Most Rev. Dr. John Carroll, S.J., 1st Archbishop of Baltimore

John Carroll, (January 8, 1735 – December 3, 1815) was the first Roman Catholic bishop and archbishop in the United States — serving as the ordinary of the Archdiocese of Baltimore. He is also known as the founder of Georgetown University, the oldest Catholic university in the United States, and St. John the Evangelist Parish of Rock Creek (now Forest Glen), the first secular (diocesan) parish in the country.

Sources

• [Find A Grave Memorial# 3693 http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=carroll&GSfn=...]
• Wiki page on John Carroll

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John Carroll, (January 8, 1735 – December 3, 1815) was the first Roman Catholic bishop and archbishop in the United States — serving as the ordinary of the Archdiocese of Baltimore. He is also known as the founder of Georgetown University, the oldest Catholic university in the United States, and St. John the Evangelist Parish of Rock Creek (now Forest Glen), the first secular (diocesan) parish in the country.

John Carroll was born to Daniel Carroll, a native of Ireland, and Eleanor Darnall Carroll, of English descent, at the large plantation which Eleanor Darnall had inherited from her family. He spent his early years at the family home, sited on thousands of acres in Upper Marlboro, Maryland. (Several acres are now associated with the house museum known as Darnall's Chance, listed on the National Register of Historic Places.) His older brother Daniel Carroll became one of only five men to sign both the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution of the United States.

John Carroll was educated at the College of St. Omer in French Flanders. (This was established for the education of English Catholics after discrimination following the Protestant Reformation in England. During the upheavals following the French Revolution, the college migrated to Bruges, and then Liège before finally settling at Stonyhurst in England in 1794, where it remains.) Attending St. Omer with him was his cousin Charles Carroll of Carrollton, who was to become the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence and the first United States Senator from Maryland.

Carroll joined the Society of Jesus as a postulant at the age of 18 in 1753. In 1755, he began his studies of philosophy and theology at Liège. After fourteen years he was ordained to the priesthood in 1769. Carroll remained in Europe until he was almost 40, teaching at St-Omer and Liège, and acting as chaplain to several British aristocrats traveling on the continent.

When the Pope suppressed the Society of Jesus in 1773, Carroll made arrangements to return to Maryland. As a result of laws discriminating against Catholics, there was then no public Catholic Church in Maryland, so Carroll worked as a missionary in Maryland and Virginia.

Carroll founded St. John the Evangelist Parish at Forest Glen (Silver Spring) in 1774. In 1776, the Continental Congress asked Carroll, his cousin Charles Carroll, Samuel Chase, and Benjamin Franklin to travel to Quebec and attempt to persuade the French Canadians to join the revolution. Although the group was unsuccessful, it made Carroll well known to the government of the new republic. Carroll was excommunicated by the local Quebec bishop, Jean-Olivier Briand, for his political activities.

The Jesuit fathers, led by Carroll and five other priests, began a series of meetings at White Marsh beginning on 27 June 1783; through these General Chapters, they organized the Catholic Church in the United States on what is now the site of Sacred Heart Church in Maryland.

Among the major educational concerns of Carroll were the education of the faithful, providing proper training for priests and the inclusion of women in higher education (something he had encountered resistance to). As a result, Carroll orchestrated the founding and early development of Georgetown University. Administration of the school was entrusted to the Jesuits. Instruction at the school began on November 22, 1791 under the direction of its first President, Robert Plunkett, with future Congressman William Gaston as its first student.

In 1806, Carroll oversaw the construction of the first cathedral in the 13 United States, the Cathedral of the Assumption (today called the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary) in Baltimore, Maryland, which was designed by Benjamin Henry Latrobe, architect of the United States Capitol. The cornerstone of the cathedral was laid on July 7, 1806, by Carroll, but he did not live to see its completion.

Carroll died in Baltimore on December 3, 1815. His remains are interred in the crypt of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which can be visited by the public.

www.wikipedia

Carroll is also known as the founder of Georgetown University (the oldest Catholic university in the United States), and of St. John the Evangelist Parish of Rock Creek (now Forest Glen), the first secular (or diocesan, meaning that its clergy did not come from monastic orders) parish in the country.

