Australia

AUSTRALIA. - The smallest of the continents (about 3/4 the size of Europe), the farthest from Europe and the only one situated entirely in the southern hemisphere (setting aside Antarctica).

I. GEOGRAPHY.

A. consists of a very ancient block (as in Africa), flattened by erosion and surmounted on its eastern flank by a folded arc, the so-called Australian Alps, stretching from Cape York to Tasmania. To the west the plateau, on average about 500 m high, is here and there broken by higher granite humps (up to 1500 m), except near the coast (desert, or sandy), or covered by low impenetrable scrub (scrub); and here and there hollowed into closed basins (salt lakes). To the east, the Australian Alps, which culminate in Mt. Kosciusko (2241 m), descend steeply to the sea, cut by deep valleys, but with gentle, mid-mountain forms. Between the one and the other opens a long depression interrupted by hills and mountains (Mt. Flinders), furrowed by temporary watercourses (creeks); to the S. it embraces the Murray-Darling basin (the only important river of A.: 3700 km of course, and 90 thousand sq km of basin) and Lake Eyre, which descends below sea level (− 12 m).

Included for about 2/5 in the torrid zone and for the rest in the temperate one, with an extent of 32° in latitude (as between Cagliari and Lake Tana in Ethiopia), A. has varied climatic conditions: general characteristics are nevertheless the strong thermal imbalances and the irregularity even more than the scarcity of rains. To the N. and N.-E. the climate is tropical with abundant summer precipitation (monsoons), to the E. and S. subtropical with mild winters and hot summers (rains in the intermediate season), in Victoria and Tasmania temperate, with well-marked summers and sufficient rains (winter). In the interior aridity and continentality dominate more or less everywhere. Only a little more than a third of the territory drains to the ocean; closed basins occupy more than two fifths and about a third the areas without surface circulation. The damage of drought is nevertheless tempered by the use of underground waters, captured by means of numerous artesian wells, and even by the distillation of sea water (pipeline from Perth to Kalgoorlie).

Vegetation and fauna present characteristics of marked archaism, with typical endemic forms. In the woods, luxuriant especially to the N. and E., eucalypts and tree ferns dominate; in the scrub, bushy acacias and thorny shrubs. A. lacked monkeys, carnivores (with the exception of the dingo) and ruminants; on the other hand the monotremes (echidna, platypus) and marsupials (kangaroo) are typically Australian. Domestic animals were introduced there by Europeans, and spread rapidly.

Europeans arrived in A. in 1778 (groups of English convicts); the first free colonists (Scots) in 1820. In 1851 the discovery of gold there caused a notable wave of immigration; subsequently the flow was contained.

Australian Confederation. - The Australian Confederation (Commonwealth of A.) is a federation of 6 States, a territory and a federal district and constitutes one of the members of the British Empire (British C. of Nations): to which it is linked by a governor-general appointed by the empire, assisted by a cabinet of 13 members and by a bicameral parliament: the senate (36 members) and the house of representatives (74 members), renewable (the former by half) every three years. Here is the division of the Confederation (in parentheses the year of constitution of the individual units; in thousands the sq. km. and the inhabitants).

	New South Wales (1788)	sq. km.	801	inhab.	2925
(Capital: Sydney inhab. 1484)
Tasmania (1825)	»	68	»	251
(Hobart inhab. 72)
Western A. (1829)	»	2528	»	494
(Perth inhab. 273)
South A. (1834)	»	984	»	636
(Adelaide inhab. 375)
Victoria (1851)	»	228	»	2031
(Melbourne inhab. 1227)
Queensland (1859)	»	1737	»	1091
(Brisbane inhab. 402)
N. Territory (1863)	»	1356	»	5
(Darwin inhab. 2)
Federal District (1911)	»	2	»	15
(Canberra inhab. 11)

The Australian Confederation measures 7.7 million sq. km.; 6.9 million inhabitants were settled there in 1938; 7.6 in 1947 (fewer than 1 inhabitant per sq. km. overall!). There are moreover about 60 thousand indigenous people (Australids), of whom more than two-thirds live as nomads in the least favored regions. The white population is almost exclusively (97%) of English origin; the Australian Confederation is therefore, of all the British dominions, the most ethnically pure. Foreigners number around 60 thousand, and of these 18 thousand are Italians.

