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National Geographic
15-05-2025
- Entertainment
- National Geographic
You can't tell the story of New Orleans without its Black Catholics
The revelation that Pope Leo XIV has Louisiana Creole roots shines a light on a community of Catholics that has shaped New Orleans, from a famous Voodoo priestess to the self-proclaimed inventor of jazz. A member of the Treme Brass Band plays during a concert marking the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina Concert at the historically black St. Augustine Catholic Church in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded in 1841, St. Augustine is the oldest Black parish in the United States and was the place of worship for some of the city's most influential historical figures. Photograph byThe election of Pope Leo XIV as the first American pontiff—and the subsequent revelation that he has Louisiana Creole roots—shines new light on a city long known for its vibrant mix of cultures and traditions. Indeed, it is impossible to speak of New Orleans without including the story of its Black Catholics. Black Catholicism in the Crescent City can be traced all the way back to the 15th-century European colonization of West Africa, the homeland of many of those brought against their will centuries later to Louisiana as part of the slave trade. 'When we talk about Black Catholics, we had people from the Kingdom of Kongo who were Catholic even before they came here,' says Ansel Augustine, a New Orleans native and the assistant director of African American Affairs for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. In New Orleans, the Catholicism practiced by French and Spanish settlers melded with the Catholicism and spiritual practices of the African diaspora, Augustine says. 'Thus, the birthing of the Black Catholic realities of New Orleans.' A group of boys and girls pose for a group portrait with St. Louis Cathedral in the background in New Orleans, Louisiana, circa 1975. It is the oldest continuously active Roman Catholic Cathedral in the United States. Photograph by Richard Laird/FPG/Today,the Archdiocese ofNew Orleans has one of the largest African-American populations for U.S. Catholic dioceses. But more than that, the city has been shaped by its Catholic community. Black Catholics played a role in some of the most important chapters of New Orleans history—from the origins of jazz to the earliest Black schools in America to the civil rights movement. Then there's Mardi Gras, the weeks-long Carnival celebration before the solemn Catholic season of Lent. While the latter is often more explicitly associated with religion, Carnival—with its Black Masking Indians, second line parades, living 'baby dolls,' and skeletons—is a noticeably Afrocentric moment on the Church calendar. Though not well known outside of New Orleans, these are the stories of the Catholics whose lives displayed their community's commitment to faith, justice, and innovation. How the 'Code Noir' shaped the birth of Black Catholicism The earliest colonial rulers in Louisiana were the Catholic kingdoms of France and Spain—and they tended to view marriage and procreation in terms of class. 'There was no blanket term of 'Black.' We don't really see that until the Americans take over,' says David Robinson-Morris, a Black Catholic scholar and consultant in New Orleans with REImaginelution. 'The French had the Code Noir, which dictated how people of color could move about in the world and in society.' Under these laws, interracial marriage was generally prohibited, mostly to perpetuate slavery and maintain an economic hierarchy. People of mixed race often intermarried within what became known as the 'Creole' community for reasons that became increasingly tied to wealth and status. Born in 1801, Marie Catherine Laveau was both a voodoo priestess and a devout Catholic. Her teachings helped preserve African spirituality in New Orleans as it melded together with European Catholicism. Photograph by IanDagnall Computing / Alamy Stock Photo One workaround was the system of plaçage, which allowed white men of status to cohabitate and procreate with Black Creole women outside of recognized Catholic marriages. This system is what produced many of the multiracial Black Catholics who came to shape the city's early history. Many well-known Catholics in New Orleans were of similar descent. Take the famous Voodoo priestess Marie Laveau, for example. She's best known for leading a robust, underground interreligious practice that helped preserve African spirituality in New Orleans. But she was also a lifelong practicing Catholic who had her children baptized in the Church. Then there was the philanthropist Marie Couvent, who left her wealth to a Catholic school for the indigent founded in 1840. Later backed by the Creole educator and entrepreneur Thomy Lafon, it was the first community school devoted to Black children in the Deep South. Ferdinand 'Jelly Roll Morton' Lamothe, another devout Catholic, helped pioneer the musical style later known as jazz in the city's red light district, also known as 'Storyville.' His earliest compositions came in the early 1900s, including the 'Jelly Roll Blues' and 'King Porter Stomp.' Devotion to education and living Catholic values Others in New Orleans made their mark through explicitly religious service tied to the Church. One standout was Henriette DeLille, a free-born woman who resisted the prevailing plaçage system. Her devout religious faith led her to not only reject her suitors, but also to found the Sisters of the Holy Family in 1836, an order of nuns dedicated to serving the poor and enslaved. They opened one of the nation's oldest senior care centers, Lafon Nursing Facility, in 1842 and one of the city's oldest schools, St. Mary's Academy, in 1867. 