Our Catholic Roots

This section explores the promises and challenges that faced American Catholics as they began to organize their church during the first years of the United States of America.

Our Catholic Roots 1492—1865

III. American Catholics Organize Their Church: 1789-1815

Foreword
In the sixteen years after his return to America from England in 1774, John Carroll had developed some very definite ideas about the Catholic Church in the United States. On the one hand, he recognized that the pope's authority was supreme in all spiritual matters, and he gave his full and free consent to all the teachings of the church. On the other hand, Carroll strongly believed that the way the Catholic Church in the United States organized itself should reflect and respond to American needs, and not simply reproduce European models. From his point of view in 1789, several things seemed clear about the church in America:

1. separation of church and state was a benefit to everyone;

2. a democratic style of church organization should be implemented wherever possible instead of the traditional European model;

3. Catholics, as a historically suspect minority, should go out of their way to show their patriotism, to cooperate with their fellow citizens of all religions, and to avoid giving offense;

4. Catholics in teaching or talking about their religion, should emphasize the reasonableness and logic of their religion instead of relying mainly on the teaching of the pope;

5. English should be the language of the American church;

6. Catholic education at every level—elementary school, high school, college, and seminary—was the long-term key to building a strong church.

Carroll's quarter century as a bishop would severely test his ideas and hopes. Some of his plans would fall by the wayside, victims of fear or circumstance. Others would become central to the American Catholic experience.

The picture on the right depicts the crowds cheering at George Washington's inauguration as President of the United States.

7. Bishop Carroll's First Years: 1789-1793

George Washington was inaugurated first president of the new strong federal government on April 30, 1789. At the very same moment, events were rapidly moving toward the creation of a stronger organizational structure for the Catholic Church in America. Carroll had experienced severe troubles in dealing with the disobedient priests and rebellious trustees. The country needed a diocese of its own and a bishop who had some real authority. Moreover, independent-minded Americans wished to escape the "foreign interference" of the Propaganda Congregation.

This reinforced the idea of having a bishop of their own, someone who could deal directly with the pope. So, the same group of priests who had argued against the appointment of a bishop in 1784 petitioned Rome only four years later for a bishop as soon as possible. No one was surprised that they also asked for permission to elect him themselves.

Holy Orders is one of the seven sacraments of the church. It consists of a series of special rites, or ceremonies, by which a man moves towards the fullness of the priesthood. In the sequence of, their reception, the orders are lector, acolyte, deacon, priest, and bishop. With the reception of each order, the man ordained receives new sacramental powers with which to serve the church. Thus, the deacon receives the power to preach and baptize, the priest receives the power to celebrate Mass and to forgive sins, and the bishop gains the power to confirm and to ordain. Only bishops may ordain men to these various orders, or levels of the ministry, and even bishops require the written permission of Rome to ordain another bishop. Only unmarried men may move beyond the order of deacon.

Carroll at Baltimore
Recognizing the appointment as long overdue, Pope Pius VI acted immediately. Through Cardinal Antonelli, he instructed the priests of the United States to suggest a city to serve as headquarters for the new diocese and to hold an election to choose a candidate for bishop. Antonelli took care to emphasize that the pope alone could appoint a bishop. However, he explained, for this first time only, the pope would grant the priests the extraordinary privilege of nominating the man they preferred as bishop.

When this news reached the United States, twenty-six priests, most of the clergy of the nation, gathered at Whitemarsh, Maryland, to cast their ballots. The results of the two votes were as expected. The American priests recommended the city of Baltimore as headquarters for the new diocese, and nominated John Carroll as bishop. Their advice was quite acceptable to the pope, who approved the necessary documents on November 4, 1789, barely six months after Washington's inauguration.

Before he could take up his new duties, Father Carroll had first to be ordained a bishop, and ordination could only be done by another bishop. Since the only bishop in all of North America was in Quebec, Carroll decided to return to England. There he was ordained by an English bishop in the private chapel of Lulworth Castle, the country home of an old friend.

The picture on the right illustrates Bishop Carroll's pro-cathedral in 1806.

A cathedral is a bishop's official church. It takes its name from cathedra, the Latin word for the throne or chair in this church from which the bishop presides on important occasions. Usually, the cathedral is the most splendid church in the diocese, and people will come from all over the diocese to celebrate very special occasions such as ordinations to the priesthood.

Need For More Priests
The voyage back across the Atlantic for the new Bishop of Baltimore was rough and stormy, and two full months passed before he reached Baltimore. There, in December 1790, he took up residence in the tiny house next to St. Peter's Church, which became his pro-cathedral. When a church or chapel becomes a bishop's official church, it is called a pro-cathedral. This would be home for the rest of Carroll's life.

