Raymond-Marie Roller

Monseigneur Raymond-Marie Rouleau (April 6th 1866 - May 31st 1931) was a Canadian man of the church which was archbishop of Quebec of 1927 to 1931.

Resulting from a modest family of farmers, it was born at Isle-Green on April 6th, 1866. It accepted with the baptism the first name of Felix, who was that of his father, and it is only later, with its religious profession, which it added to it those of Raymond and Marie. Its childhood ran out, calms and peaceful, in the pretty island, vis-a-vis the river which is broad there like a sea, with the hearth of simplest and Christian of the families, between the church and the school. It had an uncle priest, the Rouleau abbot, who was canon and priest of the Cathédrale of Rimouski, which came from time to time to the house.

In this environment, its heart was formed naturally with piety towards God and the worship of his furnace bridges. At 13 years, in September 1879, it entered to the Séminaire of Rimouski, where it made any sound traditional Cours, and, at 19 years, in September 1885, it took the cassock there. Along its studies, it had been shown raises pious and of sharp intelligence, applied and curious to be informed. More nice successes had rewarded its efforts and its labors.

But its weakness of constitution and perhaps also its constant work had brought a deterioration of its health which failed to compromise the future that one dreamed for him. It was said reached Phtisie and faculty itself had decided in this direction. The pale ecclesiastic, for a long time devout and trustful with the Virgin Mary, redoubled enthusiasm near the good mother of the sky. " Without wanting to claim here to reveal in detail of the too intimate files, one wrote in the Dominican Revue, say that it was torn off with died by that which intended it to belong to an order dedicated to its service and whose members carried a long time the nickname of ûh of the Virgin ..."

This order, it was that of Dominican, benches with Saint-Hyacinthe in Canada, since 1874, and which had just opened there a noviciate on July 2nd, 1885. The Rouleau abbot introduced to it and there accepted the saint white dress, of the hands of the Père Maricourt, on December 8th, 1886. Its finished noviciate, it pronounced its simple wishes perpetual on August 3rd, 1888. In France, one lived then under the blow of the law of expulsions, and, in Canada, the regular studies for the Dominicains young people were not organized yet.

The Brother Roller left consequently for Corsica, and it is with the famous convent of Corbara that it supplemented his intellectual formation. It is there, also, which, on August 4th, 1891, it did its solemn profession in the hands of the Monpeur Father. The Brother Raymond-Marie Rouleau was ordered priest, in Corsica, by Mgr Délia Foata, bishop of Ajaccio, on July 31st, 1892. He still continued two years, with the same convent of Corbara, his theological studies, that he crowned by obtaining the rank of reader, who is equivalent, at the Dominican ones, under doctor in the other universities. In August 1894, it returned to Canada, being assigned with the convent of Saint-Hyacinthe.

One initially entrusted to him, in Saint-Hyacinthe, the functions of Master of the beginners, then those of regent of the studies, 1894 to 1900. In 1900, it passed in this capacity as regent, in Ottawa, with the regular convent of the order, which was established, and he became the prior on August 10th of this same year 1900. June 12th, 1909, after brilliances examinations, it received the supreme rank of Master as a Thomas saint. Lastly, on July 2nd, 1919, the Father Roller was elected provincial the Dominican ones for the province of Canada. He controlled thus, at the same time as he still taught, and that with a wisdom and a science to which its fellow-members made most complete many times of the homages.

Its action of preacher and apostle radiated pareillement with the outside. It gave retirements in the parishes, the communities, with the clergy, everywhere where it was called, in as much as its other occupations allowed him. It was several years, with the curia archiépiscopale of Ottawa, the defender of the matrimonial bond, and it accompanied Mgr Duhamel, in the capacity as theologist, with the plenary council of Quebec in 1909. He had become the estimated adviser of our apostolic delegates, and one knew, among the initiates, that Rome often charged it in the communities with high missions with confidence. The French Canadian of Ontario, in hillock with so much of annoyances, had more once recourse to its lights, and its discrete patriotism as much as enlightened their was of a broad support.

One was astonished sometimes that it could be enough during more than twenty years to so much of various works. In Rome, one sees the men and the things top and by far, but they at a glance are seen penetrating and sure. March 9th, 1923, the Father Raymond-Marie Roller, provincial of Dominican, was elected bishop of Valleyfield, where it succeeded Mgr Emard promoted with the archbishop's palace of Ottawa. He was crowned, in his Cathédrale of Valleyfield, by the papal delegate of time, Mgr di Maria, the next on May 22nd. It was only one stage. Three years later, on July 9th, 1926, Mgr Roller had to go to occupy, in Quebec, the worthy seat of Mgr of Laval, that the deaths close to the Bégin cardinal and his immediate successor Mgr the Roy archbishop had left vacant.

