C,·cation of a Sea,lar Clergy
department was necessary to keep it alive. As he looked about for help he thought of the Franciscan Friars Minor Conventuals who had come in 1852 and were still laboring among the German and Polish settlers. 19 He asked them to take over St. Mary's Seminary-College in 1858. The offer was made to Father M. Moczygemba, O.F.M.Conv., Superior of the friars in Texas at the time. Aware of the grave responsibility, Moczygemba first went to Europe to recruit teachers and to obtain canon- ical approval for the establishment of a province of his Order in Texas. The Minister-General in Rome refused the request for a new province but he gave his consent for the establishment of a Commissariat and ap- pointed Father Moczygemba Commissary-General. Before the end of the year, Father Moczygemba returned to Texas accompanied by Fathers Bonaventure Hamer, O.F.M.Conv., and Francis Gatti, O.F.M.Conv. To meet the demands that would now be made on the Community three other friars: Fathers Frederick Doyle, Joseph Butler, and Patrick Delaney, set out from Ireland to join the group in Texas. Father Gatti was named Superior of the Texas missions of the Order and Rector of St. Mary's University in Galveston, as the Seminary-College was popularly called after 1856, when it received a charter of incorporation from the Sttate. Unfortunately, the Franciscan Conventuals had charge of St. Mary's for only one year. Unforeseen circumstances brought about their recall from the Texas field in 1859. The chronic lack of men for work in Eastern United States, the discouraging conditions that followed the economic crisis of 1857, and the strain of the approaching Civil War, caused them to give up their work at St. Mary's and abandon the Texas missions. The Commissary-General ordered the friars to Pennsylvania in 1859. He declared that he was taking this step so that the friars might have "better opportunities to observe the rule of their Order." Father Gatti took some of the novices from Galveston to Philadelphia before the end of 1859. For seven years the Conventuals had worked diligently among the German and Polish settlers in Texas with undeniable success and tried courageously for a year to administer a Seminary-College in Galveston. 20 St. i11ary's University under Laymen, r86o. There is evidence that Bishop Odin next tried to get the Jesuits to take charge of his seminary. His diocesan report contained this statement: "... it is probable that the 19 For details of their coming to Texas see Chapter IV. 20 Bonaventure Hammer, O.F..M.Conv., Du Kat/rolisclte Kirclte i11 den Ver1ini11glen Staaten N Of"tlamerikas, 36 I -362. See also documents on Franciscan Conventuals, C. A. T.
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