5/14 American Religious History

1. Albanese Ch 3
Bread and Mortar - The Presence
of Roman Catholicism

2. Brief Intro to Roman Catholic
Religion
• The Consecration of Space and Time: Sacramentalism and the
Liturgical Calendar
– Sacred and Profane
– Culture IS religion
– Universal Church

3. The Seven Sacraments
• By medieval times, popular Christian belief held
to seven particular rituals as sacramental.
– Baptism
– Confirmation
– Penance
– Eucharist
– Holy Orders
– Matrimony
– Extreme Unction
• 5 assisted in crossing specific boundaries of life
• 2 (Penance & Eucharist) were assistance in living
daily life

4. The Church
• Church as sign of God’s enduring plan and presence on
Earth
– One, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church
– Eucharist is the embodiment of Jesus Christ’ His presence in
the community.
– By taking flesh, God demonstrated the goodness of the
natural world and the sacredness of matter.
– Therefore, humanness has worth and value (thisworldly AND
otherworldly)
– Monks and Nuns seen as living examples of Kingdom of
Heaven - the elite, working to create Heaven on Earth

5. The Pope
• The Pope as Vicar of Jesus Christ
– His solemn and official teachings (ex cathedra) were popularly
considered infallible for centuries.
• Officially declared as infallible in 1870 by the Church Council of
Bishops.
• The Pope as “Pontiff” (Pontifex) or bridge (builder) to
God in Heaven
• Rome as sacred space: The center of the world.
• At the apex is Jesus, revealed in scripture and Church
tradition

6. The Consecration of Time: The
Liturgical Cycle
• Advent (in December) – awaiting the coming of Christ
• Christmas
– a season of various feasts that remember events in the Gospel stories,
such as Epiphany
• Ash Wednesday begins a 40-day period of prayer and fasting (Lent)
• Holy Week
– Palm Sunday
– Maundy, or Holy, Thursday
• Believed to be originally the same day as the Jewish Passover
• Commemorates the institution of the Eucharist
– Good Friday
• The only day of the year that Catholics are not to be present in
Mass, properly speaking.
• Use of reserved sacrament from Holy Thursday
– Easter
• Most sacred day of the liturgical year

7. Even More Sacred Time
• Feast of the Ascension
– 40 days after Easter
• Pentecost
– 10 days later
• Successive Sundays
– Almost no day of the year was without some specific, special
liturgy
• Commemoration of traditional, historic events
• Symbolism of nature
– Jesus presented as the entering light into the darkness of the
winter solstice
– Easter on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the
spring (vernal) equinox.

8. Roman Catholic Religion
• Paraliturgical Devotion
– Worship of Jesus
– Veneration of Mary
– Honoring of the Saints
– Saint Relics/Shrines
– Pilgrimage
• Ethics and Morality (treating man, knowing God)
– Based on the same regard for the natural world that is seen
in Sacramentalism and the liturgical cycle.

9. Spanish Missions
• Florida and the eastern colonies
– Juan Ponce de Leon was in the Florida peninsula
as early as 1513. 8 years later he returned with
priests to establish missions among the native
peoples.
– 1526 – failed effort of 2 Dominican priests near
Chesapeake Bay
– 1565 – St. Augustine, FL founded
– By 1595 missionary work had begun in earnest
and within 50 years there were 40 Spanish
missions with 26,000 native converts.

10. Spanish Missions
• American Southwest
– 1540 three friars from the entourage of Francisco
Vasquez de Coronado remained in what would be
New Mexico the work grew and flourished until the
1630s
– 1694 the Franciscan missionaries returned and by
1750 the Spanish counted 22 missions and
17,500 native converts
– Jesuit missionary Eusebio Francisco Kino claimed
30,000 baptized in Southern Arizona
– Californian Franciscans – 1769-1821: 21 missions
with 21,000 converts

11. Pueblo Revolt of 1680
• 1598, Juan de Onate establishes New
Mexico for Spanish Crown.
• Franciscans suppressed native religion.
• Conflict between civil authority and
religious authority
• Forced labor, taxes, etc.
• Drought, incursions by Apache and
Navajo in 1660’s led to revolt….

12. Pueblo Revolt (2)
• Directed against missionaries primarily.
• 21 out of 23 missionaries killed.
• 400 of 2,500 settlers killed. Others
retreat to a safe Pueblo and to Santa
Fe, then back to El Paso.
• Diego de Vargas leads reconquest in
1693.
• Indians treated much better afterwards.

