McLoughlin grew up in
Sacramento, California, and entered St. Anthony's Seminary in
Santa Barbara, California. He took the name Emmett during his novitiate in the
Franciscan order. After his
ordination in 1933 he was assigned to
South Phoenix, a segregated area in
Phoenix, Arizona, and began work there that would last for 14 years. He founded St Monica's Catholic Church for
African-American and
Hispanic residents in the neighborhood, and became known for his activism via the attached community center and medical clinic. Together they came to be known as the "Father Emmett Mission". He pushed for the Matthew Henson public housing projects (opened in 1940) and became chairman of the Phoenix Housing Authority. eventually becoming Phoenix Memorial Hospital. In ''People's Padre'', McLoughlin says that some priests in the area objected to the clinic treating
venereal disease. McLoughlin also encouraged workers to smuggle scorpion antivenom from Mexico. McLoughlin's Franciscan
superiors charged him with neglect of his priestly duties and ordered him to resign as superintendent of the hospital. He had the support of its board of directors, many of whom were Catholic. He has been criticized in Catholic circles for not following the
vow of obedience to the Church that he had taken as a Franciscan. McLoughlin criticized the Church for requiring young men to take such a vow, often without having experience of life outside school and seminary. He also criticized the Catholic parochial school system, and alleged that a Catholic plot had existed to
assassinate Abraham Lincoln, criticisms which fed
anti-Catholicism in America in the 1950s and 1960s. McLoughlin also joined
Freemasonry. In early 1970, Mcloughlin was still administrator of Phoenix Memorial. He later moved to
Oklahoma, where he died on October 9, 1970. He is buried in Berwyn Cemetery in
Gene Autry. == Personal life ==