The French Catholic Order of Marists (Society of Mary) were formally created by the Pope in 1836, and given the initial mission of evangelising in Oceania. Marists seek to emulate Mary’s supposed qualities of meekness and humbleness (no bad thing in itself), and they seek to educate as well as to evangelise. They were extraordinarily effective - two Marist Brothers coming ashore in New Caledonia’s Isle of Pines converted the whole island almost overnight, a feat repeated throughout the Pacific. Their first missionary leader was Jean Baptiste Pompallier 1802-1871. He settled at Russell/Karorareka and set up his mission station, part of which survives. It’s a fascinating place:

 

 

 

This was believed for a long time to be the mission building, but recent archaeological research has proved that it was in fact effectively an associated factory. The rest of the mission has been destroyed. What the Marists were producing here, very cleverly, were Bibles – in Maori. Pompallier, arriving in NZ in 1838 had very quickly made himself completely fluent in Maori. Realising the importance, almost reverence, with which  Maori chiefs treated genealogy he had equipped himself with a large clay tablet (which survives) upon which he had placed a huge family tree of the Catholic church with himself on a late and fairly insignificant branch. He lugged this thing all over the North Island and it is known to have had a very positive impact on Maori chiefs, several of whom he had managed to convert by the time of the Waitangi Treaty only two years later.

The NZ National Trust has completely restored the building, and fascinating it is too.

The Marists made bibles here from scratch. Outside is a tannery used to produce the leather bindings – there was of course no leather in NZ before the Europeans arrived. It’s now in working order again, and here is one of the tanning pits:

 

 

Inside the building was a book production line, using obsolete presses shipped out from France (the Order couldn’t afford new ones). This one, which is original, dates from the seventeenth century and it has been restored to working order:

 

 

 

Lead type was set by hand of course, and held in place in its frame by metal wedges called quoins. And hence the saying “to quoin a phrase”, now corrupted to ‘coin a phrase’ (no, I didn’t know that either – the Maori guide was excellent!). The rest of the process was entirely by hand, and yet this factory with just a handful of Brothers and some Maori assistants managed to produce 40 000 Maori bibles in just a few years – a prodigious feat.

 

But what of Waitangi? Well, Bishop Pompallier, who had become influential amongst some Maori chiefs, directly challenged the British representatives during the Waitangi meeting about freedom of religion, and got written into the Treaty this verbal statement by the Governor “The Governor says that the several faiths of England, of the Wesleyans, of Rome, and also Maori custom and religion shall also be protected by him”. This became the additional Fourth Article of the Treaty and undoubtedly played a part in persuading some chiefs to sign.

 

Pompallier became Bishop of Auckland when the capital moved there, and then in 1850 a British subject. He returned to France in old age and died in Lyon, but his remains were subsequently returned to NZ because of the huge impact he had made there.