50 YEARS AGO THE GENERAL HOUSE TRANSFERRED TO 290 VIA AURELIA
May 1st 1947, Fr Léo DESCHATELETS
was elected Superior General. Some months later he decided on the construction
of a new building for the General House of the Congregation. In 1950, the new
house was opened at 290 Via Aurelia. This fiftieth anniversary is an occasion
to rediscover the history of our General House.
In the Founder’s timeThe question of a General House didn’t arise in the Founder’s time. This title is neither appropriate for the house in Aix, then the only one, where the Missionaries of Provence came together in 1815-1816, nor for the Bishop’s house in Marseilles. We know that when Fortuné de Mazenod was installed as Bishop of Marseilles in 1823, he asked his nephew Eugene and Fr TEMPIER to join him as his Vicars General.
So for 38 years up to the death of the Founder, the Bishop’s house in Marseilles was the center of the Congregation. The Assistants General continued residing in their respective communities, Fr TEMPIER at the major seminary where he had been appointed superior in 1827, Fr SUZANNE at the Calvaire, Fr COURTÈS in Aix…. The same was true for Fr Casimir AUBERT, “personal secretary to the Founder for the Congregation’s business,” who resided at the Calvaire.
In 1854 however, the increase in the number of diocesan seminarians and of Oblate scholastics brought about the construction of an Oblate scholasticate on the outskirts of Marseilles at Montolivet. The General Chapter of 1856, which was the last one while Saint Eugene was alive, was held there. In the documents, the house is designated merely as the “Notre-Dame de Montolivet house”; only one document, signed by the superior, Fr Tempier, casually refers to it as the “General House.” It is therefore that in his mind, and probably in the mind of many, Montolivet was foreseen also as the residence of Superior General who would succeed the Founder. This is confirmed by Fr ORTOLAN.
Bishop de Mazenod died May 21, 1861. Less than a month later, Bishop Cruice was appointed by the Emperor Napoléon III to succeed him. Very quickly, the new bishop gave rise to some big difficulties with the Oblates (cf. Yvon BEAUDOIN, in Etudes Oblates 1962, 281-317). Fr Tempier had first convoked the General Chapter for Montolivet. But to assure complete liberty, it was judged better to change the place of convocation. The Chapter met in Paris in December 1861 and 37 year old Fr FABRE, whom Bishop Cruice had withdrawn from the responsibility of the major seminary, was elected Superior General.
We quote LEVASSEUR: “Due to the climate of extreme tension with the Bishop and his many and inopportune interventions, on April 28, 1862 the General Council decided that Fathers Fabre and Tempier would move away from Marseilles…. The bad situation persisted and the following June 25 the General Council decided to transfer the General House to Paris, where Fathers Fabre and Tempier had already gone.”
The foundation of an Oblate house in Paris had been decided by the Founder in February 1859. In April 1860, a lot had been acquired on Saint-Pétersbourg street, in a new developing district. The house and chapel, (which still exist, the chapel having become the St André of Europe parish church), were finished just in time for the meeting of the 1861 General Chapter.
Like a lot of other religious houses in France, the General House suffered the consequences of the French Government’s decisions against the Congregations. November 5, 1880, the Oblates were evicted from there and from 16 other houses. There is no information on the residence of the Superior General for the following years. His Circular Letters are dated in Paris. It seems that the house discreetly got back its guests. The next time Missions speaks of the house on St-Pétersbourg street is on the occasion of the celebration of Fr Fabre’s 25th anniversary of election, December 4, 1886. Though the Chapter of 1887 was held in Rome, those of 1893 (election of Fr SOULLIER) and of 1898 (election of Fr Cassien AUGIER) met in Paris. But in 1904, the Oblates were again expelled, this time definitely.
Some weeks later, the General Chapter met in Liège (Belgium) and the General House was provisionally established in that city. The following year, Fr Cassien AUGIER, Superior General, announced the transfer of the General House to Rome as of November 1, 1905 to the house near the Coliseum where the scholasticate was. The street later became known as Via Vittorino da Feltre.
Another difficulty should be mentioned. Among the new articles introduced into the Rule by the General Chapter of 1850, there is this one: “The residence of the Superior General will always be in France, unless it is transferred to Rome by order of the Supreme Pontiff….” Another Rule specified that, by oath, the new Superior General committed himself to respect the Constitutions “and especially the one concerning the residence in France of the Superior General, and this under pain of immediate deposition.” The discussions by the Chapters concerning the possible transfer to Rome take up eight pages of Volume V of Fr COSENTINO’s Commentary on the Rules. Financial problems are raised, but also the fact that the Italian political situation didn’t assure a total security to religious institutions. (The reconciliation with the Holy See did not take place until 1929.) The Chapters of 1906 and 1908 modified the Rules and the definitive transfer was ratified by the Holy See.