The great majority of the population is Protestant; Catholics amount to 1.4 million.

The population is concentrated to the extent of 3/5 in urban centers, two of which exceed a million inhabitants: Sydney (1.5) and Melbourne (1.2); there are another 4 cities with over 100 thousand inhabitants (Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth and Newcastle). The capital since 1927 has been Canberra, a small, very modern center, inhabited almost solely by state officials (12 thousand inhabitants).

Only a tiny part (1.7%) of the immense territory is cultivated (especially in the S.-E.), and it produces cereals, sugar cane, grapes and fruit, in quantities exceeding internal consumption. Forests cover barely 1% of the total surface, and yield fine timbers, chiefly for cabinetmaking. Mineral resources are considerable (gold in the S.-W., silver, copper, tin, lead, coal, especially in the S.-E., etc.; petroleum, on the other hand, is lacking), but their products are mostly exported in the raw state. The greatest source of national wealth is livestock raising; for sheep (96 million head) the Australian Confederation ranks first in the world, and by far first in the production of wool (1/4 of the world total). Cattle are also numerous (13 million head); horses (1.2) and swine (1.3); the export of butter, cheeses, fats, canned meat and hides is great. Only livestock raising has given rise to industrial activity of adequate proportions; the other industries (metallurgy, iron and steel, cement), however, have made decisive progress in the last decade. In 1945-46 the value of manufactured goods was more than three times that of agricultural products.

The railways (44 thousand km.) concern the marginal sectors E. (and especially S.-E.) and S.-W., from which numerous lines penetrate into the interior, though not connected with one another; the differences in gauge from network to network are also notable, and they hinder trade. The E.-W. Transcontinental (from Sydney to Perth) is in operation; the N.-S. one (from Darwin to Adelaide; currently reached 450 km. from Darwin) is under construction.

Foreign trade allows for very high per capita figures (54 pounds sterling in 1946-47): over 1/3 of exports and 1/3 of imports are absorbed by Great Britain. In 1946-47 imports reached 183.7 million pounds sterling, against 246.7 for exports. Among the former, textiles (silk and cotton), petroleum, chemical products, machinery, paper, electrical articles, etc. predominate; among the latter, wool (a little less than half of the total in value), flours, meats, hides, leathers, lead, etc. In this trade the first place is held by the State of New South Wales, which alone absorbs a little less than half of the total; Victoria and Queensland follow. Italian-Australian trade is modest: exports to Italy in 1946-47 exceeded imports by fully 6 times (2.4 million pounds sterling).

Under the administration of the Australian Confederation are found: 1) the territory of Papua (from 1 Sept. 1906; 234,490 sq. km. with 302,000 inhab.) on the island of New Guinea; 2) the mandated territory of New Guinea (from 17 Dec. 1920; 241,000 sq. km. with 675,000 inhab.), comprising, besides a part of the island, the Bismarck Archipelago; 3) the Solomon Islands (29,676 sq. km. with 95,000 inhab.); 4) the atoll of Nauru (22 sq. km. with 2321 inhab.); 5) the tiny islands of Ashmore and Cartier in the Timor Sea to the S. of the Malay Archipelago (1.89 sq. km., uninhabited); 6) the Antarctic Territory comprising all the islands and the continent S. of 60° S. and between 160° and 45° E. Greenwich (with the exception of Adélie Land), uninhabited.