13. Spanish Imagination
• King wanted gold, slave labor,
commodities for trade.
• Military saw opportunities for reputation,
exploits (pundonor), honor.
• Church saw opportunities for a wealth of
converts.
• Fountain of Youth, Coronado, Cities of
Gold, Eden, etc.

14. Summary
• Missionizing efforts sought to establish
and idealized version of Spain.
• Encomienda vs. Reductionado
• Conversion from the outside (cultural
behaviors) first….
• …until the inside (orthodoxy) follows.

15. French Missions
• 17th century colonization of Newfoundland with
Franciscan missionaries, later joined by Jesuit priests
in Quebec
• After 1625 Jesuits worked to master native
languages and to proselytize the Huron, but the
limited conversion rates and the attacks of the
Iroquois led to the failure of the missions.
• As early as the 1630s, the Jesuits were making
inroads into the various villages of the Pays d’en
Haut.
– Algonquian, Iroquois, Sioux

16. Pays d’en Haut

17. French Missions
• Mississippi River exploration brought the Jesuits
south
– Where French traders, trappers and settlers went, the
missionaries followed.
– By 1703, the French had established a parish in what is now
Mobile, AL.
– Mission in the French colony of New Orleans
– Missions to the Arkansas, Yazoo, Choctaw, Natchez, and
Alibamon
– Farther north a group of Acadians settled (transplanted
French from Nova Scotia who had refused to accept British
rule)  Creole culture includes Roman Catholic religion and
customs

18. Summary of French
Missionizing
• “Black Robes”
• Seminary in Quebec in 1635
• “New Jerusalem”
• Conversion from the inside…
– Learning native languages
– Translating and comparing native religious ideas
• …until the outside (behavior) is Christian.

19. Comparison
• French motivated by stories of martyrdom - thus,
individual efforts as demonstrations of faith; living in
small villages with the indians on their own terms in
their own langauges. Conversion from the inside.
• Spanish motivated by Spanish imperialism - thus,
collective efforts to establish miniature versions of
Spanish perfection. Missions created, to which
indians invited to live and be converted and shown
how to act like Spanish people. Conversion from the
outside.

20. English Colonies
• Not through missions to Native Americans, but through
resettlement of English Catholics
• George Calvert (1580-1632), the first Lord Baltimore
– Acknowledged his Catholicism and resigned his position with King
James I
– King Charles I decided to grant him a charter to establish a colony
north of Virginia
– His son, Cecil, received the charter and Leonard Calvert, the
brother, arrived in Maryland in 1634 as governor
– Act of Toleration (1649) – religious liberty was granted to all
• Catholics were a minority and when Protestants gained control after
military invasion they outlawed the Roman Church (1654)
• 1692 - Church of England Established in Maryland by William of
Orange
– Oppression in New England: had to pay taxes that supported the
Church of England, and could not vote until after the Revolution.

21. Migrations
• 1770: 3,000 Catholics in Pennsylvania and 10,000 in
Maryland.
• Between 1790 and 1830 the Catholic population grew
almost 10x to about 300,000.
• Between 1830 and 1860 it grew another 10x to over
3,000,000.
– In 1860, the Roman Catholic church was the largest, single
church denomination, though it still represented only about
10% of the total population.
• 1870: 4 million; 1880: 6 million; 1900: 12 million
• By 1920, the membership was almost 20 million, or
about one sixth of the total population.

22. External struggle
(Protestant-Catholic Tensions)
• German Protestants v. German Catholics
• Popery (Pope as antichrist)
• Conspiracy Theories
• The Order of United Americans (“Know-Nothings” -
1850)
• American Protective Association (1887)
• Nativism
– Irish Catholic authoritarianism and ritualism
– German Catholics, language and the parochial schools
• Ethnic conflict or religious conflict?

23. Internal friction
• In the 19th century, the tension was primarily between German
Catholics v. Irish Catholics, with Irish Catholics eventually
gaining leadership.
• In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, there was a massive
influx of Italian and Polish Catholics.
– Smaller groups included French, French Canadians, Portuguese,
Belgians, Slovaks, Croatians, Hungarians and Spanish-speaking
communities.
– Northern Italians (modernist, industrialist) vs. Southern Italians and
Sicilians (peasant culture)
• Native born Catholics were often suspicious of these new
groups.

