Archbishop John Carroll and the history of the Catholic church in the U.S.

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John Carroll was a Jesuit priest from Maryland. He became the first bishop to head the entire Catholic church in the U.S. He reigned from 1789 to 1815.

 

CONTENTS

1. Early Years

2. The First Superior of the Missions

3. The First Report to Rome

4. The first Bishop

5. Ministry as Bishop

 

1. Early Years

 

In 1735, John Carroll was born to an aristocratic family at their plantation in colonial-era Maryland.

He was home-schooled by his mother Eleanor, and then sent to a school that was secretly run by a Jesuit priest.

When Carroll reached age 13, his family sent him to the College of St. Omer in France. It was a popular destination for the education of boys from wealthy Catholic families in Maryland. It was there that he decided to become a Jesuit.

At age 18, Carroll joined the Jesuits. Two years later, he began his studies of philosophy and theology. Those were at a Jesuit seminary in Liège in Belgium. He was on the course to become a scholar.

After fourteen years, the Jesuits ordained Carroll as a deacon. Then in 1761, he was ordained as a priest. He remained in Europe until he was almost 40, teaching at St. Omer and in Liège.

The Stourton family took Carroll on as a tutor for their son during his grand tour of Europe. The tour ended 1773.

Also in 1773, Pope Clement XIV suppressed the Jesuits. This was a painful experience for Carroll. He suspected it was caused by political machinations by the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith.

As a Jesuit, Carroll was arrested for a few days. Then he spent a few months in England. Finally, after a 25-year absence, Carroll returned to Maryland.

He lived with his mother in the city of Rock Creek in Maryland. At first he got involved in pastoral ministry. Most of that was to his relatives.

 

2. The First Superior of the Missions

 

In the U.S., a question emerged of jurisdiction arose.

During the colonial era, the Catholic clergy in the Thirteen American colonies were under the jurisdiction of the Apostolic Vicariate of the London District in England.

Bishop Richard Challoner was the most recent vicar-apostolic. He died in 1781. His successor, Bishop James Talbot, refused to exercise jurisdiction in the United States, as it wasn’t his nation.

The Vatican had to come up with a new arrangement.

They weren’t aware of the actual situation of the Catholic church in the U.S. There were only 24 Catholic priests in the nation.

Rome could either appoint a Vicar Apostolic as head of the mission, or they could appoint a bishop.

For its part, Rome was reluctant to appoint a bishop. And for their part, the Catholics in the U.S. didn’t want a bishop. That was because the Anglicans didn’t have a bishop yet.

Perhaps the Catholics were concerned that if they got a bishop prior to the Anglicans getting a bishop, the old anti-Catholic sentiments would be revived.

Rome could have delegated the matter to the Papal Nuncio in Paris. But in the meantime, the U.S. clergy discussed it among themselves, headed by Carroll.

The U.S. clergy met at White Marsh in Maryland in 1773. The main points they discussed were whether the Jesuit farm would produce enough income, and whether the Jesuit order would be re-established.

Finally, they sent a petition to Rome. They asked that John Lewis be head of the mission and be allowed to confirm. All they wanted was a superior, and not a mission.

Meanwhile, back in Europe, Rome initially thought of naming a Vicar Apostolic, but only with the approval of the U.S. Congress. That was the arrangement Rome had with many European countries.

The popular conjecture was that a cleric from France would be appointed. On Feb. 10, 1773, the Apostolic Nuncio in Paris thought that would be a good idea. It had French backing.

So on July 28, 1773 the Apostolic Nuncio sent this proposal to Benjamin Franklin, asking him to forward it for discussion in Congress. Of course, Franklin responded that Congress can make no decisions regarding Church matters.

Unfortunately, Franklin also said unofficially that any French cleric would be fine. That sent a mixed signal.

John Carroll wanted to write to Benjamin Franklin, recommending that it would be good for Rome to consult with the clergy in the U.S. However, upon consideration, Carroll did not send that letter.

The French Council told Rome that the U.S. Congress could not be involved in Church matters. This confirmed to Rome that the U.S. Congress wouldn’t influence Catholic church decisions.

On June 9, 1774, the Propaganda Fidei sent a letter to John Carroll, appointing him Superior of the Missions.