John Carroll was born to Daniel Carroll and Eleanor (Darnall) Carroll at the large plantation which Eleanor had inherited from her family. He spent his early years at the family home, sited on thousands of acres near Marlborough Town, the county seat of Prince George's County in the Province of Maryland.[citation needed] (Several remnant surrounding acres are now associated with the house museum known as "Darnall's Chance", listed on the National Register of Historic Places and part of the system of the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission for northern suburban Washington, D.C.).

Other Carroll relatives were instrumental in the development of the colonial Province of Maryland and the establishment of Baltimore (1729), soon to be the third-largest city in America, and developed as a port on the Chesapeake Bay. His older brother Daniel Carroll II (1730–1796) became one of only five men to sign both the "Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union" (1778) and the Constitution of the United States (1787). His cousin Charles Carroll of Carrollton (1737–1832) was also an important member of the Revolutionary Patriot cause, and was the last surviving signer of the Declaration of Independence (1776). Charles Carroll lived long enough to participate in the industrial revolution, with the ceremonies of the 1828 setting of the "first stone" for the beginning of the construction of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.

John Carroll was educated at the College of St. Omer in French Flanders (northern France, bordering southern edge of modern Belgium). (This was established for the education of English Catholics after they suffered discrimination following the Protestant Reformation instituted by King Henry VIII in England. During the upheavals of the French Revolution (1789–1799), the College migrated to Bruges, and then Liège. It returned to England and was located at Stonyhurst in 1794, where it remains today.) Also attending St. Omer with him was his cousin Charles Carroll of Carrollton (1737–1832), who was to become the only Catholic signatory of the Declaration of Independence (1776), and the first United States Senator (1789) from Maryland.

Letter of Bishop Challoner to the Maryland Jesuits informing them of the suppression of the Society of Jesus Carroll joined the Society of Jesus (the "Jesuits") as a postulant at the age of 18 in 1753. In 1755, he began his studies of philosophy and theology at Liège. After fourteen years, he was ordained to the diaconate and later the priesthood in 1769. Carroll remained in Europe until he was almost 40, teaching at St-Omer and Liège. He also served as chaplain to a British aristocrat traveling on the continent. When Pope Clement XIV suppressed the Society of Jesus in 1773 in Europe, Carroll made arrangements to return to Maryland.[citation needed] The brief suppression of the Jesuits was a painful experience for Carroll, who suspected the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith of being responsible for this ill-informed decision. As a result of laws discriminating against Catholics, there was then no public Catholic Church in Maryland. Carroll worked as a missionary in Maryland and Virginia.

Carroll founded St. John the Evangelist Parish at Forest Glen (Silver Spring) in 1774.[citation needed] In 1776, the Continental Congress asked Carroll, along with his cousin, delegate Charles Carroll of Carrollton (1737–1832), fellow Marylander Samuel Chase (1741–1811), and Benjamin Franklin (1705/06–1790), to travel north to Quebec in the Saint Lawrence River Valley to try to persuade the French Canadians to join the Revolution with the lower Thirteen Colonies.[citation needed] (The French Canadians had been forced to cede control of their territory in 1763 to the occupying British Army, which won the Seven Years' War, known as the French and Indian War in North America.) The group was unsuccessful, but Carroll became known to other early founders of the United States Republic.[citation needed] (The British government allowed French Canadians to keep their language, their religion, and much of their law.)

Snubbed by the local clergy on the orders of Jean-Olivier Briand, Bishop of Quebec, Carroll took an early opportunity to accompany the ailing Franklin back to the colonial capital at Philadelphia.

The Jesuit fathers, led by Carroll and five other priests, began a series of meetings at White Marsh (in eastern Baltimore County) beginning on June 27, 1783. Through these General Chapters, they gradually organized the Catholic Church in the United States on what is now the site of Sacred Heart Church in Bowie, Maryland (Prince George's County).

