Preparing the Quebec Church for Vatican II: missionary lessons from Asia, Africa, and Latin America, 1945-1962.

Foisy, Catherine

The contribution of missionary institutes to the reception of Vatican II in Quebec remains largely unexplored. (2) That is surprising because French Canada invested huge human, material, and financiai capital in missions abroad. (3) From the Quebecois perspective, its missionaries' preconciliar experience of cultural and religious differences contributed to the emergence of a changing view on both Christianity and the Church particularly between 1945 and the opening of the Council on 11 October 1962. The help, guidance, and work of lay people in mission countries reasserted the importance of every Catholic to build strong local churches. Secondly, experiences in Asia and Africa convinced Quebecois missionaries of the necessity of adapting their message for different cultures. Thirdly, confronted with non-Christian religious practices many of them started to rethink their relations with believers of other religious traditions, their colleagues, and God.

This paper draws on 43 interviews (4) with members of four missionary institutes founded in Quebec between 1902 and 1928, (5) and the archives of these institutes. After providing an overview of missions between 1945 and 1962 from the viewpoint of the four institutes with an emphasis on the effect of the closure of China, the paper discusses the main transformations experienced by Quebecois missionaries in these years, and finally, draws parallels between some of the main characteristics of the Quebec Church on the eve of Vatican II and the experiences of the missionaries.

Quebecois Missionary Efforts before 1945 (6)

In the nineteenth century Quebecois worked in Asia and in Africa as members of European missionary institutes transplanted to Quebec such as the Franciscaines missionnaires de Marie (FMM), the Soeurs blanches d'Afrique, the Peres blancs d'Afrique, and the Oblats de Marie-Immaculee (OMI). (7) The reorganization of the Sacred Congregation of the Propaganda Fide by Pope Pius X in 1908 encouraged missionary renewal in the first half of the twentieth century. A distinctly Quebecois missionary effort, however, had already begun with the foundation in 1902 of the Missionnaires de l'Immaculee-Conception (MIC) by Delia Tetreault in Outremont, the wealthy francophone district of Montreal. Tetreault sought to develop a sense of missionary zeal in Montreal and throughout Quebec and to send missionaries to foreign lands. In 1909, the first missionaries left for China. She also played a significant role in developing three institutes founded in Quebec for missionary work abroad: the Missionnaires de Notre-Dame des Anges (MNDA), the Societe des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec (SME), and the Missionnaires du Christ-Roi (MCR). The MNDA was co-founded in 1919 in the diocese of Sherbrooke by Florina Gervais, a former MIC, and a Chinese woman, Chan Tsi Kwan (Mother Marie-Gabriel). It was officially recognized by the Vatican in 1922. The Quebec Episcopate founded the SME, a society of secular priests devoted to missions, in Montreal in 1921 in order to represent the local Church abroad and to contribute to the missionary effort by forming a native clergy in mission countries. The fact that Tetreault was the driving force behind this formation partly explains its close relationship with the MIC as well as the symmetry in the course of their development (mainly, their establishment in Pont-Viau, Laval and the choices of mission countries). Finally, Frederica Giroux, a former MIC, founded the MCR in 1928 in the diocese of Gaspe. Their first missionaries were sent to Japan in 1933. By 1945, Quebec ranked fourth in terms of national missionary effort within the Catholic Church behind Holland, Ireland, and Belgium. (8) However, that ranking was skewed because several European churches had repatriated many missionaries to rebuild Europe.

The Postwar Global Missionary Context Seen from the Quebecois Perspective

A major change in missionary effort took place because of the Communist takeover of China that culminated with the proclamation of the People's Republic of China in 1949. The Communists sought to end missionary activities but in 1952 approximately 40% of the Catholic missionaries remained despite harassment through accusations, questionings, and imprisonment. (9) After formally expelling the Quebecois missionaries in 1953, the Chinese govemment imprisoned those who, like Gustave Prevost, refused to leave. When Prevost left in May 1954, no members of the Quebec Foreign Mission Society remained in China. The last Quebec missionaries left in mid-1955.

The departure of their personnel from China meant a significant change for the four Quebecois missionary institutes studied here. Even though the MCR had never been active in China, the larger geopolitical context of the area, including the difficult Japanese postwar context, encouraged it, like the other groups, to focus on Africa and Latin America or other parts of Asia. The MCR opened a new mission in Congo (1954), (l0) the MIC opened missions in Hong Kong (1947), Cuba (1948), Malawi (1948), Madagascar (1952), Taiwan (1954), anal Bolivia (1957). The MNDA opened new missions in Japan (1949), Tahiti (1950), Peru (1951), Tanzania (1954), and Congo (1954). (11) Last, but not least, the SME sent some of its members to Japan (1948), to Honduras (1955), and to Peru (1956). (12)

Expulsion from China affected the institutes in other ways. The repatriated missionaries contributed to training a new generation of novices and seminarians and, by sharing their first-hand experience of the Sino-Japanese war, of Communist China, of privations, of uncertainty, of loss, and of fear, made the newer generation more aware of the meaning and scope of their own commitment as religious missionaries. (13) For instance, Sister Eliette Gagnon, MIC, paralleled her experience in Cuba under Castro's regime from 1959 through the 1980s with what she heard as a novice from the former missionaries to China:

   They were accused of going to China to kill Chinese children. They
   were in jail for several months. They were on a truck" where people
   threw tomatoes at them and everything else you want. And when these
   missionaries came back, I just loved listening to them telling
   these things, I loved it. Sure, mission, we knew it could be like
   that. You know, I wouldn't have looked for it, but if I'm going on
   a mission... Even when the time came to go to Cuba, I didn't hope
   to go to Cuba, I felt it was too close and not poor enough and then
   after, I was in the hardest mission we've ever had! (14)

Speaking of his first year (1952) at the SME called "Probation," Mgr Andre Vallee, Pretre des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec (PME), recalls the particular perspectives brought by those who had been to China:

   The personnel were amazing, they were old missionaries who had been
   to China, who carne back from China and they were very human....
   So, they were neither too demanding, nor too severe, but at the
   same time, they initiated us into a new life, religious life,
   priestly life, missionary life. As much as possible, they brought
   [in] missionaries on vacation in Canada. That gave us an
   opportunity to ask questions about missions and to get to know a
   little more. ... It was lectures on life in China, life of
   missionaries in China, and let me tell you that it really was
   something! (15)

This is far from being anecdotal since these young missionaries in training became the pioneers in the missionary expansion of their institutes in the late 1940s and the 1950s. Sister Gilberte Giroux, MNDA, who became a pioneer of the Japanese mission for her congregation, recalls:

   I was at the novitiate in 1945. And then, there, the founding
   Mother and the sisters, at the beginning of '46, the sisters were
   coming back from China after war and then, it's true that it was
   very emotional to get to know the founding Mother and to hear these
   sisters who had been there for 20, 21, 25 years talk about it, and
   it gave us an extraordinary boost. (Emphasis added) (16)

The connection established between these missionaries and the younger generation through a simple sharing of experience became a milestone in the subsequent development of missions and an inspiration to the newer members.

