LEAVING FOE AMERICA

Evening Post, Volume CXIX, Issue 134, 8 June 1935, Page 5

LEAVING FOE AMERICA

REV. FATHER J. HIGGfNS, S.M.

An important development in the history of the Catholic Church in New Zealand is to be seen in the impending departure of the Rev. Father John Higgins, S.M., for Canada and the United States of America.

Father Higgins will leave Wellington in August, his ultimate destination being the Catholic University at Washington, U.S.A., for the purpose of further study in the science of sociology and fuller acquaintance with modern social problems. • ' Born in Christchurch, and educated at St. Bede's College there, Father Higgins is the first old boy priest of that college. From St. Bede's Father Higgins went to St. Patrick's College, Wellington, and in 1915 entered Mount St. Mary's Scholasticate, Greenmeadows, Hawke's Bay, to study for the priesthood. He was ordained in 1921.

His first appointment was as Prefect of discipline at St. Patrick's College, Wellington, and a year later he returned to the seminary at Greenmeadows as Professor of Philosophy and Ecclesiastical History. After five years in that position, he was transferred as assistant at the Sacred Heart Basilica, Hill Street, Wellington. In 1931 Father Higgins was appointed Vice-rector of St. Patrick's College, Wellington, a position he has occupied until just recently. In the last three years he has been Director in Wellington of Catholic Social Studies, and has been responsible for numerous' articles and statements in the Press of the Dominion on various matters affecting Catholics and the problems of the day. On his'return to the Dominion, Father Higgins will continue his f special work amongst the Catholic community.