The Catholic clergy at the time of the new Republic were keenly aware that anti-British sentiment made their canonical allegiance to Bishop Richard Challoner, the vicar-apostolic of the London district, somewhat suspect. As a result, they explored various options. When Bishop Challoner died in 1781, his successor, James Talbot, refused to exercise jurisdiction in the new nation. But the American clergy, then numbering some two dozen, did not feel the time was right to have a bishop appointed in the new nation.

The papal nuncio to France conferred with the American ambassador in Paris, Benjamin Franklin, as to how the issue might be resolved in a way that would be acceptable to the United States. Franklin responded by saying that the official separation of Church and State in the United States did not permit the government to have any official opinion on who should govern American Catholics. He suggested privately that perhaps a French bishop might be given oversight of the small but growing Catholic community in the U.S.

The nuncio took into account remarks by Franklin of the high esteem he and others had for John Carroll. Carroll was appointed and confirmed by Pope Pius VI on June 9, 1784, as provisional "Superior of the Missions in the thirteen United States of North America", with faculties to celebrate the sacrament of Confirmation. The Holy See made this decision in part because it wanted to please Benjamin Franklin, who had warmly recommended Carroll for the position.

Because the U.S. government and state governments did not regulate churches, as was done in nations with established churches, the former British colonists and immigrants who made up the Catholic Church in the new land had varying ideas as to how to structure their local parish communities in this new era. Some set up churches run entirely by laity without Carroll's permission, and in other cases clergy exercised excessive control. Carroll sought to navigate a new way of organizing the Church in a new country, taking into account both the need for lay involvement and a reasonable degree of hierarchical control. In 1791, the formal message of congratulations from American Catholics to President George Washington on his election was co-signed by Carroll and lay Catholics.

In his role as the representative of Catholics in the United States, Carroll often wrote articles for publications defending the Catholic tradition against persons who promoted anti-Catholicism in the United States. He fought notions of state establishment of Protestantism as the official religion, but he always treated non-Catholics with respect. He insisted that Catholics and Protestants should work together to build up the new nation. An early advocate of Christian unity, Carroll suggested that the chief obstacles to unity among Christians in the United States were the lack of clarity on the boundaries of papal primacy and the use of Latin in the liturgy.

The American clergy, originally reluctant to request the formation of a diocese due to fears of public misunderstanding and the possibility of a foreign bishop being imposed upon them, eventually recognized the need for a Catholic bishop. The election of Samuel Seabury (1729–1796) in 1783 as the first Anglican / Church of England bishop in the newly independent United States had shown that Americans had accepted the appointment of a Protestant bishop. The American clergy had received the assurances of the Continental Congress that it would not object to election of a bishop whose allegiance was to Rome.

On November 26, 1784, the Holy See established the Apostolic Prefecture of the United States. Carroll, as Prefect Apostolic in February 1785, urged Cardinal Antonelli to create a method of appointing church authorities that would not make it appear as if they were receiving their appointment from a foreign power. A report of the status of Roman Catholics in Maryland (originally founded 1634 as a haven for English Catholics) was appended to his letter, where he stated that despite there being only nineteen priests in Maryland, some of the more prominent families were still Catholic in faith. He did say that they may have been prone to dancing and novel-reading. The pope was so pleased with Carroll's report that he granted his request "that the priests in Maryland be allowed to suggest two or three names from which the Pope would choose their bishop".

Interior of the chapel at Lulworth Castle in Dorset, England where Carroll was consecrated a bishop The priests of Maryland petitioned Rome for a bishop for the United States. Cardinal Antonelli replied, allowing the priests to select the city for a cathedral and, for this case only, to name the candidate for presentation to the pope. Carroll was selected Bishop of Baltimore by the clergy of the U.S.A. in April 1789 by a vote of 24 out of 26. On November 6, 1789, Pope Pius VI in Rome approved the election, naming Carroll the first Roman Catholic bishop in the newly independent United States. He was consecrated by Bishop Charles Walmesley on August 15, 1790 (the Feast of the Assumption), in the chapel of Lulworth Castle in Dorset, England, without an oath of loyalty to the English church. (Anglican bishop Seabury would have had to make an oath to the English crown had he been consecrated in England, so he obtained consecration in Scotland instead under their apostolic succession. Soon after this, the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America (today's Episcopal Church U.S.A.) was organized with several dioceses, separating more thoroughly from the mother Church of England). Carroll was invested in his office in Maryland upon his return from another trans-Atlantic sail voyage. This took place at the parish of St. Thomas Manor in Charles County, Maryland. When he returned to Baltimore, he took his chair in the Church of St. Peter, which would serve as his proto-cathedral. St. Peter's was the first Roman Catholic parish congregation in Baltimore Town in 1770 and was of red brick construction located at the northwestern corner of North Charles and West Saratoga streets. It had an attached rectory and school, and was surrounded by a cemetery.