Giuseppe Caraci

II. CATHOLICISM IN AUSTRALIA.

In the 16th century the existence of an "unknown southern land" was already known, whose northern and western coasts Portuguese navigators had glimpsed. A century later the Dutch also explored its southern coasts, and gave it the name New Holland, but the newest continent continued to remain a mystery for another century and a half, until Cook, in 1770, discovered the eastern coasts and it thus became possible to trace its perimeter. Nevertheless the S. Congregation of Propaganda Fide had already, as early as 1666, erected a mission of the Southern Land, entrusting it to the French priest de Pomiera, who intended to evangelize it with the help of the Sulpicians; but the project was never carried out. Fifteen years later, the same mission was entrusted to the apostolic prefect of Formosa, who was then residing in the Philippines, and who was unable to go there, nor to send missionaries there. Once these first two attempts had failed, the mission of the Southern Land was no longer spoken of until around the end of the 18th century, when A. became an English colony.

After the American War of Independence, England, no longer able to send its numerous convicts sentenced to deportation to the penal colonies of America, as it had done from 1716 to 1776, established in the south-eastern part of New Holland the colony of New South Wales, reserved for deportees. These were not all criminals; indeed, given the systems then in force in England, the majority were people punished for minor offenses or for political reasons; and among the latter there were numerous Irish, condemned for rebellions against the laws of their rulers. Thus it came about that the first white inhabitants who settled in A. were the 696 deportees who on 20 January 1778 landed with their escort at the place where Sydney later arose.

This first expedition was followed by others for three quarters of a century, with an average that at certain times was about 6000 deportees a year. The history of the penal colonies of A., as already of those of America, is a history of horrors and depravities, of oppression and brutalization, which aroused great indignation and frequent protests. Deportation was abolished in New South Wales only in 1840 and did not disappear entirely from A. until 1866. Almost from the beginning, however, alongside the colonies of deportees there came to be established nuclei of free settlers, to whom were added the liberated convicts. The free settlers had already become more numerous than the deportees when, toward the middle of the 19th century, the discovery of gold mines attracted a very strong current of immigrants to A.

Among the deportees there were also Catholics, but no freedom of worship was granted to them. They were in fact forced, under the gravest penalties, to attend Anglican religious services, and their children were educated in the Anglican faith. In 1792 Catholics numbered about three hundred among the deportees and about fifty among the free settlers; at the beginning of the 19th century they were almost two thousand, and among them were three priests, who were severely forbidden any exercise of the sacred ministry. One of them, Fr. Dixon, finally succeeded in 1803 in obtaining, along with supervised liberty, also permission to celebrate Mass once a month. A year later the permission was revoked; then, one after another, the three priests were sent back to Ireland, and the conditions of Catholics became worse than before.

In 1816 the S. Congregation of Propaganda appointed the Cistercian Fr. O'Flynn apostolic prefect of New Holland; but he could exercise his ministry only secretly among the 6000 Catholics whom he found in A.; after a few months he was arrested and sent back to his homeland, without being able to consume the Sacred Species, which remained for two years secretly venerated in the house of an Irish settler named Davis. On the site a Sanctuary has since been built, half of pilgrimages. The brutal and illegal treatment inflicted on Fr. O'Flynn caused a stir in England and brought light on the religious persecution to which the deportees and Catholic settlers in A. were subject.

In 1819 the Congregation of Propaganda entrusted the mission to the apostolic vicar of the Mauritius Islands, who obtained that two of his missionaries be appointed by the government as chaplains for the Catholic deportees. This happened in May 1821, and that date marks the beginning of religious toleration in A. The first Catholic priests of A. — especially Fr. Therry and after him the Benedictine D. Ullathorne, who had been appointed by the apostolic vicar of the Mauritius Islands vicar general for all of A. — had to endure a hard struggle to obtain greater religious freedom. Only in 1832 was it possible to obtain a plot of land on which to build a church; until 1836 the schools remained the absolute monopoly of the Anglican Church. Catholic chaplains were forbidden to receive conversions of Protestants, and Catholic deportees were denied religious marriage. The Catholics, who in 1821 numbered about 10,000, had risen by 1833 to 17,179, a good half of whom were free settlers. This induced the Holy See to separate A. from the vicariate of the Mauritius Islands and to erect it as an autonomous apostolic vicariate (1842) called that of New Holland and the Island of Djemen (as Tasmania was then called). In 1841 this vast vicariate already counted 40,000 Catholics and 28 priests, with a total population of 211,095 souls.