'Mother Henriette has left a legacy that can't be disputed,' says Alicia Costa, who has served as superior general of the Holy Family Sisters since 2022. 'We're still working and Henriette is really our model.' DeLille is now on the path to sainthood, making her one of the most emblematic figures among New Orleans Black Catholics and the larger region, who invoke her name weekly in an official prayer distributed by the local archdiocese. St. Katharine Drexel, a white Philadelphia heiress who founded the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, opened the nation's first Black Catholic institution of higher education, Xavier University of Louisiana, in 1925. It has since gone on to produce some of the nation's most prominent Black achievers, and more Black medical professionals than almost any other school in America The Josephites, another Catholic religious community founded to serve African Americans, also has a long history in New Orleans. Their priests and religious brothers have served in the city since 1909 and founded a historic all-boys Black Catholic high school, St. Augustine, in 1951. 'The Josephites served in the Greater New Orleans Urban League, even as president, and fought for equal housing and job opportunities,' says Roderick Coates, a Josephite priest in Louisiana. 'They helped found Christopher Housing for seniors and low-income people [and] served on the Board of Education for New Orleans Public Schools.' Civil rights and the Catholic Church Catholic activism characterized much of the city's presence in the Black liberation struggle, especially out of Tremé—the nation's oldest Black neighborhood. The civil rights attorney A.P. Tureaud, Sr., battled Jim Crow from his office at the headquarters of the Knights of Peter Claver and Ladies Auxiliary, a Black Catholic fraternal order of which he was a member. A mile away, local restaurateurs Leah and Edgar 'Dooky' Chase II—both Catholic—hosted Martin Luther King, Jr., and other movement activists for closed-door planning meetings. President Norman C. Francis of Xavier University in New Orleans shakes hands with Pope John Paul II after appearing before the United Nations committee against apartheid in a special session to pay tribute to the late Dr Martin Luther King, Jr., in 1980. He was the first Black president of the school, which itself was the nation's first Black Catholic institution of higher education. Photograph by Afro American Newspapers/Gado/Getty Images Homer Plessy—of the landmark Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson that upheld Louisiana's law on 'separate but equal' facilities—resisted segregation as a Catholic connected to the city's most historic Black church, St. Augustine. Norman C. Francis, a Black Catholic and dean of men at Xavier University of Louisiana, also helped play a role in the Civil Rights Movement, offering a dormitory as a hub for the Freedom Riders in 1961 amid white supremacist violence in the city. 'All of this is connected with our Black Catholic heritage and our faith, telling us to use spaces, places, gifts, and strength to create a more just society,' says Augustine. While Hurricane Katrina in 2005 reshaped much of New Orleans and its tangible Black Catholic heritage, the city has remained resilient. 'Remember, New Orleans is older than the country. It is a city in America, but it's not an American city,' says Robinson-Morris. 'We're talking about African culture, literally from the motherland, colliding with Afro-Caribbean culture. We're talking about French culture and Native American and Spanish culture, and all of the various ways those cultures are expressed.' It is precisely this sort of cultural and ethnic admixture that has come to bear with the new Pope Leo XIV, whose ancestry exhibits a typical New Orleans ambiguity that is still American in its own way. While he has not publicly spoken on the details of his mother's Black and Catholic Creole beginnings in New Orleans, it is clear that the background of the first American pope is as complex—and as providential—as the country's own genesis. 'Long before he was the pope, when he was just a priest and a cardinal, he mentioned that one of the reasons to a vocation was because all the neighborhood priests were always in and out of his house because they liked his mom's cooking,' says Jari Honora, the genealogist who discovered the pope's Creole roots. 'Now we know why, because his mom—both maternal and paternal—was straight out of New Orleans.' Nate Tinner-Williams is cofounder and editor of Black Catholic Messenger, an independent, nonprofit digital media publication covering stories of interest to African-American Catholics. He is a master's student in theology at Xavier University of Louisiana's Institute for Black Catholic Studies and a contributing writer for the Boston Globe.
