 |
|
 |
|
United States: Crossing boundaries - page 1 |
|
|
|
04.11.04 |
|
Página 2 de 2
It is important to know a little bit about this people whose descendants still live among us. They were an Algonquin tribe, hunters and gatherers. Necessity and the encroachment of the white man forced their migration south from the Great Lakes through Indiana and Illinois until finally they crossed into Kansas where they encamped at Sugar Creek. They had been evangelized earlier in their history by the Jesuits, but the suppression of the Society put an end to the mission. It was taken up later by a holy Breton priest, Benjamin Petit; he was responsible for translating Scripture texts, prayers and hymns into Potawatomi. Upon his death the Jesuits again took up the cause. By the time religious of the Sacred Heart arrived at their encampment there were over 1000 Catholics in the village. The missionaries had established among them a form of Christian communal life, the description of which sounds like the primitive church: prayer in common morning and evening, daily Mass, the recitation of the Rosary together. Our nuns wrote home about the fervor of the Catholics, the seriousness with which they approached the sacraments; even when they were encamped in the forest far from the village during the hunt, they returned on time for Sunday Mass. At the same time the nuns deplored what they described as superstition and even worship of evil spirits in the native religion of the non-Catholics, and they describe the hold tribal customs had on the people, especially in times of sickness, when they could not resist turning to the “medicine men.”
The letters to Paris and the journal reveal the first reactions of these European women. The nuns admired the deliberate, reflective manner of speaking of the Indians and their remarkable memory: the interpreters could repeat a whole sermon after the priest finished. At the same time the journal minces no words in describing the lack of cleanliness and some of the customs the nuns found repugnant: eating meat raw, for example. They were horrified also to discover by experience that one way of honoring or showing respect to a person was to present that person with a fresh scalp. Sister Louise would accept it with thanks and afterwards reverently bury it with appropriate prayers. They all learned quickly never to show any surprise, still less any repugnance, at these customs, for they found the Indians extremely sensitive.
Adaptation to the primitive conditions took place rapidly and with great good humor, if we can believe the early scribes: Mother Mathevon's laugh or her voice raised in song could often be heard about the house. They had one big worry, however: Lucile and the others, except Philippine Duchesne herself, were anxious about Philippine's health; they felt that the hardships they had to endure would be too much for her. In July of 1842, just a year after their arrival, we read in the Journal that “our venerable Mother Duchesne has left us for St Charles according to the desire of our Mother General who fears that at her age and with her infirmities, she has too much to suffer in a house as poor as ours.” The same Father Verhaegen who had insisted that she come on the mission was her escort back to St. Charles.
The other three stayed and continued their little boarding school. The journal testifies to their pleasure, even pride, in the children's accomplishments in sewing, knitting, cooking, every kind of domestic art, as well as reading in English and their own language. Their teachers found that these little girls were remarkably skilled at manual work; one little ten-year old could knit a perfect pair of socks. According to the Indian agent who came to inspect, there were schools to which the government was contributing heavily with much less satisfactory results. They were grateful to this agent for securing government support, $500 at first, later $50 per child per year. At the same time the nuns report that it took all their ingenuity and patience to keep these children on task: they were unaccustomed to being indoors, to sitting still, to working at lessons, and occasionally they escaped into the woods. The reputation of the school spread even to the neighboring Osage tribe: one of their number came to the nuns to say he had five daughters; would they please send someone to teach them. That was not to be, but they did receive Osage children as boarders later on.
In 1848, only seven years after the settlement at Sugar Creek, the Potawatomi were forced by a new treaty to migrate farther west across the Kansas River to what is now St Marys. The Jesuit missionaries and the little community of RSCJ, Mothers Mathevon, O'Connor, Julie Bazire and Sisters Louise Amiot and Mary Layton, went along to the new settlement. The story has been handed down that the men of the tribe were so discouraged in the face of yet another migration that they could not face crossing the Kansas River and hacking their way through the prairie grasses to the lands assigned to them. Seeing their hesitation, Lucile Mathevon took a sickle and led the way cutting down grasses that were taller than she was. Her determination heartened and, perhaps, shamed the men, who then followed her example.