At the request of the apostolic vicar Msgr. Polding, the first bishop of A., in 1842 the Holy See proceeded to establish the ecclesiastical hierarchy there, dividing the vicariate into three parts and erecting Sydney as a metropolitan archiepiscopal see with the two suffragan dioceses of Hobart and Adelaide. These first dioceses were soon followed by others: Perth, capital of the colony of Western A., was erected as a suffragan diocese of Sydney in 1845, Melbourne, Maitland and Port Victoria, now Darwin, in 1847. The extraordinary influx of gold-seeking immigrants brought Catholics from 60,000, which they were in 1851, to 250,000 in 1861, and made necessary the creation of other dioceses, namely: in 1859 Brisbane, which in that same year had been made capital of the new colony of Queensland, in 1864 Goulburn, in 1865 Bathurst and in 1869 Armidale; while the mission of the Spanish Benedictines, founded as early as 1846 for the missions among the aborigines and dependent on the bishop of Perth, was in 1867 erected as an abbey nullius under the name of New Norcia (v.) and with its own territory. Until 1874 all the dioceses of A. were suffragan to Sydney; in that year the diocese of Melbourne was elevated to metropolitan for the whole territory of the colony of Victoria with two suffragan dioceses: Sandhurst and Ballarat. In order to attempt the evangelization of the aborigines of Queensland, the northernmost territory was detached (1877) from Brisbane, which, erected as an apostolic vicariate of Queensland (called in 1887 that of Cooktown and become in 1941 the diocese of Cairns), was entrusted first to the seminary of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul of Rome and then to the Irish Augustinian Recollects. Now, as a diocese, it is entrusted to the secular diocesan clergy. In 1882 the new diocese of Rockhampton was also detached from Brisbane.

Catholics continued to grow rapidly (they were 539,556 out of a total population of 2,245,448 souls according to the government census of 1881). Following the vote of the First Australian national Council held in 1885 (the same year in which A. was honored by the appointment of Msgr. Moran, archbishop of Sydney, as cardinal), in 1887 the erection of the new dioceses of Grafton, later called (1900) Lismore, and of Wilcannia, later Wilcannia-Forbes, in New South Wales was proceeded with; of Sale in Victoria; of Port Augusta in Southern A. and of the apostolic vicariate of Kimberley in Western A., created for the evangelization of the aborigines, and the elevation to metropolitan archiepiscopal sees of the dioceses of Brisbane, for the colony of Queensland, and of Adelaide, for those of Southern and Central and Northern A. The following year Tasmania too had its see of Hobart elevated to an archdiocese: with the erection of the diocese of Geraldton the 19th century closes. On 1 Jan. 1901 A. ceased to be a colony and became a federation of six States under the name of "Commonwealth of A." At that time it counted 3,782,182 inhabitants, of whom 856,068 were Catholics; there were 5 archdioceses, 14 dioceses, 2 apostolic vicariates and one abbey nullius.

In the 20th century there were few territorial changes of the Catholic hierarchy: in 1910 the mission of Drisdale River (v.) was created in the Kimberley for the evangelization of the aborigines, entrusted to the Benedictines of the abbey of New Norcia; in 1913 Perth too was elevated to an archdiocese and constituted a metropolitan see for the whole State of Western A.; in 1914 the apostolic delegation of Australasia was instituted with residence in Sydney; in 1917 the new diocese of Wagga-Wagga was erected in New South Wales, in 1929 that of Toowoomba and the following year that of Townsville, both in Queensland. In 1948 the diocese of Goulburn was elevated to an archdiocese under the name of Canberra-Goulburn. Naturally the parishes, religious houses, schools, and the various institutions of culture and charity multiplied, and seminaries and scholasticates were erected for the formation of priests, who in the past century came almost exclusively from Ireland; new religious congregations were introduced, others were founded in A., and almost all opened novitiates. The First Australian plenary Council of 1885 was followed by three more: in 1895, in 1905 and in 1937. The world Eucharistic Congress held in Sydney in 1928 remained memorable in Australian annals.