Yahoo
10-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Pope Leo XIV's Creole heritage highlights complex history of racism and the church in America
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The new pope's French-sounding last name, Prevost, intrigued Jari Honora, a New Orleans genealogist, who began digging in the archives and discovered the pope had deep roots in the Big Easy. All four of Pope Leo XIV's maternal great-grandparents were 'free people of color' in Louisiana based on 19th-century census records, Honora found. As part of the melting pot of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures in Louisiana, the pope's maternal ancestors would be considered Creole. 'It was special for me because I share that heritage and so do many of my friends who are Catholic here in New Orleans,' said Honora, a historian at the Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum in the French Quarter. Honora and others in the Black and Creole Catholic communities say the election of Leo — a Chicago native who spent over two decades in Peru including eight years as a bishop — is just what the Catholic Church needs to unify the global church and elevate the profile of Black Catholics whose history and contributions have long been overlooked. A rich cultural identity Leo, who has not spoken openly about his roots, may also have an ancestral connection to Haiti. His grandfather, Joseph Norval Martinez, may have been born there, though historical records are conflicting, Honora said. However, Martinez's parents — the pope's great-grandparents — were living in Louisiana since at least the 1850s, he said. Andrew Jolivette, a professor of sociology and Afro-Indigenous Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, did his own digging and found the pope's ancestry reflected the unique cultural tapestry of southern Louisiana. The pope's Creole roots draw attention to the complex, nuanced identities Creoles hold, he said. 'There is Cuban ancestry on his maternal side. So, there are a number of firsts here and it's a matter of pride for Creoles," said Jolivette, whose family is Creole from Louisiana. 'So, I also view him as a Latino pope because the influence of Latino heritage cannot be ignored in the conversation about Creoles.' Most Creoles are Catholic and historically it was their faith that kept families together as they migrated to larger cities like Chicago, Jolivette said. The former Cardinal Robert Prevost's maternal grandparents — identified as 'mulatto' and 'Black' in historical records — were married in New Orleans in 1887 and lived in the city's historically Creole Seventh Ward. In the coming years, the Jim Crow regime of racial segregation rolled back post-Civil War reforms and 'just about every aspect of their lives was circumscribed by race, extending even to the church,' Honora said. An American story of migration The pope's grandparents migrated to Chicago around 1910, like many other African American families leaving the racial oppression of the Deep South, and 'passed for white,' Honora said. The pope's mother, Mildred Agnes Martinez, who was born in Chicago, is identified as 'white' on her 1912 birth certificate, Honora said. 'You can understand, people may have intentionally sought to obfuscate their heritage,' he said. 'Always life has been precarious for people of color in the South, New Orleans included.' The pope's grandparents' old home in New Orleans was later destroyed, along with hundreds of others, to build a highway overpass that 'eviscerated' a stretch of the largely Black neighborhood in the 1960s, Honora said. A former New Orleans mayor, Marc Morial, called the pope's family's history, "an American story of how people escape American racism and American bigotry.' As a Catholic with Creole heritage who grew up near the neighborhood where the pope's grandparents lived, Morial said he has contradictory feelings. While he's proud of the pope's connection to his city, Morial said the new pontiff's maternal family's shifting racial identity highlights 'the idea that in America people had to escape their authenticity to be able to survive.' African American influence on Catholicism The Rev. Ajani Gibson, who heads the predominantly Black congregation at St. Peter Claver Church in New Orleans, said he sees the pope's roots as a reaffirmation of African American influence on Catholicism in his city. 'I think a lot of people take for granted that the things that people love most about New Orleans are both Black and Catholic,' said Gibson, referring to rich cultural contributions to Mardi Gras, New Orleans' jazz tradition and brass band parades known as second-lines. He hoped the pope's Creole heritage — emerging from the city's 'cultural gumbo pot' — signals an inclusive outlook for the Catholic Church. 