This is the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, which is technically the cathedral of Rome, where the Pope's chair, as Bishop of Rome, is located.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But there is a unique connection here to Catholicism in the United States: the first African-American priest was ordained here on April 24, 1886\u2014140 years ago. His name was Fr. Augustus Tolton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fr. Tolton was born into slavery in Missouri in 1854, but his mother Martha Jane escaped slavery, taking him and his brother to the State of Illinois when they were still very young.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Growing up in Illinois, \u201cGus,\u201d as he was known, discerned a calling to the priesthood through the mentorship of a local Irish priest. But no seminary in the United States would accept him because of his skin color.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He was eventually accepted to study for the priesthood in Rome, and came here, to the Pontifical Urban University, in 1880. Six years later, he was ordained a priest at St. John Lateran's by Cardinal Giovanni Simeoni. He then celebrated his first Mass at St. Peter's Basilica.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Fr. Tolton had expected to be sent as a missionary to Africa but was instead sent back to his home diocese in Illinois to serve the African-American community. Cardinal Simeoni explained to him the reason for this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAmerica has been called the most enlightened nation; we will see now whether it deserves that honor.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n As a priest, he went on to faithfully serve his local community for 11 years before dying of a heat stroke in July of 1897.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In June 2019, Pope Francis declared Fr. Tolton venerable, moving forward his cause for canonization. Fr. Tolton went from slave to priest, but many are praying that he will soon go from slave to priest to saint.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This is the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran, which is technically the cathedral of Rome, where the Pope's chair, as Bishop of Rome, is located. But there is a unique connection here to Catholicism in the United States: the first African-American priest was ordained here on April 24, 1886\u2014140 years ago. His name was Fr. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":758,"featured_media":89580,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"acf":{"video":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/0rtM9_-ymv8","video_descarga":"https:\/\/attuale.romereports.com\/news\/bagustustoltoneng.mp4","international_url":"https:\/\/attuale.romereports.com\/news\/bagustustoltonint.mp4","type":"bn","newsletter":"si"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89584"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/758"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89584"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89584\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":89587,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89584\/revisions\/89587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}