What forms the gravest concern of the bishops and parish priests and the pride of Australian Catholics are their schools. The question of the Christian education of youth has been from the beginning of the colony an burning question, which obliged Catholics to a continuous struggle. First it was obtained that the children of Catholics were no longer obliged to undergo the religious instruction of the Anglicans, then came freedom of teaching, then the Catholic schools obtained government subsidies, like those of the Protestants; finally the State schools arose, agnostic, and, around 1880, every subsidy was withdrawn from all confessional schools. Since then Australian Catholics, besides paying their share of taxes for the State schools, which they do not use, bear the heavy burden of maintaining their schools entirely. Today A. possesses a national system of parochial schools, placed under the direct control of the bishops, which provides for the elementary education of almost all the children of Catholics. Even in the small scattered localities, where the priest can go only once a week or a month to celebrate Mass there, the little school of the sisters is never lacking. In centers of some importance there are secondary schools of various types, directed by religious. In 1939 the parochial schools were 1,065 and the middle schools 62, with a total of 203,344 pupils.

In a country where Catholics are in the minority and live scattered among Protestants, mixed marriages are unfortunately inevitable, often a cause of painful losses for the Church; on the other hand, a consoling promise for the future is the established fact that, although Catholics are only a fifth of the population, among them the birth rate exceeds two fifths of the Australian birth rate.

The central Government of Canberra has no official relations with the Holy See, because the apostolic Delegate, in accordance with canonical prescriptions, is not accredited to that Government. In 1947 the apostolic Delegation had its name changed to that of Australia, New Zealand and Oceania.

On the evangelization of the Aborigines, by now reduced to fewer than 60,000 in A., much has been said, discussed and planned; the provincial and national councils dealt with it; the Holy See, as already mentioned, has erected vicariates and missions; vain attempts have been made, on various occasions, by various religious congregations; Benedictines, Trappists, Jesuits, Missionaries of the Seminary of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, Missionaries of the Sacred Heart, Pallottines, Salesians and secular clergy; but the results were unstable and scanty. At present there are in A. ten missionary stations for the Aborigines; three in the apostolic vicariate of Kimberley (Pallottines), two in the mission of Drisdale River (Benedictines), four in the diocese of Darwin (Missionaries of the Sacred Heart), one in the diocese of Townville (a secular priest). All together, however, the Catholic Aborigines do not exceed a thousand, and the catechumens are about three times as many.

According to the latest statistics, there are in A. 1.4 million Catholics in 7 archdioceses (one for each State except New South Wales, which has two), and 17 dioceses, one abbey nullius, 1 apostolic vicariate and one mission sui iuris, with 904 parishes and 2319 churches. The priests number 2455 (of whom 80 are religious), the brothers 1300, the sisters 10,862. In the seminaries and scholasticates 602 candidates are preparing for the priesthood. Among the works of charity there are 50 hospitals, 46 orphanages and 65 other institutes and nurseries. The Catholic press is represented by 9 weeklies and 21 other periodicals.

For the religion of the primitives, v. PRIMITIVI, religione dei.

Valentino Belgeri

III. COUNCILS OF AUSTRALIA.

The erection in A. of new dioceses, and above all of a second ecclesiastical province, that of Melbourne (1874), soon gave rise to the necessity of a first plenary Council of A. and New Zealand, which assembled at Sydney from 14 to 29 Nov. 1885 under the presidency of Cardinal Francis Patrick Moran, archbishop of Sydney. Fifteen bishops took part in it, among them an apostolic vicar, 52 theologians and other personages. In 13 private and 5 public sessions, the Vatican Council, ecclesiastical discipline, the education of the young and other questions of expediency were treated, on which the fathers issued 274 decrees. During the Council the first diocesan seminary of A. was blessed. This First Plenary Council, whose acts were approved by Rome with a decree of the S. Congregation of Propaganda Fide on 1 March 1887, opened a new era for the development of the Church in A. and in New Zealand.

