Saint Michael's in Toronto
Shuster, George N.
THOUGH I have seen Saint Michael's College, Toronto, Canada, only once, it is not likely that I shall ever forget it. The sprawling border-cityj then dotted with unfinished railway terminals,...
...We have, therefore, an intimately personal reason, quite apart from any calm appreciation of good work well done, for adding our congratulations to the many already extended—for wishing Saint Michael's pleasant memories, a long and growing life, a developing opportunity to be of service...
...One should like also to draw attention to certain specific characteristics of the college itself— the work of the Philosophical Club, for instance, which is the only organization of its kind in the University of Toronto and which offers programs that might well be the envy of major United States universities...
...Ralph Adams Cram has termed "walled towns...
...In the United States it is generally believed that religious training will be most successful when conducted in institutions aspiring to be something like what Dr...
...These stores of literature out at the elbows were innocent and cordial for the most part, but I doubt if there could have been found anywhere else so shining an array of broadsides fired at "Romanism...
...During two days following May 10, those connected with the college during the present and the past could listen to the pleasant messages of recognition which came from other Canadian scholarly circles, to discussion of what had been done and earnest survey of the possible future, to brilliant speakers assembled for the occasion...
...In 1897, federation with the University of Toronto was arranged, making Saint Michael's what is termed a "constituent college...
...The college, for its part, had its share of hardships and growing pains...
...Here is a Catholic college which is frankly part of the University of Toronto...
...This had originally been founded to undertake the education of priests...
...What difference did it make to Father Soulerin if there were only fifty Catholic families all told in his neighborhood ? Neither isolation nor poverty made any task less worth doing, or ever robbed the savor of those "apt quotations from the classics" which, we are informed, used to accompany, in his conversation, indulgence in an ample pinch of snuff...
...Established side by side with similar Anglican and Methodist colleges, it has today a larger enrollment than its Anglican peer...
...The memories are complex and illustrious...
...Its students—all of whom follow an arts program— are free to attend lectures in any section of the university as a whole, free of charge...
...There are many reasons for discussing such a place, but a very special one happens into view just now...
...This printed attack upon the "anti-Christ" made use of a thousand ruses and excuses...
...Believing in the letter of the educational law, it would give many United States students headaches from which they are now immune...
...Saint Michael's has been observing its diamond jubilee...
...Special functions arranged by its faculty draw attendance from the university generally, and it may be said to do incalculably much toward the removal of prejudice and the promotion of better religious understanding...
...Among its graduates are illustrious bishops and monsignori, clerics and religious teachers...
...In 1850, Count Armand Francis Marie de Charbonnel, newly consecrated bishop of the vast see of Toronto, confronted in dismay the poor educational facilities available for the people entrusted to his care...
...Monsignor Pace and Father Francis Duffy came from the United States, and fair fortune brought Bishop Baudrillart, rector of the Institut Catholique in Paris...
...The enrollment is now 200, and there is every reason to believe that, with bettering economic conditions in the Dominion, this number will be greatly increased...
...But in the aggregate this mass of historical, philosophical and religious bigotry was so great that one had perforce to accept it as evidence of the alleged fact that Ontario was—perhaps still is—the headquarters of that army which steadily marches against the windmill it has labeled Rome...
...Suffice it to say that the Toronto college has established a goodly record, not only in so far as scholarship is concerned, but also from the f>oint of view of religious conviction...
...It should be added that Canadian education is still quite "oldfashioned...
...Enough has been said, however, to justify the statement that Saint Michael's seventy-fifth anniversary merits the attention of the Church in all America, by reason of the things it has done and the hopes it enkindles...
...Its graduates, though educated and examined strictly within its own confines, receive the university degrees...
...Most of it would have proved very funny if one had spent time investigating it a little...
...This is not the place to compare the educational practice exemplified by Saint Michael's with what is being done elsewhere under Catholic auspices...
...but it summoned the strength to carry another burden, and in 1852 several religious arrived in Toronto and began to teach...
...One and all realized the good that Saint Michael's had accomplished for Catholics in English-speaking central Canada, and were ready to look hopefully forward...
...Gradually interest and generosity were aroused, building commenced, and in 1856 people began to speak of the "Stonyhurst of Canada...
...I may say here that quite apart from the helpful friendship it has always received from Professor Sir Bertram Windle, The Commonweal owes to Saint Michael's a debt of gratitude for many things...
...The sprawling border-cityj then dotted with unfinished railway terminals, ex-soldiers out of work and vile places where beer legally forbidden was on sale, fascinated me chiefly by reason of the many book "emporiums" where low prices were scribbled into worn volumes from all parts of Ontario...
...When one has realized the milieu out of which it developed and the stupendous tasks it was called upon to perform, one sees clearly that those who indicated the direction which Saint Michael's was to follow were wise and valiant men...
...Father Soulerin, its founder and later on superiorgeneral of the Basilian order, was one of those pioneer French religious educators who seem to have inherited the spirit of Napoleon's Guard...
...Then, however, one came to Saint Michael's...
...Through it have come a large share of the numerous good friends the magazine has made in the Dominion...
...In the spiritual history of America these men are the Stonewall Jacksons and the Admiral Deweys...
...It has frankly declared its spiritual purpose, and has done excellently in so far as general university conditions are concerned...
...To it there have since been affiliated two colleges for women, which enjoy virtually the same principles...
...After him came other notable priests and scholars, one among whom—Father Cushing —lives to see the golden jubilee of his sacerdotal life coincide with the diamond-crested jubilations of the college...
...Much might be said about other good work accomplished by the Basilians throughout Canada...
...Like so many other missionary prelates of his time, he turned to apparently inexhaustible Catholic France and asked for help from the newly established Basilian order...
...It is not a pretentious place, as academia goes nowadays, but it stands for an experiment in education so original and so interesting that one wonders how it ever happened into being, in Toronto of all places...
...Finally, about 1905, the constitution was revised and the institution became what it is now—the Catholic College of the University of Toronto...
...To it have come teachers of eminence, Sir Bertram Windle and Professor De Wulf being outstanding contemporary examples...
Vol. 6 • June 1927 • No. 5
