A new production tells the story of Father Tolton, the slave who became a priest

Two years ago, the actor Jim Coleman had never heard of the Rev. Augustus Tolton, who is believed to be the first African-American Catholic ordained a priest. Now he portrays him in a production, “Tolton: From Slave to Priest,” which is currently touring the United States.

Based on the book From Slave to Priest: The Inspirational Story of Father Augustine Tolton, by Caroline Hemesath, S.S.F., the play is an account of Father Tolton’s remarkable life. After escaping from slavery with his mother and siblings, the young Tolton was raised in Illinois in the Catholic faith. Rejected by U.S. seminaries because he was black, Father Tolton repaired to Rome, where he studied for the priesthood. After his ordination in 1864, “he wants to go to Africa where he wants to be a missionary, but he’s sent back to the ‘enlightened’ country of America,” said Leonardo Defilippis, the founder of Saint Luke Productions, which produced the play. Father Tolton returned to the United States, where eventually he started St. Monica Parish on Chicago’s South Side, ministering to African-American and white parishioners.

Mr. Defilippis first learned about Father Tolton while visiting the Diocese of Springfield, Ill. “A pastor gave me a book on [Tolton] and said, ‘Could you do a show?’ That’s what we do at Saint Luke Productions. We’ve done that for 38 years.”

Mr. Defilippis started Saint Luke Productions in 1980 to stage a production about the Gospel of Luke. Since then, he and his wife, Patti Defilippis, have staged scores of other plays. Saint Luke worked on “Tolton” for two years before it opened at Chicago’s DuSable Museum of African American History in November 2017.