Seminaries of Saint Paul

The Saint Paul Seminary's Metropolitan Cross

The seminaries began as one institution: the Saint Paul Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota. John Ireland, the first archbishop of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul, wanted to build a seminary to provide move priests for the growing Catholic immigrant population of the Upper Midwest. Ireland's primary benefactor was James J. Hill, president of the Great Northern Railway. Hill was a Protestant, but his wife Mary Hill was a devout Catholic. In honor of Mary, Hill donated $500,000 to create Saint Paul Seminary. [4]

The SPS campus was designed by architect Cass Gilbert, who also designed the Minnesota State Capitol. The six original buildings were constructed to look like a train depot (the seminary administration building), a steam engine (gymnasium and physical plant), box cars (Cretin, Grace (though constructed in 1913), and Loras halls), a refectory, and a roundhouse (school building). The campus was completed in 1894.

The dedication ceremony for SPS was attended by the apostolic delegate to the United States, Archbishop Francesco Satolli, four other archbishops, ten bishops, and over four hundred priests. The Pontifical Mass was attended by 20,000 people all told. When it opened in 1894, SPS had sixty-five seminarians By 1900, enrollment had risen to 110 seminarians from all over the Midwest and as far away as San Francisco, California. Ireland then began the second phase of the SPS project; erecting St. Mary's Chapel It was dedicated on May 4, 1905.[5]

In the early 1920s, the archdiocese opened Nazareth Hall, a minor seminary located in Arden Hills, Minnesota. It offered a four-year high school program and a two-year college program in philosophy. Its graduates could progress to a major seminary, such as SPS, or transfer to a four-year college. In 1986, the archdiocese opened Saint John Vianney College Seminary (SJV), offering undergraduate courses for seminarians.

In a reorganization in 1971, Nazareth Hall was closed. The philosophy courses from Nazareth Hall and SPS were transferred to SJV. SPS remained the graduate program for seminarian. SJV spent several years in Loras Hall, then Brady Hall on the University of St. Thomas campus. The current SJV building was built in 1983, and the chapel was dedicated on September 11, 1983.[6]

The dormitory row (Loras, Cretin, and Grace halls) from Saint Paul Seminary was nominated to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986 as a historic district, but the listing was never finalized.[7]

In 1987, the archdiocese, in conjunction with SPS and Thomas College, opened the Saint Paul Seminary School of Divinity. Under the agreement, SPS built new administration and dormitory buildings and sold the most of its land and buildings to St. Thomas, including Loras, Grace, and Cretin residence halls and the Binz refectory. The Ireland library building was included in the sale, but the books remain the property of the seminary. St. Mary's Chapel was also renovated at that time; the new administration building was built to connect to the former front of the chapel, which is now the rear.

The reorganization allowed SPS increased resources for formation of seminarians to priests. The new School of Divinity provided graduate level course in theology for lay people who wished to assume leadership roles in their parishes and schools. The School of Divinity would remain under the jurisdiction of SPS.

Reverent William Baer became the rector of SJV in 1999 and instituted changes that increased SJV enrollment from under 50 to above 150. In 2005, Monsignor Aloysius R. Callaghan was appointed rector of SPS. During his tenure as seminary rector, the seminary greatly increased its enrollment and programs. Reverend Michael Becker was appointed rector of SJV in 2010.

On 23 October 2018, SPS, JSV, and the School of Divinity were all merged into a single institution, the Seminaries of Saint Paul. It was decided that a unified brand would help all three institutions. unified mission and vision the decision was made to have a unified brand. While after the branding change they will still have two rectors and operate relatively independent of each other as they had before, the new initiative aims to make the Seminaries of Saint Paul a "national center of formation" for seminarians and lay people.

On January 1, 2019, Reverend Joseph Taphorn succeeded Callaghan as SPS rector.[8]

The seminary building is on the north campus of the University of St. Thomas, just northwest of Ireland Hall and east of Flynn Hall. SJV's chapel is simple, with a large circular mosaic of loaves and fishes in the center. It has been renovated and rearranged several times. The basement contains the Pope Benedict XVI Room, where then-Cardinal Ratzinger met with then-Rector Msgr. Richard Pates. On display in the room is a zucchetto of Benedict XVI, given to a seminarian who visited Rome when he exchanged it with the Pontiff for a new one. The ground floor has priest and administration offices, as well as guest rooms. The remaining four floors are residence halls.