24. The American Catholic Ethos in
the 19th C.
• Emphasis on authority
– Overriding authority of the church
– Until 1908, the Roman church in America
was technically a missionary church
under the direct control of the Vatican.
– “Roma locuta est; causa finita est” –
“Rome has spoken; the case is closed.”
• Catholic “revivalism”
– instead of focusing on individual
transformation, the visiting priests
focused on a renewed energy in
devotional and ritual practice.

25. The American Catholic Ethos
• Emphasis on ritual
– Devotional practice – the rosary, prayers to saints,
etc. Dios de Los Muertos (Nov 2) or All Soul’s Day
• Openness to the supernatural
– Often tied to agrarian-based folk religion that went
beyond the church’s teachings.

26. Catholic Authoritarianism vs.
Protestant Freedom
• Resurgence of Church after defeat of Napoleon in 1814
• Abortive Revolutions of 1848-1849
• Syllabus of Errors (1864)
• Vatican Council of 1870 (Vatican I)
• Immortale Dei 1885 (Leo XIII)
• “as the pope is the sovereign of the Church…, he is also the
sovereign of every other society and of every other kingdom.”
Reactionary and Conservative stance of Church toward
modernity, democracy, science, religious authority
descried by Protestant Americans, but also by Liberal
Catholic Americans.

27. Protestant Missions to
Catholic Immigrants
• Need to “transform the immigrant
into a true American”
• “Christian Americanization”
• Most Protestant denominations
developed foreign-language
ministries
• J. Gresham Machen, Christianity
and Liberalism, 1923

28. Institutional Development
• Population grew way ahead of parishes and priests. Threat of
defection from the Church.
• Help from Europe:
– Financial
– Lay brothers and nuns
– Secular Priests
• 1860: 2000 priests; 1880: 6000; 1900: 12,000; 1910: 17,000
• From a single province (Baltimore) in 1845 to 100 by 1914.
• First Plenary Council 1852
• 1908: American Church removed from the authority of the
Congregatio de Propaganda Fide

29. Catholic Schools
• Public schools were dominated by Protestant agendas, ideas, prayer,
etc.
• German Catholics championed parochial schools (mostly to maintain
their language and culture).
• Liberal prelates (Gibbons, Ireland, and Keane) preferred to
accommodate to public schools (to integrate immigrants into American
culture better)
• The Pope sides with the Germans and the issue is settled.
• Georgetown, St. Louis, Fordham, Notre Dame, and Holy Cross survived
through 1884 when the Catholic University of America established as
capstone educational institution.
• 1884 Plenary Council calls for a parochial school in every parish within
the next 2 years
– 45% of parishes achieve this by 1892
– Made possible by teaching orders of nuns.

30. The “Americanist” Controversy
• Can we become American and still be Catholic??
• Separate dioceses for each nationality?
• German-Irish tensions of 1890’s
• Danger of Defection
• Danger of Schism
– Polish National Catholic Church (1890)
– Lithuanian national Catholic Church (1914)
• “Language Saves the Faith!”
• 1891: St. Raphael Society of Switzerland appeals to
Rome for separation.
• Denied by Pope amidst much discussion

31. The “Americanizers” (Liberal Catholics)
• Isaac Hecker (1819-1888)
– Convert in 1844 to the Roman
church by way of
Transcendentalism.
– 1858, Pope Pius IX encouraged him
to form a new community to fulfill
their dream of using "American
methods" to convert American non-
Catholics: Congregation of St. Paul
the Apostle, or "Paulists," founded in
New York.
• James Cardinal Gibbons (1834-
1921) Archbishop of Baltimore
– Not necessarily liberal doctrinally, but
liberal politically.
– The Faith of Our Fathers (1876)
• Archbishop John Ireland (1838-
1913)
• Archbishop John J. Keane (1839-
1918)
• America as a motherland
• Need to assimilate
• Form working relationships with
Protestants

32. Controversy Settled • 1893 World Parliament of
Religions
• Americanizers accused of
Liberalism forbidden in the
1864 Syllabus of Errors.
• Pope Leo XIII (papal
leadership 1878-1903)
– 1895 encyclical: The church would
be better off if “in addition to liberty,
[the church] enjoyed the favor of
the laws and the patronage of
public authority.”
– 1896: Keane removed as rector
from American University
– 1899 encyclical: condemns
“Americanism”
• “Roma locuta est; causa
finita est”

33. What’s up with Rome?
• Leo at first seemed sympathetic to Americanism,
but:
1. Archbishop Francesco Satolli made Papal Delegate to the United
States 1893 - this gave Rome their own source of info.
2. Leo XIII supported liberalism if it could restore the Papacy’s lands
and temporal authority after Italian Civil Wars of 1866. This failed,
so he turned reactionary.
3. American Liberalism was becoming popular in Europe.
4. Reports to Rome by American conservatives warning of “false
liberalism” and potential “disaster for the Church.” (personal
rivalries for cardinal hat, etc.)
5. U.S. Declaration of War against Spain in 1898.