Old St. Peter's was built across the street and opposite from the "Mother Church of the Anglican Church in Baltimore", Old St. Paul's Church (Anglican/Episcopal) at the southeast corner of Charles and Saratoga, also surrounded by its cemetery overlooking the cliffs of the Jones Falls stream to the east which ran north to south through Baltimore Town to the harbor of the Patapsco River. Neighboring Old St. Paul's has had four successive structures at that same site. It moved to Baltimore Town in 1730, the year after it was laid out, from its first site on the Patapsco Neck peninsula in southeastern Baltimore County, where it was organized in 1692 as one of the "Original Thirty" Anglican Church parishes designated in the colonial Province of Maryland. these two churches were Catholic-Anglican neighbors for over seventy years in downtown Baltimore (1770–1841).

Statue of founder and first American bishop and archbishop John Carroll in front of Healy Hall on the campus of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

Among the major educational concerns of Carroll were the education of the faithful, providing proper training for priests, and the inclusion of women in higher education (something to which he had encountered resistance). As a result, Carroll orchestrated the founding and early development of Georgetown University in Georgetown, a colonial-era tobacco exporting sailing port on the upper Potomac River on the Maryland northern shore, recently ceded by the state to the United States government for the newly laid out District of Columbia and future federal capital city (now Washington, D.C.) presently in the western half of the new federal district beyond Rock Creek. Administration of the school was entrusted to the Jesuits (Society of Jesus) order of Bishop Carroll. Instruction at the school began on November 22, 1791 under the direction of its first President, Robert Plunkett, with future United States Representative (Congressman) William Gaston as its first student.

In his first year of service in 1791, Carroll convened the first diocesan synod in the United States. The twenty-two priests (of five nationalities) at the First Synod of Baltimore met at Old St. Peter's Church (now proto-cathedral), discussed baptism, confirmation, penance, the celebration of the liturgy, anointing of the sick, mixed marriages and supplemental legislation concerning things such as the rules of fasting and abstinence. The decrees of this synod represent the first local canonical legislation in the new nation. Among the regulations were that parish income should be divided in thirds: one third for the support of the clergy, one third for the maintenance of church facilities, and one third for the support of the poor.

To train priests for his diocese of three million square miles, Carroll had asked the Fathers of the Company of Saint Sulpice to come to Baltimore. They arrived in 1791 and started the nucleus of St. Mary's College and Seminary, Baltimore. Carroll gave his approval to the founding of Visitation nuns. In 1799, under the direction of Carroll's future successor Leonard Neale, the nuns founded Visitation Academy in Georgetown. He was not successful, however, in inducing the Carmelites, who had come to Maryland in 1790, to take up the work of education.

In 1796, Irish Augustinian friars came to Philadelphia. Carroll took the lead in effecting a restoration of the Society of Jesus in Maryland in 1805, without informing Rome, by an affiliation with the Russian Jesuits. They had been protected from suppression by Catherine the Great. That same year Carroll urged English Dominican friars to begin a priory and college in Kentucky to serve the numerous Maryland Catholics migrating there. In 1809 the Sulpicians invited Elizabeth Ann Seton to come to Emmitsburg, Maryland to found a school. Carroll had to contend with a "medley of clerical characters". One of the most notorious was Simon Felix Gallagher of Charleston, an eloquent alcoholic with a large following.

In 1806, Carroll oversaw the construction of the first cathedral in the 13 United States, the Cathedral of the Assumption (today called the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary) in Baltimore. It was designed by Benjamin Henry Latrobe, architect of the United States Capitol. The cornerstone of the cathedral was laid on July 7, 1806, by Carroll, but he did not live to see its completion.