It must be emphasized that the situation in China forced the leadership of the institutes to think about the future, and to prepare their younger members better professionally to meet new challenges. This movement was accelerated during the 1950s. At the MNDA's general chapter in 1958, the superior wrote: "The intellectual and technical training of our sisters is becoming more urgent and is the cause of one of the Superiors', both general and local, greatest preoccupations." (17) Between 1946 and 1952, two members of the MNDA completed Bachelor degrees in Nursing; two obtained Bachelor of Arts, two earned diplomas in Music; one a diploma as a laboratory technician, five became licensed nurses, and fourteen secured teaching certificates. In contrast, in 1959 alone, 40 MIC sisters were studying for certificates at teachers colleges or universities and 32 others were at university studying music, medicine, or nursing. (18) Most of the new mission countries insisted on these higher professional standards for work in the health, social services, and education sectors.

The SME, which ran seminaries at all of its missions, put great emphasis on professional training in education. Mgr Jean-Louis Martin, PME, recalls how he was sent to Pittsburgh to complete a graduate diploma in education:

   Me, when I was ordained, I had been nominated for the Philippines
   and then, they named me to study education in Pittsburgh because
   there were many colleges, it was the American system, and they were
   opening major seminaries. So, they nominated me for the Philippines
   and then, in education. So, I wasn't to go right away to a mission
   country, but to leave afterwards for the Philippines. So, I went to
   Pittsburgh to Duquesne University. They credited me with several
   classes that I had done here because we had all sorts of classes at
   the major seminary. (19)

The three other institutes that ran elementary and high schools also educated their members. Sister Georgette Barrette, MIC remembers the situation after she had made temporary vows in 1951:

   So, what happened? Happily, I was able to do my 10th and 11th
   grades and I obtained my 11th grade diploma because one sister
   taught us, and the school board allowed us to do our exams at St.
   Viateur parish. So, I studied. After teaching a very short time,
   only one year, I taught a little at the motherhouse and I went to
   Trois-Rivieres to serve and there, they saw I had a facility for
   teaching. So, this is the reason they made me pursue my studies.
   ... I did my bachelor in education at that time. (20)

Third, the diversification of mission countries brought a series of challenges related to the pioneering character of these missions and to aspects of daily life in these new countries. For instance, Sister Mariette Trepanier, MNDA, sent to Tahiti six years after the opening of a new mission by her institute, tells how the governor defended the pioneers in front of the local bishop when they arrived in Faaa to run an elementary school in 1950:

   So, when, just after the sisters arrived to teach in Faaa, the
   bishop presented the superior to the governor, he wasn't talking
   about her running the school. When the bishop told the governor
   that a French woman would run the school, be said: 'No! They will
   run their school!' There, he was taking responsibility. He said: 'I
   take this on myself.' And right away, he prepared a letter and
   signed it, authorizing the Missionnaires de Notre-Dame des Anges to
   run their school, though they were not French. That's it! (21)

Other missionaries found that their house was not ready, so they had to move temporarily to a different diocese. Local authorities sometimes asked the missionaries to take charge of services that other religious missionaries would not undertake. Sister Antoinette Castonguay, MIC, sent in 1955 to Baguio, the capital city of the Northem island of Luzon in the Philippines remembers:

   So, we started by learning Ilocano and not Tagalog; it was
   specifically part of our work because the bishop, a Belgian,
   [M.sup.gr] Brasseur, had said: 'I accept your community here, but
   because so many communities come to Baguio because it is the summer
   capital, I want you to go visit the tribes, the aboriginals, not
   the Ilocanos who live nearby.' There were five tribes. Each had its
   own language, but they can communicate in Ilocano because they
   attend the market to sell their fruits and vegetables. (22)

Sometimes faced with the unexpected character of the cultural, economic, religious, and social challenges posed by these new missions, the lack of room for voicing their views in the Quebec Church, and the realization that they had common interests to defend and to promote, Quebecois missionary institutes recognized the need for association. (23) In 1950, thirteen communities of missionary priests founded an intercommunity secretariat independent from the Church hierarchy, the Entraide missionnaire. (24) The Entraide took into account the contribution of the humanities and social sciences in dealing with some of the main contemporary cultural, economic, and political issues including the Cold War and other issues related to Communism. That was a crucial step in paving the way for the development of social analysis tools that flourished in the following decades in a constant dialogue with third world churches and theologians. By initiating a new Bulletin in 1954, (25) Entraide missionnaire aimed to create conditions for critically engaging issues about mission, Christianity, and the Church. In the second edition of the Bulletin de l'Entraide, a missionary in Africa wrote that "Missionaries alone cannot hope to answer the needs of Africa' s contemporary situation. It is necessary to rely on lay help in order for these countries to progress on a Christian basis, through religious, cultural, social, and economic life." (26) This comment is congruent with the experience of most missionaries interviewed, as the next section will illustrate at length.

Experiencing Difference: Renewing the Church from Missionary Ground

In order to show how Quebecois missionaries came to adopt a new perspective on Christianity and on the Church, it is necessary to focus on their relationship with local churches in mission areas, with other cultures, and finally, with other religions, as examples of ways in which the experience of difference and othemess became a solid ground from which they renewed their understanding of mission. After the Council, mission understood as dialogue became the dominant conception in Catholic missiology. (27) For example, Kenyan Catholic theologian Francis Anekwe Oborji insists on interreligious dialogue, dialogue with cultures and local churches, and dialogue as human promotion, (28) The change of perspective by Quebecois missionaries through their experiences during the preconciliar years corresponds to this major shift in the Catholic Church.

In most of their endeavours in mission countries, in addition to establishing close and efficient collaboration with the local ecclesiastic authorities and helping to develop vocations to religious life and the priesthood, missionaries relied on lay people for help in their daily activities and acknowledged the importance of this assistance. Working with the laity became the best way into the mission countries' culture and language, as Sister Gisele Beauchemin, MCR, evokes describing her arrival in Katanga (Congo) in 1959:

   What helped me a lot when I arrived at the hospital was a young
   woman, one of the first Congolese nurses. She was 21 years old; I
   was 26, I had done all of my training and I began working with her.
   She taught me the language and everything else, and the local
   custom. So, this, this truly helped me a lot because I had a young
   friend and we worked together. (29)

In terms of pastoral work, the development of the Legion of Mary (30) and of specialized Catholic Action (31) movements by Quebecois missionaries in Asian, African and Latin American contexts contributed to the development of lay leadership. For instance, the experiences of members of the SME in the diocese of Choluteca in southern Honduras in the late 1950s led to the establishment of delegates of the word, (32) to the emergence, in collaboration with the local diocese, of radio shows for adult education and literacy, and the development of cooperative movement leaders among the peasantry, a reality that attained its peak inthe 1960s and the 1970s. (33)