The II Plenary Council took place from 17 Nov. to 1 Dec. 1895 under the presidency of the same cardinal archbishop, with the participation of 20 bishops, 2 apostolic administrators, 49 theologians and other persons. Fourteen private sessions and 3 public ones were held, in which the fathers published 344 decrees, aimed at confirming or expanding the previous legislation: the Congregation of Propaganda approved its acts by decree of 22 Jan. 1898.

The III Plenary Council assembled in 1905 under the presidency of the same card. Moran, with the participation of 6 archbishops, 22 bishops, an abbot millius and other persons (cf. H. W. Cleary, s. v. in The Catholic Encyclopedia, II, p. 117). At its close Pius X addressed a letter to the participants dated 29 Oct. 1905 (Pii X P. M. Acta, II, Rome 1907, p. 176).

The IV and last Plenary Council of A. and of New Zealand was held from 4 to 12 Sept. 1937, under the presidency of the apostolic delegate Msgr. Giovanni Panico, with the participation of 7 archbishops, 23 bishops, 22 theologians, 16 religious superiors and other dignitaries. There were 7 private sessions, 3 public and 2 general, in which particular attention was given to adapting the national ecclesiastical legislation to the new Code of Canon Law, to the means of developing Catholic Action and of combating the communist danger. To this end 685 decrees were published, arranged according to the order of the CIC. The deliberations of the Council were approved by the Congregation of Propaganda by decree of 14 March 1938.

Besides these plenary councils there have been others. In 1844 the Provincial Council of Sydney, in 1862 the Provincial Council, the I of A., at Melbourne and there likewise the II in 1869. Other diocesan councils were held at Melbourne, Maitland and Sydney.

Corrado Morin

IV. SCHOOL SYSTEM.

In A. education is regulated by the individual States that form part of the Australian Commonwealth. These are particularly intent on lowering the number of illiterates, which has fallen to only 5%. For this reason particular care is devoted to elementary instruction, which is not always easy to provide because of the enormous distances and the scarcity of communications. Besides the normal elementary schools, "Full-time-schools", there are the "Half-time-schools", where pupils spend only part of the day studying, while the rest of the day they spend working. There are also provisional elementary schools, "Provisional schools", in small centers where the children reach the number of 10; if this number cannot be reached and the distance from the nearest center is too great, elementary instruction is carried out with the "House to house schools", "School with substituted teachers" and "Correspondence schools" systems. In the first case the teacher reaches his pupils by train, cart or bicycle, gives the lesson, corrects the assignments; in the second case the instruction is handled by a substitute for the teacher, who comes from time to time to check the activity carried out by his substitute; in the third case the instruction is given by correspondence. New South Wales has established "Travelling schools" and Queensland two "Railway cars schools"; these are the so-called mobile schools that move from one center to another, stop for six to eight weeks, and the children, and particularly the girls, learn there not only to write, but also the things necessary for the home.

Secondary instruction is divided into two-year and three-year courses. The first comprises: "Farm-rural-schools" and "Higher primary small lipper classes". The second comprises: "Intermediate-high-schools" and "High-schools". These are lower secondary schools. From the two-year ones one can go on to "Hawkesbury Agriculture College" and from the three-year ones to "High-schools" lasting 4 or 5 years. At the end of the course one obtains the "Leaving certificate" diploma, which gives the right to attend a "Teachers College" or one of the six universities. The universities are the following: that of Sydney founded in 1852, of Melbourne founded in 1853, of Adelaide founded in 1874, of Brisbane founded in 1893, of Perth founded in 1901 and of Hobart founded in 1989.

Catholic emancipation in England in 1829 greatly improved the living conditions of Australian Catholics, who were permitted to found the schools that were recognized by the State in 1912.

There are 532 "Boys-Colleges", 201 "Girls-Boarding-schools", 222 "Superior-Day-schools" and 1064 "Primary schools". The education of the clergy is provided for in 9 ecclesiastical seminaries. - See Pl. XXX.

Miroslav Stumpf