Daniel Rudd

Daniel Rudd was a lay leader within the Catholic Church during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He used his experience and influence to usher in black consciousness among Catholics in the United States and to advocate for the equality of all African-Americans. The Christian Solider (1890), an African- American newspaper published from Lexington, Kentucky, declared, "Dan A. Rudd of the Catholic Tribune" to be "the greatest negro Catholic in America." , A Life Begun Enslaved , Born on August 7, 1854, in Bardstown, Kentucky, Daniel Arthur Rudd was the eleventh of twelve children to parents Robert and Elizabeth (Eliza) Francis Smith Rudd. His parents were enslaved to two different owners: Robert to Richard and Margaret Rudd and Eliza to Charles and Matilda Haydon. Three generations of Rudd's family had cared for St. Joseph Proto-Cathedral, which was near the Haydon's plantation, Anatok. Daniel Rudd was quoted as saying he never experienced any segregation in his church. "We have been all over St. Joseph Church from foundation stone to pinnacle and no one ever told us to move." Rudd was baptized in 1854 at St. Joseph Church and later received his First Communion there in 1863. Gary Agee (A Cry for Justice, 2017), Rudd's biographer, noted that Rudd and his family experienced a high level of respect and equality within the Catholic faith during his early years. , Life in Ohio and the American Catholic Tribune , Since about 1870, Rudd lived in Springfield, Ohio. With his business partner, James T. Whitson, in 1885 they established the first newspaper by and for African Americans, the Ohio State Tribune. In 1886, the name was later changed to the American Catholic Tribune, becoming one of the most prolific black-owned weekly journals in the United States. In 1886, Rudd moved the operations to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he started featuring articles that spoke out on black issues such as segregation and discrimination. Rudd's mission and philosophy came through: "The Catholic Church alone can break the color line. Our people should help her to do it." , Benedictine monk and author, Cyprian Davis, O.S.B. (The History of Black Catholics in the United States, 1990) noted, "Rudd's thoroughgoing commitment to Catholicism as a church and as a cause. This partisanship in an African American setting was unprecedented. In short, the Catholic church is the great hope for black people in the United States." Rudd organized the first Colored Catholic Congress (now the National Black Catholic Congress) held January 1 to 4, 1889, in Washington, D.C. Four additional congresses followed: Cincinnati (1890), Philadelphia (1892), Chicago (1893), and Baltimore (1894). , At its height in 1892, over 10,000 subscribers read the American Catholic Tribune. It often identified contributions of black leaders and criticized racist public policies. Rudd also took opportunities to promote Catholicism as an inherently welcoming institution for all people, while also recognizing the need to combat racism within the Church itself., Rudd's pioneering efforts to encourage all African Americans to embrace the Catholic Church as their spiritual home revealed that he was a true visionary of evangelization. He believed that Catholic means universal., To economize, in 1893 Rudd moved to Detroit, Michigan, where he published the American Catholic Tribune until 1897. , [Reverse Side] , We will do what no other paper published by colored men has dared to do-give the great Catholic Church a hearing and show that it is worthy of at least a fair consideration at the hands of our race, being as it is the only place on this Continent where rich and poor, white and black, must drop prejudice at the threshold and go hand in hand to the altar. - Daniel Rudd , Mississippi and Arkansas , Sometime before 1910, Rudd moved to what is today known as Boyle, Mississippi (Bolivar Co.), to work in the lumber industry. In 1912, he moved to Madison, Arkansas (St. Francis Co.), to set up a sawmill for Scott Bond, Arkansas's first black millionaire, acting as accountant, adviser, and superintendent. , Rudd co-authored with Bond's son, Theophilus, a biography of the elder Bond. The book, From Slavery to Wealth: The Life of Scott Bond: The Rewards of Honesty, Industry, Economy, and Perseverance (1917), highlighted the ability of African Americans to succeed if given the opportunity. Rudd later moved to Marion, Arkansas, to work for John Gammon, a well-to-do black farmer. , In 1919, Rudd became active with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and twice asked Bishop John Morris for permission to represent the Diocese of Little Rock at its conferences. The bishop twice denied Rudd's request by stating that there were few black Catholics in Arkansas at the time. Morris later asked Rudd to represent the black Catholics of the Diocese of Little Rock at the 1926 Eucharistic Congress in Chicago, but he could not attend. , Back Home to Kentucky , Still in Arkansas in 1932, Rudd suffered a stroke and moved back to his hometown of Bardstown, Kentucky, where he died on December 3, 1933, at age 79. He is buried at St. Joseph Cemetery. Of the many positions held by Rudd in his lifetime, the occupation listed on his death certificate was "teacher." , The Impact of the Life of Daniel Rudd , Daniel Rudd, born in Kentucky, grew up and spent most of his life until his death in 1933 opposing efforts to treat persons of color without respect and dignity. A self-made and educated individual, Rudd became known as a prominent editor of a newspaper in Cincinnati and a powerful force-perhaps the primary force-in beginning what is now the National Black Catholic Congress... You and I will agree that we are desperately in need of heroes in our culture, and so I raise up the life, work, and spirit of Daniel A. Rudd, born a slave, who lived consistently as a committed Catholic adult, seeking ways to work for justice. - Most Reverend Joseph E. Kartz, D.D., Archbishop of Louisville Column in The Record, September 10, 2020. , Inspired by the early work of Daniel Rudd, a pastoral letter entitled, What We Have Seen and Heard: A Pastoral Letter on Evangelization from the Black Bishops of the United States, was published in 1984 and affirmed the gifts of African Americans, rooted in their African heritage, to the larger Catholic Church. Following the publication of this pastoral letter, interest to reestablish Rudd's Colored Catholic Congress movement grew, and in 1987, the first National Black Catholic Congress of the 20th century was held in Washington D.C., the same city where it began 100 years earlier. Now, as it was then, the Congress's evangelizing mission is the improvement of the "spiritual, mental, and physical conditions of African Americans." The Congress is held every five years.