On January 5, 1860 the Bishop of Philadelphia lay in the snow a few blocks from his new cathedral, St. Peter and Paul, on Logan Square. By the time a priest arrived with the holy oils, Bishop Neumann was already dead. By his own request, this holy man was buried in a crypt in Saint Peter’s Church on 5th and Girard to be with the other fellow Redemptorist priests. This place is now the National Shrine of St. John Neumann.
John Neumann was born in Bohemia in 1811. He studied to be priest at the University of Prague, but when he was to be ordained to the priesthood in 1835 the bishop decided not to ordain any more men since there was an exorbitant number of priests. Fully aware that he was called to the priesthood, John Neumann studied English as he worked in a factory with English-speaking workers and he wrote to the bishops in America to find out if they needed priests. The bishop of New York answered and agreed to ordain him. In 1836 the bishop of New York ordained him and John became one of 36 priests shepherding 200,000 Catholics. He was sent to western New York to a diocese that stretched from Lake Ontario to the border of Pennsylvania. His church had no steeple nor door, but it did not matter since he mostly traveled from village to village celebrating Mass and the sacraments. Due to the work and the isolation, John joined the Redemptorists, a religious congregation dedicated to parish and foreign missions. Later, he would become the superior of all of the Redemptorists in the United States and then Pope Pius IX named him bishop of Philadelphia in 1852.
Bishop Neumann was the first to organize the diocesan schedule of the Forty Hours’ Devotion in America. He was also renowned for establishing the first parochial school system under a diocesan board. Pope Pius XII in 1958 wrote that “the figure of Venerable John Neumann is pre-eminent. It was mainly through his prodigious efforts that a Catholic school system came into being and that parochial schools began to rise across the land.” Bishop Neumann was also the founder of a religious order for women, the Third Order of St. Francis of Glen Riddle, whose rule he wrote in 1855 after returning from Rome for the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. The School Sisters of Notre Dame regard Bishop Neumann as their second founder, “their father in America.”
In 1921 Pope Benedict XV declared Bishop John Neumann “Venerable.” In 1963 Pope Paul VI declared him “Blessed” John Neumann. Then the lower church was built at St. Peter at 5th and Girard where his remains, remarkedly well-preserved after a century, were exhumed and placed in a glass case under the altar in the lower church. Many devoted pilgrims came to pray to this holy man. In 1977 Pope Paul VI declared John Neumann a Saint in heaven.
Many have come from all over the world to honor this miraculous saint. Saint John Paul II made a point to visit the Shrine when he came to Philadelphia to attend the Eucharistic Congress in 1976. Seminarians from St. Charles Borromeo have made annual pilgrimages every year. Bishop Neumann had a special talent to learn languages such as French, Spanish, Italian, Gaelic and Dutch so that he could hear confessions in different languages. Many Irish have come to honor this Saint since he was the “foreigner’ who learned Irish to be able to hear the confessions of those who did not know English. In fact, one Irish woman remarked, “Isn’t it grand that we have an Irish bishop!” He mastered Italian and preached to them in their native language. In 1855 he purchased a Methodist Church in South Philadelphia and dedicated it to St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi, which is the first national parish for Italians in the United States.
The miracle that paved the way for sainthood for Bishop John Neumann was from a six-year old boy from West Philadelphia, Michael Flanigan. In 1963 this little boy was diagnosed with a lethal form of bone cancer. Doctors gave him six months to live. The cancer, which is virtually incurable, spreads rapidly to other parts of the body. It had already spread to the boy’s right tibia, to his jaw and lungs. When told that they little boy would die, the parents took Michael to the Shrine at St. Peter’s Church at 5th and Girard. After several visits to the shrine, Michael made a dramatic recovery. There was no cancer anywhere. The Vatican Congregation for the Causes of Saints declared that Michael Flanagan’s cure was “scientifically and medically unexplainable” and attributed it to the intercession of Bishop John Neumann. This was the miracle that was needed to make this great holy man a Saint.
Rejoice in one of our own! Visit the shrine at 5th and Girard and pray for whatever you need. I assure you that Saint John Neumann will intercede for you. He is a miraculous saint! Saint John Neumann, pray for us!
The Rev. Gus Puleo is pastor of St. Patrick Church in Norristown and serves as director of the English as a Second Language (ESL) program at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Philadelphia. He is a graduate of Norristown High School and attended Georgetown University, where he received B.A. and B.S. in Spanish and linguistics. He has master’s degrees in Spanish, linguistics and divinity from Middlebury College, Georgetown University and St. Charles Borromeo Seminary. He holds a Ph.D. in Spanish from the University of Pennsylvania.