Last Chance Mass is an outreach offered by the seminary to the students of the University of St. Thomas and the surrounding community. Every Sunday night at 9pm, Mass is offered in the SJV chapel to the general public by the rector of the Seminary, with refreshments following.[12] It was originally for the football players of the University of St. Thomas.

When Coach Glenn Caruso took over the University of St. Thomas football team in 2008, he approached the men at the seminary and asked them to come and cheer on the Tommies at football games, as not many people attended them due to their losing record. Since then, the men of SJV have been some of the most active fans for the football team, attending every home game.[13] A subgroup of the seminarians, called "Caruso's Crew", dress up as hard hat workers and paint on faux moustaches. The crew carry large tools made of cardboard and duct tape (a hammer, saw, wrench, and lunch box). This group has been known to travel hundreds of miles to attend away games.[14] Each year's Caruso's Crew is chosen by the previous year's crew.

Of its alumni, more than 500 men who graduated from SJV today serve in ordained ministry. This total includes four bishops; most notable among them is Archbishop Blase J. Cardinal Cupich.

The Archbishop Ireland Memorial Library is the theological library of the seminary; there are over 110,000 volumes in the library. The library is integrated into the University of St. Thomas library system so that non-seminary students are able to use its resources as well. Classes are held in the Brady Educational Center, which also houses the undergraduate music department of the University of St. Thomas.

Loras, Grace, and Cretin halls were the original residence buildings; they were sold to the University of St. Thomas during the seminary/University affiliation agreement. Ground was broken on the current residence and administration buildings in 1988, and they were completed in 1989.

Seminarians in the Pre-Theology program live in a former convent several blocks off-campus.

Chapel from Summit Avenue

The center of Ireland's vision for The Saint Paul Seminary, was the chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. The cornerstone of the chapel was laid during a Pontifical Mass on July 2, 1901, the fiftieth anniversary of Bishop Joseph Crétin's arrival in the new diocese.[5] Though envisioned in 1891, the chapel was only completed by architect Clarence H. Johnston, Sr., who completed the last of Hill's ambitious building project, in an Italian Romanesque style. St. Mary's chapel was officially consecrated by Bishop Cotter on May 24, 1905, in another Pontifical High Mass celebrated by Bishop McGolrick. Under Archbishop Austin Dowling, the interior of the chapel was finished in the 1920s.

Bishop Fulton Sheen, in his autobiography A Treasure in Clay, talks about how his love for a daily Holy Hour was started at St. Mary's Chapel.

The chapel was renovated in 1988, as part of the construction of the new seminary building, with a new design by Frank Kacmarcik which included reversing the interior of the chapel, removing the statues from the side altars, and whitewashing the interior decoration. Archbishop Roach intervened before the stained glass windows and the mural in the apse (now the entrance) could be destroyed, though too late to preserve the original high altar. The dramatic simplification of the chapel was done in order to capture the original look of the chapel's starkness before Archbishop Dowling had the interior finished.[5]

Chapel interior

Presently, the interior of the chapel has begun to be redecorated when the original Stations of the Cross were restored to the chapel, a statue of Our Lady of Confidence (Madonna della Fiducia) was installed and dedicated in a side-altar niche, and a relic of Saint Mother Theresa of Calcutta was placed for veneration in the chapel. All of the new additions were done under the direction of rector Aloysius Callaghan.

Throughout all the years of formation, men who are sponsored by Catholic dioceses to study for the Catholic priesthood have a spiritual director, academic adviser, and formation director.

The Pre-theology program is a two-year, non-degree seeking program for men in priestly formation who already have an undergraduate degree not from a college seminary.[16] The program contains various philosophy and theology classes, some of which are taken at the University of St. Thomas and some of which are entirely in-house.[17]

The M.Div. program is a four-year program which includes summer pastoral programs such as hospital ministry,[18] Spanish immersion,[19] and parish placements. The academic curriculum was revised and updated in 2016.[20]

Each seminarian has a "Teaching Parish" in the area where he is assigned throughout his four years of theology.[21] At his "Teaching Parish," the seminarian is expected to grow in skills needed for pastoral ministry under the mentorship of an experienced pastor and committee of laypeople.