'I want the continued elevation of the universal nature of the church — that the church looks, feels, sounds like everybody,' Gibson said. 'We all have a place and we come and bring who we are, completely and totally, as gifts to the church.' Shannen Dee Williams, a history professor at the University of Dayton, said she hopes that Leo's 'genealogical roots and historic papacy will underscore that all roads in American Catholicism, in North, South and Central America, lead back to the church's foundational roots in its mostly unacknowledged and unreconciled histories of Catholic colonialism, slavery and segregation.' 'There have always been two trans-Atlantic stories of American Catholicism; one that begins with Europeans and another one that begins with Africans and African-descended people, free and enslaved, living in Europe and Africa in the 16th century,' she said. 'Just as Black history is American history, (Leo's) story also reminds us that Black history is, and always has been, Catholic history, including in the United States.' Hope for the future Kim R. Harris, associate professor of African American Religious Thought and Practice at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, said the pope's genealogy got her thinking about the seven African American Catholics on the path to sainthood who have been recognized by the National Black Catholic Congress, but haven't yet been canonized. Harris highlighted Pierre Toussaint, a philanthropist born in Haiti as a slave who became a New York City entrepreneur and was declared 'Venerable' by Pope John Paul II in 1997. 'The excitement I have in this moment probably has to do with the hope that this pope's election will help move this canonization process along,' Harris said. While it's not known how Leo identifies himself racially, his roots bring a sense of hope to African American Catholics, she said. 'When I think about a person who brings so much of the history of this country in his bones, I really hope it brings to light who we are as Americans, and who we are as people of the diaspora,' she said. "It brings a whole new perspective and widens the vision of who we all are.' Reynold Verret, president of Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans, the only historically Black Catholic university, said he was 'a little surprised' about the pope's heritage. 'It's a joyful connection,' he said. 'It is an affirmation that the Catholic Church is truly universal and that (Black) Catholics remained faithful regardless of a church that was human and imperfect. It also shows us that the church transcends national borders.' ___ Bharath reported from Los Angeles. ___ Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
The Independent
10-05-2025
- General
- The Independent
Pope Leo XIV's Creole heritage highlights complex history of racism and the church in America
The new pope's French-sounding last name, Prevost, intrigued Jari Honora, a New Orleans genealogist, who began digging in the archives and discovered the pope had deep roots in the Big Easy. All four of Pope Leo XIV's maternal great-grandparents were 'free people of color' in Louisiana based on 19th-century census records, Honora found. As part of the melting pot of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures in Louisiana, the pope's maternal ancestors would be considered Creole. 'It was special for me because I share that heritage and so do many of my friends who are Catholic here in New Orleans,' said Honora, a historian at the Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum in the French Quarter. Honora and others in the Black and Creole Catholic communities say the election of Leo — a Chicago native who spent over two decades in Peru including eight years as a bishop — is just what the Catholic Church needs to unify the global church and elevate the profile of Black Catholics whose history and contributions have long been overlooked. A rich cultural identity Leo, who has not spoken openly about his roots, may also have an ancestral connection to Haiti. His grandfather, Joseph Norval Martinez, may have been born there, though historical records are conflicting, Honora said. However, Martinez's parents — the pope's great-grandparents — were living in Louisiana since at least the 1850s, he said. Andrew Jolivette, a professor of sociology and Afro-Indigenous Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, did his own digging and found the pope's ancestry reflected the unique cultural tapestry of southern Louisiana. The pope's Creole roots draw attention to the complex, nuanced identities Creoles hold, he said. 