Running for president in 1928, Al Smith argued it was possible to be both a good Catholic and a faithful servant of the American people, writes Terry Golway. Even in losing, he changed U.S. history.
History
How the church can recognize the legacy of slavery and move toward reconciliation
The U.S. Catholic Church still has work to do toward racial reconciliation, writes America associate editor Olga Segura, and this summer’s 1619 Project in The New York Times provides a template worth considering.
From 1974: Why the President should be impeached
In the July 27, 1974 issue of America, the editors laid out the ground rules and implications of the impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon.
Review: Saint Teresa of Avila’s agony and ecstasy
The Life of Saint Teresa of Ávila is termed an “autohagiography,” a self-justification of saintliness, by Carlos Eire, a professor of history and religious studies at Yale University.
What 19th-century German anti-Catholicism can teach us about our own church
Despite the long and illustrious history of the Catholic Church in Germany, in the late 19th century Catholics became the great Other to modernizing, secularizing forces.
Boston’s archdiocese is expanding efforts to digitize their archives
A major expansion of the project will effectively double the number of parishioners whose names will be indexed in the digital archives.
Review: Latinos are protagonists in the American story
Rejecting the implications of the label “minority,” Carrie Gibson tells the entire 500-year history of Spanish-speaking peoples in what is now the United States.
A statue of George Washington in London reminds us that all empires fall
This statue, which was permitted by an excess of imperial pride, now serves as a symbol of the humbling inflicted by the vicissitudes of history, writes Matt Malone, S.J.
One teen’s quest to capture the stories of men who went to the moon
I wanted to know what it was really like to travel to the moon, but I realized that the only people who knew would not be around much longer.
An open letter to the only Catholic signer of the Declaration of Independence
Charles Carroll of Carrollton, as he became known, was a firm believer of religious liberty and an American Catholic pioneer, but his toleration of slavery was a failure of the greatest magnitude.
