Father Augustine Tolton

In these fascinating pages, popular author and speaker Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers tells the gripping story of the first African American Catholic priest in the New World: Fr. Augustus Tolton. Mocked and ridiculed for his race, Fr. Tolton persisted in his vocation to the priesthood, despite being denied acceptance by every Catholic seminary in America. He was ordained to the priesthood in Europe and soon returned to America to serve the black communities in Massachusetts and Chicago. Fr. Tolton’s struggles tell the story of race in America and in the Catholic Church in the 19th Century, as well as the remarkable perseverance of a holy man who sought above all the salvation of souls.