'There is Cuban ancestry on his maternal side. So, there are a number of firsts here and it's a matter of pride for Creoles," said Jolivette, whose family is Creole from Louisiana. 'So, I also view him as a Latino pope because the influence of Latino heritage cannot be ignored in the conversation about Creoles.' Most Creoles are Catholic and historically it was their faith that kept families together as they migrated to larger cities like Chicago, Jolivette said. The former Cardinal Robert Prevost's maternal grandparents — identified as 'mulatto' and 'Black' in historical records — were married in New Orleans in 1887 and lived in the city's historically Creole Seventh Ward. In the coming years, the Jim Crow regime of racial segregation rolled back post-Civil War reforms and 'just about every aspect of their lives was circumscribed by race, extending even to the church,' Honora said. An American story of migration The pope's grandparents migrated to Chicago around 1910, like many other African American families leaving the racial oppression of the Deep South, and 'passed for white,' Honora said. The pope's mother, Mildred Agnes Martinez, who was born in Chicago, is identified as 'white' on her 1912 birth certificate, Honora said. 'You can understand, people may have intentionally sought to obfuscate their heritage,' he said. 'Always life has been precarious for people of color in the South, New Orleans included.' The pope's grandparents' old home in New Orleans was later destroyed, along with hundreds of others, to build a highway overpass that 'eviscerated' a stretch of the largely Black neighborhood in the 1960s, Honora said. A former New Orleans mayor, Marc Morial, called the pope's family's history, "an American story of how people escape American racism and American bigotry.' As a Catholic with Creole heritage who grew up near the neighborhood where the pope's grandparents lived, Morial said he has contradictory feelings. While he's proud of the pope's connection to his city, Morial said the new pontiff's maternal family's shifting racial identity highlights 'the idea that in America people had to escape their authenticity to be able to survive.' African American influence on Catholicism The Rev. Ajani Gibson, who heads the predominantly Black congregation at St. Peter Claver Church in New Orleans, said he sees the pope's roots as a reaffirmation of African American influence on Catholicism in his city. 'I think a lot of people take for granted that the things that people love most about New Orleans are both Black and Catholic,' said Gibson, referring to rich cultural contributions to Mardi Gras, New Orleans' jazz tradition and brass band parades known as second-lines. He hoped the pope's Creole heritage — emerging from the city's 'cultural gumbo pot' — signals an inclusive outlook for the Catholic Church. 'I want the continued elevation of the universal nature of the church — that the church looks, feels, sounds like everybody,' Gibson said. 'We all have a place and we come and bring who we are, completely and totally, as gifts to the church.' Shannen Dee Williams, a history professor at the University of Dayton, said she hopes that Leo's 'genealogical roots and historic papacy will underscore that all roads in American Catholicism, in North, South and Central America, lead back to the church's foundational roots in its mostly unacknowledged and unreconciled histories of Catholic colonialism, slavery and segregation.' 'There have always been two trans-Atlantic stories of American Catholicism; one that begins with Europeans and another one that begins with Africans and African-descended people, free and enslaved, living in Europe and Africa in the 16th century,' she said. 'Just as Black history is American history, (Leo's) story also reminds us that Black history is, and always has been, Catholic history, including in the United States.' Hope for the future Kim R. Harris, associate professor of African American Religious Thought and Practice at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, said the pope's genealogy got her thinking about the seven African American Catholics on the path to sainthood who have been recognized by the National Black Catholic Congress, but haven't yet been canonized. Harris highlighted Pierre Toussaint, a philanthropist born in Haiti as a slave who became a New York City entrepreneur and was declared 'Venerable' by Pope John Paul II in 1997. 