Xaverian Brothers
|
|
The Xaverian Brothers or Congregation of St. Francis Xavier (CFX) are a religious order founded by Theodore James Ryken in Bruges, Belgium in 1839 and named after Saint Francis Xavier. The order is dedicated to Catholic education in the United States.
| Contents |
History
Ryken's vision
Theodore James Ryken was born on August 30, 1797 in the small village of Elshout, North Brabant, Holland, to ardently Catholic middle class parents. Orphaned at a young age, Ryken was raised by his uncle, who was instrumental in imparting the qualities of faith, zeal, and devotion to duty onto the boy.
Ryken, like most of the early Xaverian Brothers, was trained as a shoemaker. However, Ryken also felt a calling by God which impelled him to work first as a catechist, then in helping to conduct an orphanage, and again in caring for cholera patients in North Holland.
At the age of 34, Ryken went to North America and served as a catechist among the missionaries to the Native Americans. During his three year tour, he conceived the idea of starting a congregation of brothers to work alongside the missionary priests. On returning to Europe he set about planning the establish such a society in Belgium, a country eminent for missionary zeal.
Founding
When Ryken journeyed back to the US in 1837, he noticed that the city youth, noticeably the children of immigrants, were even more in need of instruction than the Native Americans. Bishop Rosati of St. Louis encouraged him to found a religious congregation of laymen whose members would labor among all classes of youth. Six other bishops sanctioned his plan to bring religious teachers to the United States.
Mr. Ryken prepared for a journey to Rome to receive the permission and blessing of Pope Gregory XVI by going through a term of probation in the novitiate of the Redemptorist Fathers. This influenced him to model the religious garb of his order after that of the Redemptorists. The spirit of the Xaverian Brothers, on the other hand, can be traced to the influence of the Jesuit confessor and counselor of Mr. Ryken, Father Isidore Van de Kerckhove, who drew up the original rules.
Although many religious institutes were being founded at the time as part of a revival that succeeded the fall of Napoleon I, Ryken's vision was different. He wanted to found a missionary institute rather than a congregation that would address the needs of a specific region. On June 15, 1839, with this ideal and vision, the forty-two year old Ryken went to live in a rented house on Ezelstraat in the centuries old city of Bruges, Belgium. For five long days the founder waited for the arrival of the two companions who had promised to join him in his undertaking: a tailor and a weaver. Unfortunately for Mr. Ryken, his companions would prove less dedicated and resilient than himself and it took a year before better suited candidates were welcomed into the house on Ezelstraat. Despite poverty and hardships, the little band grew gradually stronger. Two primary schools were soon opened in Bruges, and some brothers were sent to a normal school at St Trond for professional training.
By 1841, the community had grown beyond the space available in the little house on Ezelstraat, and Ryken, with financial help from a sympathetic banker, purchased a large estate in a neighboring section of Bruges called "Het Walletje". The Xaverian brothers began to attract candidates from Germany, Holland, Belgium, England, Ireland and France. In 1848, a colony of brothers went to England to open schools in parishes in Bury and Manchester. Eventually, they opened Clapham College, London.
Troubles and resignation
Ryken would be burdened by the loan he took in order to purchase Het Walletje for the rest of his superiorship. Additionally, internal hardships including a crisis at the Mother House in Bruges showed Ryken to be an inept administrator. Ryken was invited by the Bishop of Bruges, Jean Baptiste Malou to tender his resignation. Ryken willingly turned over his office to a younger man, and then spent the last eleven years of his life as a simple subject in the order he had established.
Before his death on November 26, 1871, at the age of seventy-four, Ryken had the happiness of being present at the first general chapter of his order in Bruges in 1869. By this time the threatening debt had not only been cleared, but the number of brothers had grown from 58 in 1860 to 133, and there were nine well-established communities working among the poor in Belgium, England and the United States.
Mission to the United States
In 1853 Louisville Bishop Martin Spalding invited the Xaverian brothers to open a school in his diocese, and in 1854 the first colony of brothers moved to the United States. The Brothers took charge of several parochial schools in 1864 opened St. Xavier's College.
In 1864, Spalding, then Archbishop of Baltimore, asked the Xaverians to open schools there, and they did so. Baltimore was made the center of Xavierian activities in the United States, and in 1876 a novitiate was opened there.
By 1900, the Xaverian Brothers had opened schools in New York, Massachusetts, Virginia, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania.