Father Augustus Tolton

We ran an item in this blog last January 5 on the life of Father Augustus Tolton (1854-1897), the first African American Roman Catholic priest in the United States. On March 18 the Archdiocese of Chicago announced it was taking the preliminary steps in making Father Tolton a candidate for official sainthood.

The Chicago Sun-Times story on the move had an interesting quote from Tolton: "It was said that I would be the only priest of race in America and would not likely succeed," he wrote. But an Italian cardinal told him, "'America has been called the most enlightened nation; we'll see if it deserves that honor. If America has never seen a black priest, it has to see one now.' "