Type in a keyword to search the site.
The First Spiritan Seminary
When the founder of the Spiritans, Claude Poullart des Places was asked by St. Grigion de Montfort to join him in giving parish missions in country areas in France he refused as he felt that his charisma was in training future priests. His seminary was in time highly rated for the intensive training given to its students over a period of seven years. Because of that tradition the society was requested by the Holy See to launch and maintain the French National Seminary in Rome (1854).
19th Century schools
When religious congregations were allowed once again to operate schools and colleges in France the congregation took charge of secondary school which usually combined a lay boarding school, a junior seminary and an orphanage or industrial school. The industrial or trade schools were manned by Spiritan Brothers and they were highly successful in Africa where there was a singular lack of technical skills.
The First Spiritan Schools in Ireland
It was decided in 1859 to open a house of recruitment in Ireland to cater for the needs of the English colonies included in the missions entrusted to the Congregation. The man entrusted with this new foundation, Pere Jules Lenan, saw that Irish Catholics were poorly served in the matter of secondary schools and that in the wake of the Penal Laws and the famine they had little zest for the missions to the Third World. He hit on a strategy of using his expertise in education to launch schools for the benefit of Ireland and to avail of the opportunity to train future priests oriented to the missions. The strategy worked well at home and was later to influence the approach of the Irish Spiritans in their pastoral work abroad. In Blackrock (1860), Rockwell (1864) and St Mary's, Rathmines (1890) the contribution by the Congregation to education at second and third levels was seen to be outstanding, and the influence on public life, literature and sport etc. was substantial.
