THE LATE BROTHER JOHN

New Zealand Tablet, 5 February 1914, Page 49

THE LATE BROTHER JOHN

(From a correspondent.) News comes from Turin, Northern Italy, of the death, at the age of 75, of Brother John, Second Assistant to the Superior-General of the Marist Brothers, and who was for many years a Provincial of the Orderin Australasia. In him, the Brothers, committed to his charge as Assistant, lose a Superior whose devotedness won their confidence and gained their esteem. The,Order suffers by his death, for he was a prominent member of the General Council of the Institute, in whose deliberations his long experience and varied knowledge enabled him to. take a leading part, when dealing with matters that appertained to the various parts of the world where the Brothers are located. Brother John was an Irishman, and hailed from the County Cork. In the famine years, and whilst ho was yet young, his parents went to England, and settled in London, where they entered into business. Success awaited their efforts in the big metropolis, and soon they found themselves possessed of sufficient means to give their children a liberal education. At an early age, they sent Denis, the subject of this little sketch, to a French college conducted by the Marist Brothers at Beaucamps, in the North of France. Here his application and intelligence soon attracted the attention of his masters, as also did his modesty and piety, which they did not fail to foster, and with happy results, for at the age of 16 he became a postulant of the -Society, entered the novitiate, and.began to train himself for the religious life, in which he was destined to play a distinguished and a useful part. When his noviceship was finished, he was employed at preliminary work in the French schools. Whilst so engaged, he prosecuted' his studies of the French language, and succeeded not only in acquiring a thorough knowledge of its literature, but also a mastery of its accent, which enabled him to speak it with such accuracy and fluency, that in later years Frenchmen never doubted that he was a countryman of their own. It was in those days, while teaching the French boys the rudiments "of their own language, that he prepared himself for the great work, the exalted rank, and the responsible sphere of labor that the future had in store for him. After a few years in France, he was transferred to . the British Isles, first to London, and then to Glasgow. In the latter city, he became a BrotherDirector whilst yet young, and many were the trials, sufferings, and discomforts he had to endure through lack of proper accommodation at home, and through abuse and ribaldry in the streets whilst going to and coming from his work. Never physically robust, and ever inattentive to his own requirements, the loner hours of teaching, both day and night,-soon began to tell upon his health. His strength gave way, and he began to

develop symptoms of incipient consumption. The Superiors, to save so valuable a life, sent him out to Australia, where the Brothers had arrived a few years previously, and had made a beginning at Sydney. Hero he recuperated rapidly, soon recovered, his former vigor, 9*nd, being appointed Provincial, he set to work earnestly to develop the newly’ created Australian province committed to his charge. The task was a difficult one, for he had at his disposal neither men nor money. But he had in abundance, to make amends, tact, zeal, business acumen, and a trust in Providence that amounted almost to presumption. Before long, he had secured a valuable property at Hunter’s Hill, 7 miles distant by water from Sydney. On this, a novitiate was erected and a beginning made in the training of Brothers, who came in large numbers in those days, as if sent by Providence, to take charge of the schools that were pressed upon him from all directions. In a few years he was able to supply all the Sydney parishes with Brothers, and so too most of the leading towns in New Zealand. In the matter of educational establishments, the one that will ever remain a monument to his memory is St. Joseph’s College, Hunter’s Hill. This institution is widely and favorably known. From its portals have gone forth'hundreds of students mentally and morally equipped to act their part in matters social, religious, and professional. Architecturally, it is the largest and the finest building of its kind in Australasia. Built in white sandstone, capable of accommodating comfortably 500 boarders, and costing 5£60,000, the time taken for its erection did not exceed a dozen years. It was built by day labor, under his own supervision, and when the 'workmen put on the finishing touches, he had no occasion to pay them with borrowed money. Many marvelled where the funds came from ; more than one questioned him about his ‘bankers,’ but he replied, as Father Champagxxat, the venerable founder, used to do, * that he drew on a source that never failed, the Bank of Providence.’ In 1893; he attended a meeting of the General Chapter in France, and at its -close he was transferred from Australia to the British Isles. Soon the province began to feel his absence. It needed his strong hand, clear foresight, and pushful energy, to keep it on the upward grade, and so after an absence of three years, he was ordered back to his old post, to encourage and direct the Brothers with the .same earnestness and zeal as formerly. ITTs stay, however, was short, for in 1899 he was elected an assistant to the Superior-General, and this necessitated his final separation from Australasia, save for trips which he made triennially to visit *the houses of the province. The final of these he made last year, when, notwithstanding the fact that he had far outlived the patriarchal span, he visited every house and interviewed every Brother in the province, 7 which now embraces all the Commonwealth except Queensland, the Dominion of New Zealand," the Islands of the

South ’ Seas, and New Caledonia. Though he was inured to travel, , and loved the sea, the journeys among the islands, very often in open boats, exposed to the tropical sun and torrid rains, proved too much for him, and so, when ! he returned to Sydney, he was too ex-, hausted to continue,-his work, and had to seek rest. His vitality, however, soon re-established itself, and he was about as usual, and finished the duties he ' was delegated to perform. He left Sydney for Turin, the present headquarters of ■ the Order, in May last. The last news by mail reported him enjoying his usual health. But the winter climate of Northern Italy, which borders on the Alps, is very rigorous. A recurrence of a cold, to which he was subject in recent years, hastened on the inevitable at last.; - ’-Vv Brother John was a man who did good by stealth and blushed to find it fame.’ What he has effected in the cause of Catholic education in these colonies is beyond the power of human ken to know. Without ostentation, hidden from the public eye, a stranger to controversy and newspaper correspondence, he moved noiselessly about, planning and- thinking ways and means for opening new schools, recruiting subjects for the Brotherhood, forming and fitting them for their, work, and placing them in positions in which they would achieve the greatest good. He was a religious in the fullest sense of the word. Severe in what concerned himself, indulgent to others, mingling mildness and strictness in his dealings with his Brothers, and thus won their confidence and respect. He was a constant reader of books, both secular and sacred -was gifted with a good memory was a keen observer of men and things, and so as a raconteur in two languages he was a treat to listen to. His respect for authority was innate —for priests and bishops he had an abiding reverence; and in regard to his own Superiors, he had , absolutely no will of his own. He was a man who gained the respect of those with whom he came in contact, arid in the esteem of bishops and priests with whom he had dealings in school matters he stood universally high. For over sixty years he had labored in the cause of Catholic education, spending himself and inducing others to spend themselves in bringing the truths of religion and the knowledge of the love of God home to the minds and hearts of the children, especially to those Who were poor, or, as in the case of the Islands of the South Seas, to those who were still in the thraldom of paganism. He has passed away, his toil is ended, he has gone to his reward, but the seeds he planted will continue to fructify through the labors of the Brothers whom he has left behind him to mourn their loss. R.I.P. ' -v