The Social Conditions of Birth and Development of the Polish Pastoral Care in Western Canada (1896-1914)

Abstract

The paper discusses the first period of mass emigration from the Polish soils to Western Canada, which period began in 1896 in connection with the plans of industralization of the prairie provinces, ie Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. The process had been completed at the outbreak of World War I. The paper presents various conditions, eg personal, cultural, economic, demographic, and geographic which conditions gave shape to the process of birth and development of the Polish pastoral care posts in Western Canada. Three factors conducive to or hampering this process have been distinguished here. The first group includes the proethnic attitude of the French Catholic hierarchy which hierarchy encouraged the development of the pastoral care of ethnic groups in their mother tongues. That development was based on the emigrants' cultural values and traditions. Due to that fact, from 1898 on there were Polish priests coming to the western dioceses of Canada. They were mainly recruited from among Oblate Fathers of Immaculate Mary from Western Europe and from among the diocesan as well as monastic clergy from the U.S.A. The agricultural character of settlement and distribution of settlements over the vast territories as well as increasing emigration in the pioneer period caused a permanent shortage of priests to work among the Poles. An itinerant pastoral care travelling around Polish settlements was formed. It was exclusively typical of prairie provinces and did not occur on such a scale either in other regions of Canada or in the States.

The preservation and development of the Polish pastoral care in those geographically and economically difficult conditions was possible only due to a great attachement of the Polish emigrants to faith and the Church, and due to their active part in creating pastoral care posts. Such an attitude found its expression in undertaking initiatives for the benefit of bringing Polish priests to Polish settlements, building chapels, churches and parish houses. Such initiatives demanded a lot of financial support and enormous work of the settlers. The achievements of the Polish pastoral care of the pioneer period in Western Canada have made a valuable spiritual and material contribution on the part of the Polish ethnic group to the building of the Catholic Church on these territories of Canada.