Original scientific paper
The Croatian Catholic Mission Serving the Croats in South Africa
Ante Laušić
Abstract
Within the context of several centuries of Croat migration and settlement in new areas, throughout the world, one cannot neglect the African continent, especially its most southern part – the Republic of South Africa. But here, as opposed to the situation in other Croat immigrant colonies, immigration was not massive or organised, as it was in the Americas, in Australia and New Zealand, but rather it was individual, spontaneous or carried out in small groups. People would arrive on the basis of invitations or thanks to the support of an already settled close or distant relative, relative-in-law, friend or acquaintance. A distance of several thousand kilometres (e.g. Cape Town or Pretoria) did not, even from the start, hinder them in their mutual contacts and what is more important, in their material and moral solidarity, either on the individual level or through mutual benefit organisations that can be systematically traced from the beginning of the 20th century to the present day – although they were once stronger and more numerous, whereas now they are weaker and fewer. From the 1860s, however, the leader among all former associations and humanitarian societies was the Croatian Catholic Community, the ardent guardian of the religious and cultural life of Croats in South Africa, and this is also the basic message of this paper, which attempts to describe its establishment, its development and its present state.
Keywords
Croats; immigration; South Africa; the Catholic Community; the Parish of St. Jerome
Hrčak ID:
7859
URI
Publication date:
26.9.2003.
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