Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 13.djvu/770

 SEMINARY

702

SEMINARY

regards vocation, all that can be expected is not in- deed certainty, but p^obabilit5^ Still, preparatory seminaries must be maintained in their proper spirit, and receive only candidates for the priesthood. Parents and parish priests are urged to encourage and to help boys who by their intelligence and piety give hope that the^' are called to the priesthood (Council of Baltimore, no. 130). No one should be admitted to a theological seminary unless he has completed a six-year collegiate course, and passed a successful ex- amination (ibid., nos. 145, 152). A student from an- other diocese cannot be received without first obtain- ing information from his bishop. If it appears that he was dismissed from the seminary (as unfit for the priesthood) he should not be admitted at all (Con- gregation of the Council, 22 Dec, 1905). Dismissal from the seminary means no more than that the stu- dent is not considered fit for the priesthood; it does not necessarily reflect on his character as a Christian lay- man.

G. Intellectual Training. — In the preparatory sem- inary the aspirant to the priesthood follows the ordinary academic and collegiate course for six years; he studies Christian doctrine, Latin and Greek, Eng- lish and at least one other modern language, rhetoric and elocution, history and geography, mathematics and natural sciences, Gregorian Chant and book- keeping (Council of Baltimore, nos. 145, 151). Catho- lic colleges with a course of eight years, four years academic and four years collegiate, teach philosophy and science in the junior and senior years; but as a rule this is not accepted by seminaries as the equivalent of two years of philosophy. The Council of Baltimore requires ecclesiastical students to spend six years in the theological seminary. There they receive a spe- cial moral training which cannot be given in a mixed college, and they are taught philosophy with a view to the study of theology. In the theological seminary two years are devoted to the study of philosophy. Scripture, Church history, and natural sciences in their relation to religion. During the last four years the course of study includes Holy Scripture, with Greek and Hebrew, apologetics, dogmatic, moral, and pa.s- toral theology', Church history, and, in some institu- tions, hturgy and canon law. The courses given in these various branches have a twofold purpose: to equip every student with the knowledge necessary for the discharge of the ordinary functions of the min- veXxy; and to give brighter students the foundation of more scientific work, to be pursued in a university. The seminary trains general practitioners, the univer- sity forms specialists; the seminary gives the elements of all ecclesiastical science, the university provides a thorough treatment of some special questions. In Rome ecclesiastical students from various colleges fol- low a course of lectures at the Gregorian University, the Dominican College, the Proj)aganda, or the Ro- man Seminary; these are KUpplernciited by repeti- tions in the colleges (see Ro.man Colleges). There are likewise ecclesiastical students preparing for the priesthood who follow the courses of theology in the Universities of Louvain and Fribourg, and in the theological faculties of the German universities. In the Catholic University at Washington there is only a post-graduate course of sacred sciences.

The vast majority of the clergy in nearly all coun- tries receive their education in seminaries, and only at the end of the regular course are some of the best gifted 8(mt to a Catholic university to pursue higher studies, which leaef) XIII and Pius X, in their letters to bishops in various parts of the world and in their Decrffes rc;garding wjminaries, insist that ecclesiastical studira be in harmony with the needs of our times, but free from all dangerous novelties, especially from the errors condemned under the name of Modernism. Various means have been taken to secure the per-

fect orthodoxj' of both the professors and the students.

H. Moral and Spiritual Training. — Unlike most of the professional schools (law, medicine etc.) which give only knowledge, the seminary aims at training the will. Like West Point and the Naval Academy it subjects the student to a system of dis- cipline by which he may gradually acquire habits becoming his profession. In a priest, holiness of life is not less essential than professional science. In order to discharge with success the functions of his ministry, he must be a gentleman, a true Christian, and moreover capable of bearing the special obliga- tions of the priesthood. "In order to restore in the world the reign of Jesus Christ", writes Pius X (5 May, 1904), "nothing is as necessary- as the holiness of the clergy. " Hence, in his first Encychcal he warns the bishops that their first care, to which every other must yield, ought to be "to form Christ in those who are to forni Christ in others" (3 Oct., 1903).

Seminarians are to learn the sacerdotal virtues first of all by the example of their teachers. Hence the sovereign pontiffs and various councils frequently insist on the quaUfications of those who are chosen to train priests. They should be " con.spicuous for ability, learning, piety, seriousness of hfe. They should devote their life to study, bear cheerfully the burden of seminary rule and of a busy life; by word and example teach the students the observance of seminar^' discipline, humility, unworldliness, love of work and retirement, and fidelity to prayer" (Council of Baltimore, no. 159). Another powerful means of training seminarians in Christian virtue is the semi- nary discipline. The student is separated from the world and subjected to a rule of life which, leaving nothing to caprice, determines what he has to do at every moment of the day. Classes, studies, exer- cises of piety follow one another at regular intervals, and punctual attendance is expected of all. Fidelity to seminary rules, extending over several years, prompted by a sense of duty, and inspired by the love of God, cannot fail to produce habits of regularity, self-control, and self-sacrifice.

Instructions on Christian perfection, on the dignity and duties of the priesthood are daily given in spiritual conferences and readings. These are supple- mented by retreats, which take place in the beginning of the year and before ordinat ions, and by private con- sultations of each student with his spiritual director. Even more efficacious than instruction and discipline is the direct intercourse of the soul with God in prayer, meditation, and the reception of the sacraments. Nowhere, perhaps, has the Decree of Pius X on fre- quent communion produced more abundant fruit than in seminaries. The students gladly avail themselves of the special encouragement given to them to receive Our Lord daily. By this close communion with our great High Priest, even more than by their wiUing acceptance of all the restraints of seminary life, they gradually become worthy of the mission conferred upon them by ordination. Thus the seminary be- comes a nursery of faithful representatives of Our Lord for the salvation of men; they go forth, the hght of the world and the salt of the earth.

History fully bears out the words of the learned historian and great bishop, Hefele: "If the Cathohc world has had for the last three hundred years a more learned, a more moral, a more pious clergy than that which existed in almost ever>' country at the time of the so-called Reformation, and whose tepidity and faithlessness contributed largely to the growth of the schism, it is wholly due to this decree of the Council of Trent, and to it we in this age owe our thanks" ("Tubinger Quartalschrift", no. 1, p. 24).

1. Special treatisoB: — PoCan, De Seminario Clerieorum (Tournai, 1874); Themistor, BiMuna und Erzie.huna der Geist- lichen (Cologne, 1884); Fr. tr., L' Initruclion et I'Education du