St. John Neumann (1811-1860)

FEAST DAY: JANUARY 5
CANONIZATION: JUNE 19, 1977

St. John Neumann, the first U.S. bishop to be canonized, was a champion of the Catholic school system.

Born in Bohemia (now part of the Czech Republic) on March 28, 1811, he immigrated to the U.S. at 25 in hopes of becoming a priest; his bishop in Bohemia was not ordaining new clergy as they already had numerous priests.
Neumann was ordained in 1836 in Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. His first assignment was ministering to German immigrants in western New York. In 1840, he joined the Redemptorist Fathers, continuing missionary work in Maryland, Virginia, and Ohio, remaining ever popular with the Germans.

He became a U.S. citizen in 1848. While a parish priest in Baltimore, he was made the Redemptorists’ U.S. provincial superior. Then in 1852, he was appointed fourth bishop of Philadelphia, which was growing rapidly with European Catholic immigrants. There he greatly expanded Philadelphia’s Catholic school system, increasing enrollment from 500 to 9,000. He faced discouragement when enemies of Catholicism periodically burned down convents and schools he built.

Neumann collapsed and died on January 5, 1860 while doing errands in Philadelphia. Pope St. Paul VI beatified him in 1963 during Vatican II, and canonized him in 1977.