Our Catltolic Heritage in Texas
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30: "I have attentively reconsidered the subject; and viewing it as one of the highest importance for the restoration of religion in that now desolate country, I think that such a mission can suit only a religious order or congregation, and your own particularly." Timon could make the trip quickly to Texas by steam packet from New Orleans and ascertain, in a very short time "the present state of things and the prospects of religion," Blanc assured him. Shrewdly, he pointed out also that the time was propitious; that General Houston, who, it was rumored, had himself been affiliated with the Church, would probably second the efforts of a Papal envoy. The good Bishop closed his persuasive appeal with a warning and a prophetic word of encouragement. The strictest secrecy had to be main- tained, he cautioned. Publication of the solicitude felt by Rome for the untended flock in Texas might arouse deep resentment in Mexico. Fur- thermore, should it be voiced abroad that the Bishop of New Orleans could issue Faculties (permission to preach and confer the Sacraments) for the Texas ministry, he might be pestered endlessly by malcontent clergymen in the United States and Europe. Yet, "I sincerely think," urged Blanc, "it is in the designs of Providence that you should give a hand to this grand work . . . worthy of the sons of St. Vincent." 22 Tl,e Clmrcli sco1tt. Unknowingly John Timon had prepared himself well for leadership in the reconnaissance of Texas. Born of pioneer stock in 1797 near York, Pennsylvania, he, while very young, had been taken by his parents to Baltimore, where he attended St. Mary's College for a few months in 18n. This appears to be the only formal schooling he had had until he entered the seminary at St. Mary-of-the-Barrens in 1822. His family had moved with the endless stream of pioneers ever westward until they reached St. Louis. There the young man had come into close contact with Bishop Louis William Dubourg and Father Joseph Rosati, Vincentian superior of St. Mary-of-the Barrens, where on October 22, 1822, he had received the tonsure and minor orders from Bishop Dubourg. The following year he had entered the Vincentian novitiate, and four years later he had made his Profession on September 23, 1826, in the church at the Barrens. After ordination he had served in the lead-mine region of Missouri, where Moses Austin and his family had tried to mend their fortune and whence Austin had eventually set out for Texas. A few years later 22Blanc to John Timon, March 30, 1838, condensed in Bayard, op. cit., 22-23. Houston was baptized in 1834 in Nacogdoches by Father Diaz de Leon. See Carlos E. Castaneda, Our Catl1olic Heritage in Te:cas, Vol. VI.
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