 

3. The First Report to Rome

 

Rome offered full scholarships for two young men to study at the Urban College. And they asked Carroll for a letter on the state of the Church.

John Carroll again called the priests to White Marsh in Maryland, having sent them a questionnaire.

On March 1, 1775, Carroll sent his report to Rome on the condition of the Catholic church in the U.S. Here is a summary of his findings:

  • In Maryland there were 15,800 Catholics and 19 priests
  • In Pennsylvania there were 7,000 Catholics and five priests
  • In New York there were 1,500 Catholics
  • In Virginia there were 200 Catholics
  • In the Unknown Lands there were French Catholics

Of the priests, five were more than 70 years old.

The consensus of the clergy was that the Church could not financially support a bishop.

Carroll himself had four main points:

  • The U.S. Church should be independent, and not under the authority of the Propaganda Fidei, or “Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith,” as it was known back then. Rather, Carroll thought the U.S. Church should have the same status as the nation: independent and free, like the Catholic church in most nations.
  • The leader of the U.S. Church should be selected by the U.S. clergy instead of by a foreign power. That was due to the delicate relationship with non-Catholics in the U.S.
  • The relationship of the U.S. Church with Rome should be “spiritual” and not “temporal.”
  • Carroll advised against imprudent priests being sent over from Europe, due to the close living proximity to non-Catholics.

 

4. The first Bishop

 

Controversy at St. Peter church in New York

In the spring and fall of 1775, Carroll went on a tour to all the major Catholic centers in the U.S.

In New York there was a controversy at St. Peter church on Barkley street. Two Capuchin priests, Whelan and Nugent, were there.

Whelen arrived first, but Nugent’s preaching was considered better. The congregation’s trustees almost took legal action to have Nugent installed as pastor.

Carroll thought he had solved the problem. But after he left, the church split into two factions. Both factions wrote Carroll seeking support.

Carrol responded that in the U.S., there were no canonically-erected parishes. And hence there were no canonical pastors. Rather, all the priests were simply volunteers.

Carroll didn’t have the authority of a bishop to resolve the issue. This incident made it apparent that Carroll needed the authority of a bishop.

 

Controversy at Holy Trinity church in Philadelphia

A similar case emerged at Holy Trinity church in Philadelphia, where a priest showed up without canonical faculties.

 

Petitioning Rome for a bishop

In the next few years, Carroll began to emerge as a spokesperson for Catholics in the public forum. His understanding of the separation of Church and State was that it helped protect both the Church and the State.

When the clergy met at White Marsh in fall of 1776, it was apparent to them that only a bishop could control unruly clergy like Whelan and Nugent.

Also, by 1776, the Anglicans already had bishops. Thus Catholics did not need to be concerned about getting a bishop prior to the Anglicans

Throughout 1777, the issue of a bishop was discussed.

On Mar 12, 1778, a petition was sent to Pope Pius requesting the naming of a bishop.

The decision was made to establish a diocese of the United States, but that it would be under the auspices of the Propaganda Fidei. Also, the U.S. clergy was allowed to vote for their bishop.

On May 17, 1789, the clergy elected John Carroll as their first bishop, and Baltimore as first Sea city. Rome approved.

 

Consecrated a Bishop

In 1790, Carroll went to England to be consecrated a bishop.

While there, he made contact with the Society of Priests of Saint-Sulpice, also known as the Sulpicians. They were known as excellent seminary educators.

Jacques Emery, their Superior, expected persecution in France. He got permission from the Apostolic Nuncio to contact Bishop Carroll.

 

5. Ministry as Bishop

 

Selecting his pro-cathedral parish

When Bishop John Carroll returned to Baltimore, he selected the church of St. Peter in Baltimore to serve as his pro-cathedral parish.

A pro-cathedral is a parish church that temporarily serves as the cathedral or co-cathedral of a diocese.

Constructed in 1770, St. Peter was the first Catholic church in Baltimore.

 

Calling the Synod of 1791

His first big project was a synod of clergy in 1791, held at his pro-cathedral church in Baltimore. It was attended by 22 clergy.

They addressed a wide variety of topics, including the following:

  • Liturgical ceremonies
  • Baptism
  • Confirmation
  • Baptismal Registers
  • Trustees (to be chosen by the pastor)
  • Collections to support the priest
  • The Poor
  • The upkeep of the church
  • Children receiving first communion
  • Faculties to hear confessions
  • Mixed marriages
  • Enforcing the “Easter Duty”
  • Garb appropriate to their station but not necessarily the Roman Collar

After the synod, Carroll wrote his first pastoral letter. But it wasn’t published until May 28.

