Sask. pilgrimage recalls priests' exit from Red Deer

Parish centennial includes thanksgiving for French order

- Photo by Jeanne Davis Thirty seven parishioners from Red Deer's Sacred Heart Parish travelled to Immaculate Conception Church in Tisdale Sask., to remember the order of priests who shepherded The Red Deer parish at its founding.

By JULIETTE CHAMPAGNE
Special to the WCR
Tisdale, Sask.

Red Deer's Sacred Heart Parish honoured the order of priests who founded the parish 100 years ago with an unusual pilgrimage that recalled the abrupt exit of the Tinchebray Fathers from central Alberta.

Thirty-seven Sacred Heart parishioners made the three-day pilgrimage to Tisdale, Sask., the destination of the Fathers of Sainte-Marie de Tinchebray when their ministry in Alberta was concluded.

Father Don Stein, pastor of Sacred Heart, organized the Oct. 10 to 12 pilgrimage as part of the parish's centennial celebrations.

The pilgrimage was a time of reconciliation and thanksgiving for the contributions of the Fathers of Sainte-Marie who founded numerous parishes, schools and hospitals in central Alberta and later in Saskatchewan.

The Fathers of Sainte-Marie of Tinchebray belonged to a teaching order in Normandy, but after the official separation of Church and state in France, several of the priests came to Canada.

- Photo by Jeanne Davis The Alberta pilgrims presented a plaque remembering the Tinchebray Fathers that will be erected on this crucifix.

In 1904, they established themselves in Trochu on a ranch owned by French homesteaders, and planned to open schools in Western Canada. There was a great need for pastors in central Alberta, and Bishop �mile Legal set them to work as missionaries among the settlers.

By 1914 they were ministering to more than 45 rural communities and mining towns, having learned English and several other languages in the process.

They not only established parishes, but were instrumental in bringing women's orders such as the Sisters of Charity of Notre-Dame d'Evron and the Daughters of Wisdom from France, and who, with the fathers, founded schools and hospitals in the area.

The fathers also had a newsletter (in English) to subscribers in the region to keep them informed of upcoming Church activities. By 1924, it had been published for 11 years. Only the last letter remains.

At the time, conflicts between the English and French Catholics and power struggles within the Church hierarchy existed in Canada, and, in spite of their good works, the Tinchebray Fathers were eventually caught in the pinch after H. J. O'Leary was appointed archbishop of Edmonton in 1920.

O'Leary invoked their "monastic rule" as set out by the Vatican, and ordered the Fathers of Ste-Marie to leave their parishes and resume the communal life mandated to their order.

They were now more than a dozen priests and there was no way the sparsely populated regions of central Alberta could support a monastery. So it was that the fathers left suddenly at the end of 1924.

The Diocese of Prince Albert had no qualms about welcoming them. Tisdale became their headquarters and they served for another 30 years in eastern Saskatchewan.

In Alberta, anglophone clergy, many from Nova Scotia, replaced the Fathers of Ste-Marie, a move that struck a hard blow to the French-speaking population of the region's parishes, which in some places, such as Castor, was at the time quite plentiful.

At a memorial Mass on Oct. 11, Sacred Heart Parish presented a plaque commemorating the Tinchebray Fathers to Immaculate Conception Parish in Tisdale. The plaque will be mounted on the cemetery cross dedicated to Father Henri Voisin, founder of the two parishes.

The pilgrimage included visits to related historical sites. Of particular interest was the Tinchebray Fathers' former rectory. Built in Red Deer in 1905, upon their departure, they had it dismantled and the bricks were shipped by train to Tisdale where their residences was rebuilt.

Also visited was the grave of Voisin and other Tinchebray priests, the former site of St. Th‚rŠse Hospital which was established by the Sisters of Charity of Notre-Dame d'Evron in Tisdale, St. Th‚rŠse Church in Wakaw, Our Lady of the Rosary Hospital and Theresetta School in Castor.

Several of the pilgrims who took part were descended from the original French settlers in central Alberta, names such as FrŠre, Dumas, Gendre, Hermary, Chalut, among others, and French accents from Brittany and Savoie were heard.

The CWL councils in Castor and Tisdale served lunch to the pilgrims for the three days. It was a time of prayer, meditation and fellowship, and the pilgrims returned home tired but renewed.

Copyright © 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 -- Western Catholic Reporter