In 1804 Carroll was given administration of the Danish West Indies and other nearby islands that were under no ecclesiastical jurisdiction and in 1805 the Louisiana Territory. In April 1808, Pope Pius VII made Baltimore the first archdiocese in the United States, with jurisdiction in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Bardstown. Archbishop Carroll made three new bishops in 1810, after which an unofficial provincial council lasted for two weeks.

Carroll was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in July 1815. He died in Baltimore on December 3, 1815. His remains are interred in the crypt of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, which can be visited by the public.

Carroll was dedicated to the wider readership of Scripture among the Catholics of the United States. He insisted that the readings of the liturgy be read in the vernacular. He was a tireless promoter of "The Carey Bible", an edition of the English-language Douay-Rheims translation that was published in sections. He encouraged clergy and laity to purchase subscriptions so that they could read the Scriptures.

As both superior of the missions and bishop, Carroll instituted a series of broad reforms in the Church, especially regarding the conduct of the clergy. He promoted the use of vernacular languages in the liturgy, but was unable to gain the support for such reform by the church hierarchy. In 1787 he wrote:

Can there be anything more preposterous than an unknown tongue; and in this country either for want of books or inability to read, the great part of our congregations must be utterly ignorant of the meaning and sense of the public office of the Church. It may have been prudent, for aught I know, to impose a compliance in this matter with the insulting and reproachful demands of the first reformers; but to continue the practice of the Latin liturgy in the present state of things must be owing either to chimerical fears of innovation or to indolence and inattention in the first pastors of the national Churches in not joining to solicit or indeed ordain this necessary alteration.

It would be nearly 200 years until Carroll's wish for vernacular language-liturgy was realized in the United States as a result of the Second Vatican Council.

Carroll tolerated slavery. He had two black servants—one free and one a slave (in his will, Carroll bequeathed his slave, Charles, to his nephew, Daniel Brent, on the condition that Brent emancipate Charles within a year. Carroll also provided Charles with a small inheritance). While calling for the humane treatment and religious education of slaves, he never agitated for the abolition of slavery.

Over the course of his life, Carroll's attitude toward slavery evolved from a paternalistic advocacy for humane treatment and religious instruction of slaves to a policy of gradual emancipation (albeit through manumission by masters rather than by law). His view was that gradual emancipation of a plantation's slaves allowed for families to be kept together and for elderly slaves to be provided for. He addressed critics of his approach thus:

Since the great stir raised in England about Slavery, my Brethren being anxious to suppress censure, which some are always glad to affix to the priesthood, have begun some years ago, and are gradually proceeding to emancipate the old population on their estates. To proceed at once to make it a general measure, would not be either humanity toward the Individuals, nor doing justice to the trust, under which the estates have been transmitted and received.

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From The (Baltimore MD) American and Commercial Daily Advertiser, of Monday, Dec. 4, 1815:

Communicated.

Died yesterday, about six o'clock in the morning, the MOST REVEREND DOCTOR JOHN CARROLL, Archbishop of Baltimore, in the 80th year of his age.

His friends and acquaintances are respectfully invited, without farther notification, to attend his funeral tomorrow, the 5th inst., at 10 o'clock; the procession will move from St. Peter's Church down Saratoga Street to Eutaw Street, thence to Franklin Street, thence to the church of the Seminary, the place of interment

No carriages will be admitted into the procession.

When such a man as Archbishop Carroll dies, a man who filled so large a space in the public eye, and leaves so great a void in the community, something more than a mere notice of the event is justly expected. Without presuming, therefore, at this time to enter into a detailed account of his long and useful life, or to portray at large the features of his distinguished character, a brief and very imperfect biographical memoir of this illustrious individual 'is now given, which,' submitted to the public, in the hope and expectation that it will soon be gratified with a much fuller and more satisfactory account of his life and character, from some more skillful and competent hand.

Archbishop Carroll was born at Upper Marlborough in the state of Maryland in the year 1735, and was sent at the age of 10 or 12 years to a grammar school at Bohemia, in Cecil County. Even at this early period he gave striking presages of his worth and eminence, by the mildness and innocence of his manners, his docility and assiduity.

