Gail Bond and Alexander Taylor, members of the Tolton Ambassadors, raffle off books about Fr. Augustus Tolton, the first U.S.-born black Catholic priest whose cause for sainthood was opened in Chicago in 2010, at St. Ambrose Parish in Grosse Pointe Park on Nov. 11.Dan Meloy | The Michigan Catholic
Grosse Pointe Park — With most people having their minds on the sainthood cause of Fr. Solanus Casey, men and women gathered together Nov. 11 to reflect and pray about the sainthood cause of another Midwest priest.
The Tolton Ambassadors of Detroit hosted its third annual prayer breakfast at St. Ambrose Parish in Grosse Pointe Park, promoting the cause of Servant of God Fr. Augustus Tolton.
Fr. Tolton (1854-97) is recognized as the first black American priest, who overcame prejudice to minister to both black and white Catholics in Quincy, Ill., and Chicago.
“We’re trying to familiarize people with Augustus Tolton, who he was and what he was about,” said Kim Procter, a parishioner at Corpus Christi Parish in Detroit and member of the Tolton Ambassadors. “Fr. Tolton was recognized as a Servant of God in 2010. There are possibly two, one for sure, potential miracles attributed to him. One is there was a seminarian who stopped breathing for 30 minutes, and Fr. Tolton prayed over him and revived him.”
The Tolton Ambassadors raise money for Fr. Tolton’s cause while spreading his story and contribution to the Catholic Church in the United States.
“When you look into the process of becoming a saint, you think, ‘Oh, this is why it’s so hard,’” said Alexander Taylor, a Tolton Ambassador and member of Sacred Heart Parish in Detroit. “It’s important to have a saint that looks like you; it’s an acknowledgement you are part of the Church, that you bring something different to the Church.”
Augustus Tolton was born a slave in Missouri on April 1, 1854. In 1862, amidst the heat of the Civil War, Tolton’s mother took him and his siblings to freedom in Quincy.
But once emancipated from slavery, Tolton still experienced prejudice. He entered St. Boniface School in Quincy in 1865 before leaving a month later after the parish school staff received threats for having a black student enrolled.
Tolton later enrolled at St. Peter School in Quincy in 1868, where he received first Communion and was confirmed. Upon graduating from St. Peter in 1872, Tolton left for Rome to enter the seminary at the Collegium Uranum de Propaganda Fide after being rejected by several U.S. seminaries.
“When he went to Rome, he assumed he’d be sent to Africa to minster,” Procter said. “But he was sent back to the United States to be a face for black Catholics.”
After being ordained in 1886 at St. John Lateran Basilica in Rome and celebrating his first Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica, Fr. Tolton was sent back to Quincy as pastor of St. Joseph Parish.
“When he was sent to Quincy, he faced a lot of prejudice,” Procter said. “He was such a ‘priest’s priest’ that his service would not only attract black Catholics, but also white people. That’s when other pastors got angry with him.”
Father Augustine Tolton, also known as Augustus, is pictured in a photo from an undated portrait card. (CNS photo/courtesy of Archdiocese of Chicago Archives and Records Center) In 1889, he was sent to Chicago to minister to the city’s growing black Catholic population.
Fr. Tolton was renowned throughout Chicago for his ministry in the city, especially toward the poor. While helping those less fortunate, he suffered heat stroke and died July 9, 1897.
“His care for others, the way he would give of himself was what set him apart,” Taylor said. “The days leading up to when he died, he was traveling to help others. He represented that self-sacrifice of putting others’ needs before his own.”
Leon Dixon, director of black Catholic ministries for the Archdiocese of Detroit, highlighted the need for holy examples in the black Catholic community.
“This is an important cause, not only for our Church, but our community as well, a community that for so long has had no voice,” Dixon said. “But maybe one day it will be a community that has its own saint: the first American-born black person to be canonized.”
Dixon introduced Fr. Ray Stadmeyer, OFM Cap., pastor of St. Charles Borromeo and Nativity of Our Lord parishes in Detroit, who spoke about how Fr. Tolton loved everyone, in spite of the injustice he faced from the people, and sometimes even the Church, he was trying to serve.
“Fr. Augustus Tolton, through all the struggles and injustices he faced, all the prejudice, he still saw God in other men,” Fr. Stadmeyer said.
“The struggle for equality can’t happen in legislation,” Fr. Stadmeyer continued. “It can’t happen in another workshop about racism. It will happen one on one, and that only comes from God.”
