Philip Chivily

Advisor

Dr. Ronald Angelo Johnson

Education

B.A. in History and Classics, Hamilton College and University of Edinburgh

M.A. in Religion, Florida State University

Biography

I received my BA in History and Classics from Hamilton College and the University of Edinburgh. I received my M.A. in Religion from Florida State University. I was born and raised in New Jersey and enjoy a Taylor Ham, egg, and cheese sandwich, along with hiking, running, cooking, and reading.

Research Interests

I am interested in the study of the religious history of Black and American Catholicism; the American South (specifically the Chesapeake region of Maryland, Virginia, the District of Columbia, and Delaware); the nineteenth century; transatlantic movements; and Catholic theological developments in America. Starting from my master’s thesis, “The Vanishing Parish: The Birth, Life, Death, and Legacy of Charlottesville’s Rose Hill Black Catholic Redemptorist Community,” I endeavor to study the lives of Black Catholic parishes in the Chesapeake region, which includes Maryland, Virginia, the District of Columbia, and Delaware, in my eventual history doctoral dissertation at Baylor University.

Why I chose Baylor

I chose Baylor because of its emphasis and flexibility on student research and collaboration, placement with liberal arts colleges and religious universities and seminaries, and vibrant academic and scholarly culture.

Academic Publications

Articles

“Eat, and drink, and be merry”: A Clash Over the Opening of a Benedictine Brewery in
Mid-Nineteenth-Century America.” American Communal Societies Quarterly V ol. 16 No. 3 (July
2022): 236-248.

Endres, David J., ed. Slavery and the Catholic Church in the United States: Historical Studies.
Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2023. Reading Religion. February
27, 2025.

Dewulf, Jeroen. Afro-Atlantic Catholics: America’ s First Black Catholics Book Review. Notre
Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2022. Reading Religion. June 5, 2024.

Selected Activities

Awards/Fellowships/Grants

• 2023 & 2024 Lucius Moody Bristol Graduate Fellowship, Florida State University, Awarded $10,000 in support of archival research for my master’s thesis.

Recent Presentations

• Forthcoming, 2026, Will present paper, “Missions of Ink and Lore: History, Language, Westward Expansion, Acceptance, and Erasure in John Dawson Gilmary Shea’s History Of The Catholic Missions Among The Indian Tribes Of The United States, 1529–1854,” at the American Catholic Historical, date tbd, between January 8-10, 2026.
• Presented paper, "Catechizing Communities: Charlottesvillian Parochial Schools and the Desegregation and Integration of Charlottesvillian Catholicism” at the American Academy of Religion’s Online June Annual Meeting 2025 on June 26, 2025.
• Presented paper, “The Vanishing Parish: The Birth, Life, Death, and Legacy of Charlottesville’s Rose Hill Black Catholic Redemptorist Community of Saint Margaret Mary” at The Cushwa Center for the Study of American Catholicism’s 50th anniversary conference, “Catholic Modernity in the Americas: Land, Culture, Politics,” at the University of Notre Dame on April 11, 2025.