Publication
Petra Books, 2015.
Status
Available
Description
"...a rich chronicle of one of the greatest leaders of this diocese." -Marcel André Gervais, Archbishop Emeritus of Ottawa, Canada "...the opportunity to get to know a great figure of the Canadian Episcopate." -Luigi Ventura, former Apostolic Nuncio to Canada Alexandre Vachon 1885-1953 completed his studies for the Catholic Priesthood with distinction. He became a science teacher and pursued studies at Harvard and MIT. Early on, he realized the need to improve the lot of French-Canadians, not only in the Province of Quebec, but throughout Canada. As Director of the Advanced School of Chemistry and then Dean of the Faculty of Science, and finally as Rector at Laval University, he encouraged French-Canadian youth to choose scientific studies and, while maintaining good relations with English Canadians, to take their due place in the Canadian society. The Church recognized his talents and, in 1939, turned to him to lead the Ottawa diocese as Bishop. Rome noticed the success of his work, particularly the 1947 Marian Congress, and he was entrusted with new responsibilities which extended to the Catholic Church at large.… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member MarthaJeanne
The author translated his French original himself, which in theory is ideal - if the author is fluent enough in the second language or has access to good editors. In this case it quickly becomes obvious that neither is the case. The text is understandable but awkward, and the reader frequently
There is plenty of material for this biography, and certainly a biographer would rather be faced with having to pick and chose from abundant material than to try to stretch insufficient sources into a coherent whole. In this case, with less material the author might have spent more effort on making Vachon come to life than on relating detail after detail that only hide the person behind them.
It's early days yet, and I hope I can write more positively when I have proceeded further.
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catches on phrases that are close to what was meant, but not quite right.There is plenty of material for this biography, and certainly a biographer would rather be faced with having to pick and chose from abundant material than to try to stretch insufficient sources into a coherent whole. In this case, with less material the author might have spent more effort on making Vachon come to life than on relating detail after detail that only hide the person behind them.
It's early days yet, and I hope I can write more positively when I have proceeded further.
Show Less
LibraryThing member louis69
This is a dense book to read, crammed as it is with facts about the life of Archbishop Vachon, Archbishop of Ottawa, Canada 1940-1953. The author seems to be distantly related to the Archbishop, although this is not really disclosed. The biography was originally written in French and has been
Alexandre Vachon was born in Quebec in 1885 and his background in French Canada is a constant theme throughout the biography. Although his mother tongue was actually English, he also became proficient in French and was an outstanding proponent of the retention of the French language and strongly supported education through the medium of French. This is a recurring thread in his life and work.
I found it interesting to read about the pre-Vatican II Canadian church and compare my experience as a young person in the New Zealand Catholic Church pre-Vatican II – in many ways similar, although Archbishop Vachon’s constant concern for the survival of the French language is very different. The difficulty of having to run a separate school system rang many bells with the situation here in New Zealand. In some ways this was one of the disappointing aspects of the book for me in that one didn’t get to find out how the school situation was resolved because he died in 1953. An appended note by the author might have been useful. Looking at Google it seems that there are still separate schools but that they do receive funding from taxes.
Laval University and the University of Ottawa were both originally Catholic foundations and Archbishop Vachon played a huge part in developing and supporting these two institutions. In fact he was a teacher at Laval and it was during his short term as Rector of Laval that he was appointed as Archbishop. The title given to the biography reflects his academic achievements. His involvement in tertiary education and indeed the involvement of the Church in tertiary education in Canada during his lifetime was an eye-opener for me, living in NZ where all tertiary education has largely been run by the State. It would be an immense disappointment to him I’m sure, to look on the websites of these two institutions, for an acknowledgement of the part played by the Church in their development and not be able to find it.
The author successfully brings out the humanity of Archbishop Vachon and the volume of work he achieved was prodigious. He is a man of his time and of his Church at that time, and in 1941 he wrote:
‘Dancing is not necessary for entertainment; it is an occasion for sin…’.
The biography also portrays a man who was immensely committed to the development of the sciences and science teaching in Eastern Canada. One might ask how he fulfilled his priestly duties when he was so involved in education as a teacher and administrator.
Very occasionally the author drops in a comment of his own and these brought the book more alive for me. For example he acknowledges that the ‘creation of two hierarchical entities grouping parishes on the basis of the language used … however one must ask oneself if it does not play to the detriment of an harmonious integration of the two communities that Msgr. Vachon yearns so much for.’
The biography is meticulously footnoted and having read to the end and discovered that the Archbishop had commanded in his will, that all his private papers be destroyed, this approach seemed all the more necessary. However some sifting of the facts would have made this biography more readable. As a non-Canadian reader I would have appreciated a map or maps.
