Developing a Strong Roman Catholic Social Order in Late Nineteenth-Century Prince Edward Island (1)‪.‬

Abstract/Resume The Roman Catholic Church in PEI in the nineteenth century was threatened by ethnic tension, poverty, and anti-Catholicism. Scottish Highlanders, Irish, and Acadians fought for clerical and episcopal control of the Church. In addition, PEI was Canada's most impoverished province and there are indications that Catholics were more cash strapped than their Protestant neighbours. Finally, the Bible Question aroused potent anti-Catholicism in the 1850s and 1860s. In the following decades, the Roman Catholic Church, in response to these threats and strengthened by the tenets of Ultramontanism, created highly successful, independent Catholic social institutions. These health and educational institutions not only stabilized the forty-five percent of the population that was Catholic, but also contributed greatly to the strength of Island Catholicism throughout the twentieth century.