Catholic Encyclopedia

The Catholic Encyclopedia, also referred to today as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia, is an English-language encyclopedia published in 1913 by The Encyclopedia Press. It was designed to give "authoritative information on the entire cycle of Catholic interests, action and doctrine".

Intent
The encyclopedia was designed to serve the Catholic Church, omitting facts and information which have no relation to the Church and explaining matters from the point of view of the official Catholic doctrine, as it stood during the pontificate of Pius X. It records the accomplishments of Catholics and some others in nearly all intellectual and professional pursuits, including artists, educators, poets and scientists. While more limited than other general encyclopedias, it was far broader in scope than previous efforts at comprehensive Catholic encyclopedias, which had studied only internal Church affairs.

On issues that divide Catholicism from other Churches and Protestant ecclesial communities, the text consistently presents matters from the Catholic point of view. Since the encyclopedia was first undertaken in 1913, however, some of its entries are not up-to-date, either with respect to the secular domain or to the Catholic ecclesiastical world. In particular, it predates the Second Vatican Council, which introduced significant changes in Catholic practice.

History
The writing of the encyclopedia began on January 11, 1905 under the supervision of five editors:
 * Charles G. Herbermann, Professor of Latin and Librarian of the College of the City of New York
 * Edward A. Pace, Professor of Philosophy at the Catholic University of America, at Washington D.C.
 * Condé B. Pallen, Editor
 * Rev. Thomas J. Shahan, Professor of Church History at the Catholic University.
 * Rev. John J. Wynne, S.J., Editor of The Messenger

The editors, all situated in the United States, had their first editorial meeting at the office of The Messenger, in West Sixteenth Street, New York City. The text received a Nihil Obstat ("nothing hinders") from an official censor Remy Lafort on November 1, 1908 and an Imprimatur ("let it be printed") from John Cardinal Farley, who was Archbishop of New York at the time. This review process was presumably accelerated by the reuse of older authorized publications. In addition to frequent informal conferences and constant communication by letters, the editors subsequently held 134 formal meetings to consider the plan, scope and progress of the work, culminating in publication on April 19, 1913. A supplement was published in 1922.

The encyclopedia was later updated under the auspices of the Catholic University of America and a 17-volume New Catholic Encyclopedia was first published in 1967, and then in 2002. The New Catholic Encyclopedia is available online at some libraries.

In 1993, Kevin Knight, a 26-year-old resident of Denver, Colorado, was inspired during the visit of Pope John Paul II to that city for World Youth Day, to launch a project to publish the 1913 edition of the encyclopedia on the internet. Knight founded the website New Advent to house the undertaking. Volunteers from the United States, Canada, France, and Brazil helped in the transcription of the original material. The site went online in 1995, and the transcription was completed in 1997.

The 1922 supplement to the Encyclopedia is also in the public domain, but as of 2005 has not been placed on-line.

Derived works
While the encyclopedia does present information from a Catholic perspective, it often offers in-depth and accurate portrayals of historical and philosophical ideas, persons and events. Due to its public domain status, content from the 1913 edition can be incorporated into any work, as long as an individual does not try to pass off articles or information from the encyclopedia as his or her own. Text from the Catholic Encyclopedia appears, sometimes in an edited form, in online reference works such as Wikipedia.