Augustus Tolton: The Church Is the True Liberator

by Joyce Duriga

Overview

Father Augustus Tolton was the first identified black American ordained to the priesthood in the United States. He was born into slavery and escaped to freedom with his mother and siblings under harrowing circumstances. Throughout his life he displayed a great devotion to the Lord and the Catholic faith despite facing racism within the Church at nearly every turn. Still, he felt and preached that the Catholic Church’s teaching that all people are children of God regardless of race made it the true church for African Americans in the United States following the Civil War. In Augustus Tolton, Joyce Duriga brings to light his quiet witness as a challenge to prejudices and narrow-mindedness that can keep us insulated from the universal diversity of the kingdom of God.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780814644744
Publisher:	Liturgical Press
Publication date:	10/22/2018
Series:	People of God
Pages:	128
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.30(d)

About the Author

Joyce Duriga has served as editor of Chicago Catholic, the official newspaper for the Archdiocese of Chicago, since 2007. Prior to coming to Chicago, she was the associate editor of Our Sunday Visitor, a national Catholic newsweekly. She is the author of Helen Prejean: Death Row’s Nun (Liturgical Press), and her work appears regularly in local, regional, and national publications.

Table of Contents

Contents
Foreword   ix
Preface   xiii
Chapter One
Flight from Slavery   1
Chapter Two
Finding His Vocation   8
Chapter Three
The Catholic Church and Slavery   15
Chapter Four
The Healys   21
Chapter Five
Tolton Goes to Rome   29
Chapter Six
Back to Quincy   39
Chapter Seven
Trouble Begins   45
Chapter Eight
His Friend, Daniel Rudd   53
Chapter Nine
On to Chicago   60
Chapter Ten
Fellow Pioneer, Mother Katharine Drexel   69
Chapter Eleven
St. Monica’s Becomes a Reality   74
Chapter Twelve
Final Days of Father Tolton and St. Monica’s   83
Appendix 1
Key Dates in Father Tolton’s Life and in American History   89
Appendix 2
Saint Augustus Tolton?   95
Notes   101
Index   107

Editorial Reviews

Augustus Tolton's life is living testimony that God's Holy Spirit dwells fully in all human beings, especially those once deemed mere chattel. A slave who became a priest of God? In the wake of the Civil War what must it have been like for White people to receive the Body of Christ from those very black hands?"
Sr. Helen Prejean, CSJ, Author of Dead Man Walking and The Death of Innocents

The timeless tale of Fr. Tolton's life and contributions presented in Augustus Tolton: The Church Is the True Liberator will undoubtedly inspire and encourage readers to live authentically as faithful and faith-filled witnesses to the light of Jesus Christ.
Ashley Morris, ThM, Associate Director, Office of Intercultural and Ethnic Diversity, Archdiocese of Atlanta


This is a story that needs to be told. It's the story of a life scarred by outrageous injustices. Yet rage was not the end of the story. Father Tolton found happiness and holiness in a life of forgiveness, profound love, and self-giving service. Joyce Duriga has once again shown herself to be a master of popular, relevant, readable biography.
Mike Aquilina, EWTN host and author of The Social Doctrine of the Catholic Church

From the Publisher