John Timothy McNicholas | |
|---|---|
| Archbishop of Cincinnati | |
 | |
| See | Archdiocese of Cincinnati |
| Installed | August 12, 1925 |
| Term ended | April 22, 1950 |
| Predecessor | Henry K. Moeller |
| Successor | Karl Joseph Alter |
| Other post | Bishop of Duluth (1918–1925) |
| Orders | |
| Ordination | October 10, 1901 |
| Consecration | September 8, 1918 |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1877-12-15)December 15, 1877 |
| Died | April 22, 1950(1950-04-22) (aged 72) |
| Buried | Gate of Heaven Catholic Cemetery, Montgomery, Ohio, U.S. |
| Denomination | Roman Catholic Church |
John Timothy McNicholas,O.P. (December 15, 1877 – April 22, 1950) was anIrish-bornAmerican Catholic prelate who served asArchbishop of Cincinnati from 1925 to 1950. He previously served asBishop of Duluth from 1918 to 1925. McNicholas was a member of theDominican Order.
Timothy McNicholas was born inKiltimagh,County Mayo, the youngest of eight children of Patrick J. and Mary (née Mullany) McNicholas. In 1881, he and his family emigrated to theUnited States, where they settled inChester, Pennsylvania. He received his early education at Immaculate Heart of Mary School in Chester, and then attendedSt. Joseph's Preparatory College in Philadelphia.[1]
In 1894, at age 17, McNicholas entered theOrder of Friars Preachers (more commonly known as the Dominicans) atSt. Rose Priory in Springfield, Kentucky.[2] He continued his studies atSt. Joseph Priory inSomerset, Ohio.
McNicholas wasordained to thepriesthood at St. Joseph Priory by BishopHenry K. Moeller on October 10, 1901.[3] Following his ordination, the Dominicans sent McNicholas toRome to study at theirstudium at theBasilica Santa Maria sopra Minerva. He obtained aDoctor of Sacred Theology degree from there in 1904.[1]
McNicholas returned to Ohio later in 1904 and was appointedmaster of novices at St. Joseph Priory.[2] The following year, the Dominicans sent him toImmaculate Conception College in Washington, D.C., where he served as regent of studies and professor ofphilosophy, theology, andcanon law.[2] He contributed a number of articles to theCatholic Encyclopedia.[4]
In 1909, McNicholas was appointed the national director of theHoly Name Society, headquartered in New York City.[1] He also served as the firsteditor of theHoly Name Journal and as pastor ofSt. Catherine of Siena Parish in Manhattan[1] He returned to Rome in 1917 to become an assistant to themaster of the Order of Preachers and a professor of theology and canon law at thePontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas.[2]
On July 18, 1918, McNicholas was appointed the second bishop of Duluth byPope Benedict XV. He received hisepiscopalconsecration in Rome at the Santa Maria sopra Minerva on September 8, 1918, from CardinalTommaso Pio Boggiani, with ArchbishopBonaventura Cerretti and BishopHermann Esser serving asco-consecrators.[3] His installation took place inDuluth on November 15, 1918.[3] The Vatican raised McNicholas to the rank of anassistant at the pontifical throne in 1923.[1]
In May 1925,Pope Pius XI named McNicholas as bishop of theArchdiocese of Indianapolis. He was succeeding BishopJoseph Chartrand, whom the pope appointed as archbishop of Cincinnati.[2][5] However, Chartrand rejected his appointment.[5] Instead, Pius XI appointed McNicholas as the fourth archbishop of Cincinnati on July 8, 1925.[3] His installation took place atSt. Peter in Chains Cathedral in Cincinnati on August 12, 1925.[3]
The1928 U.S. presidential election featured New York GovernorAl Smith as the first Catholic presidential candidate in American history. Some people raised concerns that, as president, Smith would take orders from church leaders in Rome. McNicholas declared. "We, as American Catholics, owe no civil allegiance to theVatican State."[6] Smith lost the election to USSecretary of CommerceHerbert Hoover.
After the conversion of 70African-Americans in the archdiocese to Catholicism, McNicholas said,
"I earnestly ask all our colored citizens to consider the position of the Catholic Church, to study her teachings, to realize that her ceremonials, her processions, her music, are full of a profound meaning which, if understood, could not fail to stir the deepest emotion of the colored race."[7]
During his tenure as archbishop, McNicholas raised the level of Catholic education at all levels throughout the archdiocese and the country. He served as president-general of theNational Catholic Education Association (1946–1950) and national chairman of the Catholic Student Mission Crusade. He held a 13-year membership on the Episcopal Committee for Confraternity of Christian Doctrine.[2] McNicholas also served on the board ofCatholic University of America. Between 1945 and 1950, he held five terms as chair of the Administration Board of theNational Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC).[2]In 1948, PopePius XII wrote to McNicholas, as NCWC chair, urging the United States Government to accept Europeandisplaced persons as immigrants.[8] The letter, later quoted in the 1952 Vatican documentExsul Familia on the rights of refugees, declares that such refugees sometimes have a right innatural law to be admitted to rich countries:
"The sovereignty of the State, although it must be respected, cannot be exaggerated to the point that access to this land is, for inadequate or unjustified reasons, denied to needy and decent people from other nations, provided of course, that the public wealth, considered very carefully, does not forbid this."[8]
On April 22, 1950, at age 72, John McNicholas died from aheart attack at his residence in theCollege Hill neighborhood of Cincinnati.[9]Archbishop McNicholas High School in Cincinnati was named in his honor.[10]
In 1938, McNicholas condemned the persecution ofJews inNazi Germany and elsewhere, declaring that the German treatment of Jews "deserves the condemnation of all right-thinking men" and was "irrational and inhuman."[9] He also denounced the policies of the "madmanHitler" and said that there was "little essential difference between his brand offascism and theBolshevism ofStalin."[9] That same year, McNicholas issued a pastoral letter in which he wrote,
"Governments that have no fixed standards of morality, and consequently no moral sense, can scarcely settle the question of war on moral grounds for Christians ... who see and know the injustice of practically all wars in our modern pagan world. There is the very practical question for informed Christians who acknowledge the supreme dominion of God ... Will such Christians in our country form a mighty league of conscientious non-combatants?"[11]
In 1931, McNicholas joined clergymen of various faiths in participating "The Church in the Air", aCBS radio program.[9] However, he strongly prohibited Catholics from his archdiocese from participating in non-Catholic religious ceremonies, saying,
"The Catholic Church cannot give the impression that one religion is as good as another or that she must strive with those of other faiths for a common denominator in religion."[12]
In response to ArchbishopAmleto Giovanni Cicognani's call for a movement to counteract the influence of "salacious cinema",[6] McNicholas in 1933 founded the Catholic Legion of Decency (later renamed theNational Legion of Decency) .[13] The organization, which claimed at its high point a membership of 22,000,000, sought to influence decency standards in filmmaking and boycott films that it deemed offensive to Catholic teaching.
During theGreat Depression of the 1930s, McNicholas advocated "conscription of excess wealth" as "wholly in harmony with the principles of Christian social justice" and named extreme concentration of wealth as one of the "crimes of the country".[9] He also said the state could not place on charity the full burden of caring for the unemployed.[9]
This article incorporates text from this source, which is in thepublic domain.
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| Preceded by | Bishop of Duluth 1918–1925 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Archbishop of Cincinnati 1925–1950 | Succeeded by |
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