At St Marys they were enchanted with the terrain: “This country can be compared to the Promised Land, so beautiful is its situation, so fertile the land, so abundant the fish and game. The fish are so huge that on occasion it takes two men to haul one in. Our good Indians spent 1848 building their houses. As for us, upon arrival we found a two-room house ready for us; we started immediately to enlarge it and to build another for the boarding school. We are already enjoying both and we have a chapel besides.” They wrote to the motherhouse that they had no wants except reinforcements of personnel because the work was beyond the five of them. The reinforcements did come, and so did more students so that by 1866 the nuns reported 96 pupils at St. Marys. The Jesuits had a school for Indian boys near the Sacred Heart convent. As always there was close collaboration and the nuns valued the spiritual help of the priests. It was not long, however, before pressure to sell their lands to white settlers forced the Indians even farther west. As white families moved in they placed their children in the convent and the Jesuit schools. But the nuns soon found that they could not educate both races together: the extremely simple living conditions and basic instruction did not satisfy the desires of the white children, and there were not enough Indian girls left to maintain a school just for them. In 1869 the character of the mission at St. Marys changed definitively. The Jesuits established a college for white boys, and the Society of the Sacred Heart followed suit for the girls. They built a three-story brick convent and established a traditional boarding school with an academic program for white girls. This school did not succeed, and its fate was uncertain for several years.
Between 1857 and 1876 the three founding members died, Sister Amiot was the first. At her death it became apparent that her mastery of their language and her devotion to their children had endeared her to the Indians. Mothers O'Connor and Mathevon died in 1863 and 1876 respectively; they had both lived into their 80's. Again, the journal notes the love and veneration in which they were held. They are buried along with four other RSCJ who died in St. Marys in a common grave in the town cemetery.
In February 1879 a fire occurred in the Jesuit school building; the nuns moved their pupils into the community part of the house and gave the school part over to the boys. This catastrophe precipitated a decision on the part of the nuns. A few days later the RSCJ moved with their sixteen pupils into a small house in the town until the end of the school year when they withdrew from St. Marys. It is significant that death - in one sense - in Kansas led to life elsewhere, because the Superior General decided that since the closing St. Marys would free a certain number of religious, she could answer a call from New Zealand. The first RSCJ to go to New Zealand set out from St. Louis in 1880: again a crossing of boundaries.
As we reflect with our 21st century outlook on the attitudes with which these women of 19th century Europe undertook their arduous mission, we may well question their assumptions: their Eurocentrism, their conviction that the civilization that Europe offered was the norm for the rest of the world, that the Indian would be better off if he or she learned the ways of the white man who was systematically depriving Indians of their land and culture. Some of us may even question whether Christianity was a benefit to these people. Philippine Duchesne and her companions would not know what we are talking about. They were operating on a different plane. For them to impart the true faith, confer the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist, lead the “dear savages” to the knowledge and love of the Lord Jesus and thereby secure for the Indians the possibility of eternal life with God was the greatest benefit they could possibly share with persons who, though different from themselves in almost every particular were, in the words of our Rule “souls redeemed by Jesus Christ and destined to reign eternally with Him.” To achieve this goal Philippine, her companions and countless other missionaries were willing to cross any boundary. But in spite of their appreciation of the excellent qualities they found in the Indians, their unquestioned cultural assumptions meant that they brought their culture with them in order to share it with the Indians; it was inculturation in reverse.
Talk given as part of a panel on "Nineteenth Century Regional and Ethnic Boundaries" at the Sixth Triennial Meeting of the Conference on the History of Women Religious; theme: Crossing Boundaries: Comparative Prospectives on the History of Women Religious, Atchison Heritage Conference Center, Mount St. Scholastica, Atchison, Kansas, June 27-30, 2004 Frances M. Gimber, rscj
Province of the United States
|
|
Última modificación ( 21.10.05 )
|
|
|
|
|
 |