During the January Term ("J-Term"), men in their second, third, and fourth years go on trips to Mexico,[22] the Holy Land,[23] and Rome,[24] respectively.

The Master of Arts in Theology degree is a two-year, 36 credit program focused on academic theology. While students of the MAT program are primarily laypeople, it can also be taken by seminarians alongside their M.Div. degree.[25]

The seminary also has Master of Arts in Pastoral Ministry (MAPM) and Master of Arts in Religious Education (MARE) programs which are 48 and 42 credits, respectively.

In 2008, the Archbishop Harry J. Flynn Catechetical Institute was established. The AHJFCI is a two-year program which allows lay students to study the Catechism of the Catholic Church in depth. The program it split into four modules/semesters and meets once a week. The program primarily meets at the seminary, but there are satellite locations at local parishes as well as in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Des Moines. There are more than 600 lay students enrolled in the Catechetical Institute.

Formation for permanent deacons for the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis also occurs at the seminary. It is a five-year program, including the pre-requisite of graduating from the two year Catechetical Institute.

In the past, the Saint Paul Seminary had a theatre program going back as far as 1939.[26] The program appears to have died out in the late 1960s. In 2013, seminarians revived the theatre program and have put on various plays and musicals, many of them originals, since then. While most of the productions have only been put on by seminarians from the Saint Paul Seminary, Saint John Vianney Seminary has been invited to join some of them as well.

Each year in October, Saint John Vianney College Seminary (playing as the "JAXX") and the Saint Paul Seminary (playing as the "Sons of Thunder") play each other in a flag football game called the "Rectors' Bowl." SPS has won twelve of the nineteen Rectors' Bowls.

In the spring, there is a priest/seminarian basketball tournament where St. John Vianney Seminary and the Saint Paul Seminary face-off, and the winner of that match plays a team consisting of priests from the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis.

Seminarians regularly play frisbee, basketball, and other sports together. They also regularly participate in other seminary tournaments such as the Conception Seminary soccer & volleyball tournament.

• Cardinal Blase Joseph Cupich of Chicago, Illinois
• Bishop Donald DeGrood of Sioux Falls South Dakota
• Archbishop Paul Dennis Etienne of Anchorage, Alaska
• Bishop John Francis Doerfler of Marquette, Michigan
• Bishop Peter Michael Muhich of the Diocese of Rapid City

• Bishop John Roach (1968–1971)
• Fr. Kenneth J. Pierre (1971–1981)
• Bishop Richard Pates (1981–1987)
• Fr. Kevin McDonough (1987–1990)
• Fr. Dale J. Korogi (1990–1992)
• Bishop Peter F. Christensen (1992–1999)
• Fr. William J. Baer (1999–2010)
• Fr. Michael Becker (2010–2021)
• Fr. Jonathan Kelly (2021–present)

• Fr. Louis Eugene Caillet (1894–1897)
• Fr. Patrick R. Heffron, DD, JUD (1897–1910)
• Fr. Francis J. Schaefer, DD, JUD (1910–1921)
• Fr. Humphrey Moynihan, STD (1921–1933)
• Fr. William O. Brady, STD (1933–1939)
• Fr. Lawrence O. Wolf, PhD (1939–1943)
• Fr. James L. Connolly, Dr. Sc. Hist. (1943–1945)
• Fr. Rudolph G. Bandas, Ph.D.Agg., STD (1945–1958)
• Bishop William O. Brady, STD (1958)
• Fr. Louis J. McCarthy, PhD (1958–1968)
• Monsignor William Baumgaertner, PhD (1968–1980)
• Fr. Charles Froehle, STD (1980–1993)
• Fr. Phillip J. Rask, PhD (1993–2002)
• Bishop Frederick Campbell, PhD (2002–2005)
• Msgr. Aloysius R. Callaghan, STL, JCD (2006–2018)
• Fr. Joseph Taphorn, JCL (2018–present)