20 arts & life
Catholic san francisco | January 12, 2017
State librarian emeritus pens history of Catholics in America Valerie Schmalz
‘… there can be no understanding of American culture and history without an understanding of the role played by Catholic peoples in the unfolding drama of the American experience.’
Catholic San Francisco
“The history of Catholicism in America is not simply Catholic history. It is American history …” That statement from California state librarian emeritus Kevin Starr sets the direction of “Continental Ambitions: Roman Catholics in North America: The Colonial Experience” (Ignatius Press, 2016). “Previous studies have emphasized Catholic immigrants’ struggle for acceptance,” Starr writes in the preface of this first volume. Starr said it is time to reboot our perspective of Catholicism. Catholics have lost sight of the historical fact that Catholics of many different ethnicities and nationalities played significant roles from the beginning, and were present on this continent well before any other group, with the exception of the Native Americans, Starr said in an interview with Catholic San Francisco. A native San Franciscan who attended the now-shuttered St. Boniface School and is professor emeritus at University of Southern California, the 76-year-old Starr brings professional gravitas and faith to this latest book.
Kevin Starr “I think you will find a lot of new things. We don’t think of the Catholic origins of Texas. I open up all of this because history is worth an end in itself,” Starr said, but also, “I think it is very important for us Catholics today in the United States as we face certain challenges to religious freedom, to faith – it is important for us to know we are not Johnny come latelies. We are part of a founding of Catholic culture. We need not apologize to anyone.” Spanish explorers founded St. Augustine in 1565 in Florida a half century before the English landed at Jamestown, and before them the Viking explorers were Catholics, as were many of the Irish sailors on their boats, Starr said. French Catholics founded St. Louis and New Orleans,
the Spaniards California and the Southwest. Lord Calvert was granted a charter to the colony of Maryland from the English king with equal rights for Anglicans and Catholics, while German Catholics settled southern Pennsylvania. All before 1776. “This volume is intended to be the first part of a larger narrative written at a time of crisis and renewal,” Starr wrote. “… there can be no understanding of American culture and history without an understanding of the role played by Catholic peoples in the unfolding drama of the American experience,” writes Starr. “Behind this book is some 20 years of intermittent research while I was doing other books,” Starr said in the interview with Catholic San Fran-
cisco. “This is not a booster book. It’s a history book. Sometimes Catholic civilization did well, sometimes not so well,” Starr said. The project was inspired by John Gilmary Shea, a “pioneering” and “great Catholic historian” who wrote a four volume work in the 19th century, Starr said. “The Catholic Church is the oldest organization in the United States, and the only one that has retained the same life and polity and forms through each succeeding age. Her history is interwoven in the whole fabric of the country’s annals,” Shea wrote in the first volume, published in 1886, “The Catholic History in Colonial Days,” Starr notes in the preface to his first volume. “Few, if any contemporary historians of American Catholicism would open a similar history with the same confidence,” Starr writes in the preface. “Still, everything that Shea claimed of the Catholic Church in her American context remains true.” “We are an immigrant church and we glory in that,” Starr said in the interview, “but the immigration began a thousand years ago.”
Despite flaws, book has much to offer parishes dealing with diversity will be written by how these groups are received in the coming years. John Francis Burke in his book “Building Bridges, Not Walls” offers “Building Bridges, Not Walls: Nourpastoral suggestions for how parishes ishing Diverse Cultures in Faith” can build inclusive communities (“Construyamos puentes, no muros: where everyone is welcome and all Alimentar a las diversas culturas en gifts can be used. la fe”), by John Francis Burke, transBurke, who specializes in multilated into Spanish by Marco Batta. cultural and multilingual church Liturgical Press (Collegeville, Minnechoirs, also teaches political science sota, 2016). 216 pp., $24.95. and religious studies in Texas. His Much of the story of the Catholic Church in the United States can be told focus is mainly on Spanish-speaking immigrants and the problems that by focusing on how immigrant groups occur between them and the Englishhave been received by the church – speaking Catholic community. whether well or poorly – and how He begins each chapter with a these groups have changed the church. pastoral scenario focusing on one of This story continues today with the the many problems that can occur continual influx of immigrants from in a parish when people from differSpanish-speaking countries, Africa, AD_REVDEC2016_650.ai 1 11/30/2016 ent 10:26:47 AM cultural groups come together to Asia and valley the catholic Pacific Islands. worship and live. He then lays out a The story of the church’s future Daniel S. Mulhall
Catholic News Service
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broad array of information to help the reader understand the historical and cultural differences between these cultures. In writing “Building Bridges” Burke has done his homework. The bibliography is substantial and the citations throughout reflect respected scholarship. Positively, this provides a reader with a wealth of content and solid explanation. Negatively, by covering so many substantive issues in the few pages available to him, Burke tends to simplify issues and arguments so much that one may argue with some of the conclusions reached. While officially 216 pages in length, Building Bridges is actually a more modest work of about 108 pages in English because half the pages are in Spanish. Having the Spanish on the left side of the page and the English on the right makes reading a bit complicated – one naturally wants to continue to the back side of the page – but it is a minor distraction. What’s more of a distraction is that Burke seems, at times, to suggest that
the problems in culturally diverse parishes are caused by the failure of the English-speaking community to recognize and respect the gifts and culture of the Spanish-speaking. While this can be (and often is) the reality there also has to be an understanding of what is taking place in the English-speaking community as well. In reality, no specific person or group is responsible for the tensions; they just are. This is where a longer book with a more detailed presentation on the issues would have been beneficial. “Building Bridges” is a welcome addition to the literature on this topic. People working in culturally diverse communities will find here a wealth of valuable information and insight to help them address the underlying issues that they experience working across cultures. Mulhall previously served as the assistant secretary for catechesis and inculturation at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.