AFTER THE FRENCH TREATY OF 1855, TONGA ~ Which, incidentally, was the 1st recognition of Tupou Is sovereignty by a European power....the Marists dispersed freely to various points from their sanctuary at Mua. Missionaries were stationed at Maufaga in 1855, at Hihifo (or Houma) in 1858, at Haapai in 1858, at Vavau in 1859, at the Niuas in 1886, at Nukualofa in 1901 and later at Logoteme, Kologa and Eua...but the treaty couldnt procure them a following. Converts from Uesilianism were few...the only notable movement being that of about 200 who turned to Catholicism and during the troubles of 1885. Congregational growth, consequently, came mainly from natural increase. Progress was specially slow in the northern islands...the station at Haapai being abandoned in 1867 and reopened only in 1891...that at Vavaus marginally more fortunate in beginning with a degree of local support. A Portuguese settler named Santos provided land for the mission while his family together with that of Simonet and a few dissentients among the Uvea Uesilianas (whod returned to Vavau with Pooi in 1851) provided the nucleus of a congregation. Still, normal apostolic opportunities remained xtremely limited...so much was this the case that Marie Joseph Breton whos stationed at Vavau from 1863 til his death in 1881, during which time Catholic #s remained steady at about 100s enabled to emerge as an alternative kind of missionary hero. In contrast to the more spectacular martyr and Francis Xavier types hes left to concentrate on his own austerities and spirituality to such an xtent that he became famed as the hermit of Oceania (Mangeret, op.cit., pp. 227-87; Edward A. Tremblay, ~When You Go To Tonga (Boston, 1957), pp. 92-9). A similarly complete, though apostolically more successful, commitment to his vocations the of Pierre Jouny who spent 45yrs 1886-1931 in the remote Niuas (Blanc, LHeritage, p. 216). During that time he laid the foundations of a Catholicism that by 1972, although numbering only about 1,000, embraced about 1/3 of their population...by that yr also Catholics #d about 1,600 at Vavau, 750 at Haapai and 700 at Eua. (Figures from Catholic census for 1972, contained in personal communication from Rev. J. Foliaki S.M., Mar. 9, 1973) Only on Tongatapu did the Marists gather a substantial following, and even then many of those with whom theyre 1st id eventually became Uesilianas. For instance, of the children of Lavaka only 1 ramined a Catholic...and shes married to Soane Panuve, a son of the Tui Tonga [Reiter], op. cit., the family and descdendants of whom mostly remained Catholic (in 1971 Kalaniuvalu, the direct heir of the Tui Tonga, married Princess Siuilikutapu and their child, Filusi Tiosilusis baptized a Methodist, ending the historic link between Tui Tonga line and Catholicsm)
Posted on: Wed, 23 Apr 2014 17:39:14 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015