Société des Missions Africaines
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né le 28 février 1849 à Weggis dans le diocèse de Lausanne (Suisse) membre de la SMA le 18 décembre 1875 prêtre le 29 septembre 1876 décédé le 19 juillet 1921 |
1876-1884 Lyon, professeur décédé à Savannah, USA, le 19 juillet 1921, |
Le père Josef Gaspard ZIMMERMANN (1849 - 1921)
A Savannah (U.S.A.), le 19 juillet 1921, retour à Dieu du père Josef Zimmermann, à l'âge de 72 ans.
Josef Zimmermann naquit à Weggis, dans le diocèse de Bâle (Suisse), en 1849. Il fit ses études à Lucerne puis à Saint-Maurice en Valais. Il fit sa philosophie et suivit des cours de sciences à l'université d'Innsbruck (Tyrol). En 1874, après avoir passé un an au grand séminaire de Mayence, il arrivait à Lyon aux Missions Africaines. Il fit le serment en 1875.
De faible santé, l'abbé Zimmermann fut envoyé à notre maison de Nice où il fut ordonné prêtre en 1877. En septembre de la même année, le père Zimmermann était nommé professeur de dogme à Lyon. En février 1880, il partait pour quatre mois visiter les missions du Bénin et du Dahomey. A son retour, il fit plusieurs tournées de quêtes en Alsace et dans les pays de langue allemande.
En janvier 1883, le père Zimmermann est nommé supérieur de Cork. Actif et zélé, il va être l'âme et le grand bâtisseur de l'œuvre des Missions Africaines en Irlande, et cela pendant 28 ans. Le père Devoucoux lui laisse, à Blackrock Road, un collège et une église.
Le père Zimmermann va ouvrir Wilton et, par son amitié avec le Comte Blake, il va préparer les donations de Ballinafad et de Kilcogan. Il sut attirer à la Société des bienfaiteurs insignes et gagna la confiance de l'épiscopat irlandais. Devant les difficultés des séminaristes à s'adapter au grand séminaire à Lyon, le père obtint, après bien des demandes, de créer un grand séminaire en Irlande. Il obtint aussi l'érection de l'Irlande en province indépendante.
A Rome, on savait reconnaître la grande compétence et le savoir-faire du père Zimmermann dans les choses matérielles, mais on ne lui reconnut pas la même capacité pour la formation et le gouvernement spirituel de ses sujets. Aussi, dès 1910, le père Zimmermann fut-il supplanté à la tête de l'Irlande par le père Kyne qui deviendra provincial en mai 1912
Grâce au père Zimmermann qui sut doter l'Irlande de toutes les maisons dont elle avait besoin, la province prospéra. Le sacrifice qui lui fut imposé en 1911 d'avoir à quitter l'Irlande fut aussi une source de grâces pour la province.
Le père Zimmermann passa les dix dernières années de sa vie dans les missions pour les Noirs en Géorgie. Il sut se dévouer jusqu'à la fin. Les confrères irlandais, parfaitement conscients de la dette de reconnaissance qu'ils devaient à celui qui avait "fait" leur province, auraient désiré que le père Zimmermann vînt parmi eux achever sa vie, mais la mort surprit le père avant qu'il pût répondre à cette invitation.
Father Josef Gaspard ZIMMERMANN (1849 - 1921)
Joseph Zimmermann was born at Weggis, in the canton of Lucerne, in the diocese of Bale, Switzerland, on 28 February 1849. He died in Savannah, Georgia, U.S.A., on 19 July 1921
Joseph Zimmermann was born into a farming family. He was the second-born of a family of four girls and six boys. He received his secondary in Lucerne, and St. Maurice en Valais and then proceeded to the university of Innsbruck (Tyrol) where he followed courses in philosophy and science. In 1874, having spent a year in the major seminary of Mayence, he arrived at Cours Gambetta, Lyon, to join the S.M.A. He took his oath of membership on 18 December 1875. Being of weak health he was then sent to the S.M.A. house at Nice. He was ordained a priest in the seminary chapel at Nice, by the local bishop, Jean-Pierre Sola, on 29 September 1876.
In November of the same year Joseph was sent to the major seminary at Lyon to teach dogmatic theology. In February 1880 he spent four months visiting the Society's missions in the Bight of Benin and in Dahomey. On his return, armed with first-hand experience of Africa, he was assigned to collect funds on behalf of the Society in Alsace and in the German speaking countries. In January 1883 Joseph was named superior of the S.M.A. branch in Cork. There, over 28 years, he built up the work until it was of sufficient importance to be given semi autonomous status as a Province of the Society. When he came to Cork his predecessor, Francois Devoucoux, had already opened at Blackrock Road a secondary school for aspirants to the Society (an apostolic school), and also a public chapel. Fr. Zimmermann developed the work, building a chapel in Wilton in 1896, transferring the apostolic school to Wilton in March 1889 and introducing O.L.A. sisters (founded by the S.M.A. Superior General, Augustin Planque) from France in 1887.
The most significant developments took place after 1899 when the financial position of the branch was significantly improved due to the benefactions of a man who was later to be made an honorary member of the Society: Llewellyn Blake, one of the Blakes of Galway, who owned two large estates (in Galway and Mayo), and who in his earlier years had served as an officer in the Connaught Rangers). He was to give to the Society a considerable sum of money for the education of priests and also his two properties of Ballinafad and Cloughballymore (Kilcolgan). Fr. Zimmermann won the support of very many smaller benefactors. He was also successful in attracting support for the missionary cause from among priests and bishops. He was anxious that the Irish branch of the Society should train its own students and assign them to missions specifically allocated to that branch indeed his great object was to have the Irish branch erected into a full Province of the Society and to have leading members of the Irish Church involved in the work of that Province, so that the S.M.A. would become the arm of the Irish Church in Africa. His superiors in Lyon were less than enthusiastic about such schemes which they felt (and not without some justification) might breach the unity of the Society.
In the event Fr. Zimmermann took his case to Rome, going there on several occasion between 1905-1910 asking for permission to train priests in Ireland, for specific mission fields, and petitioning also for Provincial status. While admitting his excellence in financial and administrative matters his superiors in Lyon cast doubts on his ability to form good priests or to provide them with good spiritual guidance. They would certainly have liked to replace him but Rome (in the face of pressure from Zimmermann's Irish supporters such as Cardinal Logue, Bishop Thomas O'Callaghan of Cork, Bishop Browne of Cloyne, Archbishop John Healy of Tuam, Count Blake and many others) refused to sanction his withdrawal. Eventually after the affair had become something of a cause celebre in Rome, it was decided that Fr. Zimmermann should indeed have his Province but that his superiors should be given authority to replace him.
Hence Fr. Zimmermann was withdrawn (1910) and reassigned to the U.S.A. while Stephen Kyne, superior of the Liberian mission (which was given to the Irish Province as its first mission), was nominated first Provincial (15 May 1912). Joseph Zimmermann spent the last 10 years of his life in Savannah, Georgia, in an African-American parish entrusted to the Society by Bishop Benjamin Keiley. The parish, named after St. Anthony, was situated at 112 Fell Street. At the time of his death, in 1921, he had been invited by the Irish Province (now successful and expanding) to come to spend his last days in Ireland. Unfortunately he died before he could respond to the invitation. Joseph Zimmermann is recognised by Irish members of the Society as the founder of their Province.
He is buried in Savannah, Georgia.
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