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  • Fathers on the Frontier: French Missionaries and the Roman Catholic Priesthood in the United States, 1789–1870
  • Joseph White
Fathers on the Frontier: French Missionaries and the Roman Catholic Priesthood in the United States, 1789–1870. By Michael Pasquier. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. 312 pp. $74.00.

Michael Pasquier uses a “lived religion” approach to explore “the practice of the Roman Catholic priesthood and the history of French [priest] missionaries in the United States,” 1789–1870. Finding most in the area “stretching from Maryland to Kentucky to Louisiana,” he situates them “in the context of southern history.” (13) An introductory tour d’horizon presents them adjusting seminary learning to the Holy See’s expectations and missionary realities (5–6), and coping with “vocational inadequacies.” His “scrutinizing” their “thoughts and actions” makes it possible “to discover how instrumental” a small group was “to the overall evolution of the Roman Catholic priesthood in the United States.” (6) His priests felt “uncertainty and contingency” but outwardly “confidence and strength” as “confrères to each other and pères to others.” (13) Supplying context “amply,” then “looking closely” at “ecclesiastical [End Page 82] politics” and priests’ “private conversations,” the study may “speak to the larger narrative of American Catholic history.” (10)

Letters published in the Annales of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, based in France, or originals in the Propaganda Fide Archives, University of Notre Dame Archives, and the United States Society of Priests of St. Sulpice Archives in Baltimore reveal the conversations. Several other archives hold relevant letters. Biographies and memoirs round out the sources.

The first of five topical chapters addresses “Missionary Formation and French Catholicism” to relate the first-generation missionaries’ aims in educating priesthood candidates and extending the church’s reach into the nation’s interior. Chapter two, “Missionary Experience and Frontier Catholicism,” explains superiors’ expectations as priests confronted local realities, including clerical behaviors and scandals. Chapter three, “Missionary Revival and Transnational Catholicism,” explores missionaries’ efforts to recruit priests from their homeland especially through the Annales. In chapter four, “Missionary Politics and Ultramontane Catholicism,” the Holy See’s Congregation of Propaganda Fide’s oversight in resolving church disputes, evangelization, and institutional development is central. Chapter five on “Slavery, Civil War, and Southern Catholicism,” the most interesting and readable part, addresses priests’ support for white southerners’ defense of slavery and the Confederate cause.

An array of recent studies of European and American culture inform the author’s reading of sources and interpretations. Transatlantic themes and Marcel Launay’s notion of the bons pretre of rural France are prominent. These works influence a vocabulary that readers may not easily grasp.

Pasquier’s focus on priests’ personal responses to a select number of issues raises the question of why he ignored essential dimensions governing priests’ lives found in the “old” history of United States Catholic clergy. As works of Robert F. Trisco, Robert J. Wister, E. Brooks Holifield, and Kevin E. McKenna reveal, the United States church’s mission status meant local congregations were “missions” not canonical parishes; all priests were “missionaries” or “on the mission” and lacked canonical rights. Bishops reassigned priests at will to meet rapidly changing needs and thereby stirred clerical resentment. In 1866 the United States bishops provided an appeals process that proved unworkable. Years of clerical frustration set off a national priests’ rights movement in 1868, lasting decades. Pasquier’s priests reveal no contact with such mainstream ecclesiastical politics.

Lacking understanding of various layers of authority limited the author’s grasp of the priests’ world. For instance, in stressing [End Page 83] Propaganda Fide’s authority over the United States church, its actions are consistently termed “mandates,” a misleading word for varied types of acts. As requested, Propaganda routinely granted faculties for ministry, dispensations related to sacraments, and authorization for activities of religious orders, thereby enabling ministries without much oversight. After 1829, the United States bishops’ collective requests for creating new dioceses and appointing their nominees for the episcopate were routinely granted. Propaganda set up the United States Church’s reputation for independence through permitting the United States bishops to legislate the canon law applicable in their national church through the...

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