The Mater Misericordiae Hospital, Auckland

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LII, Issue 49, 9 December 1925, Page 25

The Mater Misericordiae Hospital, Auckland

(By Rev. James Eccleton, S.M.)

THE PIONEER CATHOLIC HOSPITAL.

In the last years of the 19th century the public hospital at Coromandela seaside town on the western side of Hauraki —was in serious straits. It possessed neither matron nor nurses, and the Hospital Board saw no succor nigh. It was suggested to the Sisters

gone through a course of training at St. Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney, filled the columns of the Coromandel newspaper with prehistoric piffle. The Sisters worked on unheeding, even as they did, and would do again, in our day when plague swept through this

Sisters of Mercy $ and from warm Celtic hearts aflame with love divine what deeds of splendor spring! Mother Ignatius found opposition to her project. The time was not opportune it was alleged. There were other works at her community’s hands! The Catholics of Auckland were committed to aid other excellent enterprises'! Good men and women thus tried to measure a valiant woman with their narrow guage. There were poisoned shafts, too, of falsehood and derision, but unhesitat-

of Mercy by the harassed secretary that they might of their charity in the hours left them when school work was done spend themselves during the day on the patients. At night the sufferers were to be left to the care of a wardsman. The gaunt spectre of enteric stalked through the decaying mining settlement, and the Sisters, ever quick to heed the call of the sick, found themselves perforce installed in the hospital. There were murmurings, of course. Weird misconceptions of Catholicism and of its clergy and religious had been imported from the United Kingdom and had in New Zealand lived stolid, stiff, and stodgy. The wild savagery of the Orangeism that survives in the spiritual and intellectual jungles of the North of and the stupid vaporings current in “papal aggression” days found echo in sleepy Coromandel. A new hospital was being built, and when it was ’ ready the Sisters moved into it to receive the patients. Bilious bigots blind to the self-sacrifice of the Sisters, now reinforced by two of their number who had

fair land. Dr. McGregor, the then InspectorGeneral of Hospitals, gave the Coromandel Public Hospital the best report of its chequered history. The rugged, able,, and honest Scotsman rebuffed the fools who babbled inanities and insanities. Not one farthing did or would the Sisters draw from the Hospital Board for their work. Charity in its only real sense was their spur, their magnet, and their reward. ■ THE VENERABLE FOUNDRESS. V In Auckland a valiant woman of wide vision, of all-embracing charity, of gentle mercy, the late Rev. Mother Mary Ignatius Prendergast, had dreamed' of a Catholic hospital in the city staffed by the Sisters of her own Order, the Sisters of Mercy. , She had made her plans quietly and fully. Across the gulf her sisters were working. To Auckland she would bring them to found there an Hotel Dieu that one day might rival the Mater Misericordiae Hospital in far-off Dublin. For they are Irish in origin, these

\ ingly the lion-hearted mm moved on and peav nut minds ceased to bo vociferous although , they long remained whisperingly vocal. ■ . ' The Work Commenced. •• r - In 1900 from the late Mr. P. L. Dignan was, purchased his fin© home, and with it three and a half acres of land, on the heights of the volcanic cone of Mt. Eden, the dress circle of Auckland. The city lies beneath. Parnell, Newmarket, Remuera, Epsom, densely peopled and. throbbing - with life and energy, send their sounds faintly upward to the white hospital that crowns the hill. Otahuhu and Mangere are in the distance with • tile blue ridge of the Waitaker© Range behind and the Pukekohe Hill rising in the dim distance. Out to the west are the sparkling waters of the Waitemata, the manyislanded gulf, and the hills of Coromandel. To the north are the northern suburbs across the ribbon of the busy harbor, yet more islands, and the glory of the mighty Pacific, with the rugged, towering sentinel, Mt. Rangitoto, dominating all. '

X , There was-no fanfare of trumpets .when : the . Sisters came to!, Eden’s heights. There was a quiet, unheralded coming, a scrubbing of floors, and an adequate furnishing. Patients came slowly,-but- when they canid they ’ came in a steady stream. As the sufferers' grew in numbers the leading physicians and , surgeons of the city grew’- to know'. ,that- the Mater Misericordiae' Hospital, the hostel for sufferers under the protection of Our Lady, of her who is the Mother of Mercy, the Mother of the Man-God who is Infinite Mercy itself. To staff the hospital to meet its evergrowing needs New’ Zealand Sisters of Mercy crossed the Tasman Sea to study in- Australia, in Catholic hospitals of Australian Sisters of Mercy and of Australian Sisters of Charity, and to obtain Australian certificates. In their own land these certificates would be denied them unless they would study in public hospitals. State supervision is very useful and, we may grant, even necessary, but. the doctrine that the State and the State alone is efficient is at least questionable. If we in New Zealand are to press this teaching much'-further we shall have-the'Servile State- : in all its ugliness. “More-business-in Gov-;, eminent and less Government in business” may be an excellent election slogan. It would be very interesting and not at all unpleasant to see it become a norm' bf Conduct/* When' next the- Sisters of the “Mater” apply y to the Government for the right, to train their own nurses in their own hospital in their own land they may perchance have in reply something better than glacial politeness or the official inertia and listlessness born, of lack of competition and consequent lack

