Fourth cross to rise again in Lorette as parish celebrates anniversaries
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Notre-Dame-de-Lorette Parish is celebrating three big anniversaries this year with a series of events.
It has been 160 years since the first appointed missionary priest. It has also been 125 years since the opening of the present church that has breathtaking paintings by Montreal artist Louis-Eustache Monty covering the wooden ceiling and walls that are reminiscent of the famed Sistine Chapel and its works by Michelangelo.
Included in the celebrations is the upcoming 150th anniversary of the first residential priest for the Notre-Dame-de-Lorette mission in 1877. The founding of the parish has strong ties to the founding of the RM of Taché in 1880, with both histories very interconnected.

The return of the long-lost fourth cross on lot 58 is also planned. It is now being constructed by Michel Rozière, husband of committee chair Colette Rozière.
It will rise on the south side of Dawson Road between the dog park and incoming recreation centre. Its original north side location has long since been home to commercial businesses.
Taché council acknowledged the RM’s intertwined history with the parish and discussed at its last meeting finding funding for a bilingual plaque to go with the cross when it is put up. Nothing has been ordered yet.
The fourth of four crosses in the parish disappeared years ago. It was first placed into the earth of the Seine River valley in 1934 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the parish’s founding.
The other three crosses were erected earlier and have been replaced as the harsh climate takes its toll. Their locations and years erected are Provincial Road 206 and River Road (1928), east of Lorette near Dufresne on Dawson Road (1929), and on the west side of town at Dawson Road and McDougall Road (1923).

The wayside crosses are placed beside roads much like is still done in places with a Catholic history like Quebec and countries in Europe. All of Lorette parish’s were placed at places of worship that also served as schools.
Rozière described the fourth cross at the home of Jean-Baptiste Gauthier and his wife Rosalie Germain as the most significant.
“It was a place of worship, it was a school; the RM of Taché started there in 1880,” listed Rozière.
She went on to say it also served as a post office in 1880. The Gauthier family moved there in 1861, nine years before Manitoba was a province and six years before Canada was a country.
The first Métis families also arrived on or before 1860, including the Bériaus, Vaudrys, Gaudrys, Dumais, and Romain and Elzear Lagimodiére.

Rozière and the rest of the committee, including her sister Lucille Brunette who also sits on the parish pastoral committee, are gathering pieces of history by speaking to elders and family descendants of the Métis and French families mostly from Quebec who first settled the area, and by literally bringing back church artifacts.
The current church has ornately carved pews and columns, plus its amazing painted ceiling and walls from shortly after it was first opened in 1900. But the original altar where the priest gave his sermon from is at St. Boniface Museum.
Rozière said staff at the museum do not think they will be able to get it out before renovations are done in a couple years. That altar is believed to have a relic gifted from the parish’s namesake Loreto, Italy.
But she is seeking the return of the pair of delicately carved statues gifted to Ste Genevieve years ago. They would join the other two of Jesus Christ and patron saint of farmers and rural communities St. Isidore.
All but one of the bells with historic name engravings are out for repair and are hoped to be back soon.

And there is a surprise coming that the committee members do not know about yet courtesy of their priest who went to Loreto, Italy.
“He hasn’t shared with me what they got yet. He wants to surprise us,” said Rozière.
The first event that kicked off celebrations was participation with a banner on a horse and buggy in the Parade of Lights this past Dec. 6 in Lorette. The next ones are schedule for June 21-22. A video documentary is being made, and there is a yet to be scheduled parish crosses pilgrimage planned.
The full list of events can be found at notredamedelorette.info.
Anyone who wishes to help can contact the parish office at 204-878-2221.