BLACK HISTORY MONTH
February is Black History Month. To commemorate the month, I want to tell you the story of a young boy nicknamed “Gus.” During the Civil War, he fled slavery with his mother and two siblings from the Confederate state of Missouri to the free state of Illinois.
In his new home of Quincy, Illinois, he was befriended by an Irish priest named Father Peter McGirr who enrolled him in his parish school where he faced racial prejudice. Gus eventually learned German from other priests who were German Franciscans and was able to attend Saint Francis Solanus College (now Quincy University).
He wanted to be a priest, but no American seminary would accept him. So he enrolled at the Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome where he became fluent in Italian, Latin and Greek.
Augustus was ordained in Rome on April 24, 1886, in the Basilica of St. John Lateran. He went back to the Archdiocese of Chicago where he was well liked by many people, black and white. Sadly, many of his fellow priests did not like him because he was such a wonderful speaker that people felt as if he was bringing heaven down to earth.
His parish of Saint Monica, on the corner of 36th Street and Dearborn Avenue in the south side of Chicago, grew from 30 faithful to a whopping 600-plus! Tragically, this priest succumbed to heat stroke on July 9, 1897. He was just 43 years old. The name of this courageous priest is Father Augustus Tolton.
On Feb. 24, 2011, the late Cardinal Francis George, Archbishop of Chicago, Bishop Joseph Perry, auxiliary Bishop of Chicago, and Bishop Thomas Proprocki, Bishop of the Diocese of Springfield, Illinois, began the petition for sainthood of this wonderful man.
Please pray for sainthood for this wonderful man. If you would like to learn more about this holy man, a biography is available at Ignatius Press or Amazon.
Servant of God Father Augustus Tolton, pray for us!
Father William M. Tulua is a parochial vicar at St. Catherine of Parish in Kapaa, Kauai.