George Barry O'Toole (1886 – 26 March 1944) was a founding member of the

Catholic Radical Alliance The Catholic Radical Alliance was founded in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1937 by the Roman Catholic priests Charles Owen Rice, Carl Hensler, and George Barry O'Toole, with the approval of their bishop, Hugh C. Boyle. It supported the unioniza ...

. He was important for clarifying the right of

Catholics The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

conscientious objector A conscientious objector (often shortened to conchie) is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. The term has also been extended to objec ...

status. He began his religious career as a parish priest, and as a U.S. Army

chaplain A chaplain is, traditionally, a cleric (such as a minister, priest, pastor, rabbi, purohit, or imam), or a lay representative of a religious tradition, attached to a secular institution (such as a hospital, prison, military unit, intelligence ...

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

Education career

He taught philosophy at both

St. Vincent College St Vincent College is a co-educational sixth form (16-18) college located in Gosport, Hampshire, England. The majority of students come from the surrounding towns including Gosport, Fareham, Stubbington and Winchester. The nearby Gosport Ferry ...

, Latrobe, Pennsylvania and Seton Hill College. He was the first president (rector) of the Catholic University of Peking. He also was the head of the Philosophy department at

Duquesne University Duquesne University of the Holy Spirit ( or ; Duquesne University or Duquesne) is a private Catholic research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Founded by members of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit , image = Holy Gh ...

Labor activities

He was a founding member of the Catholic Radical Alliance, an early labor support organization in

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

, and was important to the foundation of St. Joseph's House of Hospitality, also in Pittsburgh.

Pacifist activities

In 1939, he stated that a just war was nearly impossible, because the "modern abuse of universal

conscription Conscription (also called the draft in the United States) is the state-mandated enlistment of people in a national service, mainly a military service. Conscription dates back to Ancient history, antiquity and it continues in some countries to th ...

" made wars on so gigantic a scale as to be unjustifiable. Later he testified before a Senate hearing in opposition to the

Burke-Wadsworth Act The Selective Training and Service Act of 1940, also known as the Burke–Wadsworth Act, , was the first peacetime conscription in United States history. This Selective Service Act required that men who had reached their 21st birthday b ...

, a

act pending before Congress in 1940.

Creationism

O'Toole was the author of the creationist book ''The Case Against Evolution'' (1925). The book was dismissed by academics as a "religious and not a scientific work". Science writer Martin Gardner noted that O'Toole endorsed the "naive criticism of strata chronology" from creationist George McCready Price.Gardner, Martin. (1957). '' Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science''.

Dover Publications Dover Publications, also known as Dover Books, is an American book publisher founded in 1941 by Hayward and Blanche Cirker. It primarily reissues books that are out of print from their original publishers. These are often, but not always, books ...

. p. 133.

Publications

* George Barry O'Toole (1925)
''The Case Against Evolution''
The Macmillan Company. * Ch'ien-li Ying and George Barry O'Toole (1929). ''The Nestorian Tablet at Sianfu: A New English Translation of the Inscription and a History of the Stone''. Peking Leader Press, Peking. * George Barry O'Toole. (1929). '' John of Montecorvino, First Archbishop of Peking''. Latrobe, Pennsylvania. * George Barry O'Toole and Quianli Ying (1931). ''Luo ji xue: Zhong Ying dui zhao''.

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), Chinese postal romanization, alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the Capital city, capital of the China, People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's Li ...

. . * George Barry O'Toole and Theodore Jeske-Choinski (1936). ''The Last Romans "Ostatni Rzymianie": A Tale of the Time of Theodosius the Great''.

. * George Barry O'Toole (1941). ''War and Conscription at the Bar of Christian Morals''. Catholic Worker Press. * Bishop Joseph M. Corrigan and George Barry O'Toole, editors (1944). ''Racism and Christianity; Race: Nation: Person. Social Aspects of the Race Problem, A Symposium''. Barnes & Noble, Inc., New York. .

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Otoole, Barry 1944 deaths 1886 births American Christian creationists History of Catholicism in the United States Religious leaders from Pittsburgh Roman Catholic activists History of labor relations in the United States Catholic Workers American Benedictines World War I chaplains Roman Catholic missionaries in China Fu Jen Catholic University faculty United States Army chaplains Seton Hill University American Christian pacifists Catholic pacifists 20th-century American Roman Catholic priests