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11 n a Missionary still F rom Rome, on July 31, 1841, Cardinal Fransoni dispatched a letter to Jean-Marie Odin informing him of Pope Gregory XVI’s naming him vicar apostolic of Texas and bishop of Claudiopolis in partibus infidelium. Fransoni enclosed in his mailing, by way of Bishop Blanc at New Orleans, for transmittal on to Odin, the papal bull erecting Texas a vicariate apostolic and the materials formalizing Odin’s appointment. In his comments to Odin the cardinal indicated that the Frenchman was expected to accept the nomination “for the good of religion.”1 There would be no refusal this time. The Vatican communications arrived at New Orleans on October 11, and Bishop Blanc immediately forwarded them to Odin at Galveston, along with his own instructions about ordination plans. The new bishop-designate, however , had left Galveston almost immediately following his return to Texas from New Orleans back in July, three weeks before Cardinal Fransoni had sent his mailing. Venturing westward to Houston, Victoria, and the vicinity, and then on to San Antonio, Odin had spent the entire second half of 1841 and early 1842 laboring among the Catholics throughout that area. As so often happened to him in his adult years, the French priest’s health broke down during those months. The summer heat and humidity and then the fall showers consistently made demands on Odin’s stamina. In August, as he was missioning in the area south and west from Houston to Victoria, he suffered a serious attack of fever accompanied by vomiting that felled him for more than two weeks, from the eighth to the twenty-fifth of the month. Struggling on, he made his way into Victoria and rested at John J. Linn’s home. In that town now so familiar to him, Odin enjoyed a much welcomed reunion with Father Estany.2 And then it was on to San Antonio, where the vicar apostolic designate stayed several months, laying claim to the mission properties that the Austin government had returned to the church the previous December and January. At the same time, in the Bexar city Odin endeavored to become more aware of | 104 | c h a p t e r 1 1 the area’s historical Catholic Mexican heritage, which included trying to learn as accurately as possible the Spanish of the Hispanics. As a part of this, Odin participated in the December 12, 1841, celebration for La Virgen de la Guadalupe .The Guadalupana fiestas religiosas had matured over many years as jubilees deeply set—religiously, culturally, and socially—in the lives of the Catholic Mexicans of the Bexar municipality. Regarding Odin’s developing interest in the Mexican culture and this aspect of the Catholic world at San Antonio de Bexar, one scholar recently wrote, “Odin . . . participated in Tejano religious feasts like the 1841 San Antonio celebration in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe and . . . spoke enthusiastically of the religious zeal demonstrated in these celebrations. Odin learned Spanish and was insistent that those coming to minister in Texas do the same.”3 Upon his return to Galveston in the first week of February 1842, Odin found the letter from Cardinal Fransoni and the accompanying instructions from Bishop Blanc awaiting him. After reading them, he realized that plans for a trip to New Orleans must be worked out immediately. The setting for Odin’s ordination and consecration as a bishop was to be the old St. Louis Cathedral of New Orleans. One of the most beautiful and historic Catholic edifices for worship in the United States, St. Louis Cathedral (now a basilica) had its origins as a church dating back to 1727.4 Jean-Marie Odin knew the cathedral well. He had often celebrated Mass and heard confessions in it as a missionary. Undoubtedly, as a young subdeacon having just arrived in New Orleans back in July 1822, he would have attended Mass, gone to confession, and made visits to the Blessed Sacrament in the cathedral during his several weeks’ stay in the city at that time. We have already seen that he spent much time in the cathedral awaiting his trip to Texas in the summer of 1840. Before departing Galveston for New Orleans and his ordination and consecration , however, Odin had to direct his attention to recent developments in the Texas port city. A new church of St. Mary’s—a plain and unattractive building—had just been completed in Galveston to the point where Mass could be celebrated in...

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