Black and Indian Mission Office

The Black and Indian Mission Office is a Catholic organization in the United States comprising the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions, the Commission for the Catholic Missions among the Colored People and the Indians and the Catholic Negro-American Mission Board, which are institutions for mission work that maintain separate functions but operate with one staff and one board of directors.

History

edit

The Bureau and the Commission have shared common offices in Washington, D.C. since 1935[1] and were joined by the Catholic Negro-American Mission Board in 1980.[2] In 2009, the three institutions adopted the Black and Indian Mission Office as a banner for their joint webpage.[3]

The Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions has supported and promoted Catholic missions among Native Americans and has defended the rights of Native Americans. It was founded as the Office of Catholic Commissioner for Indian Missions in 1874 with approval by J. Roosevelt Bayley, the Archbishop of Baltimore.[4]

Since 1887, the Commission for the Catholic Missions among the Colored People and the Indians has administered a national annual Lenten collection to support African American and Native American missions. In 1884, the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore decreed the establishment of the Lenten collection and a commission of three bishops to administer it. Since the 1980s, the Commission and its collection have been known respectively as the Black and Indian Mission Office and the Black and Indian Mission collection.[5]

The Catholic Negro-American Mission Board has supported and promoted Catholic missions among African Americans. It was founded in 1907 as the Catholic Board for Mission Work among the Colored People to provide a second national funding stream for Black Catholic missions.[6]

Archival collections

edit

Marquette University Special Collections and University Archives serves as the archival repository for the three institutions of the Black and Indian Mission office. Their archival records comprise one collection known as the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions, which generated the bulk of the records.

References

edit
  1. ^ Our Negro and Indian Missions: Annual Report of the Secretary of the Commission for the Catholic Missions among the Colored People and the Indians, 1935-1936, inside front cover.
  2. ^ "Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions Records". Marquette University. Retrieved September 19, 2016.
  3. ^ "Black and Indian Mission Office". Black and Indian Mission Office. Retrieved September 19, 2016.[permanent dead link].
  4. ^ Paul A. Lenz, Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions (established 1874) (n.d.). "Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions Records". Marquette University. Retrieved September 19, 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  5. ^ "Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions Records". Marquette University. Retrieved September 19, 2016.; The Quarterly: Report of the Commission for the Catholic Missions Among the Colored People and the Indians, Winter, 1985, back page.
  6. ^ "Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions Records". Marquette University. Retrieved September 19, 2016.; Our Colored Missions, "Reorganization of Mission Aid" 11 (1925): 24.
Attribution
edit