Voor kerk en mensenwereld. De priesteropleiding van de minderbroeders-franciscanen in Nederland 1853-1967

Abstract

The Dutch province of the Friars Minor-Recollects, since 1897 called Franciscans, was founded in 1853. Beginning with 200 members, their numbers rose to about 1450 shortly after the Second World War However towards 1967 the quantity of novices and students rapidly decreased. Apart from its specifically ecclesiastical duties in parochial and categorical pastoral care the province was active in many fields and operated far outside the national boundaries. It took half a century to recover itself from repressions in the past. About 1910 the province began dedicating itself to the emancipation of the Catholics by way of secondary education and by contributing to the Roman Catholic organization system. Priesthood was incorporated in a secluded way of life which was even stricter for the regulars than for the seculars. The study was part of the socialization in a furthermore rather limited group viz. that of a province of one order. Command of the language in particular was a major concern: publicity in speech and in writing was an important means of establishing a church community. A philosophy becoming independent and its history, Bible study, the history of the Church and order and developments in theology itself counterbalanced dogmatic treatises which threatened to degenerate into ideologies. In addition to education and study directed towards intellectual development the liturgical life and the inner education within the monasteries were matters of prime importance. Gradually a great deal of typically conventual or monastic life was abandoned. Monks dissociated themselves to a certain extent from the Roman Catholic Church as an institute and less friars aspired to priesthood. The return to the sources showed some signs of revival of the Franciscan movement, outside the orders and the Church too. After the closure of the noviciate in 1967 the philosophical and theological training for the friars at the monasteries were closed