(surname); or The Very Rev. Father Provincial. Very Rev. Father.—Some others (heads of colleges, etc.) are, at least by courtesy, addressed as Very Reverend; but no general rule can be given.—The title of Father is very commonly given to Secular Priests, as well as to Priests of Religious Orders and Congregations.
Even, however, with these explanations, which might have been developed at greater length, some difficulty may occasionally occur, in which case it is better to make a free use of titles of respect, rather than to run the risk of not using enough, and of thus falling short of what is due and fitting.
Battandier, Annuaire pontifical catholique (1899), 500 sq.; Francesco Parisi, Istruzioni per la gioventù impiegata nella segretaria (Rome, 1785). Some information may be obtained in Branchereau, Politesses et convenances ecclésiastiques (1875).
Adelaide, The Archdiocese of, has its centre in Adelaide, capital of South Australia. It comprises all the territory of South Australia south of the counties of Victoria and Burra to Northwest Bend. The River Murray from this point forms the boundary to the confines of New South Wales. The counties of Flinders, Musgrave, and Jervois form the western portion of the Archdiocese, with the adjacent islands. Area, 40,320 square miles. South Australia was founded by a chartered company in 1836. It was intended to be a "free" (that is, non-convict) English Protestant colony. "Papists and pagans" were to have been excluded. A few Catholics were, however, among the first immigrants. Dr. Ullathorne (Sydney) visited Adelaide in June, 1840. Governor Gawler roughly refused the Government school (commonly used for religious services) "either to the Popish priest to go through his Mass, or to the ignorant Catholics to be present at it." A store was lent by a generous Protestant, and there the first Mass was celebrated for a congregation of about fifty. The first resident priest was the Rev. William Benson (1841–44). Adelaide (hitherto part of the Diocese of Sydney) was created an episcopal see in 1843. Its first Bishop was the Right Rev. Francis Murphy, the first prelate consecrated in Australasia. At the census of 1844 there were in South Australia only 1,055 Catholics in a total white population of 17,366. Bishop Murphy had then only one priest, no presbytery or school, and his only church was a small weather-board store which was rented. Three years of hard poverty, broken by a convert's gifts, were followed by four years (1847–51) of State aid for churches and ministers of religion (withdrawn by the first elective parliament in 1852) and by capitation grants to denominational schools (1847–51). The wild exodus to the goldfields of Victoria in 1851 almost emptied Adelaide of its adult male inhabitants. Some of the clergy had to seek missions elsewhere, and the Bishop and the two who remained had, until timely aid from the goldfields arrived, to exist on a total income of 8s. 6d. per week, in a diocese burdened with a debt of £4,000. Prosperous years followed. The Passionists were introduced in 1846; Jesuits, 1848; Sisters of Mercy, 1857; Sisterhood of St. Joseph founded 1867; secular public instruction established 1878; Adelaide created an archbishopric, and part of its territory formed into the Diocese of Port Augusta, 1887. The bishops and archbishops of Adelaide have been: Bishops Francis Murphy (1844–58); Patrick B. Geoghegan, O.S.F. (1858–64); Lawrence B. Shiel, O.S.F. (1866–72); Archbishops Christopher A. Reynolds (1873–93); and John O'Reilly, transferred from Port Augusta (1895). Archbishop O'Reilly, who relieved his former diocese of a heavy debt, has gone far towards performing a like service for that of Adelaide. Two gifted scientists of the Archdiocese were Father Hinterocker, S.J., a skilled naturalist. and Father Julian Tenison Woods, a prolific writer on Australian geology. Catholic weekly, "The Southern Cross" (Adelaide).
Statistics (April, 1906). Parochial districts, 27; churches, 73; secular priests, 34; regular priests—11 Jesuit Fathers (14 lay brothers), 4 Dominicans, 5 Passionist Fathers (1 lay brother), 4 Carmelites; Christian and Marist Brothers, 45; nuns (302)—127 Sisters of St. Joseph, 86 Dominicans, 80 Sisters of Mercy, 5 Good Samaritans, 4 Loreto; colleges, 2; boarding schools (girls), 8; superior day schools, 16; primary schools, 35; charitable institutions, 9; children in Catholic schools, 4,306; Catholic population (estimate, 1905), 40,460—about one-seventh of total population.
Statistical Register (various dates); Bennett, South Australian Almanac (Adelaide, 1841); Ullathorne, Autobiography (London, 1892); Hodder, History of South Australia (London, 1893); Moran, History of the Catholic Church in Australasia (Sydney, undated); Woods, The Province of South Australia (Adelaide, 1895); Byrne, History of the Catholic Church in South Australia (Adelaide, I, 1896; II, 1902); Hodder, The Founding of South Australia (London, 1898); Woods, Port Augusta.
Adelaide, Saint, Abbess, b. in the tenth century; d. at Cologne, 5 February, 1015. She was daughter of Megingoz, Count of Guelders, and when still very young entered the convent of St. Ursula in Cologne, where the Rule of St. Jerome was followed. When her parents founded the convent of Villich, opposite the city of Bonn, on the Rhine, Adelaide became Abbess of this new convent, and after some time introduced the Rule of St. Benedict, which appeared stricter to her than that of St. Jerome. The fame of her sanctity and of her gift of working miracles soon attracted the attention of St. Herbert, Archbishop of Cologne, who desired her as abbess of St. Mary's convent at Cologne, to succeed her sister Bertha, who had died. Only upon the command of Emperor Otho III did Adelaide accept this new dignity. While Abbess of St. Mary's at Cologne, she continued to be Abbess of Villich. She died at her convent in Cologne in the year 1015, but was buried at Villich, where her feast is solemnly celebrated on 5 February, the day of her death.
Ranbeck, The Benedictine Calendar (London, 1896); Lechner, Martyrologium des Benediktiner-Ordens (Augsburg, 1855); Stadler, Heiligen-Lexikon (Augsburg, 1858); Moosmueller, Die Legende, VII, 448.
Adelaide (Adelheid), Saint, b. 931; d. 16 December, 999, one of the conspicuous characters in the struggle of Otho the great to obtain the imperial crown from the Roman Pontiffs. She was the daughter of Rudolph II, King of Burgundy, who was at war with Hugh of Provence for the crown of Italy. The rivals concluded a peace in 933, by which it was stipulated that Adelaide should marry Hugh's son Lothaire. The marriage took place, however, only fourteen years later; Adelaide's mother meantime married Hugh. By this time Berengarius, the Marquis of Ivrea, came upon the scene, claiming the Kingdom of Italy for himself. He forced Hugh to abdicate in favour of Lothaire, and is supposed to have afterwards put Lothaire to death by poison. He then proposed to unite Adelaide in marriage with his son, Adalbert. Refusing the offer, Adelaide was kept in almost solitary captivity, in the Castle of Garda, on the lake of that name. From it she was rescued by a priest named Martin, who dug a subterraneous passage, by which she escaped, and remained concealed in the woods, her rescuer supporting her, meantime, by the fish he caught in the lake. Soon, however, the Duke of Canossa, Alberto Uzzo, who had been advised of the rescue, arrived and carried her off to his castle. While this was going on the Italian nobles, weary of Berengarius, had invited Otho to