In it, Carroll discussed Catholic education, the establishment of Georgetown University as a feeder school for a seminary, and the maintenance of the clergy. He wrote, not for monetary gain but for the preservation of the faith.

Continuing, he encouraged praying for the dead, and he discussed the Blessed Virgin Mary.

 

Establishing St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore

In July of 1791, Carroll established a seminary in Baltimore. It was called St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore. It was ran by the Society of Priests of Saint-Sulpice, also known as the Sulpicians. Carroll had met them back when he was in England.

Jacques Emery, the Superior of the Sulpicians, got the go-ahead from the trustees not only to staff the seminary but also to fund it.

However, Carroll was hesitant to accept that generous offer. That was, because there were no candidates with the necessary qualifications to enter a Major Seminary. For example, none had a classical education.

Four Sulpicians arrived in Baltimore in 1791, along with five seminarians they brought with them.

In 1792, Carroll ordained his first priests out of that group.

In the first dozen years of the seminary, there were only 16 seminarians.

A Sulpician named Louis William Valentine Dubourg devised a plan to go to Cuba for a few years, with the goal of recruiting seminarians. However, he had no success.

 

Establishing Mount St. Mary college in Emmitsburg

Thus DuBourg developed a new plan. It was to establish a lay college in Emmitsburg in Maryland. Later it was renamed Mount St. Mary.

However, Jacques Emery in France, the Superior of the Sulpicians in France saw that the U.S. seminary wasn’t blossoming. Plus he was angry with DuBourg for founding a lay college, since that wasn’t the charism of the Sulpicians.

For those reasons, in 1804 Emery threatened to pull the Sulpicians out of the U.S. and back to France.

Meanwhile, pope Pius XII was in Paris to crown Napoleon as Emperor. Pius told Emery to NOT pull the pull the Sulpicians out of the U.S. and back to France. Pius told him to be patient, as it would eventually produce good fruit.

In 1826 the Sulpicians pulled their support for Mount St. Mary college in Emmitsburg in Maryland.

Ultimately, it was Mount St. Mary, not Georgetown, that became the feeder school for St. Mary Seminary.

 

The Carmelite Religious Order

A sign of vitality for the Catholic church is the religious orders. During the episcopal tenure of Bishop Carroll, several religious orders were established. But three especially stand out. Their existence was a sign of the growth and maturity of the Catholic church in the U.S.

The first religious order arrived in 1790, when Carmelite women arrived at Port Tobacco in Maryland.

Why did they come to the U.S.? It was because women from Maryland had been going to Europe to join Carmel, and they wanted to return.

Bernadina Matthews was one of those four women. Her uncle Neale was to act as the chaplain. Theirs was the only Carmel in the U.S. for 73 years.

Bishop John Carroll wanted them to be teachers. But they said their mission and charism would not allow that.

 

The Religious Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary

The next religious order was the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary, commonly referred to as the Visitation Nuns.

Jesuit Father Leonard Neale was assigned to Philadelphia. In 1793, he met three women: Alice Lalor and two widows. They sought his spiritual direction about becoming nuns.

They began to live as a community. They established a school.

Then when Neale became president of Georgetown, he invited them to come with him. He adapted a constitution for them.

In 1816 they achieved canonical status and professed solemn vows.

 

The Religious Order of the Sisters of Charity

The next order was the Sisters of Charity, established by Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton.

She was born to a prominent Episcopalian family in New York city. In 1794, at 20 years old, she married into the wealthy Seton family. The couple had five children.

But due to changing politics, the family fortune dwindled. In 1800 the family declared bankruptcy. Then her husband got tuberculosis.

Seton tried to maintain the family. In 1803 they moved to Italy for the more favorable climate. However, they were quarantined for a few months. Then eight days after their release from quarantine, her husband died.

A former business contact, the Filichi family, looked after the family until June 1804. It was then that she developed her interest in the Catholic church.

Less than a year after returning to the U.S., she joined the Catholic church. Her family and friends strongly disapproved.