34. Summary of 19th c. Catholicism
and Outcome
• Gibbons, Keane, and Ireland forced to “recant” by
declaring Americanism to be a “phantom heresy.”
• American Catholics generally had little time for creative
theology due to growth needs.
• Americanism may have accentuated the conservatism that
was already there.
• The Triumph of Catholic Conservatism
– Papal condemnation of theological modernism by Pope Pius X in
1907
– Remained the standard until the Second Vatican Council in the
1960s
• Discussion and Debate ceased within the American
Catholic Church.
• Intellectual closure and suspicion of innovative ideas
dominate up to the 1960’s.

35. Maturing of the Church in America
• 1908: Pius X Sapienti Consilio ends the missionary
status on the Catholic Church in America
• Effects of WWI:
– Immigration slows down
– National Catholic War Council (1917)
– National Catholic Welfare Conference (1921) - provides national
organization, solidarity
• Society for Propogation of the Faith 65% funded by
Americans by 1957
• Maryknoll Fathers begin missionary work in 1918

36. More Maturing
• 42,104,900 members in 1960
• Largest national grouping of Catholics in the world.
• Largest private educational system in the world.
– 1964: 10,902 elementary schools
– 2,458 high schools
– 295 colleges
– 596 seminaries
• Wealth: By 1937, Rome is 50% funded by
Americans; much greater after WWII.

37. Status of Catholics
• Until 1950’s Catholics underrepresented
in national leadership. Discrimination?
– Immigrants take 3 generations to gain
access to professions.
– Isolation self-imposed to some degree
– Negative image
• Alfred E. Smith democratic candidate
for president in 1928; “vote as you pray”

39. Catholic Social
Gospel
• 1919 John A Ryan,
professor of moral
theology at Catholic
University, “Social
Reconstruction: A
General View of the
Problems and Survey of
the Remedies”
– Minimum wage, regulation
of child labor, right to
organize labor, public
housing, national
employment service, +
unemployment, accident,
retirement insurance.
• New Deal legislation

40. “Bishops’ Program of Social
Reconstruction”
• Catholic League for
Social Justice, 1932
• Dorothy Day and Catholic
Worker Movement
• 1937, Association of
Catholic Trade Unionists
• Charles E. Coughlin -
“radio priest”
• Segregation ended 1947
• Church hierarchy less
enthusiastic in 1950’s

41. Catholic Intellectual Life, or Lack…
• George N. Shuster (1928) The Catholic Spirit in America - “…a
terrible contempt for thought”
• Reasons:
1. Too busy building churches, schools, doing social work.
2. Average immigrant family lacked educational background and finances
3. In late 1940’s not one member of the Church hierarchy came from
college-educated parents.
4. Catholic education emphasized the safe basics, not creativity or
excellence
5. Official condemnation of modernism, americanism
6. Authoritarianism
7. Sacrementalism

42. Signs of Change
• John Tracy Ellis at Catholic University
(1955) American Catholic and the
Intellectual Life
• Thomas F. O’Dea (1958) American
Catholic Dilemma; An Inquiry into the
Intellectual Life
• Controversy over culture: Jesuits
(openness) vs. conservatives
(defensiveness)

43. Catholic Revival
• Bishop Fulton Sheen of New
York
– Ranked with Billy Graham
and Norman Vincent Peale
– Radio, television, many
popular books
– Prominent conversions
• Lay Movement
• Devotional Practices
– 40 Hour Veneration of the
Blessed Sacrement
– Novenas to Our Lady of…
• Liturgical Renewal

44. Thomas Merton
(1915-1968)
• Seeker from Greenwich
Village
• Seven Story Mountain
(1948)
• Trappist Monk
• Revival of
contemplative
monasticism post WWII
• Interreligious dialogue

45. Hispanic Catholicism
1. Spanish Missions
2. Hispanic
Population
3. Popular Religion
4. Liberation Theology

46. 1. Spanish Missions
• 15,000 Spanish missionaries
from 1492 to 1820
• 2 priests with each
exploration
• Gradual tolerance for native
traditions
• After Mexican War of 1848,
protestant missions
proliferated in California,
Florida, and Southwest.

