On Nov. 6, 1789, just a few years after our country was founded, Bishop John Carroll was appointed the first bishop of Baltimore one of the first 13 colonies. Baltimore was the only diocese in the entire new found world where many Catholics escaped from religious persecution from Great Britain. Bishop Carroll worked for the establishment in the United States of institutions like St Mary’s Seminary for the training, education, and eventual ordination of nativeborn American priests. He also encouraged Roman Catholic religious orders to establish branches in the United States to open schools, hospitals, and centers for higher education. Bishop Carroll, with the aid of George Washington, was able to secure federal funds for missionaries to the Indians in the West which eventually led to new Catholics growing in America. Under Bishop Carroll the Roman Catholic community grew from around 20,000 to well over 200,000. The Catholic Church has been a founding partner in this country since inception. We should be proud that God and the Catholic Church have alway and will be at the core of the United States of America. We opened some of the first schools, hospitals, and higher learning education centers. Archbishop John Carroll wrote a beautiful prayer for the president and this infant country as it first began. Join me in an excerpt from Bishop Carroll’s prayer for a renewed sense of moral values, respecting all human life, peace, end to violence in our country/ world, and for our newly elected 47th President. “We pray O God of might, wisdom and justice, through whom authority is rightly administered, laws are enacted, and judgment decreed, assist with your Holy Spirit of counsel and fortitude the president of these United States, that his administration may be conducted in righteousness and be eminently useful to your people over whom he presides; by encouraging due respect for virtue and religion; by a faithful execution of the laws in justice and mercy; and by restraining vice and immorality. Let the light of your divine wisdom direct the deliberations of Congress, and shine forth in all the proceedings and laws framed for our rule and government, so that they may tend to the preservation of peace, the promotion of national happiness, the increase of industry, sobriety and useful knowledge; and may perpetuate to us the blessing of equal liberty.” (Archbishop John Carroll, 10 November, 1791). Fr. Roach
