TRANSPLANTED IRISH INSTITUTIONS - University of Canterbury

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The Catholic Church interfered in social events organized by the H.A.C.B.S. In
1883, the Hibernian branch in Onehunga organized a dance for their members. Bishop
lE. Luck, of Auckland, was invited to attend but he wrote back saying
you wish me to approve of the practice of dancing at your future gathering. You form not only a
Benefit Society, but your special feature (and it ought to be your pride and (joy?]) is that you form
a Catholic Benefit Society and as such aspire [to be) a model society based on the principles of
Catholic teaching and practice. Now public dancing .. . is a practice that is against the spirit of the
Church- and therefore I cannot [give] it my approval, either your case, or in the case of any other
branch of the Society.67
Strict discipline was enforced on unacceptable behaviour in the Hibernian society just as it
was in the Orange Institution. The Irish had a reputation for drunkenness and the conduct
of the Hibernians could be seen as a way to dispel this perception of Irish Catholics.
Despite the desire of the Catholic Church to have an exclusively Catholic benefit
society under its control, many Catholics joined non-Catholic benefit societies. This was a
problem that plagued the Hibernians from their beginnings in New Zealand. At an annual
meeting of the Otago-Canterbury District in 1881 the reason offered for why Catholics
were not joining the Hibernians was that Catholics were ignorant of the benefits they would
receive. This meeting decided to try and remedy this problem by writing to the clergy to
urge people to join. They also sent Hibernian delegates to areas where there were not any
Hibernians already established, to explain their rules and benefits. 68
By 1899 there were still editorials in the New Zealand Tablet decrying the fact that
despite encouraging words from the prelates of the Catholic Church the Hibernians
remained nwnerically small. The men's branches were only a few thousand strong and the
female branches were "barely alive". The editorial tried to portray the benefits of joining
the Hibernians.
In its full development it is a powerful means of social intercourse among Catholics. As such it
is calculated to prevent many of the evils that are inseparable from a country in which the social
atmosphere is decidedly non-Catholic, even when it is not anti-Catholic, or non-religious, or
irreligious. The dangers are, for Catholics, the contracting of mixed marriages, and the slow
absorption of modes of thought and principles of action that tend to a weakening of faith and a
cooling of religious fervour. Besides its value as a social lever, much has been effected in the way
of good example by the spectacle of the serried ranks of the brethren attending Holy Communion
67S.c. Macpherson, 'A 'Ready Made Nucleus of Degradation and Disorder'? A religious and social
history of the Catholic Church and Community in Auckland 1870-1910' University of Auckland, M.A. ,
1987, p. 107.
68New Zealand Tablet, 28 January 1881.