Black Popes?

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Has there ever been a black Pope, or a Pope that wasn’t white?
I have no problem with white Popes, but i was just wondering because a Muslim friend of mine was challenging my faith and one of the things he criticized me for was the “whiteness” of my Catholic Faith.

Its my fault really. I spend more time doing metaphysics then i do learning about my faith; and because of my intellectual laziness regarding Catholic history(a topic i am engaging with slowly) i didn’t have any arguments to defeat my friends beliefs.
I am aware that there was at least one black saint, and some bishops and priests. But I’m sure you are going to surprise me with a lot more that i didn’t know about.😃
 
Pope Victor I
Pope Miltiades
Pope Gelasius I

In addition, St. Augustine of Hippo, one of the most gifted theologians and philosophers in our Church’s history, was African.
 
EphelDuath said:
Pope Victor I
Pope Miltiades
Pope Gelasius I

In addition, St. Augustine of Hippo, one of the most gifted theologians and philosophers in our Church’s history, was African.
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Really!🍿

Thats cool. Can you think of any more?
 
Africa fell to the Arabic empire in the 7th century, and it’s only relatively recently that religious freedom was allowed in these areas. Most Catholics throughout history were “white” because Catholicism was confined to Europe, until colonization began.
 
The “whiteness” of Catholicism? Wow, that guy knows nothing!
 
Numinous said:
The “whiteness” of Catholicism? Wow, that guy knows nothing!
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Exactly, aren’t there a lot of Catholics in Latin America (alright some, but not all of them, are white) and Africa (again same thing)? I believe at last count the Catholic population of those continents outnumbered that of Europe.

He really does not know anything about our Faith.
 
LDNCatholic said:
Exactly, aren’t there a lot of Catholics in Latin America (alright some, but not all of them, are white) and Africa (again same thing)? I believe at last count the Catholic population of those continents outnumbered that of Europe.

He really does not know anything about our Faith.
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I think he knows that there is allot of lay people in the catholic church who is of different origins. He was more talking about “Catholic leadership”.

Its evident to me, logically speaking, that it really depends on the location of the church and the cultural surroundings, as i know that there are many Nigerians in the Church where i come from in london. And if I’m not mistaken, there is a black arch bishop.
So that is not a bother to me. What really hurt me and got up my nose the most about his taunts was the way he was saying it, as if to say that we “black people” are brainwashed slaves of the “white-man religion”. There are people i know that have odd ideas similar to this.

Thats why i wanted a long list of saints and popes who where of different ethnic origins, so i could feel better about my self as an under-achieving black man, and i wanted to show him that hes talking rubbish. I just want to feel confident the next time i see him.

Thanks.
 
Since the Catholic church is, well, catholic, meaning “universal,” there are dioceses throughout the world, which means there are necessarily bishops and archbishops of nearly every tongue, nation, and ethnic group.
 
Besides St. Augustine, there is St. Monica, his mother, and also an African. 👍
 
He wasn’t a Pope, but St. Martin de Porres is a black saint. (He is awesome. I love his story. He is one of the saints with the gift of bilocation!)
 
Not to mention Jesus Himself, and His twelve Apostles, and Mary His mother, and St Paul, all of whom definitely weren’t Caucasian (white), rather Semites like the majority of Muslims. 😃

And a lot of our great Saints - Moses the Black (Ethiopian), Josephine Bakhita (Sudanese, rose to be Abbess of a community of nuns in Italy), Charles Lwanga and the martyrs of Uganda, Mary of Egypt …

As for today, Francis Cardinal Arinze of Nigeria is very high up in the hierarchy of the church, and he was considered a very good chance of being elected to the Papacy afte the death of John Paul 2.

Come to think of it though, the question isn’t about BLACKS specifically but about non-Caucasians.

In which case there are more saints who can be mentioned - Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha and St Juan Diego (both native American), Saints Andrew Kim, Paul Miki and their companions who were all native Asians martyred in China, Japan, Korea and elsewhere in Asia.
 
St Augustine and his mother, St Monica, were Romans and were not black, just for the record. Popes Victor I and Gelasius I are depicted as white, too. African doesn’t always mean black. Pope Miltiades is also depicted as white, although I remember reading he was black in a historical book.
 
I am surrounded by Asian Bishops as far as I can see:) . Bishops are church leadership. Hmmm…I think your friend needs to reconsider the whiteness of Catholicism.
In fact, check out the Bishops in the dioceses of Singapore, Malaysia, India, China, and the Phillipines to name a few. You’ll see a pretty nice diverse group of leadership.
 
chevalier said:
St Augustine and his mother, St Monica, were Romans and were not black, just for the record.
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Not all Africans are black, and just because one is a Roman citizen does not make one white. We’re not talking about just black people–we’re talking about the overwhelming number of non-white Catholics now and throughout church history.
 
Numinous said:
Not all Africans are black, and just because one is a Roman citizen does not make one white. We’re not talking about just black people–we’re talking about the overwhelming number of non-white Catholics now and throughout church history.
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Being born in Africa does not make you not white. St Augustine had Berber descent, actually, through St Monica, of which I wasn’t aware until I checked a minute ago, although I suspected he might have been an ancient equivalent of a modern Creole, but that doesn’t make him not ineligible to be called “white”. I would have nothing against St Augustine being black or whatever other “race” he would have been born in, but let’s avoid confusion as to history and the facts.

The important fact is that the early Christians were hardly an elitist society - to put it mildly. They were very often the underdogs of the system, coming from various backgrounds not considered particularly prestigious. It was also the religion that began to unite the master and slave.
 
Exactly. Besides, I would challenge the OP’s friend to define what it means to be “white,” anyway. One could argue that, since it denies the variety of heritages that go into making up an individual, the term is at best too general and at worst racist. The same can be said for the term “black.”

Ridiculous ideas of race.
 
LilyM said:
Come to think of it though, the question isn’t about BLACKS specifically but about non-Caucasians.

In which case there are more saints who can be mentioned - Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha and St Juan Diego (both native American), Saints Andrew Kim, Paul Miki and their companions who were all native Asians martyred in China, Japan, Korea and elsewhere in Asia.
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Not to mention Cardinal Sin, not a saint (AFAIK) but he deserves a mention anyway. 🙂

rossum
 
rossum said:
Not to mention Cardinal Sin, not a saint (AFAIK) but he deserves a mention anyway. 🙂

rossum
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Hehe … I wouldn’t dream of suggesting his appointment was purely because the name Cardinal Sin is so amusing … but I’m sure it gave whichever Pope appointed him a good laugh anyway. 😛
 
St. Charbel, St. Rafqa, St. Niamtulla…All Lebanese catholic saints, all from “arab” countries…

A lot of early church figures were from present day Turkey, a now “muslim” country.

Pope Anicetus born in present day Syria, “muslim” nation

Pope Constantine was considered “syrian” also born in syria
Pope Gregory III same story

Obviously in later years the Papacy became more Euro-centric naturally because the largest population of Catholics were European, it would be very tough to find catholics in the middle east and Africa because Islam was advocating the mass murder of “infidels”

If we want to talk about racism, tell him that Muslims created Slave trade, and till this day still refer to Africans as "abeed’ which translated into English means Slave.
 
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