In 1911, Wilbur Franklin Phelps founded The Menace, a weekly newspaper published in Aurora, Missouri. The paper was determined to promote its brand of socialist politics and to smear the Catholic Church with slanders and bigotry. And that’s why our founder, Father John Francis Noll, stepped in to launch Our Sunday Visitor.
Our paper’s function was by design and origin to teach the Faith, to defend the Church and to note the news (rather than report it). Our paper was to be a Catholic guide to the goings-on of the world, offering catechesis and a Catholic perspective.
The first decade
What did Father Noll’s sparing with The Menace look like? He took no prisoners. Father Noll wrote in the May 18, 1913, issue of Our Sunday Visitor:
“Any one issue (of The Menace) contains sufficient of the vile, unclean, and satanic spirit to bring discredit upon it, but no person possessed of a moderate degree of intelligence and fairness could read three or four specimen without being convinced of ‘whose spirit it is.'”
Father Noll went on to list some of the more outrageous assertions of the paper, such as the claim President Taft was secretly a Jesuit or that Catholics were secretly organizing militias to attack the U.S. at the pope’s command.
In the March 30, 1913, issue, Father Noll proposed a $10,000 reward for anyone who could prove the anti-Catholic provocations true. Much of the content of the first years of the paper addressed the hostilities of the day leveled against the Church by non-Catholics. But Father Noll took on many other topics, too. He wrote about his concerns about cultural trends, including immodest dancing and dress, famous conversions (like Buffalo Bill’s deathbed baptism), as well as began a series of articles that instructed would-be converts in question-and-answer form. “Father Smith Instructs Jackson” — as the series of articles was called — became a best-selling book and is still available today (OSV, $29.95).
Father Noll saw to it that his paper also covered world events, but always for the good of the Church. In 1918, Cardinal Gibbons wrote in defense of Pope Benedixt XV (who, being Italian, many Americans thought would ally the Church with Germany’s cause in the war):
More, perhaps, than any other single individual, our Holy Father, Pope Benedict XV, has suffered in this tragedy. Others bear only their own individual sorrows, but he bears the sorrows of all. … Though the triumph of justice always consoles him, he cannot help but mourn the slaughter of his spiritual children.
Throughout the war, Our Sunday Visitor advocated the cause of peace, likely recognizing that many readers would have been torn by loyalties to family and friends abroad. When the war finally was brought to an end, Father Noll wrote in the Nov. 24, 1918, issue:
The word a war-weary world has long awaited has come at last — peace. Let us now all hope and pray that the cessation of war will bring to the people of Germany and Austria-Hungary what our President claimed we of this country were fighting for — more liberty, more democracy in government.
The roaring Twenties
The war years gave way to a social revolution. Scientism as an ideology was on the rise. Margaret Sanger’s campaign of birth control propaganda drew national attention, as did the debate over evolution. In a 1922 issue, Father Bernard O’Reilly argued for the importance of the rights of Black Americans, particularly the right to education. Directly challenging white supremacist theories that considered African Americans inferior, Father O’Reilly wrote:
The strenuous champion in behalf of the negro race … should receive the encouragement and support of every American Catholic. Whatever may be the cause or explanation, it must be admitted that in the past we have not done our full duty toward our black brothers. The only proof needed is the small number of negroes who are Catholic.
Father Noll repeatedly denounced the Ku Klux Klan and its bigotry. In later years, Our Sunday Visitor consistently supported the Civil Rights movement and defended the priests and women religious who appeared in clerics and habits in non-violent demonstrations. Father Leo Farragher wrote in April 1965:
Since Selma, white people ask me frequently about the priests who went there. … To each questioner, I explain that these priests and the other clergymen went to Selma to protest the physical outrages to the Negroes and also to give an on-the-spot example of brotherly love and compassion for the oppressed.
Throughout the 1960s, Our Sunday Visitor ran many articles defending the Civil Rights movement, no doubt to the consternation of those who felt the Church should not have any role to play in our nation’s political life.
Father Noll defended attacks against Catholic schools, like an Oregon bill that aimed to make private schools illegal, and zealously supported the 1926 International Eucharistic Congress in Chicago (the first to be held in our nation). For Father Noll, the era drew to a close with one great concern: the rise of communism, the great enemy of the Faith.
The Depression era
When the stock market crashed on Oct. 24, 1929, and opened the Great Depression, Bishop Noll was ever ready with an encouraging word. In 1931, he wrote:
Comparatively few seem to be learning the lesson which is taught by the depression. … The evident lesson to rich and poor alike, to statesmen and economists, is that material prosperity is not within the power of man to provide permanently and that there are higher things for which a man should live.