Jean-Paul Guillet, PME, a pioneer of the Honduran mission, was involved in the establishment of the radio schools system, following a model established in Colombia in the early 1950s in Sutatenza, a small village, where Joaquin Salcedo, a priest, created the radioescuelas concept to promote rural development through education. From it evolved the Catholic Popular Cultural Action, an association that expanded to ali of Colombia. (34) Rev. Guillet recalls the first years of the project:

   I was program director, I didn't have any experience; I learned
   from scratch. And ata certain point, the auxiliary bishop told me:
   'Listen, let's leave the radio to Father Molina. I would like you
   to devote yourself to the creation of the radio schools system.'
   So, we formed a civil association with bankers, lawyers, doctors to
   provide some funding and to manage a system. We had hired teachers,
   managers and I'm the one who started travelling a bit through the
   country, in the Southern zone in order to organize it all. So, I
   had seen how the system was organized in Colombia. It's a Church
   system. (35) It was the parishes that decided, a bit like in
   Honduras. There were many small rural villages, and the parish was
   in charge of finding what we called monitors, literate people who
   acted a bit like the guide for a group of students and who were a
   bit like the eyes and the ears of the teacher to each small
   group.... Then, they had established a centre where monitors were
   to be educated, to be trained.... So, we built it on the same
   schema, the same structure. And it gave results, everybody was
   impressed. (36)

In addition to working with lay people to create and develop a social project run by the local church, this system was also a direct response to the local cultural, economic needs, and to realities of social injustice. Of course, the missionaries also endeavoured to establish close and efficient collaboration with the local ecclesiastic authorities and to develop vocations to religious life and to the priesthood, notably through educational institutions.

In the same vein, [M.sup.gr] Jean-Louis Martin, PME, in recalling what he and his companions in Lima, Peru did in order to face their daily pastoral challenges, underlines their reliance on lay people and the development of training programs:

   What we did, to be honest, we were overwhelmed because when we
   arrived in mission, we had a lot of tasks, even material tasks, we
   had to rebuild a church.... So, we were overwhelmed. Then, what
   happened, for us, it was not about doing new things. To have more
   people coming to church, there are two things. We said, one is we
   are three and one of us works full time on the material aspect of
   the mission and the two others a little. It is as if we had, each
   of us, between 10,000 and 12,000 inhabitants. So, right there, we
   invested in the training aspect of people. Training. So they will
   do it. Those who came to the church, we took them. So, we organized
   ourselves to have young people work with young people. The
   catechists worked with 400, 500 children who came for catechesis; I
   didn't do any of it and never did! Maybe I did once, and after, I
   put this into the hands of other adults, of young people for them
   to train other people. The same goes for weddings, the same for
   choral singing. Instead of doing it all, right from the start, the
   point was to delegate, even material things, when possible. But to
   train people is the first thing to do. (37)

Another example, taken from the African continent, is that of the MNDA. They started collaborating with lay people and local Episcopal authorities to foster the creation of native religious communities, such as the Franciscan Sisters of St. Bernadette in the diocese of Rulenge in former Tanganyika (Tanzania). (38) Creating such an association of lay women was one of the first steps of this missionary institute's modus operandi leading to the foundation of native local religious communities in Tanzania and in Tahiti. (39) A former local superior in Rulenge, Sister Annette Roberge, MNDA, who arrived there in 1954, comments that: "The official recognition of lay people should have come before Vatican II. In mission countries, it was these people who helped us, assisted us, as catechists, for instance. Already, back in the 1950s, we closely collaborated with lay people." (40) Her observation echoes the conciliar interventions of African and Latin American bishops who stressed the laity's essential contribution to missionary work due to the lack of priests and religious personnel to answer their people's growing spiritual and material needs. (41)

Throughout the 1950s, the Societe des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec began teaching its seminarians that mission could be conceived somewhat differently than the two mainstream conceptions of the time, Plantatio ecclesiae (42) and individual conversion. [M.sup.gr] Francois Lapierre, PME, recalls:

   After this, on a missionary level, from the first year in Quebec
   City, [students had] a book, Au coeur des masses (1951) by Father
   Voillaume. A book related to Charles de Foucauld's experience. So,
   there was a certain way to question mission. You know, a little
   more contemplative, with the poor, etc. This has marked our mission
   years, mine. (43)

Interviews with missionaries make clear that their initial training did not systematically treat interreligious dialogue. Nevertheless, the notion of otherness was at the centre of missionary encounters with a diversity of cultures, and the older generations of missionaries transmitted that to students in their initial training. The very experience of difference, intrinsic to mission, created conditions for transforming most missionaries' personal vision of what it actually meant to "do mission." For instance, Sister Gisele Beauchemin, MCR, remembers a conversation with an elderly Congolese woman whom she met several weeks after arriving in 1959:

   I can tell you this; it was 'Outside of the Church, no salvation!'
   ... I had a grandmother full of fetish, you know, a real one....
   So, the young children, when they were about to die, if the parents
   wanted it, we baptized them. It's true.... But my old lady, when I
   saw that she was about to die.... I asked her: 'You're going to
   die. Are you afraid of dying?' And she looks at me like this. She
   says: 'No! Me, I am a daughter of God! I am the daughter of God and
   I will go...' (44)

From that experience, Sister Beauchemin felt that she needed to enlarge her own view of salvation, of the Church, and of mission. Such attitudes towards difference, whether cultural or religious, were prevalent at the time among many Quebecois missionaries. Similarly, Sister Marie-Therese Beaudette, MIC recalled how she learned, during her first six years as a Biology and English teacher in Hong Kong (1958-1964), to become a missionary by acquiring a better knowledge of the local culture and beliefs:

   And then, it is there that I learned that we could not teach the
   Word of God if we were not aware of the culture. What do I want to
   say? That I can't talk about the Word of God if I don't begin by
   knowing someone's culture, the belief of someone I don't know. It
   is there that I truly became interested in Confucian philosophy.
   Ah! I picked up everything I could find on Confucius to try to know
   the culture and the belief of my students. Now, I see more and more
   how it is that the culture, the philosophy of Confucius and all the
   Enlightenment of Buddha, how it leads to joy.... So, I meditated
   very much on Confucian philosophy and then, I could see that this
   Word of God corresponded to that and we saw all of the values, the
   human values, the Christian values, the biblical values. Still
   today, it is from experience, I haven't been trained this way. l've
   listened a lot, I listened to people speaking, and I listened to
   our old sisters from China. It changed my way of doing mission....
   For Chinese, harmony, for Confucius, harmony is a constant
   objective.... Even if we don't demonstrate it in the same manner as
   we do with kisses, this human touch, it has to be there, in our way
   of being, exactly. So that, it all changed my mission, my way of
   looking at it, and my religious life, and my life in God, and my
   way of approaching other people. (45)

Although much of the time puzzled by cultural and religious differences and somewhat transformed in their thinking about these issues by their actual experience of mission, at the end of the day, all the missionaries interviewed retained their initial ideal: to bring Christ to mission peoples.

