Faithin Omaha eBook Collection

Download or read book Tar Heel Catholics written by William F. Powers and published by Rlpg/Galleys. This book was released on 2003 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although today the largest religious denomination in the United States, until the 1960s, the Roman Catholic Church represented less than 1 percent of the population of North Carolina. Tar Heel Catholics recounts the story of the Catholic Church in what was long called "mission territory" on the doorstep of a rapidly developing American Catholic institutional presence. The explanation of this phenomenon lies in the history of the Deep South itself, including slavery, segregation, and the overwhelming religious dominance of the Baptist church. Tar Heel Catholics relates the great difficulty early churchmen encountered in attempting to establish Catholicism in an inhospitable environment. It was not until 1924 that North Carolina became the last state in the union to gain the status of a diocese.