Chapter Three : The Community ,
1900-1939
Urn Choo Sye ' s Senior Class in about 1925 . Front row centre , left to right , Reverend Brother Dauid , Reverend Brother Marcian ( Director ), Reverend Brother Honorius .
' IknoW of no place where more good can be done than here , butwe must have good men to do it ,' wrote Brother Michael to his su perior in Paris in 1902 . Brothers , he explained , must be well seasoned if they were to follow their calling in Singapore . Those who failed to survive his scrutiny were swiftly sent home . Those who stayed gave years and years of devoted service . Brother Pierre Aimare , the Sub- Director , taught for seventeen years at SJI before moving , in 1909 , to become the Director of La Salle College , Kowloon . Brother Sigebert spent eighteen years at SJI before going to Penang . Brother Ulftan went on leave in 1912after twelve years of service in Singapore . Brother Stephen Edward was Sub- Director from 1909to 1914 , Director from 1914to 1921 , and again from 1927 to 1933 . He had a third term as Director between 1937 and 1939 . Stability was the mark of SJI then as it is today .
As a religious community , the Brothers followed a rigid routine of spiritual exercises , within which they pursued their vocation of teaching . They took vows of celibacy , poverty and holy obedience . Inevitably they were a closed circle , far more aloof than now in the early years of the twentieth century when there was little communication between them and the lay teachers . Indeed , to break down this barrier was the deliberate policy adopted by Directors like Brother Ignatius , whose picnic expeditions for the entire staff are among the most joyful memories of retired teachers like Miss Jansen .
The physical surroundings of the Brothers were hard . They had a spartan discipline , and the hot black habits that were then worn everywhere must have been a severe trial in a tropical clirnate . Then , as now , the character of the community inevitably took colour from the character of the Director . Brother Michael , for example , was an Irish-American , a volatile mixture . He could be abrasive , and the Brothers may sometimes have felt that they had been salted in the fire of the discipline , to borrow a Pauline expression .
Brother Michael had reservations about French
Brothers . In his letters he asks the Superior not to send him any more French Brothers on account of their defecti ve English accen t . Fortuna tely for SJIthey did not cease to come . Yet , like every good General , he cared deeply about the physical and spiritual wellbeing of his men , and one of the first subjects we find him writing about in the correspondence that survives is a house where the Brothers could spend their holidays :
' July 27th , 1901 .
' MostHonored BrotherSuperior , lhavethe honor to submit to your considera tion and approval a plan of our proposed country house in Telok Kurau . None but those living in the Orient can tell the necessity of this building . Our Brothers , many of whom are delicate in health , are parched beneath a torrid sky , so when the holiday comes round they need a place to rest and breathe the pure air . Besides we need a house where our Brothers can be together during Vacation , and not be obliged to do , as we have done in the past , renta house that is not adapted to our life . This house , I believe , will be a means of saving many vocations , as it saves our Brothers from contracting the habit of visiting . Brother Visitor agrees with me on its necessity ...' Brother Michael added that he had the money and only needed permission to build .
The country house that Father Nain designed for them at Telok Kurau proved to be much more than a holiday retreat , which all the Brothers loved . As , over the years , they bought the land surrounding it , they found they owned an estate upon which , in the 1930s , they could build a new school as the city spread out to Katong . This was St Patrick ' s School , the foundation of which marked a turning point to the history of the Brothers in Singapore .
At the centre of the Community life was the Chapel . How much it meantto Brother Michael is unconsciously revealed by what he wrote about the refurbishing of the old Chapel in 1904 :
The Communitq , 1900 -1939 17