Most of the missionaries' new understanding of Christianity, the Church, and mission came from their experiences in Africa and Latin America and, to a lesser extent, Asia. Members from the four institutes studied here collaborated to the best of their knowledge and as closely as possible with the local ecclesial authorities in order to build strong local churches. By establishing different groups and movements, missionaries were slowly transforming their vision of Christianity and of the Church through daily contacts with married people, mothers, fathers, children, and young adults. By taking into account both their material and spiritual needs, missionaries developed innovative approaches and projects such as the radio schools in Honduras or visits to tribes usually out of reach in the Northern Philippines. Similarly, in Cuba, [M.sup.gr] Martin Villaverde, the bishop of Matanzas, asked the MIC to teach the children in small village schools across the diocese, since the female religious communities in Cuba preferred to run colleges in the major cities for children from middle and upper classes families. Sister Eliette Gagnon, MIC, recalls that story:

   We had small rural schools, in pueblos. We really lived with the
   people there. And, around these schools, there were places,
   bateyes, little groups of houses where they went to teach catechism
   to children under a tree, in a house entryway. We went upon the
   bishop's request, who told us in his letter: 'We need sisters who
   will go [and] get, who will go to those who don't come to us.' So,
   he wanted sisters who would get out of their convents to go to
   those who don't come to us. It wasn't the custom, this, that
   sisters go out. The nuns who were in Cuba had large colleges in the
   provinces' capital cities. They taught the upper class. (46)

Encounters with cultural and religious differences deeply influenced these missionaries' understanding of mission. As they put their training, knowledge, and own way of being in perspective, they entered into a different sort of relational dynamics with the people they were sent to serve, with their colleagues, the local authorities, and God. Some parallels can be established between these elements and the state of the Quebec Church during the preconciliar period.

The Quebec Church on the Eve of the Council

Renewal movements like the catechetical and the liturgical ones as well as specialized Catholic Action movements were active in Quebec in the postwar period. (47) According to Claude Ryan, a prominent journalist and politician, "profound mutations were taking place from the early 1950s in the daily culture of Quebecois, notably in terms of the people's spiritual and moral reference points and the values promoted by their lifestyles." (48) Nevertheless, the Church in Quebec still considered "that any political, social or cultural issue was also a religious one." (49) This was how the hierarchy understood local reality until the second phase of the preparatory period for Vatican II (September 1961 to October 1962), a period that coincided with the unfolding of the Quiet Revolution and the preconciliar consultations held in several dioceses in the province.

Gilles Routhier, who has studied the reception of Vatican II extensively, notes that the reformist movement in Quebec arose from two concerns: the participation of the laity in the Church and the place of the Church in society. He argues that "the reformist push came more from the social movements than from the theological renewal, which determined a different understanding of the conciliar aggiornamento, during the Council and afterwards." (50) In that same vein, the preconciliar consultations became milestones in the emergence of a conciliar consciousness among several Quebecois bishops, (51) deepening their knowledge of local realities. (52) Aware of the mutations that Quebec society was undergoing, the episcopate focused its discussions around two major issues, namely the confessional status of social institutions, given that until the Quiet Revolution most of them were under the leadership of religious communities, and freedom of expression in the Church and in society. By the opening of the Council in October 1962, the Quebec Church was moving from a religious interpretation of society to one that fully recognized the autonomy of civil authorities and the transition to lay institutions, (53)

More closely related to the Quebecois missionary effort is the positive response given by several Quebec bishops to the call of Pope Pius XII (54) for a greater and more active collaboration of Western dioceses in the Catholic missionary enterprise. They started to establish missions in Latin America. (55) The bishop of Nicolet, Mgr Albertius Martin made the first move in that direction when, in response to the Holy See's request, he founded missions in the Brazilian areas of Alcantara and Guimaraes. Six diocesan priests were then sent abroad, supported by ten Seeurs de I' Assomption de Nicolet. In 1957, two other bishops acted positively with respect to missions. Mgr Arthur Douville, bishop of Saint-Hyacinthe, opened a mission in Cururupu in North-Eastern Brazil and sent two diocesan priests initially and three others in 1959. Six Soeurs de Saint-Joseph de Saint-Hyacinthe supported them as did 17 teachers, one doctor and his wife, a nurse. Mgr Georges Cabana, bishop of Sherbrooke, sent two diocesan priests to the apostolic prefecture of Pinheiro. Many other dioceses including Trois-Rivieres, Amos, Chicoutimi, Montreal, and Quebec sent missionaries abroad over the next decades, mainly to Latin American countries.

A sketch of the Quebec Church on the eve of the Council suggests four parallels with the preconciliar experiences of Quebecois missionaries and their institutes. The first was a tendency to reproduce in the missions the Quebec ecclesiastical model, establishing organizations such as specialized Catholic Action movements, and the Legion of Mary, and focusing on work in education, health, and social services. Secondly, missionary experiences were reflected in Quebec particularly in the growing importance of the laity in the Church in Quebec in the late 1950s and early 1960s, a matter that became a growing preoccupation of its bishops. The third point is that the growing interest of Quebecois bishops in the laity carne from a better assessment of the lay people's reality. This change of perspective for the bishops came largely from preconciliar consultations held by some of them, which represent a formal mechanism for dialogue between the episcopate, the clergy, and the lay people. In mission countries, pastoral tools and organs were also put in place in order to reach out to people on the basis of their aspirations and needs, especially through training programs, more or less formal. The fourth point is that the opening of new missions in Latin America by some Quebecois bishops was a move similar to the one made by the missionary institutes, establishing themselves massively in this particular area over the 1950s.

Conclusion

This paper established three main points. First, the geopolitical context in postwar Asia, especially with the closure of China to Westem missionaries, was a major turning point in the development of the institutes studied here. As former missionaries to China shared their personal accounts with younger colleagues, they encouraged their institutes to provide members with better professional training and to diversify geographically with several new missions in Latin America and Africa while they maintained a presence in Asia. The returnees also gave the newer generation of missionaries a strong and deep sense of what mission was about, preparing them to open new missions.

Diversification of mission countries posed a series of challenges to Quebecois missionaries in their daily practices notably the need to work as closely as possible with the local church, including lay people and the clergy. In most places, their purpose was twofold: planting or consolidating the local church and transmitting the faith (conversion). In both cases, Quebecois missionaries rapidly realized that lay help was essential since in neither Latin America nor Africa were there sufficient religious personnel. Through this, as in the case of southern Honduras, new projects emerged that were outside the traditional missionary services of education, health, and social services. Local people, with the help of missionaries, designed the radio schools system. In addition, cultural and religious differences forced most missionaries to put their own beliefs, culture, training, and ways of being in perspective if they wanted to reach out to the people to whom they had been sent. In sum, they had to open themselves to the other's culture, lifestyle, and religion. Finally, there were clear similarities in the ideas of the preconciliar experiences and practices of Quebecois missionaries and the ways in which the Quebec Church, notably through the Episcopate, prepared itself for Vatican II.

