Maryland: In Honour of Our Shared Mother

ship, sunset, slave ship, slavery

Two ships approached the estuary, sails set to tack along the coastline. It was clear they had travelled far from the dockyards of Europe, showing the strain of a long trans-Atlantic voyage. Faces lined up along the deck, peering landwards, observing the unfamiliar territory anxiously. Would they find somewhere suitable to disembark? Would this new world be fit for a colony, for life and growth? Would they be welcomed by the natives whose ancestors had lived here for generations?

First impressions were promising, so much so that one of the two Catholic chaplains on board was to write to the Jesuit Fr Murcio Vitelleschi, “Never have I beheld a larger or more beautiful river… it is not disfigured by any swamps, but has firm land on each side.”

Finally, the order was given to lower a boat, and the settlers stepped ashore onto the new land, carrying the King’s charter to found the new colony. Their first act was to raise a cross before Mass was said to thank God for the safe crossing of the Atlantic and to pray for the success of the new colony. The year was 1634.

A New Civilisation

At first glance, it might appear that this was a Spanish, Portuguese, or French expedition carrying the religion and seal of their king but it wasn’t. This was an English expedition, sent with the explicit approval of the English king, which was to found one of the original thirteen colonies of the United States. The ships were aptly named Ark and Dove, as they aimed to provide the beginnings of a new civilisation in a strange land, new life in a world the settlers perceived as empty as the world after the flood. Onboard, the settlers were a mix of Catholics and Protestants, probably mostly Protestant, but with the leadership firmly and devoutly Catholic.

In my previous column, I referred to the Recusant Catholics of England, and to the story of St Nicholas Owen. In their search for religious freedom, father and son George and Cecilius Calvert (the first and second Lord Baltimore respectively) followed their desire to be free of oppression and managed to gain the support of King Charles I for their expedition. In honour of King Charles’ wife Henrietta Maria, the new colony was to take the name, Maryland.

Maryland

It is in the naming of the new land that we can see the subtilty of the Catholic leaders’ relationship with the Crown and those who influenced policy. The official reason for the naming also guarded against the angry Puritan elements then demanding the submission of England to a much more drastic version of Protestantism, and who would soon lead Britain into a bloody and brutal civil war. It was not unusual to name colonies after monarchs, Virginia for example being named for the ‘Virgin Queen’ Elizabeth I.

At the time, Queen Elizabeth encouraging her subjects to refer to her under this title would have been a direct provocation to Catholics at home as well as the Catholic powers of Europe, as the Virgin Queen for Catholics would be, of course, Mary the Mother of Our Lord and Queen of Heaven. What could be more delightful riposte for believing Catholics than to found a colony next to the one named for an excommunicated monarch and naming it after the Queen of Heaven?

Of course, the Protestant English (especially the more Puritan minded) were against the ‘worship’ or veneration of Mary, so it could not be proclaimed as such. Yet here was an expedition supported by a king who helpfully had a wife whose name was Maria. And she was a Catholic. It is likely that when the name was decided there were at least a few knowing smiles among these Catholic conspirators, as though saying we know who this land is really named for. Historians might say there is little written evidence that Maryland was named for the Virgin Mary, but the evidence, as we will see, is the history of English Catholicism itself.

‘Dowry of Mary’

For English Catholics, England has been known as the ‘Dowry of Mary’ for hundreds of years. Whilst the title certainly goes back to the Medieval period, there is evidence for the title’s well-established popularity by the fourteenth century. Mary came to be seen as being in a special relationship with England, that she was England’s special protectress and that the people of England had a special devotion to her. Even after the trauma of the Reformation, English Catholics continued to consider their homeland the Dowry of Mary. In 1893 Pope Leo XIII declared to English pilgrims his admiration for “the wonderful filial love which burnt within the heart of your forefathers.” In our modern, more ecumenical times a prayer is still said for England which asks for Mary’s dowry to return to the Faith:

O Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, and our most gentle Queen and
Mother, look down in mercy upon England, thy Dowry, and upon us all
who greatly hope and trust in thee. By thee it was that Jesus, our Saviour
and our hope, was given unto the world; and he has given thee to us that
we might hope still more. Plead for us thy children, whom thou didst
receive and accept at the foot of the cross, O sorrowful Mother, intercede
for our separated brethren, that with us in the one true fold they may be
united to the Chief Shepherd, the Vicar of thy Son. Pray for us all, dear
Mother, that by faith, fruitful in good works, we may all deserve to see
and praise God, together with thee in our heavenly home. Amen.

This identity is so strong that in 2020 England was officially rededicated as the Dowry of Mary, an act that included the use of this prayer.

The Catholics who arrived in the New World with Lord Baltimore would have had this tradition running through their veins. What better way to express that faith and give honour to their Mother than by the children of the Dowry of Mary naming their new homeland after Mary? To them, England was rightly Mary’s land. The Faith there had been oppressed and Mary’s rightful gift taken away from her. These English Catholics had left England to gain the space to practice their religion, but they had also claimed a new land as Mary’s. They had given her a new dowry in the New World, a new dowry clearly named as belonging to her. Maryland.

MaryLand

There will be objections to this interpretation, but it fits with our knowledge of the people who were building this colony. As an aside, in the modern era, we often seem to fall into the error of ascribing historical individuals 2D personalities. We’re more likely to believe we see complex layers of motivation and decision-making in characters on a Netflix series than in real people who lived in the past. This might be one reason why people find it so hard to believe that someone can be a saint: after all, if you struggle to see motivation past the words on the page of a history book, you’re unlikely to believe in the power of our inclination to sin or in the grace given to fight it. Much easier to accept what is visible on the surface than to understand the complexity of a real human soul.

The Past

As we move away from a more religious time, the interpretations of the past have become less aware of the complexity of religious motivations, to the extent that they often ignore it altogether, or even worse simply caricature it as some odd personality fault. Since religious motivations were behind the founding of the colony, it is difficult to see how they would have not affected the naming. Even Virginia, named for Elizabeth I, was also given that name because it was virgin land, untouched by Europeans. Naming a place, or a person, after multiple individuals is not exactly unusual. It’s also a good cover when you have to worry about giving your persecutors another excuse to make your life difficult.

For the United States, religion is part of its foundation story. The ‘Land of the Free’ is justly proud of the creation of a nation tolerant of all religions. But the narrative developed that the Puritans came from England, and from that lineage, a tolerant largely Protestant nation was created. The myth has developed that the toleration of religion in the United States is a Protestant creation.

An Example of Tolerance

The truth is that the first colony to explicitly aim in its foundation for toleration of all Christians (admittedly very strictly defined) was the colony of Maryland. When the Puritans did manage to seize control of the colony, there were fears that toleration would not last. Of course, the consequent history of the thirteen colonies and the United States is complex. But it is worth remembering that when we think of the history of the United States, Catholics were there from the beginning, and so is the explicit presence of Our Lady.

In his usual witty way, Winston Churchill once described the Americans and English as being two peoples divided by a common language. Another link between the two nations which is well worth remembering is that of a shared Mother, of a desire by our ancestors to link the two lands as the lands of Mary. They would want us to ask for her intercession and protection, and to remind us to try and live as her loyal sons and daughters.

 

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