Christian: Catholic - papacy and episcopacy

Dubois, John (24 August 1764–20 December 1842), Catholic bishop and educator, was born in Paris, France. Nothing is known of his parents. He received his education at the Collège of Louis le Grand, the Seminary of St. Magloire, and the Sorbonne. He was ordained a priest by the archbishop of Paris on 22 September 1787 and was assigned as a curate to the large parish of Saint Sulpice, where he also served as chaplain to a mental institution and a group of nuns. With the help of the ...

DuBourg, Louis William Valentine (probably 10 January 1766–12 December 1833), archbishop and educator, was born Louis-Guillaume-Valentin DuBourg at Cap Français, Santo Domingo, the son of Marguerite Armand de Vogluzan and Pierre DuBourg, chevalier de la Loubère et Saint-Christaud, Sieur de Rochemont. Pierre was a licensed sea captain who prospered from wholesale trade and plantations. From the age of two, William was raised by his maternal grandparents in Bordeaux, where he excelled at the local Royal College of Guyenne. He then studied in Paris at the Seminary of Saint Sulpice and the Sorbonne. On 20 March 1790, less than a year after the fall of the Bastille, DuBourg was ordained a Catholic priest by Antoine-Eléonore-Léon Leclerc de Juigné, archbishop of Paris, and he was urged to direct his talents toward education....

Haid, Leo Michael (15 July 1849–24 July 1924), abbot-bishop and educator, was born Michael Hite in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, the son of John Hite, a cooper and nurseryman, and Mary A. Stader (sometimes given as Stetter), later a domestic. The Hites named the fourth of ten children and their third son Michael at birth, but upon entering monastic life (1868) he acquired the religious name Leo; by 1872 the spelling of his surname had been altered to Haid, apparently to appease American pronunciation. He was raised in modest circumstances by his immigrant parents. Devout Catholics, the Hites had settled in Westmoreland County to be near the Benedictine monastery of Saint Vincent. In 1861, after his father’s death and mother’s remarriage, Haid assumed residence at Saint Vincent as a pupil in the monks’ school. He won respect there as a boy of intelligence and character....

Heiss, Michael (12 April 1818–26 March 1890), Roman Catholic educator and bishop, was born in Pfahldorf, Germany, the son of a peasant couple, Joseph Heiss and Gertrude Frei. From 1835 to 1839, he attended the University of Munich, where he came under the influence of theologians such as Johann Adam Mohler and Johann Joseph von Gorres. He completed his studies for the priesthood at Eichstätt and was ordained in Nymphenburg in 1840....

McNicholas, John Timothy (15 December 1877–22 April 1950), archbishop and educational leader, was born in Treenkeel, County Mayo, Ireland, the son of Patrick McNicholas, a steel mill laborer, and Mary Mullany. The family immigrated to the United States in 1881 and settled in Chester, Pennsylvania, a port of entry on the Delaware River about fourteen miles from Philadelphia. At the age of seventeen, John entered the Dominican order at St. Rose Priory in Kentucky and was ordained to the priesthood on 10 October 1901 at St. Joseph Priory in Somerset, Ohio. He then spent three years in Rome, earning a doctorate in theology and gaining many influential friends both in the upper echelons of the Dominican order and in the Roman Curia....

McQuaid, Bernard John (15 December 1823–18 January 1909), Catholic bishop and educator, was born in New York City, the son of Mary Maguire and Bernard McQuaid, a laborer. Orphaned at the age of ten, McQuaid found refuge with the Sisters of Charity and under their influence decided to enter the priesthood. After attending local schools he studied at Chambly College near Montreal and finished his training at St. Joseph’s, the diocesan seminary in Fordham, New York. Precarious health made him less gregarious than other students, but after ordination in 1848 he proved to be a dynamic ecclesiastical administrator. Beginning with his first pastorate, St. Vincent’s Church in Madison, New Jersey, he preached energetically and organized Catholic schools in the surrounding counties....

O’Hara, Edwin Vincent (06 September 1881–11 September 1956), Roman Catholic bishop and educator, was born on the family farm near Lanesboro, Minnesota, the son of Owen O’Hara and Margaret Nugent. After absorbing academic rudiments in public schools, O’Hara decided to enter the priesthood and in 1898 began study at St. Thomas College in St. Paul, Minnesota. Two years later he moved to the adjacent St. Paul Seminary for theological training and received ordination in 1905. He was recruited for service farther west and served as assistant pastor from 1905 to 1911 and then pastor until 1920 of St. Mary’s Cathedral in Portland, Oregon....