One can find an account by Fr Aloysius KEDL of the first Oblate establishments in Rome from 1863 on in Vie Oblate Life (1992 and 1993): a Procure, then soon after a scholasticate. April 9, 1887, the scholastics moved into their new scholasticate, near the Coliseum; the construction had taken more than two years. The setting up of the General House in the same premises in 1905 could not but be temporary. In 1932, a new building was joined to the first, in order to serve as a General House. It was used for this purpose until 1950, then became the quarters of the Studium.
In 1948, the Congregation was in full expansion. The new Superior General, Fr Léo DESCHATELETS, with his Council, decided to find, or eventually build new premises for the General House. The decision was taken on January 31. There is a summary of a conversation with the Superior General, where he explains his project: “If it is true that to govern is to foresee, such a view of the future must incite us to establish at the heart of the Congregation a center perfectly adapted to these perspectives. To create it is to help the growth of the Family; hesitating, means hindering it."
He gives three reasons: the necessity of leaving more space to increase the number of Roman scholastics, the proposed establishment for ongoing formation (the future Studium generale superius), and finally the needs of the General Administration itself. It is necessary to create new services (General Office of Studies, Mission Secretariat) and to expand the existing ones (Press Office, Postulation, Archives, Procurator to the Holy See, General Secretariat).
Fr Gaetano DRAGO, Assistant General, and Fr Edmond SERVEL, Treasurer General, were put in charge of looking for an appropriate site. They left us some very detailed notes on their explorations. Fifteen sites were visited. After three months and half, they discovered the property called Villa Pacelli on the Via Aurelia. “For the first time, we have found a site that seems to offer only advantages…. It should be looked into closely. Without waiting further, Fr DESNOYERS - then replacing the Superior General who was traveling in America - secretly visited the place. During the evening recreation, he said: ‘We could’nt find better’.” It was the afternoon of May 21, 1948; the morning of that same day had seen the funeral of Fr Hilaire BALMÈS, first Assistant General, who had died suddenly. The act of sale was signed in Naples on June 24.
The property had belonged to the Pacelli family; there is a mention of Ernesto Pacelli, a cousin of Pius XII’s father and director of Banco di Roma, who had had the villa built. But because of family disagreements, it had been sold to the Baiocchi brothers, who in turn sold it to the Oblates. We might also note that in 1849, the French army that had come to help Pius IX had their camp on this property, and they were honored by a visit of Pius IX himself on September 30, 1850.
It would be too long to tell of the never-ending discussions with the occupants of the various buildings on the property (close to 150 people in all), the means in order to bring in the necessary funds from Canada, the choice of the precise site of the building and its orientation, the drafting of the plans and the scale model. The construction site was opened January 25, 1949 with a three part ceremony: “the blessing of the property, the consecration of the building site to Saint Joseph, the first stroke of the pick by the Superior General.”
The work lasted about 21 months. “Since the hill on which we set has no bed rock, the foundations must rest on pilings that go down about 12 meters to a layer of sand. At this depth, and under an enormous weight of earth, the sand is as compact as rock.” The house was built on 580 of these pilings. The first stone was laid on May 21, 1949 in the presence of all the Oblates in Rome; it was in fact set into one of the columns of the chapel. It had been taken from the facade of the Church of the Mission in Aix.
One year later, June 6, 1950, the Oblates gathered in the chapel around the Superior General who was celebrating his 25 years of ordination. August 15 was set as the date for moving. The new house was blessed on October 30, in the presence of several Oblate bishops who had come to Rome for the proclamation of the dogma of the Assumption two days later. On November 10, the vices gerens(bishop who manages the Diocese of Rome in the name of the Pope) consecrated the chapel.
A new building was added in 1957 for what was then called the Second Year or the De Mazenod Retreat. Since October 1972, it has been used by the International Scholasticate.
To this day, the building at 290 Via Aurelia and its annexes house the Superior General and his Council, the different services of the General Administration, the members of what is called the General House community, the student Fathers, the International Scholasticate, and two communities of nuns: the Sisters of St. Catherine of Siena and the Daughters of St. Francis the Seraphic; in all, 95 people, 29 nationalities, not counting the visitors who pass through, both Oblate and others. In closing let us mention Brothers Giuseppe D’ORAZIO and Jean-Paul BEAUDET. Both are more than 80 years old and are still members of the 290 community. They have known the House since its beginnings.
