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King's House, Belleville—closed retreats for men and women.
How count the grains of sand beside the sea?
How hush the happy warbling of the birds?
Yet this no greater task for mortal man
To compass the Grace of God with empty words.
Anonymous
THE EARLY PART of the twentieth century, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate were still unknown in the Midwest of the United States. Already for three generations they had been laboring in the South and Southwest. In the East also, many had been evangelized by Oblates. But when the first great war broke out, many Oblates in various parts of the world discovered that their German origin had marked them as undesirables and were banished from spheres of activity they had come to love. Seeking refuge from the confusion and disorder stirred up by the war, they came to the Midwestern states of Minnesota and Wisconsin, striving at the same time to find priestly duties to fulfill. In October of 1916, fourteen Oblates arrived from Australia after having spent two years in detention there. Coming to Minnesota, they found Oblates from Canada already laboring in the poor parishes—some starting new parishes. After two years in prison they were eager for priestly work and priestly life again and willingly answered the call of any and every bishop. Most of their work was in parishes—most of the parishes poor ones. The fathers found parish life in the United States far different from that of Germany and adaptation created difficulties. Add to this the problems peculiar to a time
Hurkes Implement Co.
Watertown, S. D.
S. J. Antus Realtor
Cloquet, Minn.
St. Henry's Preparatory Seminary — for the Belleville Diocese and Oblate juniors.
of war and understanding of their hardships becomes more pronounced. They were scattered in their work but a property had been purchased where they would gather every year for renewal of the interior and communal life. The question now was: How long would they continue in this manner?
The period following the war, “the roaring twenties,” was a period of trial ar.d error, of disillusionments and new hopes, of muddled beginnings and lost opportunities. It was the “Amazing Age,” the “Dynamic Decade.” Ferhaps most of all it was an age of uncertainty and insecurity. A “war to end wars" had been fought and won, but was the war over? America signed no treaty until 1921. There was prosperity, but would it last? The mild depression of 1920-1923 left people wondering. This insecurity was not unfelt by these Oblates in the Midwest. What would happen now? Would the General Administration recall them to their former tasks? They had come to love the United States and though they were engaged in the secondary works of the Congregation they felt sure that they could establish themselves as a province and launch into its principal aims.
In 1921, Father John Pietsch, O.M.I., was delegated to visit the German fathers in Canada and from him the newly arrived Oblates received much encouragement and a promise to set their cause favorably before the General Administration. But the latter
St. Theresa s Church	Our	Lady	of Good Hope Parish
Gulfport, Miss.	DeLisle, Miss.