Priest, Parish, and People
Priest, Parish, and People

Author: Richard N. Juliani

Publisher:

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 428

ISBN-13:

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From the perspective of historical sociology, Richard N. Juliani traces the role of religion in the lives and communities of Italian immigrants in Philadelphia from the 1850s to the early 1930s. By the end of the nineteenth century, Philadelphia had one of the largest Italian populations in the country. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia eventually established twenty-three parishes for the exclusive use of Italians. Juliani describes the role these parishes played in developing and anchoring an ethnic community and in shaping its members' new identity as Italian Americans during the years of mass migration from Italy to America. Priest, Parish, and People blends the history of Monsignor Antonio Isoleri--pastor from 1870 to 1926 of St. Mary Magdalen dePazzi, the first Italian parish founded in the country--with that of the Italian immigrant community in Philadelphia. Relying on parish and archdiocesan records, secular and church newspapers, archives of religious orders, and Father Isoleri's personal papers, Juliani chronicles the history of St. Mary Magdalen dePazzi as it grew from immigrant refuge to a large, stable, ethnic community that anchored "Little Italy" in South Philadelphia. In charting that growth, Juliani also examines conflicts between laity and clergy and between clergy and church hierarchy, as well as the remarkable fifty-six-year career of Isoleri as a spiritual and secular leader. Priest, Parish, and People provides both the details of parish history in Philadelphia and the larger context of Italian-American Catholic history.

Commonwealth Catholicism
Commonwealth Catholicism

Author: Gerald P. Fogarty

Publisher:

Published: 2017-07-31

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780268070649

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Commonwealth Catholicism is the first comprehensive history of the Catholic Church in the State of Virginia. Distinguished historian Gerald P. Fogarty tells the story of Virginia's Catholics in the state's history, from the colonial period to the present. Using archival resources, Fogarty brings to life the events and characters that comprise the Church's colorful and often turbulent history. Catholics in Virginia, as in other parts of the South, were a tiny minority from the beginning and remained so for much of their history. They gathered into small, isolated communities, often without a resident priest. The Catholic population in Virginia was so small, in fact, that there was only one diocese until 1974. Catholics were often suspected of unpatriotic sympathies by their Protestant neighbors and tried to remain unnoticed, blending in, as far as possible, with the prevailing Protestant culture. Full religious tolerance for Virginia Catholics did not come until the Revolution. Reconstructing the available documentary evidence, Fogarty tells the story of these early communities in full detail. Fogarty also brings to life many of the prominent actors in the unfolding drama. Father Matthew O'Keefe, the pastor of the Norfolk region from 1852 until 1886--a period of intense Know Nothing activity--is one example. O'Keefe was asked by two men calling at the rectory door to minister to a dying man. Reaching the Elizabeth River on the edge of Portsmouth, Virginia, the two said that the dying man lay further on. O'Keefe "took a pair of revolvers from his coat, placed the men under citizen's arrest, and marched them into Portsmouth where he turned them over to the sheriff. They subsequently confessed that they had been hired to assassinate him." Commonwealth Catholicism, a considerable accomplishment from one of the most prominent historians of American Catholicism, will remain for many years the definitive study on the subject of Virginia's Catholic heritage.