In 1790, being Bishop of Baltimore meant being spiritual leader to 36 priests and about 35,000 people scattered over the whole of what was then the United States. His diocese extended westward from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River, and southward from Canada to Florida. Within it, Catholics represented fewer than one-tenth of one percent of the 3.9 million total population that was counted in the first federal census of 1790. How could a small number of people, so spread out, be given proper spiritual care? Carroll admitted in his first sermon at St. Peter's Pro-cathedral that he was awed by the responsibility he took on. He asked his people for their prayers, although he already had some plans for action. The most important of these centered on the need for Catholic education at every level.

While still in London after his ordination as a bishop, Carroll had met with Father François Nagot, a Sulpician priest from the Seminary of St. Sulpice in Paris. The revolution in France had been raging for more than a year, and revolutionary leaders were beginning to take a hostile attitude toward the church, which they identified with the old regime they had demolished. Recognizing where events were leading, the Sulpicians were looking for a refuge outside of France. They offered to come to the United States, open a seminary at Baltimore, and even bring some students with them. Carroll knew the Sulpicians' reputation as sound educators of young men entering the priesthood. He gladly accepted their offer.

In seeking to reform the Catholic Church after the Protestant Reformation, the Council of Trent identified one of the most important problems to be addressed— poorly trained clergy. To begin solving this problem, the council established laws requiring every diocese to have its own seminary, a special school for the proper training of priests. The seminary program in effect today, updated at Vatican Council II, consists of four years of college, followed by five years of specialized training for ministry. The word "seminary," comes from the Latin seminarium, a sheltered place where young plant seedlings were raised and prepared for eventual transplantation.

St. Mary's Seminary and Georgetown College
In the summer of 1791, Father Nagot arrived at Baltimore with three other Sulpician professors and five students. He purchased the One-Mile Tavern, outside of town, and promptly converted it into St. Mary's Seminary. This was the first institution in the United States for the training of priests. At Carroll's suggestion, Nagot postponed the first classes because of the terrible heat, and finally launched his program in October.

Eighteen months later, the seminary had gained four students and lost five, and the Sulpicians had run out of money. So they planned a new way to attract young men to their classes. They would fill the numerous empty spaces in their seminary with regular students in search of a college education.

This, they hoped, would improve the seminary's income and perhaps help them identify some candidates for the priesthood among the college students as well. The idea worked, but it also raised charges of unfair competition from another Catholic institution, the struggling new Georgetown College only forty miles away. So after a short stay, the extra students were sent home.

Meanwhile, the seminary struggled on. Stephen Badin, the first student to complete the training at St. Mary's Seminary, was also the first priest to be ordained in the United States, in May, 1793. Ordination was a rare event in the United States, but by the time of Carroll's death in 1815, thirty priests had been ordained from the first seminary of the nation.

Long before he had been named a bishop, Carroll had been searching for a way to provide a Catholic college education for young Americans. By gentle persuasion, he eventually coaxed the clergy to grant funding, and Georgetown College, later to become Georgetown University, was established in 1789 on the outskirts of the nation's future capital.

The early years for Georgetown were rocky, and a desperate competition for students was waged between Georgetown and St. Mary's Seminary. This competition brought no great success to either institution. Even more important, American Catholics were mostly simple farmers and mechanics, and were preoccupied with the day-to--day problems of earning a living. Like most Americans of the time, Catholics had neither the money nor the attitudes that would make them think about a college education for their children.

These were the first buildings at Georgetown College, on the banks of the Potomac River. The campus at Georgetown University has extended over the years. Many university buildings and dormitories now occupy this section of Washington, DC.

Beginnings of Catholic Education

With both Georgetown College and St. Mary's Seminary under way, Carroll called all his priests together for a meeting at St. Peter's Pro-cathedral in November of 1791. He had two goals for this important meeting of priests:

1. to seek their advice about the best ways to organize the church in America;

2. to secure their support for policies and actions he considered necessary to the growth of the American church.

As revealed in an official letter which he addressed to all American Catholics after the meeting, the issues needing attention were all very important.