'The excitement I have in this moment probably has to do with the hope that this pope's election will help move this canonization process along,' Harris said. While it's not known how Leo identifies himself racially, his roots bring a sense of hope to African American Catholics, she said. 'When I think about a person who brings so much of the history of this country in his bones, I really hope it brings to light who we are as Americans, and who we are as people of the diaspora,' she said. "It brings a whole new perspective and widens the vision of who we all are.' Reynold Verret, president of Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans, the only historically Black Catholic university, said he was 'a little surprised' about the pope's heritage. 'It's a joyful connection,' he said. 'It is an affirmation that the Catholic Church is truly universal and that (Black) Catholics remained faithful regardless of a church that was human and imperfect. It also shows us that the church transcends national borders.' ___ Bharath reported from Los Angeles. ___ Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
Associated Press
10-05-2025
- General
- Associated Press
Pope Leo XIV's Creole heritage highlights complex history of racism and the church in America
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The new pope's French-sounding last name, Prevost, intrigued Jari Honora, a New Orleans genealogist, who began digging in the archives and discovered the pope had deep roots in the Big Easy. All four of Pope Leo XIV's maternal great-grandparents were 'free people of color' in Louisiana based on 19th-century census records, Honora found. As part of the melting pot of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures in Louisiana, the pope's maternal ancestors would be considered Creole. 'It was special for me because I share that heritage and so do many of my friends who are Catholic here in New Orleans,' said Honora, a historian at the Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum in the French Quarter. Honora and others in the Black and Creole Catholic communities say the election of Leo — a Chicago native who spent over two decades in Peru including eight years as a bishop — is just what the Catholic Church needs to unify the global church and elevate the profile of Black Catholics whose history and contributions have long been overlooked. A rich cultural identity Leo, who has not spoken openly about his roots, may also have an ancestral connection to Haiti. His grandfather, Joseph Norval Martinez, may have been born there, though historical records are conflicting, Honora said. However, Martinez's parents — the pope's great-grandparents — were living in Louisiana since at least the 1850s, he said. Andrew Jolivette, a professor of sociology and Afro-Indigenous Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, did his own digging and found the pope's ancestry reflected the unique cultural tapestry of southern Louisiana. The pope's Creole roots draw attention to the complex, nuanced identities Creoles hold, he said. 'There is Cuban ancestry on his maternal side. So, there are a number of firsts here and it's a matter of pride for Creoles,' said Jolivette, whose family is Creole from Louisiana. 'So, I also view him as a Latino pope because the influence of Latino heritage cannot be ignored in the conversation about Creoles.' Most Creoles are Catholic and historically it was their faith that kept families together as they migrated to larger cities like Chicago, Jolivette said. The former Cardinal Robert Prevost's maternal grandparents — identified as 'mulatto' and 'Black' in historical records — were married in New Orleans in 1887 and lived in the city's historically Creole Seventh Ward. In the coming years, the Jim Crow regime of racial segregation rolled back post-Civil War reforms and 'just about every aspect of their lives was circumscribed by race, extending even to the church,' Honora said. An American story of migration The pope's grandparents migrated to Chicago around 1910, like many other African American families leaving the racial oppression of the Deep South, and 'passed for white,' Honora said. The pope's mother, Mildred Agnes Martinez, who was born in Chicago, is identified as 'white' on her 1912 birth certificate, Honora said. 'You can understand, people may have intentionally sought to obfuscate their heritage,' he said. 