From this school he was sent to the College of St. Omers in France, where, after going through the studies of that celebrated institution with the most distinguished success and honors, he was transferred to the College of Liege, and was there ordained a priest, and after surrendering his patrimonial estate to his brother, became a member of the Society of Jesus. Upon the dissolution of that Society, he acted as the Secretary of the dispersed Fathers, in their remonstrances with the court of France respecting the temporal interests of the abolished order. For this station, he was peculiarly qualified as well by his distinguished learning and talents, as by the remarkable purity and elegance of his style, in the French as well as Latin language.

He then went to England and was selected by the late Lord Stourton (a Catholic nobleman) to accompany his son, the present Lord Stourton, as his preceptor and governor on the tour of Europe. During this tour, he wrote a concise and interesting history of England for the use of his pupil, still preserved in manuscript. He also kept a journal of his travels, which strikingly displays that good sense, sound judgment, and enlightened intelligence, which ever distinguished him.

Upon his return to England, he resided for some time in the family of Lord Arundel (another Catholic nobleman); but upon the approach of the Revolutionary War, he withstood the earnest and pressing solicitations of his noble and beneficent patron, and came back to his native country.

Shortly after his return, at the request of the American Congress, he accompanied Dr. Franklin, Charles Carrol of Carolton (his relation and friend) and the late Judge Chase, on a political mission to Canada, and throughout the arduous and hazardous conflict which ensued, he remained fervently attached to the cause of his country.

He did not at any time, however, neglect his church duties, the primary object of his care and solicitude. Upon his arrival in his native country, he lost no time in taking upon himself the laborious care of several Catholic congregations, widely separated from each other, where his memory is cherished with the most enthusiastic affection.

Sometime after the establishment of our Independence, the Catholic body in this country (before that time subject to a spiritual hierarchy in England) solicited the Pope to erect the United States into an Episcopal See; and the subject of this memoir was nominated to the Sovereign Pontiff as the Bishop. There was no hesitation on the part of the Pope, to whom his character and talents were well known, in confirming the nomination. At a later and recent period, at the solicitation of the Catholic clergy of his diocese, he was raised to the dignity of Archbishop.

In the exercise of his sacred functions he displayed a spirit of conciliation, mildness, and Christian humility, which greatly endeared him to those under his charge.

His manners and deportment in private life were a model of the clerical character; dignified yet simple, pious, but not austere. This secured him the affectionate attachment of his friends and the respect of all.

In him religion assumed its most attractive and venerable form, and his character conciliated for the body over which he presided, respect and consideration from the liberal, the enlightened, and the virtuous of all ranks and denominations; for they saw that his life accorded with the benign doctrines of that religion, which he professed.

The members of his own church to whom he was in truth a guide and a father - who daily witnessed the kindness, the beneficence, and the tenderness of his heart - who in the purity of his doctrines and precepts saw the purity of his own unsullied character - who saw him on his deathbed, with the meekness, the patience, and the cheerfulness, of a Saint and a Martyr, view the sure and rapid approaches of his own dissolution; concerned not for himself, but anxious only for the welfare of those whom he was soon to leave will long remember him with the most profound, heartfelt grief, gratitude, and veneration.

He taught us how to live, and oh, too high the price for knowledge, taught us how to die.

Death, the terrors of which he had so often dispelled from the minds of others, had no power to disturb his serene and tranquil soul.

But long will his bereaved and disconsolate flock mourn the loss of him, who was the succour and support of the wretched; who when this world could afford them nothing on which to lean, turned to him for consolation, as their spiritual father.

Long will the poor mourn for one, who always relieved their wants to the utmost extent of his means, and even extended his care of them beyond the bounds of his own existence - They will long weep for him who watched, and wept, who prayed and felt for all.

Those helpless orphan children, to whom he was indeed a father, and who flocked around his dying bed, to receive his last advice and blessing, may well weep, for their loss is irreparable.

His Church may well mourn, for her loss is incalculable.

https://www.archbalt.org/most-rev-john-carroll/