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ketekorero May - July 2015
parish news Putaruru celebration for work of Mill Hill Fathers John Fong and Michael Smith A ceremony to honour the work of the Mill Hill Fathers may hold important clues as to a way forward for Maori in the Diocese of Hamilton. The ceremony was held after Mass at St Patrick’s Church in Putaruru on 15 March in the parish’s hall, the “Mill Hill Centre”. The ceremony was driven largely by the dedication of Deacon Joseph Haumaha who spent over a year researching the lives of the Mill Hill priests who served out of what was then their main headquarters, in Putaruru. [See historic background below] Fr William Tuerlings was the last Mill Mill to serve at St Patrick’s from 1990 to 1998 and, when he left, he told Deacon Haumaha no one would follow. Recalling the dominant role the Mill Hills played in his family’s life, Deacon Haumaha determined to ensure they were properly remembered. At the official ceremony, Deacon Haumaha presented to Emeritus Bishop Denis Browne the history and two large photographic frames (containing the portraits) of the 16 Mill Hill priests who had served as diocesan priests at St Patrick’s Church from 1925 to 1998. Also present at the ceremony were the parish priest Fr Vincent Jones, Fr Hemi Hekiera, Phillip White (representing the parishioners), and kaumatua, Hori Deane from Ngatira Marae (hapu Ngati Ahuru and iwi Ngati Raukawa) and his supporters. Recognising the work put into the event, Emritus Bishop Denis Browne said: “This wouldn’t have happened today if it wasn’t for Deacon Haumaha. He did all the research, and ordered all the people to come here.” It was very important to have such a place because there were four Mill Hill priests left in New Zealand. New Era While the ceremony to some extent marked an end of an era, it also marked the start of a new era in the diocese for Maori. Deacon Haumaha told Kete Korero that when the early Catholic priests came to the area, they typically used Latin in Mass. Maori did not know Latin but they understood the spirit of the Church. “So the priests learnt our language and they played a special role with our people, with the
From left: Deacon Joseph Haumaha, Sam Papa, Emeritus Bishop Denis Browne, Pa Hemi Hekiera, Fr Vince Jones, and Hori Deane. six marae in the area.” In the early days, Maori had to deal with a culture that came from a colonial European background, and so it was a real help having the priests who understood the language and Maori culture. “We used to have a bicultural society and now are multi-cultural but we still work under one banner of the Catholic Church – that’s the important thing. When Pope John Paul II came to New Zealand in 1986, part of the visit was the ordination of the first Maori bishop. “He said to the Maori people at the time ‘God created you as Maori and be Maori in your faith in the Catholic Church’. God created us and he never said I want you to revert back to being Pakeha. “The whole thing is that in our world is our church, our faith. We have about eight cultures here in Putaruru but we come together in this church here with the one body of Christ.” One of the reasons he had worked hard on bringing the commemoration to fruition was to bring the focus back on to the Church. “We are so bombarded in our society today with different images that it’s hard to reflect on that one direction of the church.” Fr Hemi Hekiera, who attended the ceremony, has, with Fr David Gledhill, been charged with bringing the new Whaia te Whaea Maori collegial area forward across. He agreed the Mill Hill priests were a vessel for bringing the message of God to the people, and now the church was going through a process of finding another way forward.
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“We are trying to hear God’s direction as to where we are moving. The Pope gives us a good idea and the church gives us a good idea but then we must try and flesh that out in the areas where we live and where we work.” The Mill Hill priests had to some extent had an advantage of coming from a culture where a number of languages were spoken, not just mainly English. The language still played an important role in Maori inclusion in the church, Fr Hemi said. “At the moment, Maori is going back into its own language, so that’s another area that needs to be acknowledged, used and become part of today’s world.” The work and the study he had done over the past year had given him a better understanding
Hori Deane from Ngatira Marae of the direction for the church. “The church has to get back into the culture of the people – not deny its own culture but to acknowledge the culture of the people, and I think that is one of things we must try and work in.” Background History The Mill Hill Fathers, formally known as St Joseph’s Missionary Society, was founded by Cardinal Herbert Vaughan in 1866 in a villa near Mill Hill, which is about 16 kilometres north of London. (Cardinal Vaughan’s society was at that time called “St Joseph’s Missionary College”.) Its purpose was “to train missionaries to propagate the Gospel among unevangelised races beyondEurope”: Catholic Encyclopedia: St Joseph’s Society for Foreign Missions. In 1886, the Mill Hill Fathers established a Maori Mission in the Diocese of Auckland. It was not until 20 March 1925 that the first Mill Hill priest, Fr Martin Alink, became the priest at St Patrick’s in Putaruru. There followed 15 other Mill Hill priests serving at St Patrick’s. These priests did not become independent and were part of the local diocese. At present, there are thought to be four Mill Hill priests living in New Zealand. They are Fr Michael Ryan (the New Zealand Superior) living in retirement in Auckland; Fr Anthony Timmerman, retired and living in Auckland, and Fr Anselm Aherne, a parish priest at St Columba Church in Frankton, Hamilton. After his retirement, Fr Tuerlings decided to fill a void in the history of the Mill Hill Fathers in New Zealand. The result was a book, Mill Hill and Maori Mission, completed in 2003.