47. 2. Hispanic Population
• After WWII Puerto Ricans to NYC,
mostly very poor.
• Cubans after 1959 to Miami, middle
class and professional.
• Millions of Mexicans
• Irish dominated Church disapproved
of folk-traditions
• Patrick Fernandez Flores, bishop of
El Paso in 1978.
• 35 million Hispanics in 2000 census
(12.5%) - 77% Catholic making 38%
of all Catholics in U.S.

48. 3. Popular Religion
• Blending of native practices
(healing, narrative,
procession)
• Posada - Joseph & Mary
• Parrandas - Three Kings
• Quince anos - coming of age
• Dia de los Muertos - Nov 2
• Oferenda - offerings on
home alter
• Novenario - 9 days of
mourning

49. 4. Liberation Theology
• Bishops Conference in
Colombia in 1968
• Gustavo Gutierrez (1971) A
Theology of Liberation
• Emphasis on social justice
• United Farmworkers Movement
(Cesar Chavez)
• National Council of La Raza
• Archbishop Romero

50. Interfaith Relations
• Not good
• Catholics hardly participated in the National Conference
of Christians and Jews in 1928
• Catholic self-imposed isolation
• 1928 encyclical (Mortalium Animos) on “Fostering True
Religious Unity” - unlawful for Catholics to take part in
ecumenical assemblies as they “would be giving
countenance to a false Christianity quite alien to the
one Church of Christ.”
• By late 1950’s European theology distinguished the
spiritual from the physical body of Christ, so Protestants
could be seen as ‘separate brethren’ or ‘brethren in
Christ’

51. John XXIII elected in 1958, John F. Kennedy
elected in 1960, Second Vatican Council 1962-1965
Vatican II

52. Vatican II Euphoria
• “aggiornamento” - updating the Church
• 17 non-catholic churches had “official observers” -
Protestants, Jews, Catholics meet to strategize about
racism.
• English Mass replaces Latin Mass
• “people’s alters” priest faces laity
• Singing of (often Protestant) hymns
• More active roles for laity
• Parish councils and school boards formed
• Coordinating organizations for priests, bishops.

53. The Three Johns of the 1960’s
• Pope John XXIII: 1961 Mater et
Magistra and 1963 Pacem in
Terris - economic and social
justice, UN charter of fundamental
human rights, racism, cessation of
arms race, etc.
• John F. Kennedy
• John Courtney Murray wrote
“Declaration on Religious Liberty”
for Vatican II
• All signal a new epoch…

54. Vatican II Vacillation
• Guidelines were slow in coming from
Rome; bishops were cautious about
changes.
• So local priests experiment with “house”
churches and unauthorized innovations
• “Friday’s fish” controversy and identity
• Ironic backlash and anti-authoritarianism
• Charles S. Curran affair at Catholic
University

55. Dissidence
• Daniel and Philip Berrigan oppose Vietnam War
AND apathetic Church policy
• 1972 protest against Cardinal Cooke at St.
Patrick’s Cathedral in NYC - by nuns.
• Sisters Formation Conference 1954 -
emancipation of nuns
• Change in clothing
• 1967 Bishops’ sponsored social science study of
priests: shocking results - e.g. 87% did not
support official teachings on birth control, etc.

56. 1971 Gallop survey:
• Only 52% Catholics attended mass regularly
• 42% did not regard absence as a sin
• 63% had not been to confession in over 8 weeks
• 60% did not pray together as a family or said rosary
• 78% said that their children could still be saved if they
left the Church
• 75% believed that contraceptives were okay; 50% pro-
abortion
• Almost as many Catholics turned to Billy Graham for
inspiration as to the Pope.

57. John Paul II and
Retrenchment• 1978 election of John Paul II:
First non-Italian Pope in over
400 years.
• Sense of humor, poet, folksy,
philosopher, linguist, hardened
by Communism.
• Unlike the grass-roots
fundamentalism in
Protestantism, a return to old
ways was imposed from above
for Catholics.
• Any hope for liberalization
squelched

58. Further Challenges
• Declining vocations
• Sex scandals
• Merging or closing of some parishes and
schools