St. John Neumann

Who they were

John Neumann was a Bohemian seminarian who could not get ordained at home, because his diocese had too many priests, so he crossed the Atlantic on hope and arrived in New York in 1836 with one suit of clothes and a letter that might be honoured. It was. Ordained within weeks, he took the missions of upstate New York on foot, joined the Redemptorists, and in 1852 was made Bishop of Philadelphia: a small man, barely five foot two, an immigrant with accented English, in a see of wealth and nativist riots, and openly convinced he was not up to it.

What he built says otherwise. The first unified diocesan school system in the United States, growing from two schools to nearly a hundred. Parishes at the rate of one a month. And confessions heard in the eight languages he had learned, including Gaelic, mastered so that Irish immigrants could confess in their own tongue, which is the man in one detail. He dropped dead on a street errand at forty eight, and was canonized in 1977, the first American bishop raised to the altars.

Why people turn to St. John Neumann

Catholic school families, teachers, and principals, since every parish school in the country stands in his lineage. Immigrants, alongside St. Frances Xavier Cabrini.

How to ask their intercession

At enrolment, at the school fundraiser, for a teacher by name, and in the job you are convinced you are too small for.