American Saint: The Life of Elizabeth Seton

Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton (1774–1821) deserves to have her story retold by award-winning author Barthel (Reynolds Professor of American Studies, Wake Forest Univ.; A Death in Canaan). Accessibly written, historical, and descriptive, this book is based on archival research, interviews with scholars, and Seton's own writings, all resulting in a carefully woven portrait of the first American-born Catholic saint, canonized in 1975, the woman who built the foundation for the parochial school system in the United States. Born into a prosperous New York Episcopalian family that was strongly Bible and Eucharist based, Elizabeth married for love, bearing five children in seven years. Barthel uses flashbacks and flash forwards in unfolding her subject's widowhood while in Italy, her conversion encounter there with Roman Catholicism, her return to strongly anti-Catholic New York and her anti-Catholic relatives, and her move to more accepting Baltimore and Emmitsburg, MD, to begin a woman's religious community (Sisters of Charity), educating children of all social levels. Throughout, Barthel keeps an eye on women's issues pertaining at the time.