Book Review: Discovering a Lost Heritage: The Catholic Origins of America

catholicism.org ^ | August 28th, 2009 | Eleonore Villarrubia

[Brugmansian]

I would put it this way: mandatory public education was passed in order to break Catholic kids from their faith. The schools were Protestant schools and Protestants hoped to absorb the sons and daughters of Catholic immigrants into the Protestant majority.

My larger point is, as is the case with other groups, that the history is distorted. There wasn't endless discrimination and violent hatred against Catholics. People got along more than they didn't. What made news and dominates history are the exceptions.

Parish Priest: Father Michael McGivney and American Catholicism showed the norm in New Haven in the second half of the 19th century. The relations between the old congregational churches on the New Haven Green and the upstart St. Mary's thoughtful, warm and touching.

I can't link directly but an article showing the other side is at the Library of Congress> The Nineteenth Century in Print> Periodicals.

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpcoop/moahtml/snchome.html

Search for Our Roman Catholic Brethren. I. The Atlantic monthly. Volume 21, Issue 126, April 1868 by James Parton.

It is a wonderful essay. Full of praise for Catholic priests,lay Catholics, the Church and suggestions by Parton that his fellow Protestants adopt some Catholic practices

[chesley]

Thomas Aquinas was an American?

Let’s see. He died in 1274. What year did columbus discover America. It’s been a while, but I remember the ditty from school, “In 1492, columbus sailed the ocean blue”, or something like that.

[dangus]

No, St. Thomas Aquinas wasn’t an American. I never said he was. He DID, however, have a profound impact on the political and legal theory of our founding fathers.

[chesley]

Well, that was not the issue under dispute, as I understand it. However, neither do I dispute that the thinkers that came before had an influence on the the ideas of the founding fathers. Even Catholic, Jewsih, and possibly even Muslim ones.

And, of course, we all know that the Founders got their ideas about Constitutional governance from the Iroquois. ;). But what was the proportion of Iroquois, or any Native Americans for that matter, among them?

The fact is, that the vast majority of them were of a British Protestant background, and that is my point.

[dangus]

>> Well, that was not the issue under dispute, as I understand <<

Then maybe you should refrain from the snarky, sarcastic comments, because I was responding directly to the question, “[W]hat role did Catholics play in forming the institutions of this country?” I was not answering, “what were the demographics of the founding fathers?” Common law is an institution of this country which considerably predates the Constitution, and from which the Constitution depends.

[chesley]

Me? Snarky?

You have a different understanding of the question than I do. Using your understanding, we could as well be talking about the role that the pagan Romans had on the founding of America. And come up with plenty of stuff. But actual Catholics were few enough on the ground at the founding of the United States. Not absent of course, there were plenty, but their influence was definitely not the major portion.

Don't make it personal; I'm not.

[dangus]

This is snarky:

“Thomas Aquinas was an American? Let’s see. He died in 1274. What year did columbus discover America. It’s been a while, but I remember the ditty from school, “In 1492, columbus sailed the ocean blue”, or something like that.”

[chesley]

Now I thought it was witty. My bad, I guess.

But TA wasn’t one of the founders was my point.

[eleonore]

I am posting this reply to clear up the error which my astute critic, ALPHAPilot, caught. I have spoken to the book’s author, Adam Miller. The mistake is that the name of the town is actually North Salem, NH, not New Salem. In thispart of New Hampshire you will find what is referred to as “America’s Stonehenge.” It is even listed as such on my New Hampshire roadmap. The claim on the website of “America’s Stonehenge” is that there is evidence of an advanced, unknown people in that area dating from 4,000 years ago. BTW, ALPHAPilot, your correction of the factual error contains a grammatical error: reviewer’s is possessive; it needs an apostrophe. God bless you. Eleonore Villarrubia

[ALPAPilot]

That makes much more sense. As an airline pilot living in seacoast NH the geography was pretty easy. Unfortunately, I am the product of a public school education and english isn’t my strong point.

I’ve been to American Stonehenge, it’s an interesting place. I’ll have to check out the book.