Jean Forest

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Fr JEAN FOREST, aged 37 (on arrival in New Zealand in Group VI in 1842).

He came not as a missionary but as a Marist superior representing Fr Colin to inspect Marist life and intervene with Pompallier about his problems with his Marist staff. He travelled around the various stations in the first year or so, and then stayed on in Auckland where Pompallier appointed him Rector in March 1845 to minister to the Europeans. He never learned to speak Maori. Soon after his arrival in Wellington with the 1850 Viard Marist exodus, he was appointed parish priest in Lower Hutt. In October 1859 he founded Napier parish which he served faithfully for 25 years. He died on 28 September 1884, aged 79, and is buried in Napier Hill cemetery.


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Jean Forest

1st Visitor [1] of the Missions

Born 31 October 1804 in Chuyer, Loire, in the Archdiocese of Lyons, Jean Forest was among the 20 men who first took vows in the Society of Mary on 24 September 1836.
Appointed as Visitor of New Zealand[2] in 1841 he set off for Oceania from London aboard the vessel London on 16 November 1841 and arrived in Port Nicholson (Wellington) on 6 April 1842. (It was said by some he never left New Zealand again; but in fact, he had seven months in Sydney in 1858.) Colin gave him precise instructions. [3] He was to see all the Marists, learn their situation, privations and dangers and he was to work as closely as possible with Pompallier and the religious superior designated by him. [4] The General Administration had also charged him with the task[5] of examining whether a house was possible and necessary for Marists having its own land. The intention was that this would eventually become the Provincial House and a house for sick and aged confrères. It would also be a place for new missionaries to stay while learning the language of their mission. The visitor was to draw up a report which could be submitted to the Cardinal Prefect of Propaganda in Rome, and Colin carefully noted he was not conferring any authority on Forest. Colin did not want to encroach in any way on the “rights and authority of the vicar apostolic”. [6]
On arrival in New Zealand Forest found about 200 Irish Catholics in Wellington which had an overall population of 2,000 at the time. Five days after arriving in New Zealand he continued to his final destination – Kororareka via Auckland. [7] After a long and rough voyage, he reached there on 4 May 1842. In his travels he ministered to all the people he met.
Within a short time, he realized the bad situation of the missionaries in New Zealand, largely due to Bishop Pompallier's financial mismanagement and overindulgent zeal for conversions, and he determined to prepare some proposals for Colin, and for the Holy See if necessary. Although Pompallier did not welcome the idea of another 'superior' of the missionaries and was afraid of Forest infringing on his ecclesiastical authority, he knew from previous experience[8] that Forest was most diplomatic. When Garin was moved into active ministry, Forest took over the tasks previously done by Garin without accepting the title of ‘provincial’. [9]
In 1843 he organized retreats for the missionaries. On 8 January he starts a retreat at Tauranga; [10] in late February at Kororereka, Garin and Pompallier alternated ‘on mission’ while Servant gave the pastoral part; and on 2 April at Hokianga, he preached for others and then did his own retreat in Holy Week. From 1845[11] Forest was based at Auckland with Jean-Baptiste Petitjean. Colin did write to Forest from time to time, but Forest wrote to Colin much more often. [12] Colin regularly exhorted Forest to make sure there was always a community of two or three Marists in the same mission station.
In 1850 Forest was appointed superior by Colin for a term of 3 years, with the title of “Visitor”. [13] In the same year, he moved to the Diocese of Wellington, where Bishop Philippe Viard instructed him to open the mission in the Hutt valley (northern end of Port Nicholson harbour) and built in 1851 the church of Saints Peter and Paul, as well as a presbytery and school.
Hoping the climate in Hawke's Bay would be better for his health, in April 1859 Forest transferred to Meeanee mission as assistant to Euloge Reignier. In 1858, Napier had become the capital of a new province and the 45th Regiment was quartered there. The Catholic population increased so that in March 1859 a Catholic church, St Mary's, was opened in Napier to which Forest moved in August. In 1860 Forest was appointed Napier's mission rector, a position he held until his death in 1884.
Forest welcomed the Sisters of the Mission to New Zealand in 1865 where they started Sacred Heart College. In 1867, the Sisters opened with Reignier's support opened in the convent grounds, St Joseph's Providence, a school for Maori and mixed-race girls. This school is still in existence at Greenmeadows and is now known as St Joseph's Māori Girls’ College.
Remembering his charge to buy a property for the Society of Mary he was grateful Reignier had bought a property on Meeanee Flat. In 1880 a house was built, which was suitable as a retreat for the sick and elderly. Later this became the site of St Mary's Seminary which moved to Greenmeadows in 1910.
He was authorized in 1872 to receive the consecration of Mademoiselle Suzanne Aubert[14] as a novice into the Third Order Regular of Mary and to accept her profession a year later. Suzanne Aubert went on to become Mother Aubert, Foundress of the Daughters of Our Lady of Compassion. Forest also welcomed the Marist Brothers to Napier in 1878, almost ten years after first requesting them to come.
Forest administered the Wellington diocese on Viard’s death in 1872, and again in 1880, during Bishop Francis Redwood’s ad limina visit to Rome.
Jean Forest, 1st Visitor of the missionaries of Oceania, died in Napier, New Zealand on 28 September 1884, and was buried in the Napier Hill Cemetery.

Notes

  1. ↑ At the stage Forest leaves there are 3 priests and 3 brothers in the islands. He never visited the islands with his vessel sailing from London directly to NZ. CS1 doc 301 mentioned islands but specifically named NZ; scope later narrowed - Of New Zealand – see CS2 doc 31 [4].
  2. ↑ See CS2 doc 32 [4].
  3. ↑ CS 1, 301 (20 October 1841, Colin to the missionaries of Oceania).
  4. ↑ Jean-Claude Colin, Reluctant Founder, Justin Taylor, ATF Press, Hindmarsh, Australia (2018), p. 572.
  5. ↑ CS1 doc 301 [5].
  6. ↑ Jean-Claude Colin Reluctant Founder, Justin Taylor, ATF Press, Hindmarsh, Australia (2018), p.573.
  7. ↑ 18420411 departure Wellington on New York Packet for Auckland arrive 18420428 New Zealand Gazette and Wellington Spectator 13/04/1842, p.2. 18420503 departure Auckland on Minerva for Bay of Islands arrive 18420504 (veille de l'Ascension LRO doc 166) / The Australian 23/06/1842.
  8. ↑ CS2 doc 31 [12].
  9. ↑ LRO doc 245, 247, 254.
  10. ↑ LRO doc 247, 253, 254.
  11. ↑ LRO doc 434.
  12. ↑ Forest wrote 12 letters to Colin from 3 April 1842.
  13. ↑ CS4, 135 (21 January 1850).
  14. ↑ She had arrived at Auckland in 1860.


Garin Delegated Religious Superiors 1836-1898 Calinon
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