Cheverus High School - Clarion Yearbook (Portland, ME)

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lHl llll lll BISHIIP CHIVIRUS ISHOP CHEVERUS was a man of action. When he first came to this country, he wrote to Bishop Carroll in Baltimore, Send me where you think l am most needed . . . I am willing to work with my hands, if need be. His biographer tells us that in his ministry he was called upon to use his hands not only for maintenance but out of charity to his flock. Once when he had become Bishop of Boston, he was seen chopping fire- wood at 5:00 A.M. to bring to his poorer parishioners. He had gotten up early so no one would see Boston's first Bishop pulling wood on an improvised sled. When there was work to be done, as there always was, Bishop Cheverus went out and did it. In his later years, after he had traversed the New England countryside far and wide, he told a friend, I never walked as much as fifteen minutes for pleasure. It was always on business. Those he loved most, in his own words, my dear ones, were his beloved Indians of Maine. For more than twenty years he visited them, accustoming himself to their diet of boiled fish, writing an Indian catechism under great difficulties, and striving to build churches. Even as Bishop, he devoted some months of every year to their spiritual well-being, visiting them and preach- ing to them on every occasion that he could. Bishop Cheverus' activity was not the kind that lacked foresight. He realized that the initial impres- sion he made on his non-Catholic neighbors would spell for many years the reactions they would main- tain towards other Catholics. At his small, plain house in Boston, Cheverus found himself surrounded by some of the finest minds in the new world. So, in spite of his other daily duties, he set out to help them learn the full Truth. ln these efforts, he managed to learn the English language in minute detail, going so far as to memorize long passages from the best English authors. Before many years had passed, he was acknowledged as Boston's leading authority on the English language! Daily he kept up also his studies in Greek, French, and Latin. He soon belonged to all the learned societies of Boston. Never once did Cheverus act in a way that could bring discredit to the Church or to the Christian re- ligion. It was in hard and honest labor that he brought forth great fruit. Each year saw great gains made in his flock, all because his good example in his active life led many to inquire into the source of his strength, which was Christ Himself. OLDES1' CHURCH IN NEW ENGLAND: St. Potrick's, Damariscotta. The Church and cemetery were consecrated by Bishop Cheverus, July 17, 1808. Maine's first Catholic Governor, the Honorable Edward Kavanagh, is buried here.