanied by two Jesuit missionaries travelling as gentlemen adventurers. • 1646 defeat of the Royalists in the English Civil War led to stringent laws against Catholic education and the extradition of known Jesuits from the colony • Toleration Act of 1649 – granting religious tolerance to all Trinitarian faiths – would become the basis of our First Amendment • The first free standing Roman Catholic Church in British North America at Historic St. Mary's City in 1667

14. Catholics Prior to the American Revolution • Population of Catholics • In 1634, Maryland recorded a little less than 3,000 Catholics out of a population of 34,000 (around 9% of the population). In 1757, Pennsylvania recorded fewer than 1,400 Catholics out of a population of about 200,000. • In 1785, when the newly founded United States) contained nearly four million people, there were fewer than 25,000 Catholics (about 1.6% of the population). • Church Structure • Colonial Catholics were under a titular bishop of the Catholic Church in England and Wales or Vicar Apostolic of the London • At the time of the American Revolution • No bishops, No diocese, 25? priests – no sisters, 3 standing churches

15. Catholic Life in the Colonies • Difficult and dangerous • Itinerant Priests – Weddings, baptisms and other sacraments provided occasionally • Family devotions – the rosary, novenas, family prayers. • Catholic books – Introduction to a Devout Life and The Imitation of Christ – Thomas Kempis

16. The American Revolution • In the Military • American Catholics, a very small percentage of the population of the 13 colonies, 1.6 percent, were overwhelmingly patriots and played a role in the American Revolution out of all proportion to the small fragment of the American people they represented. • Served in Leadership positions in Army – One in particular - Colonel John Fitzgerald was a trusted aide and private secretary to General George Washington. • In the Navy - Captains Joshua Barney and John Barry • Regiment that was Catholic during the Revolution was recruited at Saint Mary’s Parish in Philadelphia under the command of Colonel William Clifford.

17. The American Revolution • Foreign Aid from Catholic Spain • Catholic, including Lafayette, Duportail and Pulaski. Of course the French troops were almost all Catholic, and there were tens of thousands of them who saw service in the US. • The first mass in Boston was a funeral mass for a French soldier with members of the Continental Congress in attendance. • Washington on occasion attended mass during the War along with other Founding Fathers. An Artillery wife, Mary Hays McCauly (better known as Molly Pitcher) shared the rigors of Valley Forge with her husband, William Hays. Her actions during the battle of Monmouth on June 28, 1778 became legendary..

18. The Declaration of Independence • Charles Carroll of Maryland • Charles Carroll, the only Roman Catholic to sign the Declaration of Independence, was also the last surviving signer, dying in Baltimore in 1832 at the age of 95. • Was considered the wealthiest of the Founding Fathers and had the most to gain by independence. • Spent much of his fortune on financing Washington and his army