'Always life has been precarious for people of color in the South, New Orleans included.' The pope's grandparents' old home in New Orleans was later destroyed, along with hundreds of others, to build a highway overpass that 'eviscerated' a stretch of the largely Black neighborhood in the 1960s, Honora said. A former New Orleans mayor, Marc Morial, called the pope's family's history, 'an American story of how people escape American racism and American bigotry.' As a Catholic with Creole heritage who grew up near the neighborhood where the pope's grandparents lived, Morial said he has contradictory feelings. While he's proud of the pope's connection to his city, Morial said the new pontiff's maternal family's shifting racial identity highlights 'the idea that in America people had to escape their authenticity to be able to survive.' African American influence on Catholicism The Rev. Ajani Gibson, who heads the predominantly Black congregation at St. Peter Claver Church in New Orleans, said he sees the pope's roots as a reaffirmation of African American influence on Catholicism in his city. 'I think a lot of people take for granted that the things that people love most about New Orleans are both Black and Catholic,' said Gibson, referring to rich cultural contributions to Mardi Gras, New Orleans' jazz tradition and brass band parades known as second-lines. He hoped the pope's Creole heritage — emerging from the city's 'cultural gumbo pot' — signals an inclusive outlook for the Catholic Church. 'I want the continued elevation of the universal nature of the church — that the church looks, feels, sounds like everybody,' Gibson said. 'We all have a place and we come and bring who we are, completely and totally, as gifts to the church.' Shannen Dee Williams, a history professor at the University of Dayton, said she hopes that Leo's 'genealogical roots and historic papacy will underscore that all roads in American Catholicism, in North, South and Central America, lead back to the church's foundational roots in its mostly unacknowledged and unreconciled histories of Catholic colonialism, slavery and segregation.' 'There have always been two trans-Atlantic stories of American Catholicism; one that begins with Europeans and another one that begins with Africans and African-descended people, free and enslaved, living in Europe and Africa in the 16th century,' she said. 'Just as Black history is American history, (Leo's) story also reminds us that Black history is, and always has been, Catholic history, including in the United States.' Hope for the future Kim R. Harris, associate professor of African American Religious Thought and Practice at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, said the pope's genealogy got her thinking about the seven African American Catholics on the path to sainthood who have been recognized by the National Black Catholic Congress, but haven't yet been canonized. Harris highlighted Pierre Toussaint, a philanthropist born in Haiti as a slave who became a New York City entrepreneur and was declared 'Venerable' by Pope John Paul II in 1997. 'The excitement I have in this moment probably has to do with the hope that this pope's election will help move this canonization process along,' Harris said. While it's not known how Leo identifies himself racially, his roots bring a sense of hope to African American Catholics, she said. 'When I think about a person who brings so much of the history of this country in his bones, I really hope it brings to light who we are as Americans, and who we are as people of the diaspora,' she said. 'It brings a whole new perspective and widens the vision of who we all are.' Reynold Verret, president of Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans, the only historically Black Catholic university, said he was 'a little surprised' about the pope's heritage. 'It's a joyful connection,' he said. 'It is an affirmation that the Catholic Church is truly universal and that (Black) Catholics remained faithful regardless of a church that was human and imperfect. It also shows us that the church transcends national borders.' ___ Bharath reported from Los Angeles. ___ Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
New York Times
09-05-2025
- General
- New York Times
Live Updates: Leo XIV Vows to Lift Up ‘Ordinary People' in 1st Mass as Pope