As the episcopal chairman of Lay Organizations for the National Catholic Welfare Council, Bishop Noll oversaw the efforts of the National Council of Catholic Men (NCCM). The NCCM produced radio broadcasts, initially on NBC. The first of these programs, “The Catholic Hour,” debuted in 1929 and quickly became associated with its primary speaker, Fulton J. Sheen. Bishop Sheen was a regular in Our Sunday Visitor and wrote the following in a 1935 issue:
When I am asked what the Church means to me, I answer that it is the Temple of Life in which I am a living stone; it is the Tree of Eternal Fruit of which I am a branch; it is the Mystical Body of Christ on earth of which I am a member. The Church is therefore more to me than I am to myself; her life is more abundant than mine, for I live by union with her. She could live without me for I am only a cell in her body; but I could not live without her.
“Comparatively few seem to be learning the lesson which is taught by the depression. … The evident lesson to rich and poor alike, to statesmen and economists, is that material prosperity is not within the power of man to provide permanently and that there are higher things for which a man should live.”
— Bishop Noll, 1931
Throughout the 1930s, the paper labored to encourage people in living out their faith, in taking consolation in the spiritual life. The paper published facts about the Resurrection and excerpts from great thinkers like the famous cardinal, St. John Henry Newman. Other famous Englishmen graced the paper’s pages in this era, including Father Ronald Knox and the beloved apologists G.K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc. And Bishop Noll took on the moral controversies of the day. He wrote in a 1935 issue of the newspaper:
Mercy killings are murder in the eyes of the Catholic Church. Abortion is murder. Any direct, unprovoked taking of the life of another except in the case of just self-defense is murder. … Argue as long as we may, we shall never be able to justify the intrinsic wrongness of deliberate killing even for “mercy.”
And while Our Sunday Visitor would continue to grow, The Menace closed its doors in 1942.
Another war and the years after
By 1938, it was clear that another war was fast approaching. Bishop Noll’s efforts were directly aimed at keeping Catholics out of the conflict. World War II broke out in 1939, however, and in an issue of Our Sunday Visitor bearing the exact date of the war, an American priest, on tour in Europe, wrote about Nazi activities from Switzerland. Father John O’Brien urgently warned:
Christianity is fighting for its life in Germany today. The mighty power of the Nazi regime is pitted against historical Christianity with its Semitic background and its central figure of Jewish blood. The government is steadily applying step-by-step repressive measures to the Church which can have no other logical end than its complete eradication and the substitution of a new religion of race and blood.
Our Sunday Visitor continued to urge American Catholics to resist propagandistic efforts to be drawn into the war. The paper denounced the glorification of war. And Bishop Noll viewed with particular horror the idea that the U.S. might join forces with Russia. In July 1941 he wrote, “Today Beelzebub is fighting Beelzebub, and we should be on neither side.” When Imperial Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entered the war, Our Sunday Visitor greeted the news with grim determination in its December 21 issue: “The terrible eventuality which we have so long dreaded has now become a fact — our nation is at war with Japan, Germany, Italy, Romania, Hungary and Finland.”
Throughout the war years, Our Sunday Visitor would go on to support the war effort, but emphasized the importance of prayer and continued urging the cause of peace. Our Sunday Visitor’s celebration of the end of the war was muted, likely due to the terrible destruction wrought by the use of the atomic bomb.
In the 1940s and 1950s, Our Sunday Visitor was at the forefront of the fight against communism, which the Church saw as a direct threat to both religious freedom and human dignity. The newspaper regularly published articles warning Catholics about the dangers of atheistic Communism and urging them to stand firm in their faith. Articles on spirituality in this era were hopeful and confident.
Our Sunday Visitor lamented the loss of Eastern Europe to Soviet control and the fall of the missions in China. And in the post-war years, Our Sunday Visitor would face another loss: the passing of its founder on July 31, 1956.
Years of change
By the time John F. Kennedy ran for president, Our Sunday Visitor’s circulation had risen to over one million copies. And given that so much of the newspaper’s history had been given to fighting anti-Catholicism, the paper joyfully celebrated his victory. When President Kennedy was assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963, the paper somberly mourned his loss: “Seldom in our history have so many people from all walks of life been struck by the passing of the leader of a nation. And seldom have the tributes been so heartfelt and genuine.”
The Second Vatican Council (1962-65) ushered in a time of tremendous change within the Church. Our Sunday Visitor played a key role in helping Catholics understand the council’s teachings and the implications of that teaching on daily life. When Pope St. John XXIII called the council, Our Sunday Visitor described its significance in February 1959, saying:
The head of the corporation has called in his directors for a board meeting. That’s all there is to it. But because it is such a huge corporation, comprising one-third the human race, it is a rare event — there have been only 20 since the ascension of Our Lord — and so it makes history.
