Mary Brackett Willcox and Catholicism in the Suburbs
A New England Puritan becomes a prominent and influential Catholic in the Diocese of Philadelphia. An unlikely story but one that happened to Mary Brackett. Mary was born in 1796 in Massachusetts to Captain James Brackett and Elizabeth Odiorne.[1] In 1819, she married James Mark Willcox from Ivy Mill, PA.[2]
Irish Catholics and Secret Societies
The Catholic Church has a long history of opposing secret societies, partly because of the oaths of loyalty involved in such groups. Nevertheless, during the 1800s there were two major organizations that attracted numbers of Irish Catholics: the Fenian Brotherhood and the Molly Maguires. The Fenian Brotherhood was founded in
Catholic Philopatrian Literary Institute
The oldest Catholic lay educational society in America was founded on December 22, 1850 by Father Edward Sourin (later a member of the Society of Jesus).[1] Named, Catholic Philopatrian Literary Institute, it was organized as a fraternal setting in which young Catholic men could “cultivate and improve the minds… and
Papal Infallibility
A hundred and fifty years ago, the First Vatican Council gave formal definition to the dogma of Papal Infallibility. While the idea of Papal Infallibility had a long history of support within the Catholic Church, such as from St. Francis de Sales in the 1500s, declaring it an official dogma