Because Seton had a good education, she started a boarding house and a small school. But it wasn’t successful.

In 1808, Sulpician Father William Dubourg invited her to join him in Baltimore to establish a girls’ school there, to be near Mount St. Mary college. Seton opened the school in the fall of 1808.

Seton was convinced that she was meant to be a Religious. Before Bishop Carroll, she professed her simple vows publicly.

Four women joined Seton. Then Dubourg invited Seton and the four women to set up a convent. On July 31 of 1809, they set up their convent at Mount St. Mary college in Emmitsburg. Their constitution was based upon a European model.

Their school at Emmitsburg was fairly successful. By 1814, Seton was receiving requests for her nuns to teach in other cities.

The first decade of the Sisters of Charity was a struggle with finances, with illness and with death. Seton herself died in 1821, at age 46, of tuberculosis.

Later, in the Civil war, the Sisters of Charity became excellent nurses on the battlefield.

 

Coadjutor Bishop

The Catholic church in the U.S. was growing rapidly. Bishop Carroll was swamped.

So on December 7 of 1800, Father Leonard Neale was named Coadjutor bishop.

A Coadjutor bishop acts like a Vicar General does today.

 

First Archishop

By 1803, Kentucky and Tennessee were added to the nation as states. And Ohio and Indiana were added as territories. The Louisiana Purchase added 828, 000 acres of new land from France.

Thus Carroll’s jurisdiction went from Maine to South Carolina, and from Baltimore to the Mississippi River.

There were more and more Catholics. So in 1809, Rome named Carroll the Archbishop of the United States. And they named four Suffragan dioceses.

 

Four Suffragan dioceses

In the Catholic church, various neighboring dioceses are collected into a group called an ecclesiastical province.

Within an ecclesiastical province, the main diocese is called the Metropolitan Archdiocese. The other dioceses are called Suffragan Dioceses.

The bishop of the Metropolitan Archdiocese is called the Archbishop. He has no power of governance within a suffragan diocese. But he has some limited rights and duties to intervene in cases of neglect by the authorities of a suffragan diocese.

In the case of the United States, in 1808 there were four new Suffragan dioceses:

  • Philadelphia
  • Boston
  • New York
  • Bardstown

For the new Diocese of Philadelphia, pope Pius VII named a Franciscan priest from Ireland named Michael Francis Egan as the first bishop. He was consecrated in 1810.

For the new Diocese of Boston, pope Pius VII named the French-born Jean-Louis Anne Madelain Lefebvre de Cheverus as the first bishop. He was a non-juring cleric during the troubled years of France.

Non-juring was a term applied to clerics who refused to swear allegiance to a ruling monarch after the French Revolution.

For the new Diocese of New York, pope Pius VII named a Dominican priest named Richard Luke Concanen as the first bishop. He was consecrated in Rome in 1808. However, due to Napoleon, Concanen wasn’t able to leave Rome until 1810, when he died.

So Archbishop Carroll named Anthony Kohlmann as Vicar General of New York.

And for the new Diocese of Bardstown, pope Pius VII named a French-born Sulpician priest named Benedict Joseph Flaget as the first bishop. He remained there until 1850.

 

The final years of Archbishop Carroll

In 1814 pope Pius VII restored the Jesuits. However, Carroll did not return to them.

Carroll’s health declined for several years. He died in 1815.

For 35 years John Carroll had been a dominant figure in establishing the Catholic church in the U.S.

He was an excellent choice for a founding bishop. He was a churchman, a statesman, and a patriot. He overcame immense obstacles such as a lack of clergy and a lack of finances.

 

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HISTORY – U.S. CATHOLIC

MAJOR ERAS:

  1. The Spanish Missions in New Mexico: 1540 to 1616
  2. The Spanish Missions in Florida: 1549 to 1763
  3. The English Missions in the Mid-Atlantic region: beginning in the 1570s
  4. Catholics and the American Revolutionary War: 1775–1783
  5. Archbishop John Carroll: 1774-1815
  6. Archbishop Leonard Neale: 1815-1817
  7. Archbishop Ambrose Maréchal: 1817 -1828
  8. Archbishop James Whitfield: 1828 to 1834
  9. Archbishop Samuel Eccleston: 1834-1851
  10. Archbishop Francis Kenrick: 1851–1863

SEE ALSO: References, Church History

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