(1) This paper was first presented as "Lessons from Asia, Africa, and Latin America: Assessing the Reception of Vatican II in Quebec from a Missionary Perspective" at the 2011 Canadian Catholic Historical Association's Annual Meeting held at St. Thomas University, Fredericton, N.B. The author thanks Maurice Demers, Eric Desautels and Catherine LeGrand, members of the Interdisciplinary Research Group on Canadian Missionaries, as well as Jean-Philippe Warren, the three anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments, the editors ofthe journal for their precious help, which ali improved the manuscript substantially. Finally, this research would have not been possible without the financial support provided by the Fonds quebecois de recherche sur la societe et la culture's doctoral fellowship.

(2) Here, the expression "missionary institutes" refers to the different forms of religious and consecrated life, as institutionalized in religious communities, secular institutes, and apostolic societies, among others, devoted primarily to missions abroad.

(3) According to Jean Hamelin, in 1957, French Canadians gave $2,242,531 to pontifical missionary organizations. Jean Hamelin, Le XXe siecle, Tome 2: De 1940 a nos jours, dans Nive Voisine (ed.) Histoire du catholicisme quebecois (Montreal: Editions du Boreal, 1984), 202. Ina paper entitled << Le missionnariat canadien francais : d'un engagement religieux a une action cooperative deconfessionnalisee>>, presented at the 2011 International Society for the Sociology of Religion in Aix-en-Provence, Eric Desautels demonstrated how, until the mid-1960s, French Canadians were very committed to supporting the missions abroad, largely through contributions to ponfifical missionary organizations like Sainte-Enfance and Propagation de la Foi, whose budgets respectively attained peaks of $345,000 in 1962 and of $1,669,632 in 1964.

(4) Between July 2010 and August 2011, the author interviewed 6 Missionnaires du Christ-Roi, 12 Missionnaires de Notre-Dame des Anges, 10 members of the Societe des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec, and 15 Missionnaires de l'Immaculee-Conception. Ali interviews were conducted in a one-on-one context, at one of the four institutes' motherhouses. The interviewees are indicated by their real names. Overall, the author recorded 110 hours of interviews (audio only). Seven missionaries were interviewed twice, due to different circumstances and each interview lasted, on average, two hours. The interviews were conceived as life stories and were conducted on these four main themes: 1. Personal and vocational story; 2. Missionary experience; 3. Quebec society, and 4. Faith and the Other.

(5) A statistical compilation in 1947 listed 19 male and 29 female religious communities as having missionaries abroad. To our knowledge, in total, only 6 of the male communities and 7 of the female communities were missionary institutes in the strict sense, as defined in footnote 2. Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec, III, no. 14 (March-April 1949): 324-325.

(6) Canada was a missionary country from its early seventeenth century beginnings until the twentieth century. That may have affected the development of missions abroad, but is not considered here, neither are the domestic missions to the First Nations such as the work of the Missionnaires du Christ-Roi in Longlac, Ontario, Mount Currie, and Anahim Lake in British Columbia, nor their social work with immigrants. Further research on Quebecois missionaries in Canada is needed.

(7) The Sisters of Providence had been in Chile since 1853 but constituted their own Chilean province distinct from the Mother House on 17 March 1880. Http://www.providenceintl.org/en/histoire_historique_ 1860.php, accessed on 29 July 2011.

(8) At that time, the ratio of missionaries to Catholics was 1 missionary for every 1120. In Ireland, it was 1/457; in Holland, 1/556, and 1/1050 in Belgium. Hamelin, Le XXe siecle, Tome 2, 191.

(9) By September 1952, all Canadian Presbyterian missionaries had left China. Serge Granger, Le lys et le lotus. Les relations du Quebec avec la Chine de 1650 a 1950 (Montreal: VLB editeur, 2005), 125.

(10) Ali the translations are the author's own unless otherwise noted. MCR General Archives, Rapport presente au Chapitre general des Saeurs MCR de 1954 (sexennat 1948-54), 3 p.

(11) MNDA General Archives, Rapport presente au Chapitre general de 1952 (sexennat 1946-52), and Rapport presente au Chapitre general de 1958 (sexennat 1952-58).

(12) Societe des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec, Bottin 2009, 7.

(13) This is the notion that martyrdom is intrinsic to the missionary commitment be it concrete or latent. On this idea, see Beatrice de Boissieu, << Theologie et spiritualite du martyre a travers les ecrits des missionnaires >>, dans Catherine Marin (ed.) La Societe des Missions Etrangeres de Paris, 350 ans a la rencontre de l'Asie, 1658-2008 (Paris : Editions Karthala, 2011), 155-69.

(14) <<Elles ont ete accusees d'etre allees en Chine pour tuer des enfants chinois. Elles ont ete en prison plusieurs mois. Elles ont ete promenees dans un camion oh les gens leur lancaient des tomates pis tout ce que tu voudras. Puis, quand ces missionnaires-la sont revenues, j'etais au noviciat, j'adorais les entendre raconter ces choses-la, j'adorais. Oui, la mission, on s'attendait a ca. T'sais, je l'aurais pas cherche, mais si je vais en mission... Meme quand y'a ete le temps de Cuba, j'aurais pas desire aller a Cuba, je sentais que c'etait trop proche pis pas assez pauvre pis apres, j'etais dans la mission la plus dure qu'on n'a jamais eue !" Excerpt from the interview with Sister Eliette Gagnon, MIC, on 17 May 2011 at the MIC Motherhouse, Outremont.

(15) <<Le personnel etait extraordinaire, c'etait des vieux missionnaires qui avaient ete en Chine, qui etaient revenus de la Chine et puis, ils etaient tres humains. ... Alors, y'etaient pas trop, trop exigeants ni trop severes, mais en meme temps, ils nous initiaient a une nouvelle vie, la vie religieuse, la vie de pretre, la vie de missionnaire. Autant que possible, ils nous amenaient des missionnaires en vacances au Canada. Ca nous donnait l'occasion de questionner sur les missions et de connaitre un peu. ... C'etait des conferences sur la vie en Chine, la vie des missionnaires en Chine et laissez-moi vous dire que c'etait quelque chose!>> Excerpt from the interview with Mgr Andre Vallee, PME, on 23 March 2011, Sainte-Anne-de-la-Perade.

(16) << J'etais au noviciat en 1945. Et puis la, mere fondatrice et les soeurs au debut de 46, les s0eurs revenaient de la Chine apres la guerre et alors, c'est sur que ca a ete beaucoup d'emotions de connaitre mere fondatrice pis d'entendre parler ces soeurs-la qui avaient passe 20, 21, 25 ans et ca nous a redonne un elan extraordinaire (nous soulignons). >> Excerpt from the interview with Sister Gilberte Giroux, MNDA, on 19 June 2010 at the MNDA Motherhouse, Lennoxville.

(17) She reported that one sister was enrolled in medicine at Universite de Montreal and another was working for a bachelor degree in pedagogy at College du Sacre-Coeur. MNDA General Archives, Rapport du sexennat 1952-58 presente au Chapitre general de 1958, 18.

