Viatorian priest reflects on 60-year legacy at Japanese school
Officials at St. Viator Rakusei High School in Kyoto, Japan, unveiled a marble fountain earlier this month to recognize the school’s 60th anniversary and its founders, seven Viatorian priests.
One of them, Fr. Francis White, CSV, lives at the Viatorian Province Center in Arlington Heights. At 94 he is the oldest member of the Viatorians, yet he vividly remembers his years spent in Kyoto, arriving shortly after the end of World War II.
During an interview with honors students from St. Viator High School’s Querbes Scholars program last week, White described his role as the school’s first principal as among his most important work as a Viatorian.
“I loved it,” he says simply.
He was among a group of Viatorian missionaries from Canada and the United States. They were sent to Kyoto — once hailed as the imperial capital of Japan and “shrine city” for its 1,400 ancient Buddhist temples — with a mission to reach local people through education, both at the parish and school level.
They first established a church, St. Viator Parish in Kyoto, before they obtained a charter in 1951 to build a school for boys.
White was 34 at the time, and had taught only deaf students in the Bronx before he left for the Far East armed with a master’s degree in curricular administration.
He and his Viatorian colleagues knew no Japanese, but they quickly learned how highly the Japanese regarded education.
“We set extraordinarily high standards for the school, and the people accepted them,” White wrote during his early years there, “with the result that the school has a reputation of being strict with an extremely high scholastic rating.”
The school they labored to build now serves 1,300 boys and is ranked among the top 20 private schools in Japan. The parish started by Viatorians in 1961 continues to serve surrounding families as well as students at Kyoto University.
Fr. Mark Francis, superior general of the international Viatorian congregation and a native of Wheeling, traveled to Japan for the milestone celebrations.
“For 60 years Viatorians have worked at Rakusei to promote respect for others, loyalty to teachers and friends, and a concern for the common good,” Francis said in an address to the student body. “These elements continue to help all of us to reach out to the world with compassion and hope.”