St Joseph's Society
Having spent 12 years at Upholland, I feel my first comment on seminary life must be: “thank goodness the ‘Junior Seminary’ is a thing of the past”. The older I get the more I regret that I was ‘robbed’ of my youth and of growing up with my siblings as one of them, rather than as someone special who appeared among them a couple of times per year. And I still wonder why it was thought to be a good idea that prospective secular priests should spend almost the whole time of preparation for priesthood virtually cut off from all contact with the saeculum! Similarly, I regret that in Phils and Divs we were judged by our ability to regurgitate chunks from text books (e.g. Tanquery and Noldin) rather than by our ability to use our minds. And, while accepting the importance of rules for the well-being of any society, I still wonder whether judging suitability for the priesthood largely by the “keeping of the rule” was particularly helpful: did it perhaps hinder rather than help the growing up process?
And yet I must also express gratitude for the good things that have come my way as a result of seminary training – the fine education I received, especially in the School, and the love for study that it inspired; the splendid example of many of the profs; the high ideals set before us; the inspiring liturgies, especially at Christmastime and Holy Week; the fun and the friendships, the plays and the pantomimes, and even those daily football matches in all weathers. I know they turned some people off football for ever, but they gave me a love for the game and an interest in it which have proved an enormous benefit, especially during my 23 plus years as a prison chaplain when football often proved the magical opening gambit to a conversation – especially with those who were allergic to any kind of converse with the clergy.
Let me mention a few of the endless flow of memories that come to mind. The dreadful home sickness that settled upon me for a week or two each time I returned from holiday. The day a few of us were cheerfully clearing snow from above the choir loft when a figure suddenly emerged from the top of the ladder – it was Mgr. Joe Turner, the rector - looking like a snow man from head to foot, but, as always, completely unperturbed by the unexpected turn of events. Those “November handicaps” when, after names were drawn from a hat, the unfortunates had to answer questions (“habeo difficultatem” the prof would intone), though, apart from when they were at liturgy, they had never heard Latin spoken nor had they used it themselves. The secreting of pats of margarine under the table in the Ref so that it could be retrieved and scraped on dry bread at tea-time. The real winter weather, when we would trek to the Lake at Wrightington, skate for hours (all of us aspiring Torvill and Deans) and then the long walk back. The occasion when we came running down from the Beacon and were assured by the dog owner that her yelping little pet wouldn’t harm a soul – till in fact it attempted to take a bite out of a runner whose only protection was a ridiculously thin pair of shorts . The “club”, at the bottom of the steps leading to the College lake, where those of us addicted to nicotine would gather each day, summer or winter, to get our morning ‘fix’,
And of course the Refectory, where, because the main meals were eaten in silence, there was the famous sign language that enabled us to communicate with one another, without speaking a word. And the food itself, particularly the desserts, which went by a whole panoply of nicknames - from Wet Nelly to the innocent but indelicate-sounding Stiff Dick.
In those far-away days it seemed unthinkable that Upholland College would ever come to an end. And when, in 1987, the College did in fact close its doors as a seminary for the last time, I’m sure I was not the only one who shed a quiet tear for the passing of our Alma Mater. For all the criticisms that might be levelled against her, and despite the difficult and the hard times experienced, I still rank my years at St Joseph’s College, Upholland among the most richly blessed of my life.