Charles Uncles

Charles Randolph Uncles, SSJ (November 8, 1859 — July 20, 1933), was a African-American Catholic priest. In 1891, he became the first such priest ordained on US soil.^[1] Two years later, he co-founded the Society of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart (a.k.a. the Josephites), formed to minister to the African American community.^[2] As such, he was the first and only African-American to establish a society or order of priests.^{[citation needed]}

Biography[]

The son of Lorenzo and Anna Marie (Buchanan) Uncles, Charles was raised in East Baltimore, Maryland.

The Mill Hill Missionary Society (whose American branch would later become the Josephites) recruited a number of candidates to become priests for their North American mission. In the end, Uncles was the only one. He studied at in Liverpool, England for the task.

On returning to the U.S., he studied at St. Joseph Seminary in Baltimore. He was ordained in December 1891 at the Cathedral of the Assumption by Cardinal James Gibbons and celebrated his first Mass on Christmas Day.^{[citation needed]}

In 1893, the US provincial for the Mill Hill Fathers, Fr , requested that the society's American operations be broken off into its own society, to which the Superior General acquiesced. The Josephites were then formed with the Mill Hill priests who wished to remain, including Uncles.

From 1891 to 1925, Uncles taught mainly in Epiphany College in Baltimore and New Windsor, New York.

While residing at Epiphany College, Uncles fell ill and died July 20, 1933, considering himself to be an outcast from the Society due to the racism he experienced therein. He was buried in the college's cemetery, but was exhumed in the 1970s and reburied at Calvary Cemetery in the Josephite Plot.^[3]

References[]

External links[]

• Agnes Kane, "Meeting the Pioneers of Black Catholicism", National Black Catholic Congress (2008 archived copy)