of contrast. The Australians are in better case. A continent breeds bigger, broader men and women. We in New Zealand , are insular and insularity creates the mental outlook of a microbe. The consensus ‘of the? •'opinion of. 1 thousands of patients from New Zealand and fi om beyond the seas, of- all ' classes and creeds, the calm judgment of distinguished physicians and surgeons, the -action 'of the eminent American surgeons who placed the “Mater” on the short list of New Zealand hospitals approved of the American College of Surgeons and the affectionate regard of Aucklanders, all these should speak effectively with myriad Tongues. The ' day must come, and come soon, when officialdom must listen or stand apart from a mighty and a goodly company in sullen apathy. The Work Extended. In 1918 was opened a new brick wing of the hospital. The vision of Mother Ignatius, then in the house of her eternity, was becoming real. The added accommodation was scion inadequate., Sufferers • clamor for ■ admission. A short week ago the 'Sisters purchased “Kiwi” and a further acre and a half of land, the home and grounds of the late Mr. P. L. Dignan, This property adjoins the hospital grounds and its procuring.; gives the Sisters the -whole of the spur Ah which the hospital stands. Already plans : ‘ are being prepared of a great central block, of a great hospital five storeys in height, containing every latest appliance and convenience. It is to house a hundred more patients.The sunlight and clear air of Auckland are to be laid fully under tribute. An extensive

roof garden is not the least of matters planned. The private hospital is to be, as it has been, but a means .to an end. A great public hospital is to be a home of rest, refreshment, and peace for the stricken poor, lor the tortured souls and bodies of men and women of the ranks, who have dropped from drooping shoulders at least for a time life’s heavy burden. There are not, as once there were wolves by the wayside. There are, and there will be, white-robed, smiling Sisters of Mercy to tend their wounds to help them back, if that be God’s ordaining, to health. That is the aim and the hope of the “Mater” staff. When the longed-for public hospital is in being the private hospital will be but ancillary and auxiliary. To the Sisters of Mercy the sick represent each and every one, Our Lord Himself. “You do it unto Me” is engraven in their hearts. It has ever been there. It was there when English and Irish Sisters of Mercy accompanied Florence Nightingale to the Crimea. The battlefields of the American Civil War knew them as did the blood-dyed fields of the., late War. There can be no class war no creed war, 1 no color bar where they work, for where they work, iii operating theatreor beside the bed of suffering, .goes the charity of Christ and its compelling urge. , . When death does come and its angel will '. mot be denied, its advent to the “Mater” . vis not . the coming of a gloomy visitant with its wings beating with the throbbing of the drums of doom. The angel of death is a Vgentle,' smiling visitor, with arms far-flung in sweet invitation,. when in the “Mater” he takes from the hands of the Sisters the soul

H from a body racked with pain wherein not ■' even their unceasing care could keep the vital flame. Even as Mt. Eden once poured forth from > its crater’s torn and jagged lips its volcanic flame so do consecrated hearts to-day in the “Mater” just below that still yawning volcanic pit burn with charity that is of Our Lord and of Him alone. The First Quarter of a Century. Twenty-five years ago two Sisters with the ink still damp upon their Australian certificates were at the “Mater’s” opening. They still are there, rejoicing in its growth and hopeful of great things yet to be. Around these Sisters are yet others, Irish, English, Scottish, New Zealanders, and Australians and with them are a. brave efficient band of lay nurses. Two of the lay nurses have been at the “Mater” for many years. It pains the Sisters that for their training the lay assistants must, in order to qualify as registered nurses, leave the hospital for three years and work in public hospitals in New Zealand or, at the price of exile, study in Catholic hospitals in Australia. On the 12th of December, in the grounds of the “Mater” and in those of “Kiwi” adjoining a garden fete is to be held. The Sisters had not wished for a great event, but their friends —clerical and lay, Catholic and otherwiseare working hard to make it a great success. The knowledge of the brave, unselfish work of the Sisters of Mercy in building up with poor initial resources, s the Mater Misericordiae Hospital must stifle v all pettiness, all carping criticism and engender in the heart of everyone something of the flame of charity and sacrifice that blazed in the heart of the valiant woman, Mother Mary Ignatius Rrendergast, when she set her hand to the building of the pioneer Catholic hospital in the Dominion and crowned it with the name and fame of Mercy. The Mater Misericordiae Hospital, Auckland SILVER JUBILEE, NOVEMBER, 1925. On Eden’s heights, above the city’s roar, Girt all about by hill and forest green, Yet tow’ring tall as do the hearts that soar Beyond mere time, with calm majestic mien. Sweet Mercy on its brow, and love and peace That are of God enshrined within its Avails Stands out the haven for the sick, surcease From pain its aim, when nail of suff’ring falls. Five lustra has the “Mater” seen speed by Since, firm in high resolve, unchecked by storms, A woman’s heart, strong urged by pain’s sharp cry, Brave made by Charity, the puny norms Of earthly guile contemned, set high this L y home, .r • From Celtic souls what deeds of splendor spring! Her soldier saint her courage showed: The loam Of earth, bedewed with Grace, such brave deeds bring!

Throughout the fleeting years, without the beat Of drum, with soundless instancy, as pass In tranquil majesty before the Seat Of God the mighty spheres, as in the Mass The Christ Himself appears, unto the sick As to Our Lord Himself has come health’s balm With charity, not self, its urge, the quick To strength renewed, with cease to death’s alarm. The dawn of greater things now breaks; for wide

With far-flung arms in Mary Mother’s name The “Mater” reaches out the flowing tide Of stricken poor to hold for Mercy’s fame In Christ’s dear name. We “Ave” call for past Well spent, for resolutions brave; then, leal To Christ and His dear ones unto the last We set our hands to make a vision real. — J. A. Eccleton. Auckland, December 3, 1925.