John England (bishop)

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John England (bishop) bigraphy, stories - 1st Roman Catholic Bishop of Charleston, South Carolina

John England (bishop) : biography

September 23, 1786 – April 11, 1842 (aged 55)

John England (September 23, 1786, Cork, Ireland – April 11, 1842, Charleston, South Carolina) was the first Roman Catholic Bishop of Charleston, South Carolina.

Abolitionism

England operated in a heavily Protestant city. During the 1820s-1830s, he defended the Catholic minority against nativist prejudices. In 1831 and 1835, the bishop established free schools for black girls and boys. In 1835, riled by the propaganda of the American Anti-Slavery Society, a mob raided the Charleston post office and the next day turned its attention to England’s school for ‘children of color.’ Alerted, England led Charleston’s Irish Volunteers to protect the school. Yet soon after this, when all schools for ‘free blacks’ were closed in Charleston, England acquiesced, thus divorcing Catholicism in Charleston from abolitionism.Joseph Kelly, "Charleston’s Bishop John England and American Slavery," New Hibernia Review 2001 5(4): 48-56

Legacy

In the interests of his impoverished diocese he visited the chief towns and cities of the Union, crossed the ocean four times, sought aid from the Pope, the Propaganda, the Leopoldine Society of Vienna, and made appeals in Ireland, England, France, Italy, wherever he could obtain money, vestments, or books. In 1841, he visited Europe for the last time. On the long and boisterous return voyage there was much sickness, and he became seriously ill through his constant attendance on others. Though very weak, notwithstanding, on his arrival in Philadelphia, he preached seventeen nights consecutively, also four nights in Baltimore. With his health broken and his strength almost exhausted, he promptly resumed his duties on his return to Charleston, where he died.

Most of his writings were given to the public through the columns of the United States Catholic Miscellany, in the publication of which he was aided by his sister. His successor, Bishop Reynolds, collected his various writings, which were published in five volumes at Baltimore, in 1849. A new edition, edited by Archbishop S.B. Messmîr of Milwaukee, was published at Cleveland in 1908.

Bishop England High School, founded in Charleston, South Carolina in 1915, was named in his honor.

Bishop

He was consecrated Bishop of Charleston at Cork, 21 September 1820, and refused to take the customary oath of allegiance to the Crown, declaring his intention to become a citizen of the United States as soon as possible. He arrived in Charleston 30 December 1820. Conditions were most uninviting and unpromising in the new diocese, which consisted of the three States of South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia. The Catholics were scattered in little groups over these States.

The meagre number in Charleston consisted of very poor immigrants from Ireland and ruined refugees from San Domingo and their servants. In 1832, after twelve years of labour, Bishop England estimated the Catholics of his diocese at eleven thousand souls: 7500 in South Carolina, 3000 in Georgia, and 500 in North Carolina. South Carolina had been settled as a royal province by the Lords Proprietors, who brought with them the religion of the Established Church, and it was only in 1790 that enactments imposing religious disabilities were expunged from the constitution of the new State.

Religious and social antecedents and traditions, and the resultant public opinion, were unfavourable, if not antagonistic, to the growth of Catholicism. The greatest need was a sufficient number of Catholic clergy. This sparsely settled section, with scattered and impoverished congregations, had not heretofore attracted many men of signal merit and ability. Bishop England faced these unfavourable conditions in a brave and determined spirit. The day after his arrival he assumed formal charge of his see, and almost immediately issued a pastoral. He then set out on his first visitation of the three States comprising his diocese.

No bishop could be more regular and constant in these visitations. He went wherever he heard there was a Catholic, organized the scattered little flocks, ministered to their spiritual needs, appointed persons to teach catechism, and wherever possible urged the building of a church. During these visitations he preached in halls, court houses, State houses, and in Protestant chapels and churches, sometimes at the invitation of the pastors. When in Charleston he preached at least twice every Sunday and delivered several courses of lectures besides various addresses on special occasions. He successfully advocated before the Legislature of South Carolina the granting of a charter for his diocesan corporation, which had been strongly opposed through the machinations of the disaffected trustees.