(18) Bilan 1959 (MIC General Archives, Fonds ANCQ-627/1900, 70956/G362). *

(19) <<Moi, quand j'ai ete ordonne, j'avais ete nomme pour les Philippines et puis, ils m'ont nomme pour etudier a Pittsburgh en education parce que y'avait beaucoup de colleges, c'etait le systeme americain et puis, ils ouvraient des grands seminaires. Alors, ils m'ont nomme pour les Philippines et puis, en education. Alors, je n'allais pas partir tout de suite, mais partir apres pour les Philippines. Alors, je suis alle a Pittsburgh a Duquesne University. On m'a credite certains cours que j'avais faits ici, parce qu'on avait toute sorte de cours au grand seminaire. " Excerpt from the interview with Mgr Jean-Louis Martin, PME, on 17 March 2011 at the SME Motherhouse, Lavai (Pont-Viau).

(20) <<Alors, ce qui est arrive, j'ai pu faire, tres heureusement, ma 10e et ma 1 le annees et j'ai obtenu mon diplome de 1 1e annee parce qu'une soeur nous enseignait et la commission scolaire acceptait qu'on aille passer nos examens dans la paroisse de St-Viateur. Alors, j'ai poursuivi mes etudes. Apres avoir enseigne un peu, tres peu de temps, juste un an. J'ai enseigne un peu a la maison-mere et je suis allee rendre service a Trois-Rivieres et la, ils ont vu que j'avais de la facilite pour enseigner. [...] J'ai fait ma licence en pedagogie a ce moment-la. " Excerpt from the interview with Sister Georgette Barrette, MIC, on 13 August 2010, MIC house in Pont-Viau, Laval.

(21) << Alors, quand monseigneur est alle avec la superieure, la presenter au gouverneur comme les soeurs qui arrivaient a Faaa, qu'elles enseigneraient a Faaa, mais il parlait pas de direction. Alors, monseigneur lui dit au gouverneur que ce serait une dame une telle, Francaise, qui dirigerait l'ecole. Le gouverneur a dit "Non! Elles dirigeront leur ecole !" La, il prenait une responsabilite, une grosse responsabilite. II a dit : "Je prends ca sous mon bonnet." Et tout de suite, il a prepare une lettre et puis signe comme de quoi que les soeurs missionnaires de Notre-Dame des Anges etaient autorisees a diriger l'ecole, n'etant pas Francaises. C'est ca!>> Excerpt from the interview with Sister Mariette Trepanier, MNDA, on 17 June 2010 at the MNDA Motherhouse, Lennoxville.

(22) << Alors, on a commence par apprendre l'Ilocano et non pas le Tagalog, surtout que ca faisait partie de notre travail parce que l'eveque etait un belge, [M.sup.gr] Brasseur. Il avait dit : "Moi, j'accepte votre communaute ici, mais y'en a tellement de communautes qui s'en viennent ici a Baguio parce que c'est la capitale d'ete, mais je veux que vous alliez aux tribus, aux indigenes, pas les Ilocanos qui restent autour de vous, mais ceux des tribus." Puis, y'avait cinq tribus. Mais les tribus, elles ont chacune leur langue, mais ils peuvent communiquer en Ilocano parce qu'ils vont au marche vendre leurs fruits et legumes. >> Excerpt from the interview with Sister Antoinette Castonguay, mic, on 27 July 2011 at the MIC house in Pont-Viau, Laval.

(23) The Association dealt with many issues in a concerted way, among them was the war reclamations case. As early as 1943, the Canadian government was repatriating missionaries. Once the war was over, the government asked the religious communities to reimburse them for the cost. In 1952 the communities and the Canadian government reached ah agreement. Entraide Missionnaire, Une histoire d'avenirs (Montreal: Les editions Depart, 1986), 3; 127-28.

(24) They included the Societe des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec, the Oblats de Marie-Immaculee, the Religieux de Sainte-Croix, the Franciscains, the Capucins, the Jesuites, the Peres blancs d'Afrique, the Dominicains, the Redemptoristes, the Sulpiciens, the Clercs de Saint-Viateur, the Peres du Saint-Esprit, and the Missionnaires du SacreCoeur. The Association's first constitution, dating from 1950, was inspired by the Mission Secretariat in Washington, founded in 1949 by [M.sup.gr] Fulton Sheen.

(25) In 1954, the organization revised its initial constitution to enlarge its membership by allowing orders of brothers and sisters to join. The number of members rose rapidly from 24 to 84 religious communities. The Constitution defined the organization's ends as follows: "Entraide Missionnaire aims at entertaining and promoting between the missionary institutes of Canada a cordial and active cooperation in all matters of interest to them, mainly by 1) providing means to get in touch with each other; 2) facilitating more efficient means of action; 3) providing an information office, and 4) collaborating on Missionary study weeks." These objectives, though reformulated over time, remain core to the Entraide mission and work. (Entraide Missionnaire, Une histoire d'avenirs, 130-133).

(26) << Les missionnaires seuls ne peuvent esperer repondre aux besoins de la nouvelle situation en Afrique. Il est necessaire de recourir a des aides la'iques pour faire progresser le pays sur une base chretienne, par la vie religieuse, culturelle, sociale et economique. >> Bulletin de l'Entraide, I, no. 2 (April 1954): 4.

(27) The foundation of Missiology as a theological science can be traced back to 1910 when German Church historian Josef Schmidlin started lecturing at the Catholic Faculty of Theology in Munster. Other chairs in mission studies were created across Europe in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Canada's first chair in missiology was at the University of Ottawa in 1948. In short, mission in the Catholic Church was recognized as a valid object of study before Vatican II.

(28) The South African Protestant missiologist David J. Bosch aimed his theological reflections at developing an ecumenical postmodern missionary paradigm in thirteen elements: Church-with-the-others, missio dei, mediating salvation, the quest for justice, evangelism, contextualization, liberation, inculturation, common witness, ministry by the whole People of God, witness to People of other living faiths, theology, and action in hope. For its synthetic quality, though, we prefer to use Oborji's typology here. For more on both works, see David J. Bosch, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1991), 587 and Francis Anekwe Oborji, Concepts of Mission: the Evolution of Contemporary Missiology (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2006), 240.

(29) <<Puis, j'avais, ce qui m'a aidee beaucoup, je suis entree a l'hopital avec une jeune, une des premieres infirmieres congolaises, elle avait 21 ans moi, j'en avais 26, j'avais fait tout le trajet de formation. Pis c'est avec elle que j'ai commence a travailler, elle m'a enseigne la langue et tout pis la coutume. Elle, elle etait catholique, par exemple. Ses parents, c'etait des enseignants. Alors ca, ca m'a beaucoup aidee parce que j'avais une amie jeune comme moi pis on travaillait ensemble. >> Excerpt from the interview with Sister Gisele Beauchemin, mcr, 28 September 2010, at the MCR Motherhouse, Laval (Chomedey).

(30) The Legion of Mary was founded in Dublin, Ireland on 7 September 1921. As a lay Catholic organisation whose members are involved in the life of the parish "through visitation of families, the sick, both in their homes and in hospitais and through collaboration in every apostolic and missionary undertaking sponsored by the parish, the Legion's priority remains the spiritual and social welfare of each individual." http://www.legionofmary.ie, accessed 20 June 2012.

(31) The first specialized Catholic Action movement, the Jeunesse ouvriere catholique (JOC), was founded in 1925 by the Belgian priest Joseph Cardjin. The movement's pedagogy, "see, judge, act," offered a synthesis of the Church social doctrine and teachings to the Catholic youth of the time in order to transform the world according to these teachings and the Gospel. For more on the specialized Catholic Action movements in Quebec, see Louise Bienvenue, Quand la jeunesse entre en scene. L 'Action catholique avant la Revolution tranquille (Montreal : Boreal, 2003), 291 and Lucie Piche, Femmes et changement social au Quebec. L 'apport de la jeunesse ouvriere catholique (1931-1966) (Quebec : Les Presses de l'Universite Lavai, 2003), 349.

(32) Delegates of the word were lay people, both men and women, who had been identified as community leaders by members of the SME in the diocese of Choluteca in Honduras. Given the large number of rural communities and the lean diocesan resources in terms of personnel at the tum of the 1950s and during the 1960s, these lay people were given catechetical and pastoral training by the Quebecois missionary priests to chair weekly celebrations of the word in the place of a priest.

(33) For more on the 1960s and 1970s in Honduras, see Fred Burrill and Catherine LeGrand, "'Une double solidarite': The Societe des Missions-Etrangeres du Quebec in Honduras, 1955-1979," a paper presented at the Inside and Outside the Nation workshop, University of Manitoba, April 2009 and Jean-Paul Guillet, Une aventure formidable! Quelques donnees sur les 25 premieres annees de la mission du Honduras (1955-1982) (Laval, 2006), 26-32.

(34) Jean-Paul Lafrance, Anne-Marie Laulan et Carmen Rico de Sotelo (eds.) Place et role de la communication dans le developpement international (Quebec : Les Presses de l'Universite du Quebec, 2006), 92.

(35) For further information on the emergence and development of the radio schools system in Colombia, see Maria-Piedad Fino-Sandoval, <<Les ecoles radiophoniques colombiennes, 1950-1960, Mission et developpement >>, dans Caroline Sappia et Olivier Servais (eds.) Mission et engagement politique apres 1945. Afrique, Amerique latine et Europe (Paris : Editions Karthala, 2010), 245-252.

(36) <<Alors, on a commence pendant un an ou deux, c'etait de developper la radio. J'etais directeur des programmes, j'avais pas d'experience; je me suis entraine sur le tas. Et un moment donne.... l'eveque auxiliaire, li m'a dit: "Ecoute, laissons la radio au pere Molina (qui etait le pretre hondurien). Moi, j'aimerais que toi, tu te consacres au systeme, a l'etablissement du systeme d'ecoles radiophoniques." Alors, on a forme une association civile avec des banquiers, des avocats, des medecins pour un peu faire du financement, ramasser des fonds et administrer un systeme. On avait engage des professeurs administrateurs et c'est moi qui me suis mis a voyager un peu a travers le pays, surtout dans la zone sud pour organiser tout ca. Alors, j'avais vu comment etait organise le systeme en Colombie. C'est un systeme d'Eglise : c'etait les paroisses qui choisissaient, un peu comme au Honduras, y'avait beaucoup de petits villages ruraux, agricoles et c'est la paroisse qui s'occupait de chercher des groupes, ce qu'on appelait des moniteurs, des gens alphabetises qui etaient un peu le guide du groupe d'etudiants et qui etaient un peu comme les yeux et les oreilles du professeur dans chaque petit groupe.... Puis, y'avait, ils avaient etabli un centre ou les moniteurs allaient etre instruits, formes. C'etait soutenu par l'Eglise. C'etait une oeuvre d'Eglise, en fin de compte. Alors, on a etabli un peu sur le meme schema, la meme structure.... Et ca a donne des resultats, tout le monde etait emerveille. >> Excerpt from the interview with Jean-Paul Guillet, PME, on 17 March 2011 at SME Motherhouse, Lavai (Pont-Viau).

(37) <<Ce qu'on a fait, pour etre vrai, on etait deborde parce que quand on arrive en mission, nous autres, on avait beaucoup de taches, meme des taches materielles, on avait a refaire une eglise.... Alors, on n'arrivait pas, on etait deborde. Donc, ce qui est arrive, c'est que pour nous, ca a pas tellement ete de s'attaquer a des choses. Pour qu'il y ait plus de gens, y'a deux choses. Nous autres, on disait, l'une, on est trois pis y'en a un qui travaille a temps plein dans le materiel pis les deux autres un petit peu. C'est comme si on avait chacun 10 a 12000 habitants.... Alors, tout de suite, on s'est mis sur l'aspect de formation des gens. La formation. Alors, c'est eux autres qui vont le faire. Ceux qui venaient, on les prenait. Alors, pis on s'organisait pour avoir des jeunes, pour travailler avec les jeunes. Les catechetes travaillaient avec les 400, 500 enfants qui venaient pour la catechese; j'en faisais aucune, jamais j'en ai faite. J'en ai peut-etre faite une pis apres, j'ai confie ca a des adultes, a des jeunes pour former du monde. La meme chose pour les mariages, la meme chose pour le chant. Au lieu de tout faire, alors, tout de suite, c'est deleguer, meme les choses materielles, quand c'etait possible. Mais c'est former du monde, premiere chose. >> Excerpt from the interview with [M.sup.gr] Jean-Louis Martin, PME, on 17 March 2011, SME motherhouse, Lavai (Pont-Viau).

(38) The 1958 Superior General's report for the 1952-1958 period notes that: "The beginnings have been painful and we needed all of the local Superior's ingenuity and virtue, to stay on our feet.... The work goes well, developing in such a way that we will soon form an Association of Secular Virgins who will be of great help in our work with the women of the region, where there is no local school." MNDA General Archives, Rapport de la superieure generale au Chapitre general (1952-1958), 1958, 9-10.

(39) In China, they created an association of secular virgins in response to the demand of local bishops. Their main purpose was to assist Western missionary priests with their work, specifically to reach out to Chinese women. This Chinese association never led to the foundation of a specific native Chinese religious community, unlike the Tanzanian and Tahitian cases.

(40) << L'heure des laics, ca aurait du venir avant Vatican II. La-bas, en mission, ce sont nos laics qui nous aident, les catechetes, par exemple. Deja, dans les annees 1950, on travaillait avec les laics, dans le temoignage, ils sentaient qu'on les aimait. Nos cceurs sont de la meme couleur, pas de difference. >> Excerpt from the interview conducted with Sister Annette Roberge, MNDA, on 18 June 2010, MNDA Motherhouse, Lennoxville.

(41) Eddy Louchez, << L'innovation dans le champ missionnaire conciliaire >>, in Gilles Routhier and Frederic Laugrand (eds.) L'espace missionnaire. Lieu d'innovations et de rencontres interculturelles (Paris: Editions Karthala, 2002), 271-303.

(42) A Latin expression that literally means church planting, Plantatio ecclesiae was the conception of mission based on the establishment of a local Church, including a hierarchy, parishes, anda teaching clergy. During the preconciliar period, Louvain missiologist Pierre Charles strongly defended this vision of Catholic mission.

(43) <<Ensuite de ca, au plan missionnaire, des la premiere annee a Quebec, il y avait un livre, Au coeur des masses du pere Voillaume. Un livre en lien avec l'experience de Charles De Foucauld. Alors, y'avait une certaine facon de remettre en question la mission. Vous savez un peu plus contemplative, avec les pauvres, etc. Ca a marque nos annees de mission, les miennes. >> Excerpt from the interview with [M.sup.gr] Francois Lapierre, PME, on 15 February 2011 at the Bishop's house, Saint-Hyacinthe.

(44) <<Je peux vous dire ca, c'etait "Hors de l'Eglise, point de salut!" ... J'avais une grand-mere qui etait pleine de fetiches, tu sais une vraie.... Alors les petits enfants, quand ils allaient mourir, si les parents voulaient, on les baptisait, c'est vrai.... Mais ma vieille, quand j'ai vu qu'elle allait mourir.... Ben, je lui ai demande : "Tu vas mourir. Est-ce que tu as peur de mourir?" Pis elle me regarde comme ca. Elle dit : "Non! Moi, je suis une fille de Dieu! Je suis la fille de Dieu pisje vais m'en aller... >> Excerpt from the interview conducted with Sister Gisele Beauchemin, MCR, on 28 September 2010 at the MCR Motherhouse in Laval (Chomedey).

(45) <<Et puis, c'est la que j'ai appris aussi qu'on pouvait pas enseigner la Parole de Dieu si on connaissait pas la culture. Qu'est-ce que je veux dire? Que je ne peux pas parler de la Parole de Dieu si je ne pars pas de la culture de quelqu'un, de la croyance de quelqu'un que moi, je ne connais pas. C'est la que j'ai commence vraiment a m'interesser a la philosophie de Confucius. Ah ! Je ramassais tout ce que je pouvais sur Confucius pour essayer de connaitre la culture et la croyance de mes eleves. Etje vois aujourd'hui, de plus en plus, comment est-ce que la culture, la philosophie de Confucius et tout le Enlightenment de Bouddha, comment ca mene a la joie.... Alors, moi, j'ai beaucoup, beaucoup medite la philosophie de Confucius et puis, je pouvais voir que telle Parole de Dieu correspondait a ca pis on voyait toutes les valeurs, les valeurs humaines, les valeurs chretiennes, les valeurs bibliques. Encore aujourd'hui, c'est du terrain, j'ai pas ete formee comme ca. J'ai ecoute beaucoup, j'ecoutais les personnes parler, j'ecoutais nos vieilles s0eurs de Chine. Ca a change ma facon de faire la mission.... Pour les Chinois, l'harmonie, pour Confucius, il faut toujours arriver a l'harmonie. C'est tres important et puis, il faut donner comme Bouddha qui se base sur Confucius, il faut qu'on sente un groupe ou dans une communaute, qu'on vit la chaleur humaine. Meme si on le demontre pas comme nous on le fait avec des baisers, mais cette chaleur humaine-la, faut que ce soit la, dans notre maniere d'etre, exactement. Alors, ca, ca a tout change toute ma mission, toute ma facon de voir, et ma vie religieuse et ma vie en Dieu et mon approche avec les personnes. >> Excerpt from the interview conducted with Sister Marie-Therese Beaudette, MIC, on 19 August 2011 at the MIC house in Pont-Viau, Laval.

(46) Excerpt from the interview conducted with Sister Eliette Gagnon, MIC, on 17 May 2011 at the MIC Motherhouse, Outremont.

(47) According to Gilles Routhier: <<Ces mouvements introduisent des breches importantes dans le discours ancien [et preparent] les grandes revisions des annees 1960. >> Gilles Routhier, << Quelle secularisation ? L'Eglise au Quebec et la modernite >>, in Brigitte Caulier (ed.) Religion, secularisation, modernite. Les experiences francophones en Amerique du Nord (Sainte-Foy: Presses de l'Universite Lavai, 1996), 93.

(48) <<... des mutations profondes etaient en cours des les annees 1950 dans la culture quotidienne de la population, notamment dans les points de repere spirituels et moraux des personnes et dans les valeurs vehiculees par les milieux de vie. >> Claude Ryan, << L'Eglise du Quebec a la veille du Concile et de la Revolution tranquille >>, in Gilles Routhier (ed.) Vatican II au Canada : enracinement et reception (Montreal : Fides, 2001), 168. Trained in the student Catholic Action movement, Ryan became its leading lay figure in 1945, and later was appointed editor and director of the daily newspaper Le Devoir during the Quiet Revolution years. He led the Quebec Liberal Party from 1978 to 1982.

(49) <<... considerer que toute affaire politique, sociale ou culturelle est egalement une affaire religieuse... >> Routhier, <<Quelle secularisation ? L'Eglise au Quebec et la modernite >>, 90.

(50) << La poussee reformatrice vient davantage ici des mouvements sociaux que du renouveau theologique, ce qui determine une comprehension differente du programme d'aggiornamento conciliaire, au moment du concile et dans les annees qui suivirent. >> Gilles Routhier (ed.) L'Eglise canadienne et Vatican H (Montreal : Fides, 1997), 1.

(51) According to Sylvain Serre, ten dioceses held preconciliar consultations with lay people: Montreal, Joliette, Saint-Jean, Quebec City, Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pocatiere, Saint-Jerome, Amos, Sherbrooke, Rimouski, and Nicolet. Sylvain Serre, <<Les consultations preconciliaires des la'/cs au Quebec entre 1959 et 1962>>, in Routhier (ed.) L'Eglise canadienne et Vatican II, 113-141.

(52) <<Je fais aujourd'hui I'hypothese que la formation de la conscience conciliaire des eveques tient a la fois et tout autant a leur enracinement dans leurs Eglises locales qu'a leur insertion dans I'assemblee conciliaire, que leurs positions en concile relevent a la fois et tout autant, des aspirations et des attentes de leurs fideles, des echanges et discussions in aula, en commission ou dans les coulisses conciliaires. >> Routhier (ed.) Vatican II au Canada : enracinement et reception, 168.

(53) With the Quiet Revolution, the Quebec state re-entered the field of social development to play its role as leader, a role that had been played by religious communities and the clergy since the Patriots' Rebellion of 1838.

(54) Pope Pius XII published two major documents on missions during the 1950s: the encyclical Evangelii Praecones (1951) on the promotion of missions, especially in Latin America, and the encyclical Fidei Donum (1957), calling for a special effort of the missionary movement to Africa.

(55) This paragraph draws largely on the data collected and presented by Gilles Routhier, <<L'Amerique du Sud: nouvel horizon missionnaire de l'Eglise du Quebec au XXe siecle >>, a paper presented at the 62th annual conference of the Institut d'histoire de I'Amerique francaise, Montreal, 17 October 2009.