Kevin's Corner 06-13-10
A VERY SIGNIFICANT CENTENNIAL: A century ago last weekend Stephen Theobald was ordained to the priesthood. Theobald had been born in British Guyana in 1874, studied law in Guyana and journalism in England, and then went to work for a Canadian newspaper. When Archbishop John Ireland and Claver founder Fredrick McGhee learned that this young man of African descent wanted to become a priest, they brought him from Montreal to the Twin Cities. He studied for five years at the Saint Paul Seminary and was ordained for service on June 5, 1910. It is hard now to imagine just how many barriers stood between Theobald’s ambition and its fulfillment on that June morning in the Cathedral. This was the era of the virulent spread of Jim Crow in the U.S. South and of ethnic cleansing in the North. Although the Archbishop had explicitly ordered that his Seminary be racially integrated when founded in 1885, only a handful of Black priests were ordained in the entire United States in the next twenty years. One of the two leading Catholic church leaders of his day, John Ireland was not welcomed to speak in many U.S. dioceses – his aggressive advocacy of civil rights for all Americans was an embarrassment for co-religionists who had made their peace with racism. But Stephen Theobald found his home in the Twin Cities through the partnership that the Archbishop had forged with Fredrick McGhee, about whom you have read much here. McGhee and Ireland would not live to see the tenth anniversary of Theobald’s ordination. But so important were they to the ordination of the first Black priest of our Archdiocese that, a century later, we are still waiting for the ordination of the second.
REMEMBERING FATHER THEOBALD WITHIN CLAVER: When I came to this parish twenty years ago, there were relatively few parish members with a first hand, adult memory of Father Theobald. He served at Saint Peter Claver for more than a generation, from a few months after his ordination until his death. But his life ended prematurely as a result of a ruptured appendix (almost always fatal in those days before good antibiotics became available) and he died at 58 years of age on July 5, 1932. Clavers who were already adults before his passing were in their 80’s by the time that I had a chance to interview them. Those old enough to have sought his spiritual counsel or to remember his preaching described him as brilliant and profoundly holy. But they also agreed with those who were children or teenagers in the 1910’s and 20’s: Father Theobald was both personally remote and a strict disciplinarian. Bill Gardner told me about the time their pastor caught a fellow altar boy and himself committing some innocent high jinks during Mass in the 1920’s: his punishment was to recite an entire Rosary while kneeling on the metal grate over the “one-lung” furnace that heated the old church at Aurora and Farrington. In his late 80’s when he told me the story, Mr. Gardner still winced with remembered pain from his fifteen minutes of young torture. Father Theobald was followed by a gregarious, ball-playing Irish-American priest who enjoyed a pint or two with the men of the parish, and so his personal reticence and shyness stood out all the more.
REMEMBERING FATHER THEOBALD BEYOND CLAVER: There are two groups of memories about Father Theobald outside of our parish. First, to Saint Paul-area Catholics of his day Father Theobald was a prized confessor renowned for his personal holiness. He started a weekly Novena to the Little Flower (Saint Therese of Lisieaux) that attracted many people to evening devotions and confession at Claver. I have heard from several sources – but have never been able to confirm with documents – that Father Theobald was called on by the Archbishop in the 1920’s to perform one of the very few formal exorcisms ever authorized in our Archdiocese. If the story is true, it speaks to the profound respect in which Theobald’s priestly character was held. Second, Rondo community members and national civil rights leaders found Father Theobald to be a determined civil rights advocate, knowledgeable in law and communications. For example, the Saint Paul Branch of the NAACP sent him as its delegate to the 1914 national convention, two years after the founding of the local branch and five years after the national organization’s founding. He was in demand around the nation as a Catholic defender of human rights in the 1920’s. His premature death caused an outpouring of grief from other-than-Catholic sources that was quite untypical in those pre-ecumenical days.
FATHER THEOBALD: CONCLUDING THE YEAR OF PRIESTS: This past week about fifteen thousand priests gathered with Pope Benedict XVI in a Roman ceremony marking the end of the Year for Priests. The Holy Father had designated the last twelve months as a time to remember individual priests and the entire priesthood with gratitude, to pray for and encourage more vocations to the priesthood, and to seek a renewal of priestly life among those of us who have the privilege to live it. I have thought of Stephen Theobald frequently in the last year (and, in fact, for the last two decades). What a privilege to succeed such a person! Would it not be wonderful if several young men from our parish took up his calling? Let’s pray for such an event soon. Happy 100th anniversary, Father Theobald!
ONE WORLD SINGING PRAISES: Next Saturday night, several of our parish choirs and individuals will be joined by friends from around the Twin Cities in a summer Christian music gathering. The concert “One World Singing Praises” takes place in our church starting at 6:30 PM. Refreshments are included. Come and join in the fun and the praise!
THE END OF A FINE SCHOOL YEAR: Saint Peter Claver Catholic School finished our 2009-10 school year on several positive notes this past week. Area public and non-public schools are finishing up as well. I will provide you with a fuller report here next week. Permit me now simply to thank you for all your support.
CLAVERS AT THE WINFIELD AWARDS: For over twenty years, baseball Hall of Famer Dave Winfield and family have honored area student-athletes. Last Sunday’s Winfield Awards were truly a Claver Fest. I do not have the space here this week to tell you about the wonderful honorees – but watch this column next week. You’ll be very proud.