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translated by the author. The fact that it is a translated work shows and not only are their many typos but there are words which are not in English dictionaries I consulted. An example is ‘diocesans’ which is used often throughout the biography. I was never sure if this was ‘the people of the Archdiocese’ or ‘diocesan priests’. A further example is the use of the word ‘encycIics’ for encyclicals (location 4537 in the mobi file). Personally I found the use of the present tense in a biography difficult to get used to and often had to ask myself if the author was talking about the 21st century. In most cases he was not.Alexandre Vachon was born in Quebec in 1885 and his background in French Canada is a constant theme throughout the biography. Although his mother tongue was actually English, he also became proficient in French and was an outstanding proponent of the retention of the French language and strongly supported education through the medium of French. This is a recurring thread in his life and work.
I found it interesting to read about the pre-Vatican II Canadian church and compare my experience as a young person in the New Zealand Catholic Church pre-Vatican II – in many ways similar, although Archbishop Vachon’s constant concern for the survival of the French language is very different. The difficulty of having to run a separate school system rang many bells with the situation here in New Zealand. In some ways this was one of the disappointing aspects of the book for me in that one didn’t get to find out how the school situation was resolved because he died in 1953. An appended note by the author might have been useful. Looking at Google it seems that there are still separate schools but that they do receive funding from taxes.
Laval University and the University of Ottawa were both originally Catholic foundations and Archbishop Vachon played a huge part in developing and supporting these two institutions. In fact he was a teacher at Laval and it was during his short term as Rector of Laval that he was appointed as Archbishop. The title given to the biography reflects his academic achievements. His involvement in tertiary education and indeed the involvement of the Church in tertiary education in Canada during his lifetime was an eye-opener for me, living in NZ where all tertiary education has largely been run by the State. It would be an immense disappointment to him I’m sure, to look on the websites of these two institutions, for an acknowledgement of the part played by the Church in their development and not be able to find it.
The author successfully brings out the humanity of Archbishop Vachon and the volume of work he achieved was prodigious. He is a man of his time and of his Church at that time, and in 1941 he wrote:
‘Dancing is not necessary for entertainment; it is an occasion for sin…’.
The biography also portrays a man who was immensely committed to the development of the sciences and science teaching in Eastern Canada. One might ask how he fulfilled his priestly duties when he was so involved in education as a teacher and administrator.
Very occasionally the author drops in a comment of his own and these brought the book more alive for me. For example he acknowledges that the ‘creation of two hierarchical entities grouping parishes on the basis of the language used … however one must ask oneself if it does not play to the detriment of an harmonious integration of the two communities that Msgr. Vachon yearns so much for.’
The biography is meticulously footnoted and having read to the end and discovered that the Archbishop had commanded in his will, that all his private papers be destroyed, this approach seemed all the more necessary. However some sifting of the facts would have made this biography more readable. As a non-Canadian reader I would have appreciated a map or maps.
Show Less
LibraryThing member Kobzar
This is a clerical biography of Alexandre Vachon [1885-1953], cleric and scientist, francophone leader and ultimately Archbishop of Ottawa. Vachon was born in rural Quebec to parents of a long established francophone family and Scottish immigrants from Ireland who arrived in 1832. The youngest of
Written by a family member it reads more like a family or local history than an analytical academic study. It is encyclopedic and anecdotal in nature and chronological in structure. It is long on details, short on analysis and at times speculative. It is nevertheless a fascinating portrait of multifaceted spiritual pastor who advocated for the advancement and elevation of his charges through the advanced study of the sciences.
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thirteen siblings, Vachon graduated from the Quebec Minor Seminary and Laval University before furthering his education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University.Written by a family member it reads more like a family or local history than an analytical academic study. It is encyclopedic and anecdotal in nature and chronological in structure. It is long on details, short on analysis and at times speculative. It is nevertheless a fascinating portrait of multifaceted spiritual pastor who advocated for the advancement and elevation of his charges through the advanced study of the sciences.
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LibraryThing member Kintra
This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers. Subtitled the scholars’ cleric and the clerics’ scholar, this is a biography of one of the great leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in Canada. The former Apostolic Nuncio to Canada Alexandre Vachon 1885-1953 completed his studies for
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the Catholic Priesthood with distinction and became a science teacher pursuing his studies at Harvard, realizing the need to improve the lot of French-Canadians. Although eventually bilingual, he was born in Quebec of Scottish/Irish roots and his first language was English, yet he strongly supported education through the medium of French. The author very successfully highlights the achievements of Alexandre Vachon and although this book is not an easy read – the Adobe .pdf file provided for the review contained many long spaces and a printed version may be easier to read, however, I found this bio extremely interesting as a Protestant with Scottish/English roots from another commonwealth country where we have a very similar affluent western life-style. I am very familiar with Eastern Canada and have life-long friends in Ontario where I have spent months at a time. It would appear that Alexandre was indeed a man of his time and place. Show Less
Language
Original language
French
ISBN
9781927032626