VICKSBURG, Miss. (AP) — When the Rev. Malcolm O’Leary, S.V.D., decided he wanted to become a priest in 1947, there was only one seminary in the country that would accept him.
“I just fought it wherever I had to,” O’Leary, 78, said of the racism he encountered. He is the new pastor at St. Mary’s Catholic Church, which is operated by priests of the Society of the Divine Word.
The Camden, Miss., native was admitted to the first Roman Catholic seminary in America that allowed black men to study to join the priesthood. The Society of the Divine Word’s seminary, St. Augustine’s, opened in Greenville but relocated to Bay St. Louis, where O’Leary was ordained in 1961.
The Society of the Divine Word began in Holland in 1875 and was brought to the United States in 1895, with its headquarters set up in Illinois. In 1906, a German priest, the Rev. Joseph Heick, came to Marigold, Miss., with plans for a church and school.
After an altercation with a plantation owner, Heick was forced to sneak out of Marigold and head for Greenville, where he was put on a boat and sent downriver to Vicksburg.
Heick founded St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Vicksburg and, in 1908, founded Holy Ghost Church in Jackson.
Heick’s mission, said O’Leary, was “missionary work among the blacks.”
In 1920, the society started St. Augustine’s Seminary in Greenville. It was moved to Bay St. Louis, where the first priests were ordained in 1935.
“Some of the white people in the area didn’t like that the white women _ these were the nuns _ were taking care of these boys,” O’Leary said of the move.
Though American bishops denounced racism as immoral in 1958, O’Leary continued to face it at St. Francis Church in Yazoo City during his tenure there, from 1968 until 1972.
“Yazoo City had a law, a sidewalk tax. Black people had to pay that tax every year and keep that slip in their pockets” in case a policeman asked for it while they were downtown, O’Leary said.
After two years of boycotts of downtown stores, the city finally gave in, integrating schools and hiring black workers within the city, the fire and police departments and other areas.
“They realized we weren’t trying to destroy the town,” O’Leary said. “We just wanted justice.”
Color doesn’t matter when it comes to his job, he said.
“They (the congregation) want somebody who’s going to give an intelligent sermon and go through Mass like it should be celebrated. A priest is a priest.”
O’Leary has served in Louisiana and Texas, but mostly in Mississippi. Vicksburg is a prime location for him because his 88-year-old sister lives in Canton, and he visits her once a week.
“There are a lot of good things going on here at St. Mary’s,” he said. “They have all the activities that the church requires. I don’t need to come here and do something new. They have it all.”
O’Leary joins two other Catholic priests in Vicksburg _ Monsignor Patrick Farrell of St. Paul, and the Rev. P.J. Curley of St. Michael.
“I’m happy he’s here,” said Farrell. “I’ve known him since 1962. He’s not a young man, but he’s much younger in his thinking. And he’s very active; he plays golf.”
O’Leary quipped, “When P.J. comes back (from Ireland), I’m gonna beat his tail in golf.”
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