More Seminary Ramblings

Father Robert Sharplin

Some old places are like interesting people they take time for you to get to know and find your way around them. Holy Cross seminary in Otago was one of those places that dripped atmosphere and sometimes if you were very attentive the walls really would talk. Not that I ever recommend talking directly to walls but now and then former students or seminary staff would let drop a snippet of information or a little story and a sensitive awareness to time and place would allow the listener to fill in or embroider upon any gaps.

The physical layout of the College was bewildering having grown like topsy with buildings of different eras and styles. Basically it took the form of a gigantic crooked cross connected by a long wide two storey hall dating from the Depression era, when the church must have been more prosperous than it is today. There were many other outbuildings to be investigated. One of the darkest and most forbidding passages was the roofed over gap between the exterior wall of the chapel and the main dining room. It went by the intriguing name of Temptation Alley and was suitably dimly lit by a very obscure skylight and two bare bulbs at the end of long chords. These always seemed to be swinging slightly although there was no breeze along the corridor which also housed old cupboards and wardrobes and other items of usually broken furniture. The alley provided an alternative and unobserved route between the kitchens and the main hall which was the reason for the unusual name.

In the early years of the College (founded 1901) the kitchen staff were laywomen from the local township of Mosgiel. Any contact between the inmates of the seminary and these staff beyond the absolute minimum necessary to ensure the domestic functioning of the College was severely frowned upon. In later decades the Cluny Sisters (yes, the same order as here in Tauranga) would come to this domestic apostolate at Holy Cross and a fine looking but fiercely cold convent was built for them in the North-east corner of the grounds

I would not want anyone to think from the foregoing that we were pampered little clerical princes. By our day the lay staff had returned to the kitchens for limited hours, which was by then all the College could afford. Rosters for washing up and cleaning the kitchens were an integral part of student life and I say 'kitchens' because they sprawled over a large area and contained all sorts of equipment the purpose of which one could only guess at, dating from the halcyon days when the seminary itself was a small village comprising upwards of 200 souls.

We had to fend for ourselves on weekends and holidays and in the matters of finding provisions our year group had an invaluable scout in Darren McFarlane now PP of Paeroa/Te Aroha. (Fr) Darren had an unerring instinct for finding the right cupboard with exactly the right thing required and even seemed to be able to materialise the right key if anyone had been so unfriendly as to lock them up. It was also (Fr) Darren who we relied on in those early months especially, to find our way around to the various classrooms at the right time. Whether class was in the Old Common room an add-on above the kitchens built before modern building codes and reached by a rickety and claustrophobic staircase or the Burns Room, the still rather formal drawing room of the original Burns family homestead and yes these were collateral descendants of the famous Scottish poet but more next week on that topic.

My favourite seat of learning was the Pope's parlour, so called because the walls were adorned with near life size pictures of every pontiff from Pius IX to John XXIII. It seems that a long serving bishop in provincial New South Wales was in the habit of presenting an oil painting of the reigning pope to the local art gallery. In the 1960's when the gallery was having a clear-out a rector of Holy Cross College on holiday in OZ at the time saved them from a sad fate. My particular favourite was a full length portrait of Leo XIII so lifelike that the white satin of his soutane seemed to reflect the sunlight in the room. He had a very intelligent and warm smile, like he would have enjoyed a good joke in Italian of course. He was elected in 1878 as a stop-gap pope as he was already 68 and in very poor health. He lived to be 93, the second longest papal reign in history up to that time.

Competing with the great pontiffs of yesteryear for our attention in the popes' parlour was the rector of the college the unassuming Fr later Msgr Vincent Hunt, who was there to teach us the rudiments of Christian philosophy. 'Vince' as he was universally known at the seminary has connections to our diocese having been transported from Ireland as a young man to become the curate to the formidable Msgr Buxton in St. Mary’s Hamilton. He still recalls his arrival at the parish and Msgr Buxton's expressions of deepest regret over having to expend so much for Fr Hunt's new bedroom furniture. However Vince's quiet studious ways and ability to gain a degree (without scratching the woodwork) distinguished him from his fellow clergy and led to a seminary teaching career.

This would have ended very creditably as vice-rector if not for the unexpected departure of Vince's predecessor which put Vince in the top job temporarily. There was dithering over finding a replacement and Vince's temporary appointment lengthened into years of committed service the bishops' indecision being one of their Lordships' more inspired moves in connection with the seminary. A share in the credit for stabilisation of seminary training in New Zealand after the crisis and alarms of the post-Vatican II era must go to Vince, a priest with a kindly and moderate disposition who luckily enough for our year group was not easily perturbed.

Of course the pendulum swings in the seminary institution as well as everywhere else. Lay staff followed by nuns then lay staff again attended to domestic management. By my time in the seminary however there was an innovation undreamed of by the seminary's founders all those years ago. A Dominican Sister that is, a woman, of the opposite sex, was appointed to the teaching staff of Holy Cross and her impact expended well beyond the academic sphere. Sr Bernie was determined to uphold standards and drew a line in the sand against what could easily have become 'sloppiness' in a male dominated institution. So for Sr Bernie the butter knives were put out and the cling wrap removed from the butter dishes before we sat for supper and quite apart from seminary rules Sister's standards were observed. One of these was a little problematic for the first year students living in the East wing of the main building. Sr Bernie was of the view that the rather grand central staircase in the Burns mansion was off limits at least in the evening when staff were relaxing in their adjacent common room. Admittedly there were two other staircases to use (and also a dumb waiter should not go unmentioned). Youth however always prefers to take the direct route.

We first years were relaxing after a hard days prayer in our own 2nd floor common room preparing for some televised sporting event and (Fr) Michael Gielen having drawn the short straw was sent on a mission to the kitchens below with instructions from (Fr ) Darren on where to locate suitable items including, if available, a very delicious chocolate peppermint slice, a specialty of the good ladies of Mosgiel. He returned a little later than he should have done, ashen faced and shaken, croaking out 'She got me, she got me', before collapsing on the settee. Apparently as he reached the second landing of the forbidden stairs, which connected the Burns mansion to the central hall at an odd angle Sister had emerged suddenly from the shadows. Even before she questioned his presence there, in tones of icy authority, Michael, in fright, had dropped our provisions down the long length of the staircase. All we had that night were broken biscuits but not as shattered as Michael. About a year later (I think when Sister was on holiday) Darren discovered another secret of the house and stairway. If at the top of the stairs you turned sharp right you might discern what looked like a cupboard but was actually a small doorway through this and another sharp right turn took you to the wine cache. Too amply provisioned to have been solely for ecclesial or medicinal purposes but who are we to be puritanical.

Discerning readers will have realised by now that such a house of nooks and crannies, long echoing passageways and long and varied history would not be complete without some errant ectoplasm. Yes indeed there was a 'presence' and encountered by more than a few. I would not recount this without personal experience of the strange phenomenon and all will be revealed in the next installment...