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The American Catholic |
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Chapter Two |
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| The Irish in Ireland 1800's | ||||
| In a town typical of Ireland the people are crowded together in villages
and the surrounding countryside is planted in potatoes, the staple food for this island
people. Kelp, the seaweed, is harvested, dried, shredded and used as fertilizer to
grow the potato. In 1845, thirteen years earlier than Archbishop Hughes was breaking ground on his cathedral, Ireland was facing the toughest famine in its history. The fungus that struck the potato was probably brought back to Ireland from America. It travels by air and from plant to plant. One day the potato crop looked healthy and the next day it had rotted away. If any potatoes were harvested and looked healthy, they rotted almost immediately when they were stored. In 1845 30-40% of the potato harvest was infected. In 1846 almost the entire crop was infected. By 1848 everyone had eaten their seed crop and the famine was devastating to the entire population of Ireland. People was starving and dying by the hundreds. Wild dogs and rats ate the bodies left lying on the side of the road. Diseases became rampant; i.e., dysentery, typhus and cholera. People alive had to be untangled from their dead relatives. People were buried in open pits using "trap coffins" i.e., coffins with a false bottom that opened like a door and dropped into the pits. More than a few people were saved after being thrown into the pits alive. Ireland’s population dropped from nine million at the eve of the famine to just two million five years later. A million people immigrated. In some villages the death toll reached 80%. |
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| England is partially to blame! What led up to the famine? England’s bloody rule of Ireland and bad mismanagement forced Queen Elizabeth to move in and remove the Hiberno-Norman Lords of Ireland. She confiscated their lands and Cromwell’s swordsman carried out a large scale annihilation of Irish civilians, not even sparing her babies. Her objective was to keep Ireland poor and subjugated. All Irish lands were parceled out to British Nobility and Protestants were imported in droves."Penal Laws" were enacted to further beat down the Irish; i.e., severe restrictions were placed on Catholic clergy and the practice of Catholicism; Catholics were forbidden to vote or hold an office; carry a sword; own a horse or a gun worth more than 5 pounds; enter certain professions; engaged in certain kinds of commerce; live in a town without paying a special fee; children were forbidden to attend Catholic schools. The irony of the famine? Their was plenty of food in Ireland, but it was all being sent to England to fill the coffers of British absentee landlords. For decades after the Great Potato Famine, the Irish continued to fuel their hatred for the English with stories of how England sucked the life blood from Ireland hoping that all Irish men and women would eventually disappear from the face of the earth. The immigration to America began. By the thousands the peasants of Ireland loaded onto ships that were in poor condition and with little food for the six to eight week voyage . One tenth would die in the crossing and by the sixth year in America another tenth would die. America closed its ports to Irish ships because of the disease ridden passengers who had little more than the shirt on their backs if that. With the rise of the American middle class Irish and its dominant institution, the Irish American Catholic Church, the transformation of the Irish peasant to a respectable American citizen took place, not only by the rise of the Irish lower classes, but also by the annihilation of many of them.f an Irish. He returned home |
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| influence? Watch how many people listen when the Holy Father | ||||
Cardinal Paul Cullen Cardinal Paul Cullen created the Irish Catholic brand of Catholicism. Between the years of 1849 and 1878, he utterly transformed the Irish Catholic Church and by exporting thousands of Irish priests to America with his brand of Catholicism. Most of the Irish poor rarely attended Church, much less received the sacraments until Cullen’s appearance on the scene. In 1851 he was named the primate of Ireland. Trained in Rome, he was more Italian than Irish. He returned home to Ireland rarely for most of his priestly life. Ruthless in his style of dealing with people, he established Churches throughout Ireland with great pomp and circumstance. He was a stickler for ritual and devotions. He believed that the Church should and would reflect the ethereal presence of God. The people loved it and came in droves to regularize their marriages, have their babies baptized and become priests and nuns. He literally formed the Irish Catholic Church in Ireland by creating institutions for learning, secret societies, forcing the English to return Catholic education and demanding that all Irish would "pay, pray and obey" at all costs. Thus were the Irish Catholics who came to America along with their priests and nuns. They were all on a mission, believing that the famine was God purifying the Irish soul and giving him another chance at grace in this new land. It is not surprising with this mind-set that the Irish became in unusual numbers the skilled laborers; i.e., boiler makers, steam fitters, plumbers and America’s regulators. They dominated the police forces and the FBI and it remains so even to this day. |
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| Immigration by the Hordes The Irish were the first wave of immigrants but many more ethnic groups were to follow soon enough. The Irish made up half of all recorded immigrants in the 1840's. German immigration caught up to the Irish by the 1850's and greatly surpassed the Irish by the late 1880's. Two thirds of the Germans were not Catholic, but Lutherans. The Italians dominated the statistics at the turn of the century to 1909 topping out at 8.2 million immigrants. By the 1920's church rolls were filled with the Polish, Czechalslovocians, Slovocians, Slovenians and other ethnic groups fleeing Europe and its political unrest. If there was an ethnic identity struggle, and there was, to the Catholic Church in America the Irish won hands down. They were the first to arrive in numbers and they spoke the language. Two advantages no other ethnic group had over them. The Irish were truly immigrants to America. They set up family life here; organized clubs and social events around the Church, built schools, hospitals, professional societies, trade unions and lived in the cities. Unlike the Germans who settled more on to the farm lands of the Midwest, it was harder for them to maintain the close knit ties that the Irish maintained. The Italian immigrants tended to only be nominal Catholics and did not come here to stay and settle down. The first waves were mostly young men contracted to come here and work and then when the contract was over, take the money they had made and return to Italy. That changed over the years, but for the most part their idea of coming to America meant money to take home to the fatherland. Are we the product of an Irish Catholic Church? You bet! And the Protestants weren’t happy then and they continue to not be happy now with us. The old fears die hard and they are sure we have arrived in America to turn it into a Catholic country. Do we have political and social influence? Watch how many people listen when the Holy Father speaks on the issues. When our Protestant brothers and sisters are out in the streets proselytizing for new members and the Catholic population just continues to grow and grow. The Irish stamp has been in place in the Church since before the turn of the last century. Only now is the Irish influence waning in America and being replaced by a much more diverse group of priests; i.e., Filipino, Mexican, Colombian, Portuguese, Italian, Korean, Vietnamese, Polish, and German. We are a parish familiar with the acceptance of a new priest who cannot speak English and we begin again the job of teaching him. It is not acceptable in our culture, at least in priestly circles, to not be able to speak English. |
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