History of the Society of St. Vincent
de Paul:
Toronto
George Manly Muir, an active member of the first Canadian
Society of St. Vincent de Paul in Quebec, resided temporarily
in Toronto. He was the Clerk of the Assembly of the
Government of Canada. In 1850 he brought together a
group of well-established, wealthy Catholics in the City of
Toronto to interest them in forming a local Conference.
The group included: John Elmsley, entrepreneur and ship
owner, Charles Robertson and Thomas Hayes, merchants, S.G.
Lynn, land speculator, W. J. MacDonnell, French Vice-Consul,
and D.K. Feehan, Manager Toronto Savings Bank.
Muir commissioned them in the words of Frederic Ozanam: "Go
to the poor, go to the worker. Go not with empty hands,
and what is more go and live among the poor and the worker
like St. Vincent de Paul , become in effect one of them."
The group of men established the
Conference of Our Lady of
Toronto at St. Michael's Cathedral, under the patronage of
Bishop Charbonel. The men present under Muir's direction
elected themselves executives of the Society and adopted the
rules and regulations of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.
To be effective the Society had to expand with the church,
utilizing the parish network that indicated urban growth
patterns. Therefore, as the church in Toronto grew
so also did the Society. This step strengthened the
Society for it then required a Particular Council to unify
action, govern the conferences, and plan for expansion.
The Particular Council of Toronto was established on February
26th 1853. From that period the Society created
conferences in every newly constituted parish and spread its
network of charity.
The work of the conferences in Toronto inspired the
creation of isolated conferences over most of Ontario.
With the approval of all the Bishops in the Province, the
Central Council of Toronto was formed in 1897; it held
jurisdiction over the greater part of Ontario but was subject
to the Superior Council of Quebec. With that enactment
the metropolitan structure of the Society was reinforced and
extended. Toronto became the center responsible for all
works of the Society in Ontario.
For reasons that are unrecorded, the Central Council of
Toronto, instituted for the purpose of overseeing and reporting
to the Superior Council on behalf of the Society in Ontario,
ceased to function at some point.
The Particular Council of Toronto, instituted in 1854,
continued to oversee the work of the conferences in the
Archdiocese of Toronto. As the church in Toronto grew
and expanded, so also did the Society. In 1963 there
were conferences operating in 48 parishes. At that time
a decision was made to form a new Central Council, with 4 Particular Councils under its jurisdiction: Toronto East Particular Council, Toronto West Particular
Council, Humber Valley Particular Council, Scarborough
Particular Council
A year later, in 1964, two more Particular Councils were
added: Toronto North Particular Council and Oshawa Particular
Council.
Acknowledgements
Compiled from the history document by
Prof. Murray W. Nicholson M.A. PhD
and Particular Council Minute Book
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