The newspaper provided extensive coverage of the council’s sessions and offered in-depth analysis of the documents that emerged from it. Our Sunday Visitor also helped Catholics navigate the liturgical changes that followed the council, including the introduction of the Mass in the vernacular and other reforms aimed at fostering greater participation in the liturgy. In the tumultuous years that followed, Our Sunday Visitor urged Catholics to continue to have confidence in the Church. On Dec. 3, 2000, Our Sunday Visitor lamented: “The long civil war in the Church over conscience, authority, liturgy and other hot buttons ignores the council’s great challenge: the universal call to holiness.”
During the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, Our Sunday Visitor faced the challenge of addressing the rapid changes in societal attitudes toward marriage, sexuality and family life. Through its columns and editorials, the newspaper sought to guide Catholics in navigating these changes while remaining faithful to Church teaching. Shortly before Humanae Vitae was promulgated, the newspaper ran an article contesting an editorial published in Commonweal that encouraged dissent. In the years that followed, Our Sunday Visitor sought to bring clarity in an age of tumultuous disagreement within the Church.
Our Sunday Visitor also helped Catholics navigate the liturgical changes that followed the [Second Vatican Council], including the introduction of the Mass in the vernacular and other reforms aimed at fostering greater participation in the liturgy.
Similarly, following the Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, the newspaper has consistently defended the Church’s pro-life stance and provided extensive coverage of the pro-life movement, offering both moral and practical support to Catholics involved in the cause.
Generally speaking, Our Sunday Visitor supported American involvement in Vietnam, though some articles expressing opposition can be found in its pages. After the U.S. pulled out of the war in February 1973, the paper ran an article that summarized how many American Catholics likely felt: “But now the thing is over, and we thank God. There is still that crawling feeling across the land that perhaps we have done an evil thing, and as long as that feeling exists, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to heal our wounds completely.”
Be not afraid
As summer turned to fall in 1978, two deaths occurred. One was expected, that of Pope St. Paul VI; the other was not. No one anticipated the death of Blessed Pope John Paul I, and neither did anyone foresee the election of his successor, Karol Wojtyla (Pope St. John Paul II).
The editor of Our Sunday Visitor, then Father Albert J. Nevins, MM, wrote enthusiastically about John Paul II’s 1979 visit to America. Among the many details of the trip, he recalled a conversation overheard by a reporter from Cleveland: “The man is fantastic. He’s covered all sorts of doctrine. But I wonder if it isn’t all an exercise in futility. How many Catholics do you think will read his talks and how many will act?”
Editors of Our Sunday Visitor |
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Archbishop John F. Noll: Editor in Chief, May 5, 1912 — May 18, 1947 |
By the time Pope St. John Paul II died, he had delivered thousands of speeches and homilies. When the pope passed, the paper printed a 64-page commemorative issue in which the editors dubbed the late pontiff “Shepherd to the World.” The cover of the April 24, 2005, issue of Our Sunday Visitor featured his silhouette, as the editors noted, “an image seen at so many pastoral moments around the world during these past 26 years.” Indeed, St. John Paul II is often considered the most widely seen person of the 20th century.
In the 1990s, Our Sunday Visitor celebrated John Paul II’s defeat of communism, condemned Bill Clinton’s deception of the American public (documented in the Starr report), and entered the digital age, launching www.osv.com in 1998.
Our Sunday Visitor mourned the Americans lost in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But continuing the paper’s commitment to not fan the flames of war, an editorial cautioned, “No act of terrorism can be justified, and we cannot exterminate terrorism by use of violence.” The paper likewise cautioned the American entrance into Iraq, calling for peace and underscoring the humanitarian risks to military action.
When the clerical sexual abuse crisis hit its apex in 2002, Our Sunday Visitor immediately responded by calling for transparency, accountability and justice. From that moment, the newspaper has taken a proactive role in reporting on the abuse crisis, holding Church leaders accountable, providing a platform for the voices of survivors and working to restore the trust of the faithful.
In the 2010s, Our Sunday Visitor took a Catholic look at the Occupy Wall Street movement, grieved for the innocent lives stolen in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, denounced efforts to redefine marriage, and warned Catholics of the threats to our religious liberty in the Obama administration’s HHS mandate.
Our Sunday Visitor witnessed the virtually unprecedented resignation of Pope Benedict XVI and praised his papacy, calling him “a pope of many surprises.” Weeks later, the paper welcomed the election of Pope Francis, hoping he would be a “bridge among the diverse and growing Catholic communities worldwide.”
Always forward
In 2013, Pope Francis presided over the canonization of the Franciscan friar Junipero Serra, held at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. In his homily for the occasion, the pope said, “The Church, the holy People of God, treads the dust-laden paths of history, so often traversed by conflict, injustice and violence, in order to encounter her children, our brothers and sisters.” As we celebrate the history of Our Sunday Visitor, we look forward to the next missionary chapter of our publication. The premiere of Our Sunday Visitor magazine is a missionary enterprise, setting out like the first missionaries who evangelized our country. We make St. Junipero’s motto our own as we joyfully say along with him: “Always forward!”