Charles Connor (1)

In the bloody Civil War that split our nation, American bishops worked for the success of the Union . . . and of the Confederacy! As Catholics slaughtered Catholics, pious priests on both sides prayed God to give success in battle. . . to their own side. Men in blue and men in gray flinched at the Consecration as cannonballs (fired by Catholic opponents) rained down on them during battlefield Masses.

Many are the moving and often surprising stories in these pages of brave Catholics on both show more sides of the conflict stories told by Fr. Charles Connor, one of our country s foremost experts on Catholic American history.

Through searing anecdotes and learned analysis, Fr. Connor here shows how the tumult, tragedy, and bravery of the War forged a new American identity, even as it created a new American Catholic identity, as Catholics often new immigrants found themselves on both sides of the conflict. show less

In this comprehensive history, Fr. Charles Connor details the life of Catholics in the American Colonies. It’s a tale that begins with the flight of English Catholics to religious freedom in Maryland in 1634, and continues through the post-Revolutionary period, by which time the constitutions of all but four of the first 13 states contained harsh anti-Catholic provisions.

Catholic readers will be proud to learn from these pages that despite almost two centuries of ever-more-intense show more religious persecutions and even harsher legal prohibitions, American Catholics in the colonies simply refused not to be Catholic. show less

A pretty good overview of Catholics in America before, during, and just after the Revolutionary War. I could have used more details, more depth but that's just me.

Classic Catholic Converts. Fr. Charles P. Connor. 2001. Brief, readable biographies of American and British converts to Catholicism as well as a good description of the Oxford Movement are included in this book as is a good bibliography of books written by these converts. I expected more in depth coverage, so I was a little disappointed