17 NOVEMBER 2022
www.therecord.com.au
Edition #409
SPECIAL REPORT: ST CHARLES SEMINARY MARKS 80 YEARS OF SERVICE TO CHRIST AND HIS CHURCH
St Charles Seminary Rector Fr Phillip Fleay, Perth Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB and Geraldton Bishop Michael Morrissey cut the cake on the occasion of the St Charles Seminary 80th Anniversary Sundowner on Friday 4 November 2022. PHOTO: SIMON HALL/ARCHDIOCESE OF PERTH..
St Charles Seminary has this month celebrated its 80th anniversary. The occasion was marked with a special sundowner on Friday 4 November – the feast of St Charles Borromeo - attended by past and present students and special guests. Opened in 1942, the Seminary was built on a property known as ‘Garden Hill’ in Guildford. It was purchased by then Archbishop Redmond Prendiville (Archbishop of Perth from 1935 to 1968) with the assistance of then Geraldton Bishop James O'Collins (Bishop of Geraldton from 1930 to 1941). A few modifications to the homestead made it possible for the first students to move in and commence their scholastic year in 1942. In marking the occasion, Perth Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB said that for anybody who at any
stage made a decision to attend St Charles Seminary to try out a possible vocation to the priesthood, entered into a process that would have been, as he imagined, a very significant part of whatever then unfolded later on in their life. “One of the things that comes to me from time to time as a bishop, and prior to here, of course, I was an Auxiliary Bishop in Melbourne. And prior to that, I was in charge of the formation of the Salesians in Melbourne. “One of the things that happens to me from time to time, is someone who's in a seminary, or religious house might come and talk to me about the fact that they've discerned that perhaps they need to leave. Archbishop Costelloe continued saying that occasionally, a person might talk a little bit about how they
think they made a mistake coming to the Seminary. “And my reflection always is, well, maybe, but I doubt it. I don't think these things are ever mistakes. I think these things are part of the journey that every person has to undergo as he or she works out who they are, and what God's asking of them and what sort of person they want to be and what they want to do with their life,” Archbishop Costelloe explained. “The other thing that I wanted to do with just a very brief reflection on the fact that today does happen to be the feast of St Charles Borromeo. St Charles is a very good model for a seminary. Of course, he's remembered as the great reformer of seminaries after the Council of Trent. St Charles, highlighted Archbishop Costelloe, is a good model for a seminary, because he developed a system of seminary formation that was meant to last forever. “He was a good model for a seminary for a major and as a patron for a seminary. “Because in his own time, and in his own day, he was able to read the signs of the times in the light of the gospel, and know that it was time for something new and something different,” Archbishop Costelloe said. The seminary was entrusted to the Vincentian Fathers in 1948 who taught secondary students and seminarians who had commenced their three-year course in philosophy and sundry introduction courses in scripture and church documents. Full Text available at
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