Catholic Mission In Canada

To cook, as well as to travel and preach, would try the patience of even a saint

Most Rev. M.A. Harrington, then Bishop of the Diocese of Kamloops, British Columbia, compiled the following vignettes of missionary life in the late 1950s.

Eight vicariates in Canada come directly under the Mission Society of the Church. A vicariate is distinguished from a diocese in that it is not self supporting, because the Catholic population is too small, effectively, to help its own missionaries.

There are 11 places in the Diocese of Kamloops with resident priests, from which 102 missions are served. There are 61 missions with churches and 40 missions without churches.

Serving this vast territory are 13diocesan priests and 15 priests of religious orders. The religious order men mainly take care of the native people. There is not one priest, including the bishop, who does not say three Masses on Sunday. And usually, he must travel quite a long distance to get to the places before he can say Mass. The mountainous roads, treacherous especially in wintertime, make driving always a hazard. In online of missions, stretching on the North Thompson River from Kamloops to the Alberta border for over 280 miles, the priest’s entire revenue is not enough to provide for the transportation costs.