Pierre Toussaint

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Pierre Toussaint.

Pierre Toussaint (born around June 1766 , Port-au-Prince , Haiti ; † June 30, 1853 , New York City , United States ) was a Catholic layman and slave . Pope John Paul II elevated Pierre Toussaint to the venerable Servant of God on December 18, 1996 .

Life

Pierre Toussaint was born around 1766 in what was then the French colony of Saint-Domingue (Haiti). His owner, Jean Jacques Bérard, brought him to New York, where he trained as a hairdresser. He also learned to read and write. He made a name for himself as a hairdresser and had many upper-class female customers, which made him well-paid. Its owner became impoverished and died. From then on, Pierre Toussaint secretly supported the widow financially. This gave him freedom on July 2, 1807, shortly before her death. On August 5, 1811, he married Juliet Noel, a slave he had ransomed. He bought a house for his family and also helped impoverished women, African-American children and impoverished Catholic priests there. He raised money for charitable causes, including a house for orphans of Mother Seton's Sisters of Mercy . He also collected donations for the construction of St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York. He later helped establish the first Catholic school for African-American children and the establishment of the Oblates of Providence, a religious community for African-American sisters. Touissaint died in New York on June 30, 1853. In 1990 his remains were interred in the crypt of St. Patrick's Cathedral.

literature

  • Hannah Farnham Sawyer Lee: Memoir of Pierre Toussaint, Born a Slave in St. Domingo , Negro Universities Press, Westport 1970. (2nd edition, originally from 1854) ISBN 0837150361
  • Arthur Jones: Pierre Toussaint. Doubleday, New York 2003. ISBN 9780385499941
  • Ellen Tarry: Pierre Toussaint: Apostle of old New York. Pauline Books, Boston 1998. ISBN 9780819859105

Web links

Footnotes

  1. ^ Aloysius Church: Pierre Toussaint . In: Catholic Standard (Georgetown), January 11, 2008, p. 10.
personal data
SURNAME Toussaint, Pierre
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Venerable servant of God
DATE OF BIRTH June 1766
PLACE OF BIRTH Port-au-Prince , Haiti
DATE OF DEATH June 30, 1853
Place of death New York City