SHEPHERD TO HIS FLOCK.

Otago Witness, Issue 3958, 21 January 1930, Page 29

SHEPHERD TO HIS FLOCK.

BISHOP CLEARY

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

LONDON, December 12.

Miss Christitch writes in The Times to-day the accompanying tribute to Bishon Cleary:—

“ During long years he worked to procure a national pastor for the Jugoslav settlers in New Zealand, a concession that was only to be realised after the liberation and reunion of the Southern Slavs. Bishop Clearly was quick to recognise and appreciate the splendid work of cultivation done by the Jugoslavs in the orchards and vineyards of Oratia, at the foot of the Waitakera Ranges, and also at Avondale and Henderson. He more than once expressed his delight at the beautiful Calvary Group, a typical example of Dalmatian art, which was carved bv Jugoslav immigrants and presented to St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Auckland, where it adorns the high altar. “Anxious to meet the natural wish of this industrious, and deserving element in his diocese, Bishop Cleary appealed to the hierarchy of Jugoslavia for a priest from the homeland to minister to them in their own language. Father Milan Pavlinovitch, •parish priest of Podgora, Dalmatia, volunteered for the mission, and was welcomed by the bishop in person, who escorted him to the numerous Jugoslav settlements. Here the enthusiasm was boundless; .or the House of Pavlinovitch is cherished for its defence of national rights in the Imperial Parliament at Vienna. In a letter received from Bishop C'eary some time ago he asssured me that nothing could Be more useful than the regular despatch of Jugoslav Catholic literature to New Zealand, so that the Jugoslav settlers, in acquiring English, as they rapidly and efficiently do, should not forget their own ancestral language and traditions. He was truly a shepherd to all sections of his flock.”