Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 3.djvu/361

 CAPHARNAUM

309

CAPITOLIAS

May, 1S74. There was no cathedral, and the Divine Offices were performed in a miserable chapel which was much too small. To supply this pressing need the bishop sci about rebuilding a ruined church which from the time of Louis XV. He was able to collect a sum of about 200.(100 francs ($40,000), and in the space of three months an American company completed the construction of the actual nave with its aisles, the transept and choir being still (1900 1 incom- plete. The bishop also lost no time in establishing two schools, one for boys and the other for girls, under t lie Institute of Christian Instruction (Freres La Mennais) and the Sisters of St. Joseph of Cluny. The sisters had arrived'. I May. 1 NT-'; t lie Freres La Men- nais came 9 November, 1S77. At this epoch, through the initiative of Pere Bertin. curr and honorary canon, the equipment of the cathedral was rendered complete by the erection of a presbytery. Upon I he death of Monseigneur Guillons, Monseigneur Million succeeded him as Archbishop of Port-au-Prince, and Monseigneur Kersuzan, titular Bishop of Hippo and coadjutor to the late archbishop, was made Bishop of Cap Haitien, 10 November. 18S6. The Bishop of Cap Haitien had until then resided in a house too small for the gatherings of all the clergy in their annual re- treat. He found means to build a very fine episcopal residence, with a chapel and.adequate outbuildings, an edifice undeniably the most considerable in the city after the cat hedral. This residence was destroyed by fire, but the construction of a more spacious and equally imposing edifice is now (1906) in progress. The diocesan seminary had been carried on at Pont- Chateau, in Brittany, by the Society of Mary founded by Bl. Rene de Mont fort. When the French Go vern- ment outlawed the religious orders, Monseigneur Kersuzan succeeded in installing his present seminary (Saint-Jacques) at Lanpaul, in the Diocese of Quim- per, Brittany. It is under the care of secular priests: a director, two administrators, and six professors, with 50 students. The same bishop also founded at Cap Haitien the College of Xotrr-Dame de secours per- pUuel, which affords Haitian youths the advantages of secondary education without the expense and risks of a sojourn in Europe. This college is administered by a director, two ecclesiastic, and two lay, teachers. Lastly, the hospice owes to Monseigneur Kersuzan the introduction of the sisters, whose ministrations insure disinterested care for the sick with due consid- eration of their spiritual welfare.

Religious and Educational Status. — Since the establishment of the hierarchy the twenty-one par- ishes of this diocese have little by little been provided with pastors, and some with assistants. There are altogether sixty-three churches, chapels, and orator- ies in the diocese. The number of practical Catho- lics has more than trebled and marriages have multi- plied everywhere. There still remains, however, an unconverted majority in the immense parishes, which often contain a population of 30,000, while the small- est always contain several thousands.

In addition to the college already mentioned there i- a boys' school, conducted by ten of the Freres La Mennais, with -'(1(1 pupils; and three other schools, each employing three religious of the same order, with from 150 to 200 pupils in each. The Sisters of St. Joseph of Cluny carry on six schools, one with 250 pupils under ten sisters, and five, each with 150 pupils under three sisters. The Daughters of Wis- dom supply, besides ten religious for the hospice. 22 religious, teaching an aggregate of 750 girls in six schools in as many parishes. The number of Protestants residing in the diocese is extremely small, and is made up almost entirely of strangers from the neighbouring islands. There are three Masonic temples at Cap Haitien. and probably one in each of the other towns or considerable villages of the diocese. When there was virtually no clergy, it

was a fashion in Haiti to join the lodges; but these are now little frequented, except two or three times a. year, on festival occasions, when t here are receptions or banquets. M. Chatte.

Capharnaum, a titular see of Palestine. Its name (also Kapern.um) means village of Nahum or consolation. It is frequently mentioned in the Gospels: Jesus, when repelled by the Nazarenes, made it His new abode (Matt., iv, 13; Luke, iv, 31; John, ii, 12); He chose there his first disciples, Peter, Andrew, James, John. Matthew i Matt., iv, IS, 21; ix,9; Mark i, 16); He cured there the centurion's servant, Peter's mother-in-law, a paralytica demoniac, the Hoemorrhoissa, etc.; it was there that He brought to life again the daughter of Jairus, and deliv- ered many discourses, especially the one concern- ing the institution of the Eucharist (John, vii. The inhabitants, however, at the instigation of the Pharisees, broke off with Him, and Jesus, on leaving their city, cursed it (Matt., xi. 23). Under Constan- tine the Great, Count Joseph, a converted Jew, built a church there which the pilgrim known as "Pseudo- Antoninus" visited in the sixth century. Since then the town has not been mentioned in the history of Palestine. It was never a Greek see, nor even a Latin one in the Middle Ages. Lequien, it is true (III. 719), quotes a document concerning the ec- clesiastical province of Scythopolis, in Palestina Secunda, wherein we read: "Ibi sunt adhuc Beth- saida, Nairn et Capharnaum, sed alio nomine vocitan- tur nee habent episcopos". Just when it became a Latin titular see is not known, the title now being held by the coadjutor to the Latin Patriarch of Jeru- salem. Capharnaum must be identified with Tell- Houni on the north bank of the Lake of Tiberias. There are splendid ruins there, chiefly of a magnifi- cent synagogue seventy-two feet long and fifty-four feet wide. In a little convent on this site some Franciscans reside for the reception of pilgrims. According to some archaeologists the site of Ca- pharnaum is not at Tell-Houm, but in the vicinity, on the way to Tiberias, either at Khan-Minieh or at Ain-Tabigah. In the latter place the Cologne Catholic Society conducts an agricultural colony.

Wilson, Lands of the Bible, II. 139-149: Thomson', The

Lan4 and the Book, I, 542; EtoBZNSON, Biblical Researches

i- ,i. III. 347-357; Conder, Tentwork in Palestine, II, 1S2;

Kitchener in Quartirhi StaU m ni nf the Palestine Exploration

Fund (July, 1879).

S. \ AILHE.

Capistran (Capisteano), John. See John ( Iapis- tran, Saint.

Capital Punishment. See Punishment.

Capitolias, a titular see of Palestine, suffragan to Scythopolis in Palestina Secunda. According to the coins of the city, its special era begins a. d. 97 or 98; it dates, therefore, at least under this name, from the time of Nerva or Trajan. It was originally a part of the Decapolis. Capitolias i- mentioned by many geographers, among others by Hierocles and Georgius Cyprius in the sixth and seventh centuries. Six bishops are given by Lequien III, 715). The first, Antiochus, was present at Nicsa in 32.5; the second. Ananias, was at Chalcedon in 451; the last, St. Peter, is said In have si i lie red martyrdom at the hands of the Saracens early in the seventh century; he seems, however, to have been only a priest of Capitolias. In the twelfth century the see was an independent archbishopric, as appears from a "Notitia episeopatuum of that time (II. Gelzer, in Bvzantin. Zeitschrift, I. 253) Eubel, I, 169, mentions four Latin titulars in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The site of Capitolias is identi- fied with the ruins at Bet-er-Ras, near Irbid, the chief village of a kaimakandik in the vilayet of Syria.

ScHrM\cio:R. Northern Adjlun, 154 sq.; Leqcien, Oriens Christianus (1740), III, 715-18.

S. Vailhe.