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I heard him relate several times the story of his life, his conversion, his joining the Redemptorists, his case before the Roman Congregations, and the founding of the Paulist community. I can still recall the banks of the Lake of Geneva at the Villa Bartoloni, where Father Hecker, walking with a friend and myself, told us of his leaving the Redemptorist order.
The decree is not in my hands, but Cardinal Barnabo read it to me last evening. The General is not mentioned in it, and no attention whatever is paid to his action in my regard. The other Fathers are dispensed in view of the petition they made, as the demand for separation as Redemptorists would destroy the unity of the Congregation, and in the dispensation I am associated with them.
It was decided that all the American Fathers associated in the missionary band should be dispensed from their vows as Redemptorists, including Father Hecker, who was looked upon and treated by the decree as if he were still as much a member of the Congregation as the others, his expulsion being ignored.
The year spent in England after ordination was occupied by Father Hecker mainly in parochial duties at Clapham and some neighboring stations attended by the Redemptorists of that house.
Of He-Monks, I mean the Fathers of the Work of Redemption, or Redemptorists, whose sole business it is to travel about Begging and Praying of the Rich for money to Ransom poor Christian bodies out of Slavery; which is a better work, I think, than praying for the deliverance of their Souls out of Purgatory.
In August, 1848, Brother Walworth was ordained priest, and it was decided that he and Brother Hecker, together with two young Belgian priests, Fathers Teunis and Lefevre, should proceed to England, the Redemptorists having been recently introduced there.
Walworth had been made a Catholic but a short time before, and McMaster was received into the Church by the Redemptorists in Third Street, his two young friends being present. While he was kneeling at the altar, candle in hand, piously reading his profession of faith to Father Rumpler, he accidentally set fire to Father Tschenhens' hair, one of the fathers assisting at the ceremony.
The house was a large, old-fashioned mansion and had been owned by Lord Teignmouth, a notorious anti-Catholic bigot. Some of the larger rooms had been thrown together into one, and this was used temporarily as a public chapel. Just as the young Redemptorists arrived, Father Petcherine was preaching to the congregation.
He then determined to become a priest, and in the ministry he attained great sanctity. He founded the well-known Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, commonly called the Redemptorists; and for his voluminous doctrinal writings, Pius IX declared him a Doctor of the universal Church. The story of the entrance of St. Stanislaus Kostka into religion reads like a romance.
And this shows that the difficulty was a misunderstanding, for there is conclusive evidence of the loyalty of the American Fathers of Father Hecker no less than the others; as also of their fair fame as Redemptorists with both the superiors and brethren of the community up to the date of their disagreement.
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