Image of a grave marker in Chicago for members of the Martinez family, including the new pope's grandparents. Robert Francis Prevost, the Chicago-born cardinal selected on Thursday as the new pope, is descended from Creole people of color from New Orleans. The pope's maternal grandparents, both of whom are described as Black or mulatto in various historical records, lived in the city's Seventh Ward, an area that is traditionally Catholic and a melting pot of people with African, Caribbean and European roots. The grandparents, Joseph Martinez and Louise Baquié, eventually moved to Chicago in the early 20th century and had a daughter: Mildred Martinez, the pope's mother. The discovery means that Leo XIV, as the pope will be known, is not only breaking ground as the first U.S.-born pontiff. He also comes from a family that reflects the many threads that make up the complicated and rich fabric of the American story. The pope's background was unearthed Thursday by a New Orleans genealogist, Jari C. Honora, and confirmed to The New York Times by the pope's older brother, John Prevost, 71, who lives in the Chicago suburbs. 'This discovery is just an additional reminder of how interwoven we are as Americans,' Mr. Honora said in a text message late Thursday. 'I hope that it will highlight the long history of Black Catholics, both free and enslaved, in this country, which includes the Holy Father's family.' It's unclear whether the new pope has ever addressed his Creole ancestry in public, and his brother said that the family did not identify as Black. The announcement of his election in Rome focused on his early life in Chicago and decades of service in Peru. Mr. Honora, who works at the Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum in the French Quarter, began investigating the pope's background because of his French-sounding name, Prevost, but quickly found connections to the South instead. His trail of evidence linking Leo to New Orleans includes the grandparents' marriage certificate from their Seventh Ward wedding in 1887, a photo of the Martinez family grave marker in Chicago, and an electronic birth record of Mildred Martinez that shows she was born in Chicago in 1912. The birth record lists Joseph Martinez and 'Louis Baquiex' as Mildred's parents. The father's birthplace is listed as the Dominican Republic; the mother's, New Orleans. Mr. Honora also found records from the 1900 Census that list Mr. Martinez as 'Black,' his place of birth as 'Hayti,' and his occupation as 'cigar maker.' Mr. Martinez's details appear on the sixth line of a page of the census that Mr. Honora shared with The Times. 'Both Joseph Norval Martinez and Louise Baquié were people of color, no doubt about it,' Mr. Honora said. Joseph Martinez's exact place of birth remains a bit of a mystery — Mr. Honora also found an 1870 Census record that says the pope's maternal grandfather was born in Louisiana. But he said it was not uncommon for people to change their responses on officials records. Joseph Martinez and Louise Baquié married at Our Lady of the Sacred Heart in New Orleans. Until it was destroyed by a hurricane in 1915, the church building was on Annette Street in the city's Seventh Ward, a historic center of Afro-Creole culture. Creoles, also known as 'Creole people of color,' have a history almost as old as Louisiana. While the word Creole can refer to people of European descent who were born in the Americas, it commonly describes mixed-race people of color. Many Louisiana Creoles were known in the 18th and 19th centuries as 'gens de couleur libres,' or free people of color. Many were well educated, French-speaking and Roman Catholic. Over the decades, they established a foothold in business, the building trades and the arts, particularly music, with significant contributions to the development of jazz. They continue to be an important strand in the city's famously heterogeneous culture. The revelation of the new pope's heritage is a tremendous moment for the history of Louisiana Creoles, said Lolita Villavasso Cherrie, a co-founder with Mr. Honora of The Creole Genealogical and Historical Association. 'I hate to say it, but we feel, many of us, that our history was hidden from us,' said Ms. Villavasso Cherrie, 79, a retired teacher. In part, she said, that's because many Creoles have been able to 'pass' as white over the years. It was only with the advent of the internet, she said, that many people began to research their family history and became aware of their Creole roots. She noted that a significant number of Louisiana Creoles migrated to the Chicago area in the 20th century. John Prevost, the pope's brother, said that their paternal grandparents were from France, and that his father had been born in the United States. He said he and his brothers didn't discuss their Creole roots. 'It was never an issue,' John Prevost said. What all of this means, when it comes to the pope's racial identity, touches on some of the thorniest questions in U.S. society, but also reflects the rich diversity of the American experience. 'We are all just a few degrees (or less than a few degrees) removed from each other,' said Mr. Honora, the genealogist. Julie Bosman contributed reporting from Chicago. Susan C. Beachy contributed research.