Established in Quebec on November 8th, 1926, the new archbishop was decorated with the Pallium on February 24th, 1927. It was yet only one routing. Indeed, with the consistory of December 19th, 1927, Mgr Roller was created cardinal of holy Église, of the title of Saint-Pierre in Montorio. Its rise had been fast, which had carried out it, in less than five years, of its cell of monk, at the top of the Canadian hierarchy and Roman crimson. But alas! the last stage was to be short, it too! May 31st, 1931, after less than four years, the venerated cardinal one died in Quebec, in its palate archiépiscopal, struck down by a Crise of angina. It had 65 years of age, 45 of religious life, 43 of priesthood, 8 of episcopate and not completely 4 of cardinalat.

Man of high stature, larger than the average, well done his person, of regular figure, with the energetic and soft features at the same time, than animated the glare of the glance or the kindness of the always benevolent smile, the Father Roller with Ottawa, had already large and beautiful mine under its white costume of Preaching friar. Become bishop with Valleyfield, then archbishop and cardinal in Quebec, it kept on its white dress of monk, but the purple badges or crimsons which it had to add to it could only give him more glare. These marks of dignities, like dignities themselves, immediately suited him to charm. This man left the people and this very modest monk appeared with all perfectly with his place in the middle of the sizes and of eminences.

From the intellectual or moral point of view, one knew that Mgr Roller, after thirty-seven years of Dominican life, devoted especially to teaching, had remained a man of study and that it was a scholar and a scientist in all kinds of knowledge. It seems that was seen, up to a certain point, in its manner of being and its paces. Its maintenance, like its conversation, was of a Master. He had certainly not sought the honors. Instead of occupying a throne in a cathedral or a basilica, he had certainly preferred, one realized there without he saying it, still quiet food in his cell of monk.

He nevertheless carried briskly the burden of the sizes. But it was still more liked to rise towards the high considerations of the thought. He was never again itself, has one precisely says, that when he made some important speech in the presence of his clergy or in front of the university personnel, or wrote one of these pastoral letters, if strong of substance and so luminous of expression, as he produced such an amount of of it. It is that, if he got along perfectly in the things of the administration and the businesses, which was necessary to the achievement of the duties of its load of bishop and first Pasteur, the cardinal remained before a whole man of doctrines and a " prêcheur" in the most beautiful direction of the term.

Its speeches and its writings testified constantly to its high science, of its vast scholarship, its higher knowledge of the men and the things. It was initially a doctor - he was Master as a Thomas saint - whose intellectual value, very as much as beautiful morals qualities, ensured the authority and strengthened the ascending one that he took so quickly on all those which came in relation to him. And it is this why, seems it, more than for any other reason, the Rouleau cardinal was, like quite naturally, a so big boss in the Church of God. At the same time, it is advisable to add it, the cardinal showed himself everywhere and constantly a father with the heart sympathizing and very filled of leniency.

In the various loads which it occupied at the Dominican ones, then with the head of the dioceses which it directed, it knew, certainly, to control without weakness, with as much firmness than of wisdom and prudence. But he always exerted the authority also with most delicate of condescensions and most exquisite of the attentions towards all its managed. He was not those which are sharp with and which break, When he returned from Rome, covered purple, in March 1928, one of its former Dominican school-fellows returned testimony from there to him. " He can wait, wrote he, and he can envisage. He can give directions which ensure success, as he can repress excesses which compromise a direction."

Nemo tam Lord's Prayer! Always its kindness of heart could moderate what the handling of the authority necessarily has of a little hard and severe. Because of that, not only or obeyed to him, but still one liked to obey to him, which is better in addition to one direction. All in all, Its Eminence the cardinal Raymond-Marie Roller, about the Preaching friars, second bishop of Valleyfield, then nineteenth bishop and seventh archbishop of Quebec, will have been a large citizen of its country and splendid Pasteur of the hearts. It is one of the men of the church, in Canada, which made more the honor with its country. He will have lived in the history.

Sources

AUCLAIR, Elie. Canadian Figures , Montreal, 1933.

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