Brian Condon: Diary of James Alipius Goold, 1848-1886

Confirmation administered in St Francis Church Thursday 10th of April - 200 hundred [sic] persons received the Sacrament.

On Friday 11th April Messrs. Stack and Geoghegan were ordained deacons and O'Farrell sub deacon. Powell had minor orders conferred on him the same day.

Palm Sunday, 13th April. Gave priest[ly] orders to Rev. Mr. Stack. On Holy Thursday 100 children made their first Communion].

I left Melbourne for Sydney, en route to Europe, in the Easter week of this year. After a most unfavourable passage we arrived in Sydney on Sunday at 3 o'clock. The Archbishop's carriage being in attendance, I proceeded direct to St. Mary's where, amidst the loud pealing of the Cathedral bells, I received a warm welcome from the Archbishop and resident clergy.

My stay in the Archdiocese was short, but long enough to afford me opportunity for observation on the state of the Church. Everything connected with its spiritual administration and temporal management is an eulogium, high and flattering, on the zeal, piety and talent of the Archbishop. It is true I had painful evidence given me of a growing dissatisfaction amongst the Ecclesiastics, but from all I could learn it appeared to arise from no fault of the Archbishop in the administration of the Diocese. It was my opinion then, and is now, when I recall to recollection the information I could at that time obtain, that the cause of this discontent was attributable to the priests and not to the Archbishop. The foreign Missionaries attached to the Archdiocese appeared to me to foment it, if they were not its originators.