Most important of all, however, was the moral education and training of children. And in this matter, parents held the key to success. Carroll reminded parents that they must begin early and remain constant, year after year, in teaching their children to love God and to develop good habits and self-discipline. He went on to announce the founding of Georgetown College:

I earnestly wish, dear brethren, that as many of you as are able, would send your sons to this school of letters and virtue. I know and lament, that the expense will be too great for many families, and that their children must be deprived of the immediate benefit of this institution; but, indirectly, they will receive it; it may be reasonably expected, that some, after being educated at Georgetown and having returned into their own neighborhood, will become, in their turn, the instructors of the youths who cannot be sent from home... The general result will be a great increase of piety, the necessary consequence of a careful instruction in the principles of faith, and Christian piety. Many amongst you have experienced inconvenience and disadvantage from the want of spiritual assistance in your greatest necessities, in sickness, in troubles of conscience... The present clergymen are insufficient for the needs of the faithful; and they will be more and more so, as the population of our country increases so rapidly; unless, by the providence of our good and merciful God, a constant supply of zealous and able pastors can be formed amongst ourselves, that is, of men accustomed to our climate, and acquainted with the tempers, manners, and government of the people, to whom they are to dispense the ministry of salvation. Now, may we not reasonably hope, that one of the effects of a virtuous course of education will be preparing of the minds of some, whom providence may select, to receive and cherish a call from God to an ecclesiastical state?

Bishop John Carroll

Carroll's Message to American Catholics
Though it was not a pleasant task, the new Bishop of Baltimore also had to talk about money. Both Georgetown and St. Mary's Seminary needed support, and, except for a few established parishes in Maryland and Pennsylvania, priests and parishes everywhere in the country had little or no funds. They are without chalices, without decent and necessary furniture of the altars, without vestments suited to the different services of the Church, said Carroll. Moreover, he noted, there was no tradition of supporting the church, because persecution had kept the church absent from most states, and "underground" in the rest. This would have to change if the church were to achieve some stable presence in American society.

So Carroll established a series of financial policies at his meeting with the priests. Each pastor should choose several reliable persons to take up weekly collections after the sermon at Sunday Mass. The offerings were to be used for three purposes:

1. the relief of the poor;

2. the support of the pastor;

3. the building and maintenance of the church and of those things needed for worship.

First attention was always to be given to the needs of the poor, and care was to be taken to assure that they received the sacraments even though they might not be able to contribute to church support.

Regular attendance at Sunday Mass was another issue that required the bishop's attention. The long persecution, the absence of many priests, and the scattering of the tiny Catholic population over vast areas of the country had put regular Mass and sacraments beyond the reach of most American Catholics. In some places, a casual attitude toward the obligations of Sunday Mass and regular reception of the sacraments had sprung up.

Carroll urged his people to take advantage of the religious freedom which they had won at last, and to become active, practicing members of the church. At the same time, to protect them from wandering from the faith, he discouraged Catholics from marrying persons who were not Catholics. He also required that, when mixed marriages (marriages of Catholics with non-Catholics) did occur, the partner who was not Catholic would have to agree in advance that any children born to the marriage would be baptized Catholic and educated Catholic.

With the American Revolution still so recent a memory, the issue of patriotism was always on Bishop Carroll's mind. Protestant Americans may have agreed to recognize the religious freedom of their Catholic neighbors, but they still regarded Catholics with suspicion, if not outright hostility. The ancient fear that Catholics were the agents of a foreign power was still alive. Therefore, Carroll reasoned, American Catholics must provide special examples of loyalty to their country, and must never give cause for anyone to challenge their patriotism.

Carroll believed very deeply that there was no conflict between the democratic values of the United States and Catholic Americans' commitment to following the teachings of the church and obeying the pope. In a very visible way, he gave expression to this belief by requiring that a prayer for the president and the congress be recited after the Gospel at all Sunday Masses throughout the land:

We pray Thee, 0 God of might, wisdom, and Justice, through Whom authority is rightly administered, laws are enacted, and judgment decreed, assist with Thy holy Spirit of counsel and fortitude the President of the United States, that his administration may be conducted in righteousness, and be eminently useful to Thy people over whom he presides; by encouraging due respect for virtue and religion; by a faithful execution of the laws in justice and mercy; and by restraining vice and immorality. Let the light of Thy divine wisdom direct the deliberations of Congress, and shine forth in all the proceedings and laws framed for our rule and government, so that they may tend to the preservation of peace, the promotion of national happiness, the increase of industry, sobriety, and useful knowledge; and may perpetuate to us the blessing of equal liberty.

In his first years as Bishop of Baltimore, John Carroll had done a great deal to bring order to the American church and to gain acceptance and recognition for his fellow Catholics. But his task was only begun.

Terms

deacon: a clergyman currently or permanently filling the office of Holy Orders just below that of priesthood.

seminary: a school for the training of priests, ministers, or rabbis, always including the study of theology.

Questions for Reflection

What were the main problems that Bishop Carroll faced as a new bishop? In your opinion, how effectively did he address these problems?

Bishop Carroll was anxious not simply to provide priests for his people, but to provide American priests. Why was this so important to him?

If you were the bishop of your diocese, what would you include in a letter to the people of the diocese explaining the diocese's greatest needs?

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