August 7: Like Leaven

Welcome to the American Catholic Daily Reader podcast. Today is August 7th, and our story is Like Levin. When the first edition of the American Catholic Tribune went to press in 1886, it announced, We will do what no other paper published by colored men has dared to do, give the great Catholic Church a hearing, and show that it is worthy of at least a fair consideration at the hands of our race, being as it is the only place on this continent where rich and poor, white and black, must drop prejudice at the threshold and go hand in hand to the altar.

The brainchild of Daniel Rudd, a former slave then living in Ohio, the American Catholic Tribune condemned segregation, supported civil rights, and called on black Catholics to be like Levin among their race by bringing more blacks into the church.

Rudd himself was born into slavery 32 years earlier, on August 7, 1854, in Bardstown, Kentucky. He was baptized Catholic as a baby and attended Mass with his parents in the same church where his owners worshipped. In that church, St. Joseph's, Rudd experienced his first taste of racial harmony. Convinced that the Catholic Church was the answer to America's race problem, Rudd moved to the North after the Civil War to complete his education.

He then started a successful business and launched his newspaper to form, encourage, and evangelize African Americans. Three years after the newspaper's launch, Rudd organized the first National Black Catholic Congress in Washington, D.C. Prominent black Catholics, including Father Augustine Tolton, came from across the country to discuss pressing problems of education and evangelization. They also met with President Grover Cleveland, who invited them to the White House.

Rudd would host four more such gatherings before his newspaper folded in 1897 and he returned to the South. In Arkansas, he worked as a businessman and civil rights leader until his health failed in 1932. He died in Bardstown a year later. In the late 1980s, the National Black Catholic Congress reformed. Today, it has a nationwide membership committed to carrying on Rudd's original mission. Rudd's example teaches us that courage can take the form of words, networks, and institutions, and that lasting change often begins with a committed individual willing to challenge societal norms.

Write a note or share a story with someone in your community, building that relationship. Thank you for listening to the American Catholic Daily Reader podcast. Join us tomorrow, August 8th, for another story of faith and courage in America.