St. John Neumann Prayer Card (PC-44)

PC-44 — St. John Neumann Prayer Card — Founder of Almost 100 American Catholic Schools

The immigrant bishop who built Catholic education in America — one school at a time

He arrived in New York in 1836 with one tattered suit of clothes and a dollar in his pocket. He had crossed the Atlantic from Bohemia — what is now the Czech Republic — because his own diocese had too many priests and would not ordain him. He spoke six languages. He had nowhere to go and no one waiting for him. He simply showed up at the bishop's door, and seventeen days later was ordained a priest for the German immigrant communities of upstate New York.

Born in 1811, John Nepomucene Neumann spent his early priesthood serving a parish that covered nearly a thousand square miles near Niagara Falls — mostly poor immigrant farmers who rarely saw a priest. He joined the Redemptorists, became their first member to profess vows in the United States, and in 1852 was appointed the fourth Bishop of Philadelphia at just forty-one years old. He did not want the job. He begged not to be made a bishop. He was known affectionately by his people as "Our Little Bishop" — a reference to his famously small stature. But what he accomplished in eight short years as bishop was staggering.

When he arrived in Philadelphia, there were two Catholic schools in the diocese. When he died suddenly of a heart attack on a Philadelphia street on January 5, 1860, at the age of forty-eight, there were nearly one hundred. He had organized them into the first diocesan Catholic school system in the history of the United States — a model that every American diocese would eventually follow. He also built eighty-nine churches, established the Forty Hours Devotion as a year-round practice, founded a new religious congregation, and championed the Eucharist as the center of Catholic life. Pope Paul VI canonized him on June 19, 1977, calling him "close to the sick, a friend of sinners, and the glory of all emigrants." He is the only male American citizen to be canonized a saint. His feast day is January 5th.

Perfect for: Catholic school communities, educators, teachers, immigrants, January 5th feast day, Philadelphia Catholics, and anyone inspired by the history of Catholic education in America.