Very sad piece of early Irish History in America! *
Inspirational in terms of faith and even insights into change in our** day!*
.
How Dagger John Saved New York’s Irish
William J. Stern
Recognized as a born leader from his early seminary days, he first came to prominence in Philadelphia as an eloquent and courageous crusader against bigotry. Between 1820 and 1830, immigration had swelled the U.S. Catholic population 60 percent to 600,000, with no end in sight. The new immigrants were mostly Irish—impoverished, ignorant, unskilled country folk, with nothing in their experience to prepare them for success in the urban environs to which they were flocking. Hughes believed that the relentless barrage of anti-Catholic prejudice that greeted them in their new land was demoralizing the already* disadvantaged** immigrants and
holding back their progress.*
The “nativists,” as the* highly organized anti-Catholics** were called, included Protestant fundamentalists who saw the Catholic Church as the** handiwork** of
Satan and
superstition, intellectuals who** considered Catholicism incompatible** with
democracy,
ethnocentric cultural purists who believed the United States should be a land
for Anglo-Saxons, and
pragmatic citizens who thought it** not worth** the
trouble to
integrate so many culturally different immigrants. The nativists counted among their number many of
America’s elite, including John Jay, John Quincy Adams, John Calhoun, Stephen Douglas, and P. T. Barnum, all of whom spoke** publicly** against the Catholic Church and the** threat** to** liberty** that allowing Catholics into the country** would create**. In Boston a** mob** led by
Congregationalist minister Lyman Beecher, the father of Harriet Beecher Stowe, burned a convent to the ground; church burnings were common. Samuel Morse tapped out rumors of Catholic conspiracies against liberty on his Atlantic cable long before such trash circulated on the Internet. Books
depicting concupiscence in convents and sex in** seminaries** were everywhere.*
http://www.city-journal.org/html/7_2_a2.html :irish2:
