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Period: 1182 to 16
Establishment of the Maronite Eparchy
According to the medieval bishop William of Tyre, the Maronite patriarch sought union with the Latin patriarch of Antioch in 1182. A definitive consolidation of the union, however, did not come until the 16th century, brought about largele -
the beginning of Catholic Education
While there is no record of these earlier exploits, Catholic education in America already had a strong foothold in North America by the time the first official Catholic school entered the scene in 1606. Founded by the Franciscan order in present-day St. Augustine, Florida, from this small seed a vibrant garden would sprout -
George Morley
On arrival in Sydney in the transport Active in September 1791, he was sent to work at Toongabbie. 'Irreproachable conduct' soon won him a place in the police watch that protected the government stores. In November 1792 he received a conditional pardon. In 1796 John Hunter made this absolute and appointed Barrington chief constable at Parramatta -
Mary Reiby
Mary Reibey, whose name is spelled variously Reiby, Rabey and Reibey, arrived in Sydney in 1791 as a teenaged convicted horse thief and, through a fortuitous marriage and her own business acumen, became a leading colonial entrepreneur and philanthropist. -
fr james dixon
Dixon arrived in New South Wales in the Friendship on 16 January 1800. He remained in Sydney, where his conduct satisfied the authorities. On 19 April 1803 Governor King, influenced by the uneasiness of the Irish at not being able to practise their religion, granted him conditional emancipation and permission... -
First Public Catholic Mass
The first publicly sanctioned Catholic Mass – on May 15, 1803 – was a signal event as an act of emancipation for Catholic worshippers. And by the time it happened the colony had about 1700 of them. -
castle uphill rising
Castle Hill Rising, (March 4–5, 1804), the first rebellion in Australian history. Involving Irish convicts (for the most part, political offenders), the uprising began with the rebels’ seizure of the New South Wales convict station at Parramatta on March 4 and culminated in a clash between the rebels and government troops on the following day. -
the Rum Rebellion
The Rum Rebellion of 1808 was a coup d'état in the then-British penal colony of New South Wales, staged by the New South Wales Corps in order to depose Governor William Bligh. Australia's first and only military coup, it is named after early Sydney's illicit rum trade, over which the Rum Corps, as it became known, maintained a monopoly. -
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Marist Brothers and Fathers
The Marist Brothers, or Little Brothers of Mary, are a Catholic religious order of brothers and affiliated lay people. The order was founded in France, at La Valla-en-Gier near Lyon in 1817 by Saint Marcellin Champagnat, a young French priest of the Society of Mary (Marist Fathers). The first Marist contact with Australia came in 1837. -
Jeremiah O’Flynn
His Arrival in Australia Undaunted, O'Flynn sailed in the Duke of Wellington and arrived at Sydney on 9 November 1817 -
Church Acts
The Church Building Acts 1818 to 1884 is the collective title of the following Acts: The Church Building Act 1818 (58 Geo 3 c 45) The Church Building Act 1819 (59 Geo 3 c 134) The Church Building Act 1822 (3 Geo 4 c 72) -
Fr John Therry
In May 1834 John Bede Polding, the first Roman Catholic bishop in Australia was appointed and arrived in September 1835. In April 1837 Therry was officially reinstated as a chaplain at a salary of £150 a year, and in April 1838 he arrived at Launceston on a mission to the church in Tasmania -
Establishment of the Catholic Church in Tasmania
The Catholic Church became established in Tasmania, then Van Diemen's Land, in 1821 with the arrival of Father Philip Connolly. At the time, about one third of the population was Roman Catholic. Most of them were convicts, or former convicts, from Ireland. -
Society of St Vincent de Paul
he Society of St. Vincent de Paul was founded in 1833 to help impoverished people living in the slums of Paris, France. The primary figure behind the Society's founding was Blessed Frédéric Ozanam, a French lawyer, author, and professor in the Sorbonne -
St John's Church,(Tasmania)
St John's Church, New Town, Tasmania St John's Church, Newtown, Tasmania, was built in 1835. In 1916 its original bell fractured, and it was decided to melt down the bell into medalets, which could be sold to raise funds for a replacement bell. New Town is today a suburb of Hobart, both a residential and commercial district. -
John Bede Polding
Polding joined the Benedictine order in 1811 and was ordained priest in 1819. Consecrated a bishop, he arrived at Sydney in 1835. There he divided his territory into missionary districts and swiftly provided them with priests, churches, and schools. He procured help for his bishopric through visits to Europe. -
William Davis
William arrived in Sydney in the Alfred on 31 December 1837; his parents and other siblings migrated in 1842. Employed as a clerk with the Commercial Banking Co. of Sydney, Davis later took charge of the Goulburn branch. His first pastoral experience was with Charles Campbell, as overseer of Duntroon at Limestone Plains (Canberra). -
Sisters of Charity
In 1838, five Sisters were selected to take part in the Australian mission. These five pioneers left Ireland in August 1838, arriving in Sydney on 31 December of that year. The Sisters of Charity were the first Religious Institute of women to arrive in Australia -
Caroline Chisholm
The Chisholms decided to spend leave in Australia and arrived in Sydney in the Emerald Isle in September 1838; they settled at Windsor, where Caroline remained with her three sons when Chisholm was recalled to active service in 1840. -
Mary Mackillop
Mary Helen MacKillop was born in Fitzroy, Melbourne on 15 January 1842. When baptised six weeks later she received the names Maria Ellen. Her father, Alexander, was educated in Rome for the priesthood but, at the age of 29, left just before his ordination. He decided to migrate to Australia and arrived in Sydney on the Brilliantin 1838. -
Christian Brothers
At Polding's request, the Christian Brothers arrived in Sydney in 1843 to assist in schools. In 1857, Polding founded an Australian order of nuns in the Benedictine tradition – the Sisters of the Good Samaritan – to work in education and social work. -
St John’s Pro Cathedral (West Aust)
St. John's Pro Cathedral was the principal place of worship for the Roman Catholic Community in Perth from 1844 until 1865. Upon its completion in 1865 the Gothic -style St Mary's Cathedral replaced St John's as Perth's Catholic Cathedral. The church then became known as St. John's Pro Cathedral and was used by the Christian Brothers as a school. -
Sectarian violence at Duke of Edinburgh
Duke of Edinburgh (1844-1900), was born on 6 August 1844 at Windsor, England, second son of Queen Victoria. He entered the navy in August 1858 and travelled widely as a midshipman in the frigate Euryalus. In the winter of 1862-63 he was elected King of Greece but politics dictated his withdrawal and he was given instead right of succession to the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha -
St Patrick’s (South Aust)
The foundation stone for Adelaide’s first Catholic church, St Patrick’s, was laid in December 1845. It was the principal place of Catholic worship in Adelaide until St Francis Xavier Cathedral opened on Wakefield Street in 1858. A tower designed by architects -
Sisters of Mercy
The sisters arrived in Perth, Australia in 1846, and in 1850, a band from Carlow arrived in New Zealand. Sisters from Limerick opened a house in Glasgow in 1849, and in 1868 the English community established a house in Guernsey -
Establishment of the Sisters of St Joseph
In 1846, a group of Sisters of Mercy from Ireland arrived in the Swan River Colony (now Western Australia) and established the first secondary school for girls in the whole of Australia. In 1855, the Sisters of St Joseph of the Apparition arrived in Fremantle in Western Australia -
St Francis’ Church (Victoria)
In 1848, St Francis' became the cathedral church of the first Catholic Bishop of Melbourne, James Goold, and continued as a cathedral until 1868, when the diocesan seat was moved to the still unfinished St Patrick's Cathedral. The elegant cedar ceiling was installed in 1850 -
Old St Stephen’s Church (Queensland)
In 1849 and 1850 the New South Wales Government, under provisions of Governor Richard Bourke's 1836 Church Act, subsidised the building of Old St Stephens Church which was opened on 12 May 1850 -
Gold Rushes
The next large gold rush began in Australia in 1851, when rich deposits were found in the Ballarat and Bendigo regions of Victoria. These strikes drew diggers to Victoria’s chief town, Melbourne, from all over Australia and England until the early 1860s -
Fr Julian Tenison Woods
Julian E Tenison Woods, born in Southwark, England, in 1834 came out to Australia arriving in Tasmania in 1854. His education had been varied and rather eclectic and he spent some time in the Passionist and Marist Congregations. He worked as a journalist and was both poet and scientist. -
Eureka Stockade
Eureka Stockade, rebellion (December 3, 1854) in which gold prospectors in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia—who sought various reforms, notably the abolition of mining licenses—clashed with government forces. It was named for the rebels’ hastily constructed fortification in the Eureka goldfield. The Eureka Stockade was the most-celebrated rebellion in Australian history. -
Good Samaritan Sisters
The Congregation of the Sisters of the Good Samaritan, colloquially known as the "Good Sams", is a Roman Catholic congregation of religious women commenced by Bede Polding, OSB, Australia’s first Catholic bishop, in Sydney in 1857. The congregation was the first religious congregation to be founded in Australia. -
Presentation Sisters
The sisters arrived in Australia in 1866 in response to an urgent need to educate the children of poor Irish settlers. The first Presentation school was opened in Richmond, Tasmania, followed in 1873 by the first mainland school, which opened in St Kilda, Melbourne, and the first New South Wales school -
St Mary’s Cathedral
The cathedral was designed by William Wardell and built from 1866 to 1928. It is also known as St Mary's Catholic Cathedral and Chapter House, Saint Mary's Cathedral and St Mary's Cathedral. The property was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 3 September 2004. -
arrival of the Marist Brothers
Arriving in Sydney in 1872, the Marist Brothers, led by Brother Ludovic, the founder of the Marist Brothers Province in Australia, established a parish school at Church Hill, The Rocks. The mission was to educate students in the Marist way and to have them graduate with strong minds and gentle hearts -
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Cardinal Moran
Moran was appointed to Australia on 25 January 1884 and arrived on 8 September 1884. He was created Cardinal-Priest on 27 July 1885 of the title of St Susanna. The new Irish-Australian cardinal made it his business to make his presence and leadership felt. -
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De La Salle brothers
The De La Salle Brothers arrived in Australia in 1906 to establish Catholic schools. By 1932 a De La Salle school was established in Roma, Queensland, and in 1955 they set up a school and community in Scarborough. In 1961 the Brothers established BoysTown in Beaudesert. -
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Archbishop Mannix
Archbishop Daniel Mannix, who died fifty years ago this year at the age of 99, was Australia's most influential and controversial churchman. He did not arrive in Australia until he was in his forties, landing here in March 1913, yet he accomplished enough to fill more than one lifetime -
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Bob Santamaria
B. A. (Bob) Santamaria. 1915 - 1998 | VIC | Journalist & Broadcaster. Santamaria was Australia’s most effective and influential conservative commentator for more than two decades. A brilliant but divisive polemicist, journalist, television -
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Cardinal Gilroy
Cardinal Gilroy was appointed K.B.E. in 1969. In December 1970 he welcomed his friend Pope Paul VI on the first papal visit to Australia. It cast a glow of an older splendour over the last months of his episcopate. With relief, he tendered his resignation on his 75th birthday, 22 January 1971.
